With love, your dearest hater

Chapter 9 (Past)

It's Thursday morning. Dave still didn't contact me. At this point, I think he sees me as a poor little girl who desperately needed the help and he did what he was supposed to. Maybe he didn't even want the contact, he clearly said on the note "door's unlocked". Rationally speaking this can mean one of two things: 1) Door's unlocked so when you wake up, just leave. My job here is done or; 2) Door's unlocked cause I don't wanna want you to be scared when you wake up in a stranger's bedroom and feel like you're trapped. I would be grateful for either one of them, but for some reason I wanna dig deeper. Deep inside I want it to be the second option.

I got to the office nearly an hour ago, haven't exchanged a single word with Charlie yet. He has been in the meeting room ever since, holding a zoom call with what I imagine is an important client. That can't be good, must be something really important. Probably a high level conversation and without any prior warnings. Usually Charlie gives me a heads up or even makes me join the meetings to learn something from it. Not today.

On Sunday night, I worked my ass off to deliver the deck to that stupid ass client. Since then, he has flooded me with follow up questions. My week has been hell on earth. The fun part is that all these questions have been coming from the partner that put me on that tight schedule, none of his juniors have written me ever since. I hear there have been serious personnel cuts all over the market, maybe that's why. He doesn't have anyone else to delegate this to and is taking the job upon his hands. Suits him, to actually work for a change.

When I hit open on my outlook, there isn't a single email from DG Partners. Thank god! Finally the interview is over. That's weird, but weird good. Not weird weird. Now I finally have time to focus on my assignments. I see Charlie approaching the desk. Worry fills out his expression. He sits down and lets out a sigh.

"Morning boss! Anything cooking?" - I ask him cheerful trying to block what I feel will be a flood of small tasks and negativity. That's Charlie, he swings between extremely cheerful and extremely negative. Lately he's been the latter, something clearly is not so good at home. But as much as I like him, it's not my problem and I shouldn't have to calculate my steps around it. But I do, because I like him and I want to keep my job.

"Morning Noelle" - he says very dryly. Uh oh not good - "I take you noticed I was in a meeting until now, right? So, it was DG Partners" - shit, shit, shit. I make a mental check of everything I sent them up until yesterday night, I don't recall any red flags. They are a small client, I did respond to everything, maybe not too cheerfully, but 100% not disrespectfully. I know they can be a way for me to leverage my career. I wait for what it comes next.

"Yes, sir" - I acknowledge so that he continues.

"You know both the partners are old friends of mine. We've worked on many projects together in the day. We catch up every now and then. Today was one of these days, they have been growing steadily and one of them mentioned you two were working together a lot" - working together?? As in I work and he criticizes my work? Fucking asshole. What a piece of shit.

"Oh yes, we have" - I lie - "My understanding is that they still lack the fundamentals on their databases, so I'm just helping them with what our company has to offer. Like you told me to in the past" - I add, covering my ass in case I'm sharing too much information.

"Exactly, and you should do that" - he continues, thinking hard of something - "but it's finally time to put a face to the name, you know. They requested a meeting with the both of us tonight over dinner. I take you're free" - ok now even Charlie thinks I'm a lonely looser. ha.

"Yes, I am free. I'll send the invites. Any preferred location? Who has to be included on it?" - I ask, already putting out my little notebook to note it down.

"No need, they said they would send the invite over to me. I'll forward to you, no worries. Apparently they invest in this one big fund that own restaurant chains and we're gonna visit one of them" - He continuous already getting back to work, looking through this inbox - "Yep, there it is! You know these guys are still fairly small, so at the place they are taking us to. Clearly to impress us, sell us on their growth, brace yourself Noelle. They are gonna ask for something big, this isn't out of nowhere" - he continues pensively, cutting the conversation short. Looks like he was more telling himself all of these last bits.

"Sure, Charlie! Thanks for letting me know, I'll be there" - I get my head back to my screen and already see that Charlie forwarded the invite. I click and open it. Oh ok, wow. It's a three Michelin start restaurant on Columbus Circle, contemporary cuisine. I've never step foot on a restaurant as fancy as this one seems to be. Moreover, I most definitely would've dressed up a bit better. I'm in work clothes, not too shabby, but would never be my first choice.

I'm puzzled, what can we offer these guys that we haven't already? I have been to several meetings over dinner like this, but never as fancy. Also, usually it's the other way around, we never get invited, we always are the ones who invite. Yeah, whatever, will just wait and see how it unfolds.