Five - Sarah
I flicked my wrist and checked the time; ten AM. I hated being late to work, but today was an exception, today was my downtime. Frederick always made exceptions for me, and even though the idea of his employees being late to work made his skin crawl, he was very understanding when it came to me.
As I rushed through the parting doors I felt a bit strange, almost like the air had changed. The entrance was unusually quiet; had everyone vanished into thin air? My heels clicked against the marble, and then I took the elevator up to the third floor. Ting. The doors parted slowly, and the sight of people filled my view. “What’s going on here?” I asked Natasha, Frederick’s secretary. She was standing by the water cooler, talking to a bunch of people that I only knew vaguely.
“Didn’t you hear?” she asked me, her eyes wide. “Frederick isn’t CEO anymore.”
“The hell?” I couldn’t help but utter. “Well, where’s Frederick right now? Is he in his office?”
“He doesn’t want anyone going into his office right now,” she told me, but I ignored what she said and I headed straight for the elevator again and took it up to the fourteenth floor. The first thing I saw was Frederick, smoking a cigar and staring out the window at the city as always. I stormed into his office without knocking. “Is it true?” I asked him.
He turned to me slowly and took another drag. Then he sipped his espresso and crossed one leg over the other. “It is,” he nodding. My son is officially CEO of Callaway Tech.
“And you’re okay with this? I don’t understand,” I said, my eyes darting back and forth frantically. “What the hell happened?”
“Well apparently, my spoiled brat of a son convinced the board to remove me, so they did,” he said. I was in a state of total disbelief. A thousand thoughts were zapping through my head, and I couldn’t help but let out a gasp.
“I can’t believe he would do something like this,” I said, stomping my foot against the floor.
“Don’t worry about it,” Frederick reassured me. “I’m getting old, Sarah, it’s about time I stepped down.”
“No, this doesn’t sound like you,” I insisted. “Did Ryan get in your head about this whole merger thing?”
“Oh, about that. It’s happening,” he told me. My heart was pounding like a jackhammer; suddenly it felt like my whole world was falling apart. I was the kind of person who didn’t like surprises, let alone horrible ones. Frederick was awfully cold, puffing out thick cigar smoke and swiveling back and forth in his chair. His blinked at me slowly, and I grew more and more worried about him. “The board is convinced that we should go through with the merger. Basically, there’s nothing I can do about it.” He shrugged helplessly, and that frustrated me even more.
“So what, you’re just going to give up?” I asked him. Ryan was a despicable human, and I was growing more and more hateful towards him by the second.
“Hey, I did my best, alright? I’ve been going in and out of meeting rooms since this morning, but the decision is final. And hell, if my own children want to tear this whole thing down, then they can go ahead and do it!” Frederick reached down under his desk. My eyes followed him as he pulled out a flask, and this was my first time seeing him drink on the job. “Don’t look at me like that,” he ordered. “Technically I don’t work here anymore, so they can’t tell me shit.”
“But you do,” I said, running to him. “You run this whole thing, don’t ever forget that.”
“I’ve been thinking about retiring for quite some time now, it’s for the best,” he told me. “I just didn’t think it would happen so soon.” His head drooped like a deflated balloon, and then he took one quick sip from his flask before screwing the cap back on and tucking it into his drawer. “That’s enough drinking for today, I think I’m gonna go home.”
“I can’t believe the whole board voted on this, even Marissa? She’s one of your favorites!”
“I mean, I don’t know what the hell Ryan promised them. He keeps telling me, “Dad, I’ve got big hopes for this company!” and you know what, I don’t believe him. I think he’s gonna bring it all down, and then he’s gonna come back crying.”
“Then why let him do that? Why give him what he wants?” I asked him, eager to understand. I had never seen Frederick like this before. He was oddly calm, observing the people trodding up and down the hallway, like a robot, almost. He set his cigar aside and looked at me lovingly, and I couldn’t help but burst into tears. “You’ve taught me so many things, and now you’re just gonna walk out like that?”
“Sarah, I’m still gonna be around, you know. Besides, Ryan will make a great boss.”
I must’ve thrown up in my mouth a little. Just the thought of working for Ryan made my skin crawl, but I had no choice but to nod solemnly. “I just don’t want you giving up on this whole thing. I don’t want you to take the backseat and watch it all go up in flames.”
“Maybe when it goes up in flames, my son will finally learn his lesson,” he said, and that was when I turned around and left. I couldn’t stand the idea of change, in fact, I was very afraid of it and in this case, I had every right to be. Ryan’s whole aura made me uncomfortable, from his smug smile to his fancy suits, to the way that he squinted in the sun. Frankly, everything about him made me want to quit my job.
I made my way back to my office, and as I walked my senses became overwhelmed by merciless gossip.
“He was getting old, anyway,” I heard someone say. I felt an underlying urge to defend Frederick, but I knew he wouldn’t want me starting fights down by the water cooler. He was better than that.
“Finally, we get a hot CEO.”
“I never really liked Ryan, anyway. The guy’s a total alcoholic.”
“I saw him at a club last weekend, he was with this chick…”
“Does that mean we get a raise?”
I locked myself up in my office and shut the drapes. It didn’t help that the walls were made of glass, so I just sat there in the darkness and my only light source was the window overlooking the city...