Living Without Dreams

Chapter 32 - The Gaffneys

Susan rose early on Friday morning, ordering room service for breakfast so she could provide Greg with breakfast while also allowing him to sleep in. She let him sleep as long as he could, awaking him only when she was ready to leave for the day.

"Going already?" Greg asked when she bent to kiss him goodbye.

"I have to. My presentation is at the eight o'clock meeting this morning. I'll call you after if I can to let you know how it goes."

"I look forward to it," he assured her.

"Any idea what you're going to do today?" Susan asked.

"I'm planning to spend the day with Alan. I didn't have the chance to tell you about it last evening, but he called yesterday morning, asking if we could. He wants me to visit his rabbi with him to discuss his upcoming marriage to Cindy," Greg explained. "I promised him I would."

"You're going to Oakland?" Susan asked.

"Yes. He's coming to get me. I know it's out of his way, but he thought that was better than having me take a cab or the bus to BART and trying to figure out how to get to his place from there. We were hoping you could join us there at his house, after you get finished today," Greg said.

"I probably can, depending on the time," Susan agreed. "I'll call you. We can figure out the details then."

"Good bye Susan," Greg said as he got out of bed and pulled her into a proper embrace. "Good luck with your presentation."

"Thanks," Susan said. She kissed him again as she said goodbye, picked up her purse and computer, and was shortly out the door.

c

Susan left work at the end of the day feeling pleased with the progress she'd made with her employer. HR had registered her name change, her personal information had been updated, her internal accounts had all been restored, her presentation had gone well and she'd met with several of the department heads, some of whom knew of her and her work from when she worked there before. By the time she left the office early that afternoon, she felt confident that those who were in charge wanted her back. The only decision to be made was which position to offer her, but as always, there was all the necessary paperwork to go through before the offer could be extended. She knew how that worked. She'd been on the other side of the hiring table herself plenty of times. And then if she'd had any doubt, on her way out, Janice stopped her in the hall to ask if there was any chance she could come in briefly on Monday. Susan wanted to ask Greg to be sure, so she promised to call her back. After all, this was supposed to be their honeymoon, and so far she'd spent most of the time they'd been away working. Still, she felt fairly certain he would say it was okay. Thinking she wanted to be certain before giving Janice an answer, Susan called Greg from the parking lot, as soon as she got to the car.

"Hello?" Greg answered at the other end.

"Hi, it's me," Susan said sounding so cheerful, Greg thought he could hear her smiling right through the phone.

"Hi Susan. Are you done for today?" he asked.

"Almost. I wanted to call you though, before I leave," she explained.

"You sound happy. I take it things went well?" he asked.

"Very well. I think they're working on an offer. Janice wanted to know if I could come back in briefly on Monday. I know that was supposed to be one of the days for us, so I wanted to talk to you about it before saying 'yes'," Susan explained.

"We will be here on Monday, and the meeting with Janice sounds important," Greg recognized. "Will you need to be there all day?"

"No, just an hour and a half ... and they've invited me for lunch while we talk," Susan said. "It shouldn't take me all day."