Refresh man

CHAPTER 5

 

         Jane meets up with Vice General Manager Arthur Christilo after Carolina  helps her arrange a meeting. Jane manages to obtain a meeting with Vice General Manager Arthur, but it doesn't result in a renewal of the contract for Venus.

Venus's declining sales figures for the past few years is what Jane uses to convince Vice General Manager to give Venus soap another chance. She says,though the sales figures are declining, they aren't declining particularly badly. Vice General Manager expresses the sales figures should have been worse, he tells  Jane that the sales figures of Venus that she speaks of declining, but not declining particularly badly is due to John Locke's—or rather—his charitable efforts. It's with his help of giving Venusto nursing homes that has brought these figures to a declining trend that isn't too bad. And it's the good and close business relationship Mary Jacob has with him that prevented Venus from being removed from the shelves for two years as he speaks of time and again bailing her out of problems.

      Jane asks for a chance. She expresses her determination with promising to be there whenever he needs her to be there and will be on call 24/7 at the store if need be. But, it's no use. Vice General Manager Arthur seems to speak of the importance of building a great rapport with their business partners for things to be fruitful—just as Mary had said to Jane  after she gave Vice General Manager Arthur a message if he had time to meet with her so Jane could speak to him—when he asks why this seemingly important matter about Venus had not gotten Mary to come to the meeting to handle herself—why a rookie like Jane was present in this meeting with him, instead. He tells Jane they will have to fend for themselves then leaves.

Jane goes to Carolina with the hope of having a meeting with Director Jack Rosseau. The trip only sees Austin tell her off for not using her brain.

After the unsuccessful meeting with Vice General Manager Arthur, Jane goes to Carolina to see Director Jack . She comes across the obstacle of his secretary who uses methods well-known to her to brush her off. The secretary asks Jane to just leave her business card and the director will get in contact with her if he wishes to. Jane  doesn't do so, knowing that doing so will only see her business card thrown out and her chance to save  and Sales Team 3 will be gone. She uses trickery to get past the secretary: she pretends one of her contacts has popped out. She asks the secretary to help her look for it. The secretary begins to help look for her contacts. Meanwhile, Jane slowly breaks away from her. But it doesn't work. The secretary catches Jane and threatens to call security if she doesn't leave. Jane agrees to do so.

Jane doesn't leave, though. She hides herself behind a cleaning trolley and wheels it to get to where she needs to go. She doesn't get anywhere when Austin finds the cleaning trolley oddly moving and puts a hand on the hand rail to stop it. Jane  thinks the secretary has found her. She utters amazement of the secretary being able to find her out before saying she will leave. Both Jane and Austin are surprised to find each other there when Jane pops up from behind the cleaning trolley.

Austin takes Jane aside. Her methods are brainless, Austin expresses. He pleads her to use her brain before acting. She's a mere salesperson who can only hold Director Jack back to have a face-to-face meeting unlike him who is able to directly meet up with him was Jane's defense for her actions. Austin  only finds it to be an excuse and exits, unimpressed.

Jane gets informed by Director Jack's secretary that Austin hadn't made a mention of Venus  and only talked about the company's new revitalising mask product. Jane sees this as Austin's lack of regard for Venus soap. Angered, she steps in front of the car Austin rides in to stop it.

Jane is unharmed, but pretends to be. Seemingly, she wishes to see if Austin is human and possesses a heart: she lays herself down onto the ground, closes her eyes and waits for Austin to get to her. He is human and does possess a heart: he says for Jane to not joke around as he brings her head up to lean against his arm. He says Jane's name many times to the limp and unresponsive Jane. He barks at Lily to quickly call for an ambulance. When Austin returns back to look at Jane, he finds Jane's deathly cold glare looking up at him.

"You cold-blooded monster," Jane says to Austin. "You actually have a heart." Jane  gets up and out of Austin's arms. Angrily, she asks him why he didn't help Venus get a second chance when he could have in the meeting with Director Jack. Austin only tells her off for playing the terrible joke she played on him and says she will regret knowing him if she does it again. Being fired seems to be what Jane reads from Austin's words. "You can fire me if you want to fire me. There's no need for so much nonsense!" Jane  retorts. However,Austin reminds her that it's not only her alone that he can fire. He can also fire the rest of her colleagues in Sales Team 3. She says, "The one who's not afraid of death is the strongest. I will not let you have the chance to fire me. Never."

Jane lets go of her pride. She goes to Austin for his help. Austin offers Jane sales training. When Austin has Jane come up with a way to reach a sales figure and Jane uses her sex appeal as the method, Austin calls her effort terrible and brainless. Jane gets fed up and gives up playing the game he's controlling.

Jane lets off steam at a food and drink restaurant with her best friend, Gunish. Here, Gunish, convinces Jane that the pride Jane says she can't let go of has no where to go and it's just the better move to go to Austin's place, ring his doorbell and satisfy his childish ways to save Venus. Jane does. Drunk, she rings Austin's doorbell and offers to allow Austin to order her around for seven days to save Venus. This trip doesn't bring any results. Her drunken state only has Austin water her down in the shower—clothed, and her returning back to her home in his clothes without any progress. But some time after she gets home from Austin's place, she gets a message from Austin: accept training from him, dress appropriately and report at his place at 6 am the next day with the products.

The training brings Jane to first clear leaves from his swimming pool—a task Jane isn't happy about doing. She thinks Austin is petty again. It is something she had supervised Austin doing back in high school. The training begins. He brings her to sell the Venus soaps on the street. This ends up with her and Austin making a run and hiding from the police from being caught doing this illegal activity. A short time of this help hands-off help from Austin, Jane is let off the leash to, again, go think on her own on how to sell the Venus  soaps—only now, she has an unreasonable sales figure target to meet as Austin gives her one and it has to be meet by the next day.