SCHADENFREUDE

“Every time you do anything in the system, you need to send out an e-mail,” my supervisor said. “To cover your tracks.”

It was my first hour at my new job, too late to leave and never come back. It was so deep in Long Island it took me four hours to reach the office. Too close to the city to be suburban but too far away to be part of city life, the neighborhood attracted people who were an unstable mix of desperate and self-controlled. Some left college and walked right into the law firm where they would remain for the rest of their lives. Others, like my supervisor, never went to college but instead learned how to juggle three full time jobs.

My supervisor was as shellshocked as a general. She whispered so no one else would hear her. She trusted five people in the office, but she was willing-- even eager-- to include me in the circle, as well.

“You can be anything in this place,” my supervisor explained. “There are paralegals here who started out where you are now. They’d let you study for law school while you worked for them.”

I should have known something was wrong when they asked during the interview if any of my skills were transferable. I told them I had almost a decades' worth of experience filing paperwork and answering phones, but after a minute of silence they just shrugged and told me I looked smart. Hired on the spot for a job my employers weren’t convinced I could perform in an area four hours away from home, all because the money was good. I was a fucking idiot. I was a goddamn moron. I set my alarm for the middle of the night and went to bed while it was still light out. I transferred four times before arriving at work and watched the sun rise from the platform.

I noticed there were cameras installed to face the desks instead of entrances or stairwells, but I still thought the job was salvageable until my supervisor began to use her personal motto; “Cover your tracks.”

For example; “Whenever you complete a task, you delete your follow-up tasks to cover your tracks.” Or; “Always send a memo out when you do anything, to cover your tracks.”

I reactivated my LinkedIn that same day.

The supervisor's fears were completely justified. I could hear people in the department next door frantically shifting their responsibilities to our department when anything went wrong. My supervisor was so busy deflecting that whole weeks passed without training me to do anything.

On a day when I was sent to my desk to wait for the supervisor to iron out a problem, I took the liberty of answering my phone. The client on the other end asked a case-specific question, and I transferred them to their paralegal and wrote a memo, as instructed. Less than ten minutes later my supervisor called me on the verge of tears.

“That memo you sent out— you spoke to a client about her case? You’re not on her legal team, you can’t advise her!”

“Well, that’s what I said. Then I transferred her to the paralegal,”

“Then why does this memo say that the client asked about her case and that you spoke with her? These people are lawyers, you need to be as specific as possible. Get in there and fix it. They’re watching you upstairs.”

My inexperience was catnip to the legal team. One paralegal in particular wrote company-wide emails for things like; “This document was already scanned in.” And; “What is a C-Ray?”

My supervisor physically shook at every new e-mail. Tears filled her eyes. It was painful to see how much she needed allies, and how terrified she was of losing one. Eventually, two different attorneys asked to be removed from unessential correspondences and the e-mails immediately ceased.

The office culture was a blend of fear and pride. Everyone who worked there glowed with the inner light of accomplishment. Few of them wanted to be lawyers as children, but they wanted to be something, and even without good benefits, raises, paid lunches, or vacation days, the firm offered the emotional comfort of working at a desk. It gave them an excuse to wear a tie. It made them feel like they were on a path, even if they were only waiting for the wealth to trickle down. Almost everyone worked two full time jobs, but all of them treated the firm like it was their last chance. My deskmate was an old Indian woman from Delhi who spoke three languages fluently and was therefore pulled into every conference with a South Asian client to translate. She once googled 'Hindi translator' and instantly found a better paying job.

“Should I apply? What if they don’t call? I don’t even know these people. But they offer benefits, and paid lunch, and a higher paycheck…”

She stayed for the comfort of dozing in her old, familiar chair. The office was a raft in an ocean to these people, and from the inside it felt like the last bastion of civilization among the ruins. The few windows looked out on a wide road with a few Korean deli counters and a sea of private houses. The Manhattan skyline in the distance barely poked through the air pollution, and I felt as faded as the shadow of the Freedom Tower on the horizon. The few times I went outside was like being on a different altitude. Everything was vibrant, alien, and incredibly tiring. I couldn't enjoy anything. I had nightmares about being broken by the demands of the job. The only comfort I could find was the deep-set belief that I didn't belong here

 The only person who thrived was Niobe, the oldest daughter of a legal secretary. Niobe knew everyone in the firm. Niobe used to play in the waiting room as a little girl. Niobe was invited to the family Christmas party every year.

Niobe sounded like Junior Bear from the Looney Tunes and looked like any other girl from Queens; blonde highlights and a cross-strap bag just big enough for her phone and wallet. Every day she wore leggings, Uggs, and a baggy t-shirt. Everyday she showed off pictures of her and four identical girls making duck lips at the camera and told us about her crazy night out, which always followed the same routine.

