“One moment, please.”
Apparently, my name was recognizable enough that I didn’t even need to finish the sentence. This was good. Very good.
The hold music cut out and a man came on the line. “Melanie?”
“Yes. Hello.”
“Hey, it’s great to hear from you. My name is Johnny Holder.” An echo rang through the line. It sounded like he was on speakerphone. “I’m the CEO of Fluttr. I’m joined here in the room by my Chief Strategy Officer, Will Hertz, and my VP of Product, Mitch Lansford.”
A chorus of faceless men said, “Hi.”
“Uh, hi. Nice to...meet...you all,” I said.
“You’re probably wondering why we’ve contacted you. So let’s cut right to the chase. JerkAlert is hot. We want it, we want you, let’s do this.”
This was moving faster than I’d anticipated.
“What do you say?” This guy was insistent. What did he say his name was again?
I opened my mouth, hoping one of the five thousand questions floating around in my brain might come sailing out. But all I managed to say was, “Okay.”
“Okay, great! Listen, let’s get you out here to the office to discuss logistics...” He trailed off, his voice lowering as he addressed his colleagues in the room. “When are you guys free? What’re your schedules like?” After some unintelligible mumbling, he came back with a forceful, “Tomorrow at noon.”
“Um...that sounds good, but you know I’m in New York, right?”
“Yeah, no problem. Sheila will hook you up with a flight out of JFK tonight.”
Wow. So this is what life was like at a big Silicon Valley tech firm. Cross-country flights booked hours in advance. No biggie.
“Sound good?” he asked.
I wasn’t sure; I hadn’t had a chance to think about it. This guy was asking me to make a tremendous decision in a matter of seconds. Almost like the Fluttr app itself.
But I couldn’t keep him waiting. What if he had second thoughts, and realized JerkAlert actually wasn’t all that hot? I had to pounce, now, before this opportunity passed me by.
“Sounds good,” I said.
“Fantastic. I’m gonna shoot you over to Sheila now—she’ll help you work out all the travel stuff, the flight, the hotel, the whatever. We’re looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.”
“Likewise.”
While hold music chimed in my ear, someone started pounding on the conference room door.
“The room is occupied,” I called.
Muffled yells resounded from the hallway, followed by more pounding. I tried my best to ignore it as Sheila came back on the line, telling me she’d booked me on a direct flight to SFO at 7:25 p.m., with a reservation at the Westin in Union Square for the evening.
“Feel free to charge whatever meals or services you’d like to the hotel room. A car will be by to pick you up at 11:30 tomorrow morning.”
“Thank you so much,” I said. “See you then.”
I ended the call and ran to the door, flinging it open to see Greg on the other end, one meaty fist balled up and ready to pound. “What are you doing?” I said. “I told you, the room was occupied.”
“It’s 12:30. We booked this room for the next two hours. Check the office calendar.”
At his mention of the word we, I glanced over his shoulder. Alex was standing behind him, looking in every direction but mine. Instantly, I was overcome with regret for breaking the golden rule of dating: never shit where you eat. Not that it mattered all that much, since I wouldn’t be eating at Hatch much longer.
“Sorry,” I said. “It’s all yours.”
“No harm, no foul,” Greg said, then winked and twisted his lips into a sickening pucker. Was he trying to make a kissy-face at me? Because it looked like he just had bad gas.
I walked away, not looking back, clenching my fists to keep my hands from shaking uncontrollably. This was all too much. The call from Fluttr, the trip to California, the unexpected hallway meeting with the one person I’d been trying to avoid. Frankly, I was impressed with myself for keeping it together.
Instead of going straight back to my cubicle, I turned left, toward the server room, where I swiped my access card and hunted down Bob. I found him in his usual spot, on the floor, looking as surly and shabby as ever.
“What are you doing in here?” he said, by way of greeting.
“Remember when you said I needed a vacation? Well, I’m taking tomorrow off.”
“You can’t. It’s Update Tuesday.”
Shit. “I need the day off. And maybe Wednesday, too.”
He made a patronizing face, sucking in his lips and raising his eyebrows. “Boy trouble got you down?”
My stomach dropped to my feet, which had somehow become soldered to the floor. How did Bob know about my breakup with Alex? How did he know I’d been involved with Alex in the first place?
“It has nothing to do with that,” I said. “I just need the time off.”
“Sorry. You can’t have it.” His eyes were already on his laptop. I’d been dismissed.
Well, fuck him.
No one was going to stop me from getting ahead. I planned to be on that plane tonight, whether Bob liked it or not.
23
I didn’t bother to finish out the day. My flight took off in less than seven hours, and there was a lot to do beforehand. Like pack a suitcase, and take the A to Howard Beach before switching to the AirTrain. Plus, the security line at JFK would undoubtedly be a nightmare. I had to hustle if I wanted to get on board before they closed the cabin doors.
After leaving the server room, I went straight to my desk to enable my out of office message, then ran for the elevator. I made it home in under twenty minutes, which was some kind of record, and found Ray inspecting our kitchen countertops.
“Hi, Melanie, how you doin’?”
“Good.” I moved toward him, but stopped abruptly when I noticed that our kitchen looked completely different. And much, much nicer. “Did you install new countertops?” I ran my hand over the cool, smooth surface. “Is this granite?”
“Nah, it’s not real.” He held up a roll of what looked like thick, shiny wrapping paper. “It’s called ‘Instant Granite.’ Pretty cool, huh? Found it on Pinterest. It’s an easy upgrade. Makes the place look nicer without spending a fortune or pissing off the landlord.”