“Will that be all Sir?”

“Mary, you know you can call me Sebastian. I’ve known you for almost two years now!” I said to the cleaner that came in every second day. She was a sweet lady who refused to look me in the eye. She always said please and thank you and she always made it look as if my apartment was immaculate. I could never quite understand how she managed to make it look so polished. I wasn’t always around to see her, but when I did we’d have the same conversation over and over. I was starting to think that she saw it more as a joke now – but perhaps this was just the way she was raised. There was a part of me that liked it – because who didn’t want someone looking at you with that much reverence. And there was a part of me that felt slightly ashamed by it – because she was at least fifteen years my senior.

“I know Sir.” She said and I grinned at her.

“Oh Mary. You’re a funny one. Thank you for all the hard work you’ve done today. It looks brilliant. Now, are you going to take a bit of time off? You haven’t had a break in ages.”

She looked at me as if I were a complete stranger and I realized that I had never spoken to her with so much kindness before. What was happening to me? I was growing soft but it felt good for a change.

“Uh… Sir?”

“Take a week off. Get some rest, and then come back. You deserve it.” I said, before I could change my mind. Before she had arrived into my life I had been through at least five different cleaners, if not more. It was a similar thing to the whole secretary debacle. I kept hiring young and gorgeous cleaners who I loved nothing more than to see in their little uniforms cleaning my apartment. It would be same story with each one. They’d come in to clean and soon we’d start flirting. Soon, they’d be cleaning my apartment without any clothes on – or else I’d be demanding that they keep their outfit on while we had sex. But soon, as was inevitable, I’d grow bored with them and then the whole boss/cleaner relationship would get skewered.

“Oh no, Sir, thank you but I cannot accept. My sister is staying with me now and she has just had a baby. I have promised to help her get on her feet. I cannot afford to take any time off. We need all the money we can get. Thank you for the kind offer but I don’t mind working. It’s nice here.”

Just how little did I know about my staff? I looked at her then. Mary – pretty if not for the lines around her eyes and the way that the skin around her fingernails were all broken. Exhausted by the sheer volume of work I always gave her to do and the million things she still had to deal with when she got home.

“Don’t be silly. That’s all the more reason then. So, I’ve changed my offer now that I know about your sister. Two weeks off – and I apologise in advance for the messy apartment you might come back to – and you’ll be fully paid during that time. Now, Mary, I want you to take my offer before I change my mind. As you can see I’m in a particularly good mood today.”

She stared at me, blinking a few times before finally finding her voice. She must’ve thought I had lost my mind. “Thank you Sir. Thank you Sebastian. I appreciate it.” She practically bowed down before rushing out.

The phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Sebastian, I have a Jane Greiner here to see you. Shall I tell her to come up? Or would you like me to tell her that you’re busy? She says she works with you.” I had been very strict about who was allowed to come up to see me and who wasn’t. Most of the time I asked them to call it through to me. The last thing I wanted was a million girls thinking that they could just come up and see me anytime that they wanted. Especially since most of those girls were just one time affairs that needed to know where they stood. This rule had been implemented after a few unfortunate incidents.

“Jane? Yes, you can send her right up. Thank you.” Ahh… Jane. Now that was a face I was actually looking forward to seeing right now. And she was coming as soon as Mary was leaving. I looked around at my beautiful apartment with pride – great timing.

I waited impatiently for her to come up and then was surprised by the loud pounding at the door. I thought of Susie the Cutie and her tiny little timid knock when she had first come to see me. Jane was small and timid in her own way but she still managed to surprise me sometimes. The knock got louder.

I opened the door and grinned at her. But she wasn’t grinning back.

“Did you walk up the stairs?” I asked her. A ridiculous notion because I was staying in the penthouse in a very tall building. I peered out to see if perhaps the lift was broken.

“No. Why?”

“So why are huffing and puffing like you’ve just blown a chimney down? And… would you like to come in?” I opened the door wider and let her in.

“I’m just annoyed. I’m angry. And I’m very confused. And at the same time I feel bad for being annoyed and angry. I realize that to an outsider that would look as if I was ungrateful. But I’m not ungrateful. I’m just highly frustrated.”

I smiled inwardly. Frustrated was something that I could definitely help her with. But I still had no idea what had gotten her so worked up and bringing up any sort of sexual matters right now might not go down well. “Jane, slow down. Take a seat. Take a breather. Tell me what’s on your mind.”

She gave me a funny look then. “You really have no idea what I’m talking about, do you?”