Two or three times a week she and her friends drove out to Astoria. The boys ordered bottles. They danced until a fight broke out. By then Niobe was on the edge of a blackout and experiencing a deep, spiritual connection with one of the boys. In the early morning the whole crew would drive back to Bayside and eat a huge meal of fried food before slipping into unconsciousness. All her stories had details to spice up the formula, like the day one of her friends got drunk and said something rude to another friend.

“Hey! You can’t talk to girls like that!” Niobe yelled, and knocked him out with one punch. The whole club cheered.

“Holy crap, that guy got knocked out by a chick!” Someone shouted.

“This song is dedicated to Zeus’ daughter!” The DJ said.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Why does the DJ know your dad?”

“Everybody knows my dad,” she said. Because she was a good Greek Orthodox girl, this was true. She didn’t go anywhere her parents didn’t approve of with anybody they didn't know.

Another time she was approached by a biker outside a club who told her not to smoke cigarettes.

“What the fuck, you fat, old piece of shit, who the fuck are you to tell me what I can and can’t do!” Niobe shouted.

“No woman has ever spoken to me like that before,” the biker said. “I’m so sorry.”

When she wasn’t talking about her nights out, Niobe talked about her diet plan. Depending on her mood she was either a Real Woman who ate Real Food or a disciplined and educated dietician. On diet days she printed meal plans on the company computer. Our medical records came with serving sizes of chicken and asparagus. She offered free, unsolicited nutritional advice to anyone who made eye contact with her.

"Maybe I should get my dietician license," she mused one day as she Facetimed her friend at her desk. "I could combine all my passions; nutrition and helping people. I don't think it takes that long. I think it’s just a couple classes."

But her diet fell into jeopardy when the time came for her mother to buy lunch. She was supportive of her daughter's ambitions but well into her fifties. She'd had three children. When she wanted a burger, she was going to buy herself a burger.

Niobe fought weakly for her diet plan, crying and whimpering about all the weight she'd lost and how much she stood to lose but once she was properly bribed with fries and cheese her persona would shift like dust settling.

“I guess fried chicken is still chicken, but I can only have the white meat,” she’d say. Half an hour later she licked sauce off her fingers at her desk and mutter self-affirming mantras. “Humans weren’t built for rabbit food. Guys like girls with tits and ass. I’m not about to date no skinny guy, it’s like sleeping on a bag of remotes.”

When we all managed to successfully ignore her, she propped her phone up on her computer and FaceTimed her friends. If she was in a good mood she kept talking about her diet or her night out. If she was kind of sad she talked about her Dedication.

“I don’t care if I make friends or if I make enemies. I come in to work to do one thing, and one thing only; make money. If people don’t like that, tough shit. Yeah, I’m a bitch, but you know something? Bitches get shit done. Let’s see anybody call me a bitch to my face. They can’t, and that’s cause afterwards they still need me to do stuff for ‘em.”

Her lunch break started whenever and lasted forever, and she only clocked out at the end of her shift. She was always late and usually left early. The supervisor watched through clenched teeth.

There was no conflict in Niobe’s mind between being a good Greek girl from a traditional family and a hard-fisted, foul-mouthed smoker. Her parents saw themselves as the kind of salt-of-the-earth virtuous poor Dickens used to write about. Their life was perfectly balanced, fully actualized. They bought her as much cigarettes and beer as she or her friends could consume, as proud of her genuine spirit as they would be of an actual accomplishment. In return she gave them perfect attendance. She always came to church, and on Christmas she installed an icon at her desk. They built an apartment for her in their basement so that she could exercise as much freedom as she wanted without ever leaving home. For two parents working blue collar jobs, money seemed no object.

It was difficult to imagine the physical shape of her home. She lived with her mother, father, grandmother, two siblings, her cousin, her cousins’ husband, and their two children. Niobe was getting the whole basement, Grandma had a private kitchen and bathroom, and her cousins’ entire family seemed to share one room. Niobe explained once that she was late to work because she had to fight her sister for putting cigarette butts in her shampoo, and one day she fought with her mother over whether she could sit in her father’s lap.

"What kind of sick bitch gets jealous of her own daughter?" She demanded. "What does she think I'm gonna do? He's my fucking father, you freak."

Little things inspired petty revenge in Niobe. When we didn’t collectively fawn over her wild nights out, medical records began to disappear. We re-printed and scanned them, but it happened again later, and again the day after. This continued for three more days until the supervisor got out of her chair and walked to Niobe’s desk.

