✅ My Cousin's Keeper [NaNoWriMo 2021]

71. My New Little

At work on Monday, I was practically shaking before I even got into the office. I wasn't fearing for my career now; I knew that I was safe in that regard. But I was still going into an office where someone had tried to blackmail me, fully prepared to bring up my darkest secret in conversation.

James Reznor was in the office for a change. Perhaps he'd had a call asking what his part of our latest presentation had been; or perhaps he didn't want to miss out on a couple of young women from Human Resources coming round in somewhat revealing outfits to sell gingerbread snacks for charity. They did it every year, trying to make SYL feel more like a community than a corporation, and I did notice that there were fewer people working from home around Christmas now that the tradition had become known.

I greeted Reznor and Hagen, then headed over to my own office. I wanted to talk to Ken Heeling, but it looked like the sudden surge in attendance hadn't included him. I could wait until the afternoon; I was sure he would show up at least once today or tomorrow, but my nerves might not be able to take it if it was much longer than that. I had enough of my own work to do in any case; new clients who wanted something rushed before the January sales, and didn't have any idea what was a realistic timescale. I wanted to focus on the Claughton contract now; it was the biggest our department had seen in years. But I knew that wasn't something I had any power over, so I had to do whatever was thrown at me by the monkeys in Sales Incoming.

The morning was uneventful. Everyone was sitting at their desks with their head down, focusing on their own work. Nobody wanted to be coming in late at Christmas to get their work finished. About the only thing I noticed worthy of comment was that Carter was working just as hard as anybody else. Her fingers were flying across the keyboard, a constant staccato tap that was probably faster than my own typing speed. From anyone else in the office, I might have recommended some kind of recognition for a fast worker. But Carter had recently been an intern, and didn't have a permanent project assignment. Most of her work involved checking emails from various middle-managers and copying things into the right forms and databases. There was no reason she would be typing for two or three minutes straight without pausing to check the document she was transcribing. And there was no sign of paperwork on the young woman's desk. She was probably on one of those Internet chat rooms, Xchat or Talktap or whatever it was called, looking industrious while paying no attention at all to the work that supported her lifestyle.

"Morning, Belle," I greeted her, and she immediately stopped typing. I saw her fingers fly in an instant to yank her ID card out of the slot behind her keyboard; locking the computer in an instant. A sure sign of guilt. "What are you working on?"

"Personal project," she shrugged. "Can I help you with something?"

"You looked busy. I wondered if it was work related or not."

"It's not. But all my work is done, and policy is that I can work on whatever I want while waiting for the next email. I'm sure you know that, right?"

I couldn't argue; it was perfectly true. Most of the new employees didn't know that, unless they'd been very careful reading their employee handbooks, but she seemed to know the rules. There were rumours that she'd been hired through nepotism, some friend of her parents giving her a first job straight out of high school a few years before, so it was no surprise that she knew all the right answers.

"Yeah," I admitted. "Just so long as your work gets done. Can you do me a favour? I want to get in touch with the Regal. The cinema. We've had a few movie nights for people in the office now, and I know I've left it kind of late to organise one for Christmas, but I was hoping we could ask them for something in the new year. Help the team feel more like a family, you know? Can you check if it's possible for us to book a screen, and see if we can get that Shaaark! movie that they're showing at present. I know it's out of the ordinary, but I think some people here might appreciate it.