one
Blinking is underrated. At least I think so. Not only does it keep your eyes from drying out, it serves as a momentary break from unpleasant sights and sensations. Harsh sunlight, a gory scene in a horror movie, a sudden gust of dust-ridden air. Close your eyes, and for a second, you’re safe and shielded.
I blink to protect my eyes from the blinding white figure invading my peripheral vision. Behind the black of my lids, I feel relief. As soon as my eyes open again, the nagging brightness is back, whiter than ever.
That whiteness is a pale coworker I don’t particularly care for. I pretend like I can’t see him. It’s no big deal. I fake almost everything else when I’m here.
I have to as a twenty-six-year-old woman working at a power tool distributor called Nuts & Bolts. The company is staffed mostly by middle-aged gruff men who prefer to plaster their cubicle walls with photos of bikini models rather than pictures of their wives or girlfriends. On any given workday, I shift between a limited range of fake emotions: confidence, assertiveness, boldness. I am none of these outside of work. If I were my real self, I’d be roadkill.
When I took this job two years ago, I ingrained fakeness into my work DNA. From 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, I force myself to be steely and unflappable. There’s no room for softness here. Everything is literally nuts and bolts, hard metals, gears, blades. The parking lot is gravel. The halls are covered in a film of dust and dirt.
I have to be hard because working here is no walk in the park. Like when the managers nearing retirement age mansplain information I already know but never do the same to the male employees. Or whenever new hires in the warehouse ask me if I have a boyfriend seconds after they meet me. My pretend toughness—boss-bitch mode, I call it—keeps it mostly at bay. That, along with a strict anti–sexual harassment policy.
Why would I work in such a place? Because things like money, food, and shelter are important to me. Also because a journalism degree only goes so far when you don’t actually want to be a journalist.
And to be honest, I like the work. I’m a copywriter who somehow managed to secure my own tiny office in a building full of shared work spaces. I write descriptions about power tools. I manipulate words all day, every day. I make the most industrial, harsh objects sound enticing. I falsify how interesting they are, which is easy for a faker like me.
We all do it. Feigned interest in conversations. Phony hair color. Dishonest proclamations about penis length. Fake orgasms. I’m guilty of that one too.
Fake can be empowering. It’s human nature. It’s necessary.
And then there’s Tate Rasmussen, the pale figure bleeding into my line of sight. The one person at Nuts & Bolts whose presence doesn’t require me to pretend. I feel genuine emotions for him, all of which are rooted in frustration, anger, and irritation.
Thankfully, we reside in separate offices. The downside? His office is diagonally across the hall from mine, which means I have an unobscured view of half his face—just as he does of mine—forty hours a week. Only a narrow hallway and two flimsy doors—the equivalent of four paces—separate us.
Shutting the doors would offer more privacy, but neither of our shoebox offices contains vents. Unless we want to roast in the summer or freeze in the winter, we have to keep our doors open.
Tate’s in charge of social media for the company. It’s an amusing example of irony, as he is one of the most antisocial and eerily quiet people I’ve ever met. Luckily, we don’t interact much. Most of our communication is done via email. Face-to-face words are not often exchanged unless it is to bicker or criticize.
Most days I can ignore him, but this afternoon is proving to be a challenge because I’m enduring Tate’s loud pen tapping. When he’s not typing or on the phone, it’s tap, tap, tap, all day, every day.
“Be quiet, please,” I say.
He scribbles something on a sheet of paper before crumpling it and tossing it on my desk, zero trace of emotion on his face. I open it to find a “NO” scrawled in black ink, taunting me. Already I can feel the heat making its way to my face.
That’s Tate. Cold, calculating, and hostile. His rude, dismissive behavior is his currency, and I’m the store he chooses to shop at. I’m paid in frowns, grimaces, scowls, and blank stares.
He’s never once stepped foot in my office. I’m convinced it’s yet another one of his passive-aggressive digs at me, since he waltzes with confidence through every other space in this building. The closest he’s ever gotten is hovering around my doorway. I wonder what it would take for him to cross that invisible boundary. Would I need to be choking with bloodshot eyes, begging for him to administer the Heimlich?
I toss the paper into the trash can. It wasn’t always this way. Before he started, I was asked by the hiring manager to email him a product catalog so he could familiarize himself with the inventory. His reply was nothing short of impressive.
Emmie,
Thank you for the helpful information. I’m told working quarters will be tight, but I’ve also heard many wonderful things about you. Looking forward to sharing space with one of Nuts & Bolts’ finest.
Sincerely,
Tate Rasmussen
On his first day, I skipped into his office, mesmerized. I couldn’t help it. I was a moth drawn in by the glow of his white skin, his curly blond locks, broad shoulders, that sharp jaw. This handsome stranger looked so different from me, with my olive complexion and dark hair.
When I introduced myself, disgust and horror filled his face. Lines jutted into his forehead and his eyebrows pinched together, aging his late-twenties face in an instant. Had we passed each other on the street, he would have shrieked at the sight of me and run the other way.
He weakly shook my hand, then directed his attention back to his paperwork. His instant rebuff hurt, but I chalked it up to first-day-of-work nerves. It wasn’t. Every attempt at polite small talk, every invite to lunch was met with rejection.
And then I overheard him on the phone. Through his cracked-open door, I heard, “I don’t even know what to say about her. It’s only been a week.”
I froze. I should have plugged my ears or shoved in my headphones, but I couldn’t.
“Just looking at her . . .” Disdain dripped from his voice. “I don’t know how long I’ll be able to deal.”
So that was it. We would never, ever like each other.
I had no idea what I did to turn him sour so quickly. I should have confronted him, but I didn’t have the strength. I was humiliated, going out of my way to welcome someone who hated me instantly for some unknown reason. From that afternoon, I quit engaging him unless it was a work-related issue and he was the only one who could help. We fell into a pattern of ignoring and arguing with each other.