Niobe took one headphone out of her ear. “What’s up?”

The supervisor bent down and went through her paperwork without a word.

Niobe’s eyes widened. “What are you doing —? No! No! Stop it! Those are mine!”

In a matter of seconds, Niobe lost seventeen years off her life and became a toddler. She grabbed the basket of paperwork and pulled it away from her, shrieking the whole time.

The supervisor planted her feet and ripped the basket out of her hands before giving a thick sheaf of paperwork to another employee. “These are yours.”

“She asked me to do those!” Niobe screamed. “She asked me, and I said yes! I said I’d help because she had so much work to do!”

“Mind your business.” The supervisor ordered, then slammed the door.

I was in her office at the time. The employees behind the door had a special language they’d developed between themselves while under surveillance.  They spoke without applying any pressure to their vocal chords, releasing instead a quiet hiss through their moving lips. They bent their heads into the space between their desk and hissed, lips moving as if in prayer.

When they opened the door, Niobe’s desk was empty.

“She’s upstairs, telling Regina god knows what,” the supervisor muttered. She turned to me. "Be careful of that one. She'll go up to Regina for any reason and tell lies about you. You know I found her taking screenshots of your instagram, right?"

I felt a jolt of adrenaline in response, but I couldn't think what she might screenshot. My instagram didn't have anything I wouldn't want seen by the founder’s wife. Regina wasn't petty enough to fire an employee for aesthetic differences.

Regina looked a little like Tibetan illustration of hungry ghosts. She was the one who installed the cameras, and even had a hand in designing the very shape of the building. She should have retired years ago, but she was too in love with her accomplishments to let them grow without her. I was trained on the application that would have been her replacement in any other firm, but Regina’s social position meant that we continued to print hard copies for her to keep in her office.

The cloud carried all the legal documents, the clients contact information, the list of hospitals and medical facilities our clients went to. There was a note system the many disconnected departments used to communicate. Every activity was logged on the app.

“I confess, I have no idea how this system works.” She admitted sheepishly. "I don't trust any of this software crap. One wrong button and the whole thing could disappear. That's why I keep all the hard copies, for back-up."

Regina never spoke to me about my instagram account. The only clue I had that my supervisor’s instincts were correct was one three-day stretch where Niobe would only talk to me as if I were dirt.

"So you, like, never worked in an office before, right?" She giggled, one earbud in her hand and her Facetime screen angled to show her friend smiling on the other end.

"That’s right," I said.

"Niobe-- hey! Leave her alone! Get back to work!" My supervisor shouted, and Niobe popped her earbud back in with a deep throated giggle before changing the topic to list all the issues with keto.

Another time she played nice with me while we all shared our lunch break-- me, Regina and Niobe. She babbled for a while about family vacations and the upcoming spring break, then turned to me and asked: "So where would you like to go? If you could go anywhere in the world?"

I knew this game. Anywhere I went would be a dangerous shithole only an idiot would want to visit, but saying I never wanted to travel would be the cowards’ way out. Instead, I said; "I've actually always wanted to visit New Orleans. It's supposed to be a beautiful city, and I never had Cajun food before."

She nodded, still fake-nice while she looked for something to twist. "Oh yeah, New Orleans has all of that, definitely. But you gotta be careful when you go, because there's a lot of dangerous people out there, and a lot of hungry gators."

"Gators," I repeated, surprised she didn't threaten me with voodoo.

She shrugged. "You don’t have to believe me if you don't want. Nobody talks about it. I got a cousin in law enforcement down there that says there's a lot of stuff that goes unreported. Hard to tell what goes on. Maybe it's rare, but I'd be careful down there."

"There’s bad people everywhere," Regina mumbled, chewing on her lunch of two microwaved turkey burgers, no bread or condiments. "I wouldn't travel at all if it wasn't for--"

Silence, the barest gesture with her eyes to the head attorneys' desk.

"But you guys mostly go to resorts," Niobe supplied.

Regina nodded. "Yes, those I trust. I don't know anything about the staff, but they at least are screened. And of course everybody's getting paid, which goes a long way to keeping things honest."

Three days later it was over. Niobe’s intense attention evaporated. We moved on like it never happened, and whatever passed between Regina and Niobe didn't change their special relationship.

Like grandmother and granddaughter, they were just distant enough to adore each other. Regina saw a promise in Niobe that she couldn't find anywhere else. She had her husband, the charismatic and ambitious attorney; her beautiful daughter; her talented grandson. The son in law. The pieces of her life were held in a secure safety net. All the pain she'd endured earlier in her life had resulted in complete control over her future, but like Niobe, there were conflicting details to the narrative she presented.