“Well no, because you still haven’t told me. If you think back to the crazy conversation you just had with me you’ll see that in that entire speech you never told me what was making you so angry and annoyed and frustrated. And what was the other thing?”

“Confused.”

“Ah, yes. Confused. So… care to enlighten me or are we going to keep playing the guessing game?”

“The car Sebastian! The car. You cannot possibly expect me to accept a gift like that. You are insane.” She said. Her hands were flapping wildly in the air as if she didn’t know how to get rid of the anger inside of her. Again, I could think of better ways of releasing her anger but again it wasn’t the best time to tell her that.

“Wow. I was hoping for a different reaction. Like, you know, a thank you.” I raised my eyebrows at her.

“Thank you. Really. It’s… well actually it’s crazy of you. And I really cannot accept it. How can you get me such an extravagant gift?

“It’s not extravagant. It’s a good gift and a very good car. Anyway, I got you into that last accident and I really did feel bad about it. I know that you were very close to Mr Honda. I was just trying to be nice.”

She almost smiled but then frowned again. “Sebastian – do you have any idea how strange this is? You are living with your head in the clouds! This is not what normal people do! Not that you would know what normal was.”

“What do you mean? I am normal.”

“No, giving someone a car as a gift is not normal. Danielle told me that the car probably costs about $35,000!”

“Well, I have no idea who Danielle is but she’s pretty close. $36,000. A pretty good deal really.”

“But how are you not seeing that this is crazy? I earn $40,000 a year and you have just given me a present that’s only shy of that by four grand.”

“What? You get 40 grand a year? A YEAR? Sorry, I don’t deal with the salaries. That’s all handed by the accounts department. But I had no idea. Goodness, I’m going to have to look at paying you more. How can anyone live on that? I wonder if all the other staff are getting paid that? No wonder some of them look like they’re in a bad mood every day. Is it even possible to live with that?”

“See what I mean… head in the clouds. You will not believe how happy I was when I saw what my salary was going to be working at the casino. I was not expecting it to be that much! This is more than I have ever earned. And from my calculations it wouldn’t have taken me too long to be able to afford a nice second hand car. Remember that not all people live in penthouses and go out to restaurants every day and spend probably more in clothes in one month than some do in a year. This is good money for some people. For people like me.” She huffed when she said the word ‘me’ and I tried not to laugh at her. She was cute when she was angry.

“Listen, Jane. Maybe you’re right. Maybe I do have my head in the clouds. But it’s all relevant isn’t it? If you gave a homeless guy a brand new outfit he’d probably think he’d just won the lottory. I wanted to do this for you and it was the only way that I knew how. Looking at it from your point of view I can now see that maybe I had misjudged the whole thing. But I honestly had no idea that you would take it this way. I actually thought you would be happy. And that’s really all I wanted to do. I wasn’t trying to prove a point or to throw money in your face. I’m sorry if you see it like that. I truly just thought you would like it.”

I could see her shifting uncomfortably now, swaying a little from left to right. “Well… it is a beautiful car. Of course I like it. And that color is so me. Mrs Prius is far better looking than Mr Honda ever was.”

“So you’re keeping it?” I grinned at her. I was glad that she had taken my name suggestion to heart. “Sorry, I mean, are you keeping her?”

A small smile was now playing gently at her lips. Her pretty little lips. “Uh… I don’t know. I don’t know if I can. What are people going to think?”

“Screw what they think. And anyway, you don’t have to tell them. Tell them you decided to try your hand at gambling seeing as though you actually worked at a casino now and that you hit the luck. Anyway, I’m not taking it back. It’s yours now. So you can say whatever you want. I really don’t care. And the car discussion is now officially over. So… what can I get you to drink?” I walked over the drinks cupboard and started calling out, “Red wine, white wine, champagne, beer, whiskey, vodka… uh… let’s see… what else do we have here?”

“Do you ONLY have alcoholic beverages?” She called out.

“No, I have plenty of other drinks. But the only ones I’m offering you are alcoholic.”

I finally heard her laugh. “Okay then, wine would be great. Red”

“Wine it is!” I poured us both a glass and handed it to her.

“Hey, so now you can actually get to work on time.” I teased her.

“What do you mean? I ALWAYS get to work on time. In fact, I’m there before you most days and you LIVE at the casino.” God it was so easy to rile her up.

“Such a hard worker you are. Don’t you ever make time for play?” I smiled with delight as I saw her cheeks start to redden. Of course she was thinking about what happened the other day in the office with me. I was thinking about it too.

“I believe in a balanced life.”

“Ah, so you do make time for play.”