Company (33 page)

“Look, he came up and started bugging me. I didn't have time to deal with him. I just told him.” She comes around the desk. “He had to find out eventually, Jones. It was cruel to keep him in the dark like that.”

“You didn't mind before! Jesus, you strung him along for six months before today!”

“Well, before now, he had a chance.” She smiles and tilts her head, in a way Jones usually finds cute. “But now . . .” She reaches for his tie.

Jones pushes her hand away. It's like flicking a switch: Eve's face turns to stone. A second passes, then another. They stare at each other, mentally feeling out the shifting ground.

Eve says softly, “Don't ever touch me like that.”

Jones looks to his right. Freddy is still watching them through the glass, but as Jones's gaze meets his, he turns away.

Jones says, “Apologize.”

“For what? For not keeping that we're screwing each other a secret?” Jones winces. He is well aware of the security cameras, the hidden microphones, the snarl of wiring that connects them all to level 13. “For telling Freddy that his best friend in Zephyr is lying to him?”

“Don't you dare tell me this is a lesson.”

Eve raises her eyebrows. “Why? Do you need one?”

“Fuck you.”

“Done that,” she says.

Freddy is already gone when Jones exits the lobby doors. He squints in the sunshine and catches a glimpse of Freddy's back disappearing around the corner of the building. Jones breaks into a run. Freddy is walking at a fast clip, but Jones catches him next to the new Smokers' Corral, under the big, painted eyes of cartoon cows. “Freddy!”

Freddy turns. There's a smile on his face, or, rather, a gruesome, twisted attempt at a smile. “Hey, Jones.”

“Freddy, I am so sorry—”

“No, no, it's okay. Really. You don't have to say anything. I mean, it's not like she was ever going to go for me anyway. Holly was right. I'm not the kind of guy who gets girls like Eve. I'm the guy who hasn't been promoted once in five years.” He lets out a short bark of a laugh. “So it's all good. You just saved me forty bucks a week in flowers.”

“Freddy, you're not that guy. You're better than that. You're better than this place deserves.” This comes out with real venom, but he can tell from Freddy's expression that he thinks Jones is just being polite, which inflames him even more. “Freddy, this place is wrong. It has to change. It
has
to.” And then the words just pop out: “And if Senior Management won't change it, we have to overthrow them.”

Freddy says, “What?”

“We need a rebellion. A revolution. A resistance. To make Zephyr Holdings a good place to work again.” Jones hesitates, unsure if Zephyr ever was a good place to work. “Why can't the company care about you? Why doesn't it give a shit? You're not a resource, you're a
person.
This company is hollowing itself out. It's mined too deep into its own employees. We need change, not just because that's what we deserve but because that's the only thing that will save Zephyr from eating itself.”

“Jones, you sound a little crazy.”

“Why can't the company be better? Only because Senior Management doesn't want it to be. That's the key: control of Senior Management. If the workers act together, we can get that. How could they stop us? We're the company. We just need to unite. We need to form a union.”

Freddy blinks.

Jones says, “Or let's go back to ‘resistance.'”

“Resistance is better.”

“So are you in?”

Freddy holds up his hands. “Jones, I get what you're saying. And, yeah, it'd be nice if things were better. But it's not going to happen. First, it takes three weeks' notice in this place to organize a meeting. Second, as soon as Human Resources finds out what you're doing, they'll toss you out of the building.”

“I know.” Jones licks his lips. “But I have a plan.”

Freddy's gaze drifts to the Smokers' Corral. Two people are headed over there now; they walk inside and take seats at the wooden bench, feeling in their pockets for cigarettes. “Is this plan going to get me fired?”

“No.”

He looks back at Jones. “You promise?”

“I swear it.” And in this moment he really means it; he means it with all his heart.

“Okay,” Freddy says. “Let's hear it.”

Holly sits alone in a small meeting room off the lobby. There is an open folder and some scattered pages on the table in front of her, but these are just props in case someone peers through the little window in the door behind her. She's not actually meeting anyone.

She didn't expect to do this again. Not after Roger assigned her the gym—the gym!—the one place in Zephyr Holdings that makes any sense to her whatsoever. Forty-five minutes ago, she saw her red voice-mail light blinking, and dialed in to discover that Roger had called.

“Holly. After some further investigation, I've found we're unable to keep the gym. It turns out it's just not cost-effective. This news will come as a disappointment to you, I'm sure, but you know how these things are. I hope you understand it's nothing to do with you; you would have done a great job. Come see me if any of this is unclear.”