For example, everyone knew she hated her husband. She would never speak out against him in public, but she allowed herself little victories to satiate the roiling hatred in her gut. Eye-rolling behind his back, raised eyebrows at key moments when he spoke. She never said his name, as if in refusal of his very humanity. When they returned from one of their many trips to Disneyland, one photo from hundreds caught the staff's attention. Husband and wife stood side by side while playing a water gun game. Even in the freeze-frame it was obvious that he was enjoying a full-bellied laugh, but Regina was holding the water pistol with the dead-eyed intensity of a trained assassin.

The son-in-law and her daughter were both inconvenient truths that couldn't be overlooked. The son in law was required to be in the office at least once a day, but he spent most of that time watching movies on his phone before going to get a haircut-- sometimes twice in one day. The daughter was a wild-eyed, manic recovering addict. The family had given up any pretense of making her look for or hold work. Instead she took care of her son and upheld the fiction that her husband was the family breadwinner, while he made it very clear that he was being paid by her parents to keep quiet.

Their son was a tiny, sweet and well-loved little boy who liked to sing, dance and play fighting games. When his father got tired of the repetitive sounds of explosions coming from his tablet and tugged it gently out of his hand, the little boy lept out of his chair with palpable terror.

"Daddy! Daddy, I was just starting a new game and my thumb hit Karin by accident, and then the timer ran out so I had to play as Karin. I wanted to play as Zangief."

"Is that my little gentleman?" A tinny voice piped up from the desk. He turned with a smile not to the intercom, but to a security camera hanging on the wall.

"Hi grandma! It's me! Can I come up and play my legos?"

"No sweetie, you have homework to do. But when you're done you can come up and see me before it's time to go home."

"Ok grandma I will, I love you." He said. The red light on the intercom speaker dimmed, and he dutifully took out his notebook to begin his homework. My supervisor glanced from him to the intercom, then at the speaker and back again.

"Sweetie, does grandma have cameras and speakers at her house, too?"

"Yeah." he said, as if this was the most obvious fact in the world.

 One day I found Regina staring out the window. She had the biggest office in the building, and used one corner next to her desk as a landfill. Mail dividers, empty accordion files, discarded briefcases, a hole puncher, empty picture frames, and a filing cabinet sat piled under her desk. The dump was sectioned off by a card table with pots and pots of plants on them, plants hung from the ceiling and decorating the bookshelf. Only the dead ones were real. On the bottom shelf of her library was a row of legos and transformers. Crayon illustrations were taped to the wall next to it.

She signed off on my paperwork with blank eyes. She froze in the act of passing them back, her glazed expression still on the horizon. “You know, I’ve been thinking a lot about my childhood these past few months. I grew up not that far away from here, in a house just like the ones you can see out the window. When I was a girl, I had so much faith in people. I thought everyone was inherently good, and smart. We were very sheltered growing up, but I never thought of us that way. We were always surrounded by friends and family, all the time there were people coming and going. Life was just like a party. It never occurred to me that I was in a bubble until years later, when I was an adult, and went out into the world. These days, I just generally assume that people are scum.”

All I could do was smile. Eventually, she smiled back.

“How’s your commute?” She asked, becoming warm and motherly through her tone of voice alone.

“Long,” I admitted.

“I know. It must be very hard for you,” her accent, thick Queens with notes of Italian lingering through the generations, reached down my throat to grab me by the guts. She sounded like my mother. She sounded like my grandmother. She sounded like my aunts. Christmas parties with sugar cookies still cold from the grocery store (pronounced; gro-shry staw), walking into a warm living room and hearing three different voices cry out Wowwww, looka chu! The adults drinking Keurig while they say; remember when grandpa made his coffee with the eggshells? Remember grandma’s wine tub in the basement? Remember when the adults all switched to Italian to talk politics in peace?

"You’re young," Regina said. “I remember when we were just starting out, Anthony and I, he used to get up at five in the morning to be in the city for his job. We didn’t notice the commute when we were young.”

"Well," I began, but declined to share my thoughts on the long mornings that were never long enough to relax into, the nights that ended immediately in sleep. I wasn’t on my path the way Regina and her husband once were. I had taken the job as a fluke and now I was clawing desperately for some avenue of escape.

When I got back to the basement my supervisor’s hands were shaking. "What happened? What took you so long? Did she say something to you?"

I tried to explain, but nothing could relax her. “You can’t trust her. She’s another one trying to get you. Watch your back! Cover your tracks!”

