“Molly!”
“What?”
“What are you talking about? What meeting? I didn’t agree to any meeting. It’s not time yet. I’ve got—” Harcourt glanced at his watch, and his eyes moved to the ceiling as he calculated his remaining days.
Molly waved her chubby arm to get his attention. “Thirty-two days, I know. That’s what I told Bianca.”
“Who’s that?”
“Peter’s new assistant. Apparently, Beatrice Rhodes left the company.”
Harcourt’s eyebrow lifted at that news. Beatrice Rhodes had been his executive assistant for over seven years, and she was the best on the planet. When he’d left Peter Talbert in charge of his company until he got back, he thought Beatrice would stay with him. Then when he got back, Peter would go back to his old position and find a new admin.
Harcourt rubbed his hand over his growing stubble, wondering what had caused her to leave. Had it been her idea to go, or Peter’s? He had a sudden pang of guilt for pushing away everyone that had been a part of his life. He thought that perhaps she might have become ill, and he didn’t even know about it. Harcourt shook away the thought. He wasn’t supposed to worry about these things. He wasn’t supposed to even know about them.
Harcourt took a steadying breath. “What is the purpose of this meeting?”
“I’d tell you, but Bianca wouldn’t say much. Something about getting you prepared, I think.”
Harcourt wanted to tell Molly to call back this “Bianca” woman back and have her pass along a message to Peter Talbert that he had no intention of doing any work before the sun set on his last day, and if they didn’t like his position on the matter, then they could kindly go fuck themselves. But he held back, partly because Molly didn’t seem like the kind of woman who would appreciate such colorful language, and partly because as he considered it a little longer, it made sense that he’d need some time to prepare for his return.
His old friend Peter had flown in from wherever he’d been to stand with him during those darkest first days. Peter kept the press and other people away when Harcourt could barely inhale, let alone think about the company he was supposed to run. In the week after he buried his wife and only son, Peter hammered out the details, allowing Harcourt the opportunity to have an extended sabbatical from the firm. Peter took over as acting president and CEO so that Harcourt could go back to his home in Canada and have a chance to grieve without any business distractions. The board only wanted to give Harcourt six months, but Peter convinced them to give him a year—six months for each family member lost.
For just under eleven months Harcourt had done exactly that—stayed out of the world of his company and tried to heal. And not once during his time off did he have to deal with anything related to his company. He’d not been inclined, nor compelled to give a single shit about anything going on in his company. It was a complete 180-degree turnaround from the way it used to be, when the drive to keep growing his company bigger and bigger seemed to consume his every waking thought.
As much as he wanted to refuse this meeting—and to make them hold to every hour of his full one-year off—Harcourt understood that they wouldn’t just allow him to saunter into his office on the first day of August and hand over the helm to the mighty ship. Not when he couldn’t state the ship’s current position, or its bearing. Not when he had no sense whatsoever of any dangers lurking beneath the waves.
And it wasn’t just company details he’d blocked from his mind in the last eleven months. He’d also deliberately completely ignored and remained blissfully unaware of what was happening in the world. He read no newspapers, nor watched the television news nor listened to the radio. Other than to pop in a DVD of a movie occasionally, or to use the internet to order mosaic materials for the cottage project, Harcourt had avoided technology and the media as much as possible.
And when he did use his computer, which wasn’t very often, he averted his eyes at the first glimmer of a headline. For all he knew, the President of the United States could have been impeached in the last eleven months and replaced by a communist cross-dresser from Austin, Texas.
Other than the occasional accidental slip-up made by Molly when she came to do his laundry or cook his meals and she’d mention something she’d heard in the news, he was in the dark, even about the most basic details regarding his company.
Per the terms of the bereavement leave agreement approved by the Board, Harcourt’s only commitments to the company were a two-minute phone call with Peter at the beginning of each quarter. The primary purpose of the call was to assure the board that Harcourt was still alive. The calls never lasted more than two minutes, and Peter’s short report regarding the company, rarely varied, the same one sentence summary, always along the lines of “The company is doing great.” No specifics, no numbers, no details of any kind. Just like Harcourt had wanted.
But that was before, and this was now. They needed to prep him, so he wouldn’t fight it. Most likely, this would be the first of many such meetings to come.
After Molly left to get ready for her trip, he presumed, Harcourt went upstairs to take her advice and get presentable for the conference call. As he decided on a suit, shirt, and tie, he imagined how the meeting would go. In a large conference room at corporate headquarters, Peter and the rest of his executive staff would be seated in a room waiting for him to come online. The minute they saw him, they’d probably clap, maybe even give him a standing ovation. After that, Peter would probably express their sincere condolences for his loss on behalf of everyone in the room.
Harcourt would nod somberly and then they’d get down to business. Peter would start by presenting charts and graphs, highlighting the numbers of the company’s great success in the year he was off. Then the others would take turns, presenting their various divisions and regions, and drill down how each had contributed to the company’s continued success. They’d be touting their personal contributions, gathering brownie points for his return, making sure that he noticed them.
Harcourt stepped into his shower, allowing the water to fall over his head and face as he bent his neck back. As the water showered over the tense muscles in his neck, a melancholy grew up in the steam, thickening the water and darkening his mood. His time off and leave-of-absence would soon be over, and something had been nagging at him, doubts lingering in the recesses at the bottom of the closet in his mind. He hadn’t been able to put his finger on what was troubling him, but as he finished soaping himself off and went in for another rinse, it suddenly became clear.
He was worried about going back to work. Worried that people would expect too much from him. Worried that they’d expect him to come back as if he were good as new, or perhaps even better than before—as if the horrible tragedy had toughened him and made him stronger. As if being stripped of his emotional ties in the world would make him an unstoppable force in the business arena.
He tried to picture himself back in the saddle, the nobleman of business improving the country’s global position as he manipulated and reshaped commerce and industry again. He snorted at the absurdity of it. “Yeah, like that’s going to happen,” he said to himself as he stepped out of the shower, then reached for a towel.