So he didn't actually say,
You're a fool and I took advantage of your stupidity to find out who took my donut,
but Holly heard the message clearly enough. By the time she got the phone back in its cradle, everything was burning: her eyes, her ears, her heart. Elizabeth was sitting behind her in the cubicle, and Holly didn't dare turn around for fear that Elizabeth would see her and ask what was wrong. Instead she stayed rigid in the same position and swallowed over and over. But there was something thick and bitter rising in her throat, and it was, she realized, going to pop out of her in a completely humiliating sob, so she grabbed a random folder from her desk, hugged it to her chest, and stood up. Elizabeth glanced at her face—her red, sweaty, swelling face—and her lips parted in surprise, and behind them, Holly knew, was a question she couldn't face, so she ran out of the cubicle. The first three lobby meeting rooms were full, and she began to panic that she was about to have a wet, messy breakdown right there in the lobby, under the curious eyes of passing co-workers. But the last one was free, thank God, and she hauled open the door and threw herself inside. She sat with her back to the door so nobody could see her face and let herself go.

She supposes she must be an idiot. This is the kind of thing that Freddy would have seen coming a mile away. He probably did see it coming and that's why he was so hard on her. She can't bear to imagine Freddy's reaction. She doesn't want to see disappointment in his eyes.

There's a knock at the door.
“Busy!”
she calls, her voice shrill. But the door clicks open.
“Busy!
Do you mind?”

“It's me.”

She freezes. “Freddy, I'm in the middle of something here.”

“Sorry.” There's a pause.

“So you heard.”

“Yeah. Sorry, Holly. Roger's a dick.”

“I'm actually meeting people.” She straightens her folder. “They'll be here any minute.”

She hears him shift his feet. “Holly, Jones and I are doing something . . . I can't explain it here. But can you come outside for a second? It's important.”

“Sure. Just let me finish my meeting. Okay?”

There's silence. Then Freddy does something completely shocking, something she would never have expected and which could get him fired: he bends down and kisses her lightly on the cheek.

At 4:10
P.M.,
one-page questionnaires appear throughout the Zephyr building. They are on Zephyr Holdings stationery, titled
STAFF SATISFACTION SURVEY.
Most people don't see where they come from. Others catch sight of one of three figures, flitting between the cubicles: a kid in a beautiful ash-gray suit, a short dark-haired man with glasses, and a young blond woman with incredibly toned calves. Nobody can put a name to them, but they're vaguely familiar, in the way that almost everyone in Zephyr Holdings is. The employees pick up their questionnaires and begin to read.

Thank you for participating in the Zephyr Holdings company-wide Staff Satisfaction Survey. Your feedback will be used to measure how effectively the company is providing a productive and rewarding workplace, and to improve working conditions for all employees.

Please do not write any identifying information on this questionnaire. Your responses are anonymous.

This elicits a few derisive snorts. The employees are familiar with Zephyr's version of “anonymous” feedback. They've provided anonymous feedback before, only to be contacted by their managers for further clarification. They've had confidential discussions that ended up in their permanent record. They scour the questionnaires for tiny ID numbers and hidden watermarks.

Q1: Do you feel that Zephyr Holdings is a good place to work?

Cynical laughter pops and crackles through the building. “Check out question one,” they tell each other. The only thing more amazing than the catalog of brutal methods the company uses to demean its workers is that it thinks it's helping. Not that the employees are going to say this. Positive feedback is taken very seriously, often ending up in annual reports, but negative feedback leads to HR investigations into employee attitude problems. So the staff, or at least those who have been in the company more than five minutes, scribble down the expected responses, sprinkled with phrases such as “team-oriented environment” and “opportunities” and “productive.” When they see interns writing honest opinions, like “I have worked here six months and haven't seen anyone from Senior Management yet,” or “Nobody has explained what the consolidation was for yet or why,” or “This survey is the first hint I've seen that Zephyr Holdings is actually aware of such a thing as staff satisfaction,” they gently still their pens; they sit them down and educate them.

Q2: What could be done, in your opinion, to improve the working conditions at Zephyr Holdings?

This raises eyebrows. Men and women congregate in huddles. That's a trick question, right? Does the company really want them to say “Nothing?” That would be a bit much even for Zephyr Holdings. That would take obsequiousness to a new level. Debate rages. The old-timers, the hard nuts who entered survival mode a long time ago, say it is impossible to overestimate Senior Management's opinion of itself. They write “Nothing” in a firm, unwavering hand. The idealists—graduates, mainly—take the question at face value. There is a lot of space and they use it all, pouring out ideas. The remainder answer more cautiously. They start with “If I HAVE to suggest something,” or “This is probably too expensive, but . . .” then they too begin to dream. What if instead of being berated for leaving early and getting nothing for staying late, one could balance out the other? What if you didn't have to fill out time sheets in ten-minute increments, but were trusted to find the best way to make yourself productive? What if Zephyr acknowledged that you have a life outside the company, that you don't spring into existence when you turn up in the morning and vanish when you leave? These are wild, crazy thoughts, but they pour out, one after the other.