I already knew she wasn’t sincere. Maybe once upon a time Regina had the patience to play her sweet and mild wife routine for long enough to gain someone's trust, but she didn't need to now. I was already at her mercy, and she thought I was the most sublime idiot. She enjoyed explaining things to me, like how to check my e-mail or what a pediatrician was, and when she was done she would laugh in my face.

“Look at you, you’re overwhelmed, your eyes are glazing over!”

To contrast, her faith in Niobe was complete. Her family all made fatal flaws in their time on earth, but Niobe embodied an ideal that was violated everywhere else. She was potential personified.

“You can ask her anything. She’s a very smart girl, and a real whiz with computers. Are you computer literate?” She asked. She smirked when I said yes. “Well. Niobe is very computer literate.”

Niobe certainly believed she was very computer literate. After six months at the Geek Squad she could repair a cracked screen and type out the entire address for a proxy server into the address bar, complete with random number string. Unfortunately she didn't know there were other proxy servers, so when they blocked hers she spent hours wailing in misery.

"What am I supposed to do? How am I gonna design my new apartment if I can't look up the stuff I need?" She sniffled. I could see my supervisor mutter curses under her breathe while strangling an invisible throat. “I want my walls painted holographic white— that’s the white paint with the shiny stuff in it— and I want the little L thing in the back of my room to be turned into a walk-in closet. I want the builders to put lights in it and a door in front of it, and I want to have coat hangers and a slaystation 500 installed. Do you know what a slaystation is? Professional make-up artists use it for their clients.”

“You just get whatever you ask for, don’t you?” My supervisor asked.

“No," Niobe answered, almost offended. "My dad never gives me anything I want. This is different, because I’m asking for important stuff I can use for the rest of my life. I have to work to earn everything else. I’ve been working every day since I was fourteen to support my family.”

Meanwhile, Niobe had just learned about for-profit background checks. Regina did one for every new employee except Niobe.

"I kinda wanna know what mine says," she said dreamily.

"Niobe, you've never even left the block. It's just gonna have your address." The supervisor groused.

"Maybe it has my high school GPA or something," she said. Her train of thought was on the move. "I don't know-- I mean, think about it. Nobody knows what's actually on their background check, but every employer has to look it up before they bring you on, to make sure you're not like a psycho or whatever. Don't you want to know? I mean, it's your record."

She grabbed her purse and began to search for her wallet. "Look, I'll do mine right now, and then if anybody else wants to do theirs, I'll handle it."

"It's not a fucking horoscope, Niobe!"

But it was too late. Niobe had a taste of power. For the next week she wanted to be an FBI agent.

"Think about what it is we do here. We find people," her voice had taken on an intense, choppy quality. "We get to the heart of the issue and we take care of it."

"What are you talking about, this is a personal injury firm."

"Exactly," triumph muted, like she'd won a debate. "Personal injury. Our job is to help people in trouble. But we also have to deal with scam artists.”

“Oh my lord,” the supervisor groaned.

“Take the client in the waiting area right now,” Niobe continued. “She’s got a brand new case, and her last two aren’t even closed! And she’s--”

“Wait,” the supervisor said with a giggle. “Wait, you mean the one in the--”

“--fur coat and neck brace? This is what I'm talking about! Let’s review the tapes,” she said, and changed the window on her screen to reveal the client’s file was open the whole time.

The supervisor’s smile fell. “Niobe! We can’t be looking at the client’s court files, that’s private.”

“No one here would put their job in jeopardy,” she answered solemnly, and hit play on the video file. It was distorted black and white footage from a cheap security camera in a department store, but that didn't stop our client from making an entrance. She swept onto the screen in a full-length fur coat and neck brace like a queen, chatting with a friend about a piece of clothing on the rack. Her friend glanced up at the camera, then back at the client. They nodded to each other and parted ways. The friend lingered briefly before casually dropping a shirt on the floor, hanger and all. She quit the scene and the client returned. As she walked past the clothing rack her feet were entangled in the t-shirt. She flung out her hands, purse sailing through the air, and collapsed face-first onto the floor.

The supervisor burst into laughter. Tears welled in her eyes as she doubled over, clutching her stomach. “I love her! She’s my favorite.”

Niobe laughed as well, a little sheepishly. “I mean, you’re right, it's hilarious, but it's still wrong."

“Who cares?” The supervisor asked. Niobe, pinned between being outnumbered and unable to express her view, fell silent.

We never found out if Niobe was going to Quantico because new drama unfurled over the weekend. Niobe’s best friend was cheating on her boyfriend, and Niobe was thrilled.

“Her boyfriend’s a real piece of shit,” she explained. “He’s such an asshole. He doesn’t hit her but he gets mad when she hangs out, or gets her hair cut-- or anything. She’s gotta be with him all the time, but then he gets mad at her for hanging around him all the time.”

