Like I said, it really helped to have an infographic.
Manny, Nate, and Josie all held executive leadership positions in the family business as well as shares in the company. Manny was the executive vice president of plant operations, Nate was executive VP of sales, and Josie was executive VP of marketing. I was supposed to be following in their footsteps and working my way up to…something. Probably Dad had thought I’d take over as VP of sales after Nate eventually moved up to COO.
Instead, I’d ended up here. Knocked down to a job usually filled by a high school student.
As VP of marketing, Josie was responsible for the company’s branding, which included the Sheriff Scoopy mascot. That was likely why she was here right now. No doubt a report had gone up the chain of command about the scene in the park today. Anything to do with the company’s image or a potential public relations problem, Josie took extremely seriously.
Her tall, willowy frame was immaculately attired, her brown hair sleekly styled, and her gaze steady and razor-sharp as she stood in the doorway of the locker room. Josie always looked perfectly put together, because Josie always was perfectly put together, no matter what kind of crisis was happening around her.
“I never broke character while I was in costume,” I told her. “I never said a word to that kid.”
“I know.” Her mouth pulled into a smirk. “I saw the video.”
Oh god.
Of course there was video. We had security cameras all over the damn park. Nate had probably emailed it to the entire sales organization by now.
I sank down on the bench and dropped my head into my hands. “Awesome. Fantastic.”
“Are you okay?” Josie’s voice softened in sympathy. “It looked like that little brat got you right in the junk. Hopefully the padded costume gave you some protection.”
“Not enough,” I mumbled.
Josie sat down on the bench beside me. “Tanner, what are you doing here? Why are you working in the theme park?”
I turned my head to peer at her. “They didn’t tell you?”
“No, the first I heard about it was when I saw the report about the incident today.”
I knew it. I knew Josie had gotten an alert about it.
Pushing myself upright, I gripped the edge of the bench. One of my fingers encountered a calcified wad of old gum stuck to the underside, and I wiped my hand on my thighs. “I’ve been reassigned.”
She stared at me blankly. “Reassigned?”
“Fired, I guess, would be more accurate.”
“Nate fired you?”
“I think it was probably a joint decision that he and Dad came to together.” Nate had been the one to break the news, but he’d done it in Dad’s office with the two of them presenting a unified front.
“That sucks,” she said. “Let me guess—working in the park was Dad’s idea?”
“Until he figures out what to do with me.”
“So he’s punishing you.”
“Yep.”
Her shoulder bumped against mine. “Hey, at least you don’t have to work for Nate anymore.” She offered me a smile, and I exhaled a wry laugh. “Look, I love the guy, but if I had to take orders from my big brother, I’d strangle him with my bare hands within an hour.”
Josie was probably the smartest one of us, because she’d gone out and blazed her own professional trail before agreeing to work for the family business. She’d built her résumé at advertising agencies in Dallas and New York before moving back to Crowder a couple of years ago to bring all the advertising for the creamery in-house. In addition to scoring what I assumed must have been an outrageous compensation package to lure her back, it gave her leverage the rest of us didn’t have. Josie could always go somewhere else and get another job as good as or better than this one if she didn’t like the way Dad treated her.
I stared down at my hands. “Sorry I didn’t get out of the way of the vomit. I can’t seem to do anything right these days.”
She laughed. “Do you know how many times that suit has been vomited on?”
I absolutely did not want to know, although I could imagine. “Gross.”
“How do you feel about marketing?” I glanced at her and she shrugged. “Weren’t you an English major? I assume you can string words together well enough to write copy. Want to come work for me?”
“What about Dad?” I doubted he’d allow Josie to throw me a lifeline until I’d been humiliated to his satisfaction.
“I’ll handle Dad.” Josie arched a wry eyebrow as she glanced around the locker room. “Unless you’d rather stay here and play Sheriff Scoopy?”
“I’ll write whatever copy you want. I can do it.” I didn’t know anything about marketing, but I was willing to learn if it meant I never had to put that costume on again.
“Good. I happen to have an open job I need to fill.” She patted my knee and got to her feet. “Come to my office Monday morning at nine.”
“Thank you,” I said, gratitude forming a lump in my throat. “Seriously. I owe you big time.”
“Go home and take a shower. You smell like puke.”
There was just one teeny tiny little problem that didn’t occur to me until a full ten minutes later, when I was in my car driving home.
Lucy worked in marketing.
My ex and I were about to become coworkers.
2
Lucy
Could you report someone to human resources for singing the baby shark song at work?
My coworker Arwen was currently humming it out loud in the cubicle next to mine, and if that didn’t qualify as a hate crime, it ought to.
Arwen sang under her breath all the time in the office. It seemed to be an unconscious habit. The few times I’d pointed it out she’d seemed surprised she was doing it. She’d promised to cut it out, only she hadn’t.
Usually I could deal with her incessant humming by tuning it out. I’d gotten to be quite good at tuning things out. It was one of my useless superpowers, along with peeling an apple in one continuous ribbon and waking up five minutes before my alarm went off. But right now it was eight thirty on a Monday morning, I was short on sleep and coffee, and the baby shark song was definitely the most insidious earworm of all time.
I glanced at my work BFF in the cubicle on the other side of me. Linh’s head was propped on her hand so her wavy black hair masked her face from my view. As if she could feel my attention on her, she turned toward me, pushing her red glasses up her nose as we exchanged a look of mutual exasperation. That was one of Linh’s superpowers—always knowing when I was telepathically trying to communicate with her.
I clicked over to the company’s internal communications app and typed a direct message to her.
Is there a baby shark song exception to murder? Because there should be.
It could be worse, she replied.
How???
She could be singing “It’s a Small World.”
RUDE, LINH. REALLY HATEFUL.
I heard her snort at her desk and directed my most maleficent glare at her—which, admittedly, was not all that scary. A Disney villain I was not. My small stature, yellow-blonde hair, and freckled face undermined my fearsomeness.