Quite Quitting

Quietly Quitting Life

Shawn ended up being my guardian angel. Even though the job he had talked to Alex about was no longer available, he took me on as his temporary secretary till a new position at the company opened up.

"My secretary is on maternity leave, so work with me for now. Then I'll get you situated in something more permanent," He told me in the car outside the strip club. So I agreed, wanting something to help me keep this numbness.

Since many teams Shawn worked with were all connected to Mr. Tribecc's company, I was exposed to it at one point or another while working at LongD. So I jumped in and did what I did best—become a very useful asset.

Shawn started relying on me to run meetings and talk through contract negotiations on the second day. After that, I was working 23 hours a day again. Shawn, who tried to get me to stop the first few days, eventually joined me in hitting the pavement.

"I will be the best lawyer in the world if we keep this up." So he commented one day when we were working out of a conference room in the New York office for the Tribecc foundation.

Then a LongD meeting appeared on our calendar a few weeks after I worked for Shawn. He insisted I sit this one out. I resisted the idea. After all, no one knew better than me the ins and out of LongD. Thankfully, Alex was not part of the meeting, and his father was the only one who joined us. "My son wants me to buy the company. Can we draft up a contract for that?" He asked.

"Sure!" Shawn said.

"Charlotte, please be involved in this project. You are going to be the bridge between the two companies." He asked.

"Okay!" I said.

So he was selling the company. Good! It was a useless piece of shit anyways. That was the only reaction my heart allowed before it let the same numbness that had followed me since that day set in. I hadn't cried since then. I hadn't slept, eaten, or even remembered drinking water some days. I wanted to do nothing but work because I felt nothing, even more, when I did.

Finally, on my third week, he was to come in and sign the contract once it was drafted after a few changes Alex had requested. At that point, I had worked for three days straight, sleeping maybe 30 minutes here and there and eating scraps I found lying around the apartment or office. Due to this, a long cold had also settled into my chest, causing me to cough and sneeze several times throughout the day. I had permanently sounded sickly lately.

Shawn, who saw me fixing an email he was about to send, came up to me that morning and demanded I go home, sleep and shower. "Make him remember what he gave up."

"I don't want to make him remember anything," I warily said.

"Okay, then, rest before I get in trouble with labor laws."

So I did. I was now sitting at my apartment dining table, checking emails on my phone while playing with the cereal bowl in front of me. I didn't feel like eating as always.

"Oh my god, your home?" Sugar, unbeknown to me, had come inside. I guess she had just finished work.

"Yup. Eating and leaving soon."

"Is this Shawn guy working you just as hard as—" she stopped. She hasn't said Alex's name since I briefly told her we broke up and asked her not to bombard me with questions. "You know who."

"Nope, Shawn is nice. He is the one who suggested I go home and rest." I said, reading an email sent by a vendor calling us liars for updating one of their contacts.

"Have you seen him since?" Sugar asked cautiously.

"Here and there. Alex comes to talk to his father, so I've seen him walk past me." Now reading an email from David from LongD asking to revise the section where half the money should go to the Valerie Foundation, whose name Alex wanted to change to Valerie and Glenn. "Oofph, rich people have a lot of foundations," I said out loud.