For comfort the best friend turned to a side piece almost ten years older than her, with a child of his own and a possessive baby mama.

“What does he do?”

“He owns his own business, driving cabs.”

So he was an Uber driver.

"But he's good to her; he's sweet. He's not like that dickhead she's been dating."

Their romance began with Niobe in tow as the tides of their romantic drama pulled the relationship in and out of Orthodox sailability. When it became clear that her best friend wasn't breaking up with anybody, Niobe's excitement turned to pity.

"This poor guy likes her so much, and he's been so sweet to her.. "

“Sounds like a dream. Are you gonna date him?”

“Nah. I don't want to raise no kid.”

As with all things Niobe, this was true until it fit a narrative. The idea of getting involved with a guy with a kid was daunting because everyone in Niobe’s life was permanent. No one entered and no one left. The only time she met new people was when those in her periphery came to the fore. If someone was introduced to her without exhaustive vetting, she was instantly suspicious and mistrustful. This was why she didn't like me, a stranger from the wilds of Brooklyn.

Fortunately the new side piece, Yianni, was the cousin of a friend, lived within a half-hour drive to Niobe’s house, and shared many of the same friends. This made him safe, but it also meant that finding him attractive would have long-reaching consequences. Dating him was the same as adopting his child.

They began by hanging out without the best friend. Niobe seemed to genuinely enjoy his company, but as more people teased her about a potential schoolgirl crush, the more real it became in her mind.

“My grandpa was fifteen years older than my grandma, and my dad’s twelve years older than my mom. Age differences aren’t that big of a deal,” she said one day.

On another, she bounced in an hour late talking about her grandparent’s anniversary. “Every year since my pappous died my yiayia writes a letter to him on Facebook to say she misses him. They were really in love— I mean, like, really in love. He was her best friend. Can you imagine being married to your best friend for sixty years, and then lose him?”

At lunch she waited for married people to come in to interrogate them. “Is your wife your best friend? Is your husband your best friend? It’s better when you can talk to them, right? You really love them, right?”

She didn’t talk about Yianni anymore, but she did talk about his son, and their playdates after she picked him up from daycare.

“Wow, so it’s serious, now?”

“Oh, no, no, no,” she demurred, smiling. “Well, maybe. I don’t know. I do really like him…”

She directed the story like a movie, from their sweet flirtation to the fated swell of feelings. “Every time we’re together we just sit for hours talking about everything, y’know? He’s really smart, he’s always talking about really deep shit like life and death and how people are so attached to their cell phones these days. Y’know they did a study that showed people are using their phones more and more every day? Yianni was telling me all about it last night.”

Eventually, the romance crested. “Yianni and I are together every day now. I really feel safe around him. I want to tell him, but I also don’t want to tell him. I’m a girl, I want to be chased. I want him to make me feel wanted.”

When it began to wane, she struggled to save it. “Yianni’s been hurt by women before. He tells me all the time that it’s never been like the way it is with me. He’s scared of being hurt. I gotta show him that I can be there for him,”

...and, finally, crashed. “He came over to my house to talk about our future together, and we both agreed that we weren’t ready for a relationship yet. It was so hard to let him go, but I’m so young, I’m just starting my career. I might even go back to school, I don't know. I can’t take care of him or his son the way I want to, and with his business and his baby mama, he can’t support me the way he needs to. We agreed to stay friends, but it’s so hard. I think I love him.”

It could have stayed that way, but Yianni picked bros over hoes. “He promised we would be friends and keep hanging out, but now he never calls or comes over and when I saw him at the club the other day he ignored me. So I said to myself ‘Whatever, I’m gonna have fun by myself. I look cute, I’m with my friends, I’m gonna show him I don’t need him’. So we were drinking and having fun, and I’m dancing, I’m feeling myself, when one of his friends comes over and says ‘Why don’t you get off Yianni’s dick?’ And I’m like ‘What the fuck did you say, asshole?’ And he’s like ‘I said, leave Yianni the fuck alone!’ And at this point I’m really mad, so I say ‘Why doesn’t Yianni come over here and say that to my face?’ like, what a total bitch. Then Megan’s brother Mike comes over, and he and I never got along, but he was protecting me, trying to get this guy to leave me alone. So he tells me we should get out of there. He and I, we go and get some food, and then— you’re never gonna believe this— we end up making out in his car! It’s crazy, we’ve always hated each other, but that night after he stood up for me, there was this… chemistry. And you know I’m not the kind of girl who does stuff like that, like, sex just freaks me out. I hate sex. It was so weird. Like…. a connection…”

Days passed quickly, each one punctuated by a new bout of drama. The old Indian woman who sat next to me became a client after a car accident. She was gone for months, but I barely noticed the time. Just like everything else in the office my life had turned into a waiting game. By this point I was taking phone interviews daily. I took my lunch breaks at the Korean bakery across the street to send resumes and take calls. No one would set foot inside because, as one attorney explained to me; “Those chinos cook rats.”

The bakery was actually a very well-known international chain made famous by it’s ham and cheese croquettes, which in Korea was sort of like a fried sandwich. For ten dollars I could have two with a cup of coffee, a piece of fruit, complimentary wifi and all the privacy I needed. It became so customary that the staff had my order pre-prepared on a tray by the time I entered the store.

When I finally reached home at eight in the evening I stripped, ate and crawled into bed as fast as possible, my mind still whirling. As I lay in bed and slowly folded in like a deflated kiddie pool I asked myself the same tough questions I thought in private about my coworkers. How was it possible that I could sit in silent judgement of everyone else's life choices when we were all in the same condition? I knew why they were all tired and defeated because I felt the same way. By what measurement was I different from them? During the day I believed it was enough that I knew there were other options. My dreams didn't need to manifest at the cost of my misery. In the afternoon I told myself that I couldn't find a job because I barely had the time to write a cover letter, much less summon up the confidence I needed to sell myself. At night I asked why I didn't just settle, like everyone else. If I moved out to Long Island I could keep this shit desk job, make decent money, and save time on my commute. When Niobe moved on-- and I didn't for a second think she'd stay-- it would still be crazy, but much easier to live with. Without her constantly trying to make admirers out of us I would be free to get lost in my work and forget for a while how bad it was.

All of that changed when I finally got a call for a new job. It was temporary, yes, but anything confirmed that I wasn't destined for Regina’s stable of the damned. I discarded everything I said about Long Island, I was made for better things and my co-workers were tub scum. I floated back to work, the adrenaline rush of pure victory flooding my veins. I was free. I didn’t need Regina’s reluctant approval, I didn't need to smile and accept her insults. She'd forget who I was in a year.

When I came back downstairs I heard Niobe guiding another friend through her love life. “Why are you being such a bitch? This guy’s not some herb, he’s super hot, and anyways I know him; we went to Applebee’s once,”

I was hit by a wave of premature nostalgia as I realized that I would never see her again. She was decaying before our eyes, fighting to stay the same person she was in high school in the upside down world of adulthood, where drinking and smoking wasn't cool and romantic drama was kind of annoying. What would she do? She had plenty of opportunities; the fuel for all her dreams was that they were achievable. She could reach Quantico through a law degree, which she could get while working at the firm. It would be tough, but possible, and she craved the validation of completing a difficult challenge. The same was true of her dietician plan, which didn't need nearly as much schooling. I could see her hesitate as she crept to the edge of her tiny world, and I didn't blame her. The work required to climb up to an entry level position anywhere else wouldn't offer her the same rewards she recieved effortlessly at home. She had a place in deep Queens where she was loved, and she couldn't take that with her.

I was just getting back to work when I heard the unmistakable sound of Regina struggling down the stairs.

"Where is she!?" She roared. She was clinging to the railing with both hands as she crept down the stairs, her body too frail to withstand the intensity of her rage. Her voice quavered but was still as loud and clear as a siren. "Bring that fucking bitch to me, who does she think she is? Where is she? You! You think you can make a fool outta me!?"

Everyone in the filing pool froze.  Regina regained her balance at the bottom of the stairs and stormed past our office, into the paralegal department.

"You stupid fucking bitch, did you think I wouldn't notice what you did?" She shouted. A voice tried to respond, but was cut off. "There are cameras all over this office! I see everything!"

"What are you talking about?" A voice cried out. Almost immediately the speaker seemed to understand her position and switched tactics. "I didn't do anything!"

"Oh yes you did. I'll tell you what you did; you stole toilet paper out of the bathroom cabinet."

"What are you talking about?" She sounded truly mystified.

"I went in there just now and found the cabinet unlocked-- you were the last one in there. I know you were. I saw it!"

"What-- you mean-- yeah, I changed the roll. The cleaning lady must have left the cabinet unlocked."

"That’s not your job!" Regina roared. There was a bang like something heavy hitting a table. "Don’t you ever pull that shit again unless you want to do her job permanently."

We waited in excruciating silence for her to climb back up the stairs on her stiff knees, none of us even daring to type. Niobe was smothering laughter with both hands.

"Wonder what's got her all ticked off," she muttered. Still no one spoke. I reminded myself that I only had two more hours left at this job. If Niobe could keep to herself for just a little longer, I might even be able to celebrate when I got home. The next thing I heard was her shouting; “Oh my god! Harry Styles just came out as bisexual!”

“Who?” the supervisor asked.

“Harry Styles, from One Direction, the love of my life! I can’t believe this! He’s a fucking fruitcake now!”

“Well, I mean, it says he likes both—“

“Oh my god, what if that’s why he wears his hair long, so that he can start to become a woman? I can’t handle this! Harry Styles, a cocksucker!”

“Niobe!” the supervisor roared. “If you really can’t handle it, go home!”

“Ha! If I left, this department would be done for. You couldn’t do anything without me,”

“Wow,”

“Say it,”

“Say what?” the supervisor asked.

“Say I’m the best,”

“Turn your head back to your computer and do some work, if you want to be the best so bad,”

“No, I want to hear you say it. Take it back. Take back what you said,”

I couldn't see either of them, but I could hear the silence.

“Sit down or get out,” the supervisor said.

Another round of silence. I waited for Niobe to threaten her with Regina, or the head attorney, or one of her other connections. After a moment, through gritted teeth, she said; “Admit I’m the best.”

Another bout of silence as the two women ran the mental numbers in their head. Sitting stiff in my chair, head pointed straight in front of me, I could just make out the movement of our supervisor rising from her chair. “Get out of my office.”

“You can’t do that,” Niobe said, falling back on old standbys in defeat.

The supervisor slammed her hand on her desk. “You are in my office. You are distracting me from my work. I have every right to tell you to get out of my office. Now do it!”

In a sudden burst Niobe fled up the stairs. The office doors swung shut behind her. As the supervisor watched her go the light of triumph dimmed from her eyes. She fell back into her seat with a thump.

“I need a cigarette.” She said.

She didn’t come back. When I left for the day she was still outside the office, a ring of cigarette butts at her feet. She offered me one as I approached. I could feel her staring as I lit up.

“Are you coming back tomorrow?” she asked.

I thought about lying. It would be easier. As soon as I walked away I would never see this place, or anyone in it, ever again.

“No. I got another job.” I said.

“I had a feeling you were looking for something,” she said. “Is there any way I can get you to stay?”

“Not really.”

She nodded. “Well, take it easy. Don’t be a stranger.”

The next day I got a call on my new lunch break from Regina.

“So you found a new job. Congratulations,” she said, her tone full of sweetness and light. “Normally we ask for a two-week courtesy notice, you know,”

“I know, sorry,” I said.

“Well, can’t be helped. We’ll send you your last paycheck by mail. Is there anything you’d like me to put in my report when we notify the city that you quit?”

What the hell, I thought. This woman already thinks I’m a snivelling coward; why not use that for petty revenge? I told her Niobe made me uncomfortable. I told her Niobe used the printer for personal reasons and was a constant disruption in the workplace, and just shied away from saying her frank attitude towards sex and drinking had shaken me right to my core.

"Oh, dear," Regina cooed. "I can certainly see how difficult that could be. Well, thanks again, and all the best."

Five minutes later, she called again. “Ok, who put you up to this?”

“Sorry?”

“Who told you to say all that stuff? What did they offer you? What’s the reason behind it?”

It took me a minute to realize what she was saying.

“Was it your supervisor? What’s her problem with that girl? What’s your problem with that girl, anyway?”

“I told you what the--” No. I stopped myself. For just a second, Regina reeled me back in, over the river and across the borough to live in that world with them. My earlier civility was a courtesy she didn’t deserve, and now that she had it she wanted more. I hung up and went back to my lunch. Regina never called me again.

A few weeks later my old supervisor told me Niobe had quit over a workplace harassment lawsuit. It turned out that she’d spent most of the past year emotionally torturing a girl in another department. No one was sure what set her off, only that all the privileges that protected Niobe from all our proportionally minor complaints about her loud phone conversations completely buffeted her from any form of protective action the other girl tried to take. When she was finally done she submitted her two-week notice and a scathing workplace harassment report to the Queens County seat. Niobe was forced to quit to spare the reputation of both herself and the firm, but a few weeks later a subsequent workplace harassment case was opened with Niobe as the propositioner, claiming that the case against her was harassment.

by O F Cieri

O F Cieri is a writer and a mess based out of NYC. She likes free intellectual property, sex, violence, explosions and extremely thin scientific justification. She has been published in Ligeia Magazine, Hobart Pulp, and Expat Press. Her first book is available on Ninestar Press. Find more of her work here:-Fiction - O F Cieri Speculative fiction writer