Uncovering You: The Contract (7 page)

Two weeks ago, the summer internship ended. While our work was far from finished, I was proud of my contribution. I thought I could expect a glowing letter of recommendation from my boss.

What I got instead blew my mind:

A year-long contract to stay with the firm and see the ad-campaign through to its launch. The value of the contract? $120,000,
base
, plus another fifty percent in performance bonuses.

If I earned the bonuses, I could wipe my college debt clean when I returned to school.

Of course I signed. I was even offered accommodations for the length of my full stay, not a block away from headquarters in Palo Alto.
That
incentive was worth another thirty or forty grand.

The paperwork was done in two days. I emailed my resident dean and told him I’d be taking a year-long leave of absence. He replied instantly expressing his excitement for me, and reminded me that I’d be welcome back next year. All the Ivy League schools are good about things like that. They want to maintain a pitch perfect graduation rate.

Next came the hard part: Phoning Sonja and Fey and telling them that I’d be bailing on our rooming arrangement. I expected them to be pissed.

Instead, like the good friends they are, all they said was how happy they were for me.

It felt like a dream come true.

All that brought me to today.

For the last few days, the client has been increasingly distant in communications with my team. I shrugged off the warning signs. Stuff like that is expected from time to time. These are huge multinationals, after all. No matter how much they might be paying my firm, they have other products, other responsibilities to take care of.

It was a slight annoyance at the worst. Nothing to lose sleep over…

That is, until the head of my team found us at noon today and asked us to go home early.

He said we have been working hard and deserved a break. Since it was Friday, we’d essentially be getting a three-day weekend.

That should have set off alarms in my head. But it wasn’t like I was the only one who’d been asked to leave. The whole team was dismissed early. We made plans to meet for dinner and drinks tonight at a swanky hipster bar.

No big deal
, I thought… until I got the phone call from HR five minutes ago.

The client pulled out. The project was over. I’d be paid, prorated, for the two weeks of work. But no more. I’d have a week to give up the apartment.

It feels like my whole world is collapsing on itself. Good-bye, financial freedom. Good-bye, start of new life. Good-bye, beautiful Palo Alto.

In the span of thirty seconds, I’d basically been told that I am homeless, jobless, and have absolutely nowhere to turn.

Yale doesn’t take late registrations. No way. Never. Even coming back for the spring term would be a stretch. They like to have their students there from the start of the year. They work hard to build up a homey community, and don’t want it disrupted by newcomers halfway through the year.

Besides, most of the kids at Yale come from rich families. It’s not like they would hurt much if they fell into the same hole I find myself in.

Belatedly, I realize the pathetic futility of my threat over the phone. If I show up at my boss’s door tomorrow morning, I will wait two full days without seeing a soul.

The building is closed on the weekend.

I scream into the pillow until my voice is hoarse.

Where will I go? What will I do?
My mother—

No
. She might be the only family I have. But I will
not
go crawling back to her. We haven’t spoken for six years. She caused the rift. The onus is on her to repair it. I promised myself I would never be liable for her mistakes again.

So where does that leave me?

Broke, unemployed, and heavily in debt.
That’s where.

Even worse, I’ve now lost the next twelve months of my life.
Poof,
they’re gone, just like that. I can’t go to school. I can’t work on anything that will help me in the future.

But, I intend to stick to the other thing I said. I will not lie down and take this without a fight.

They will have to drag Lilly Ryder kicking and screaming through the pits of hell before she gives in.

Chapter Eighteen

(Present day)

I come to with a shudder.

It’s dark. Always, so dark.

I can’t feel the entire left side of my body.

Shit
.

I’ve been sleeping on it and lost circulation.

I struggle to a seated position and fight off the wave of dizziness that overtakes me. There are white spots in my vision. Even worse, the spotlight and tray of food is gone.

I try not to think about what that means. Is that it? Is the contract off the table?

Did I… win?

The only thing you won is a slow, grueling death for yourself,
the voice inside my mind taunts.
Way to go, Lilly!

No!
I shake my head.
No! I don’t want to die.

The contract promises five years of servitude before my release?

Fine. Fine! I’ll take it. I’m far beyond desperate.

“Hello?” I squeak. My voice is frail and thin. “Hello? Is anybody there?”

There comes no answer.

“Hello? Can anyone hear me?”

I wait five long breaths. Ten. Twenty. Thirty.

The lights stay off. I try to stand, hoping to trigger the motion sensor—and end up falling flat on my face.

On the floor, I can no longer feel. Neither cold, nor pain, nor hunger holds meaning to me. I exist in a void of blackness.

I ache desperately for human contact.
Any
human contact. What is life devoid of joy, of warmth, of love?

How do I hold onto the crumbling pieces of myself? How can I retain sanity in a place designed to break me completely?

Eyes closed or open, it makes no difference. I am numb. I am forgotten.

I am nothing.

Chapter Nineteen

(One month ago)

I stalk out of my Monday morning meeting with the head of HR. The warm morning sun does nothing to dispel the ice in my veins.

I am in a worse mood than when I arrived. Not only did I have to endure a nearly hour-long wait
in the firm I worked for
, but I was also dismissed as easily as a girl scout selling cookies. Mind you, this was by the
same
PR person who greeted me so warmly when I arrived at the start of summer!

Apparently, professional courtesy extends only to
current
members of the firm.

To add insult to injury, I got the feeling that the asshole thought he was doing me a favor by just seeing me.
Hah!
He then proceeded to point out all the clauses in my contract that allow for this type of termination—the clauses I neglected to pay attention to in my euphoria when I signed it.

As much as it hurts to admit, everything was done by the book. The client pulled out—not my firm’s fault—and the whole project ceased to exist. As the only intern on the team, I got the short end of the stick. The full-time employees simply got reassigned. I got kicked to the street without a second thought.

I’m angry. But, I’m also determined. Determined to do…
something
. I have a paycheck worth $2,300 for the work I’ve done. That’s something. I also have a company credit card with a fifty thousand dollar limit.

I figure I have a day, maybe two, before it gets cut off.

My first order of business is getting a new cell phone. I walk into the Apple store and let the associate charge the card for the newest, most expensive iPhone. I hold my breath when he swipes the card, then exhale in relief when it goes through.

I decide to push my luck, and ask him to add a MacBook to my purchase. I don’t need it, but I figure I can pawn it on Craigslist for full value and get another grand in my pocket.

The card gets declined half an hour later at Starbucks. I pay with cash and hurry out.

When I return to my apartment, I clear a space on the dining room table and start to game plan. I have four days before my key stops working. That’s four days to figure out what the hell to do.

Returning to Yale is not an option—at least not until January. I go to the admissions website and scroll through the onerous requirements needed to come back halfway through the year. The restrictions are there because of a limited amount of on-campus housing. My only shot is if somebody decides to go on a leave. That’s mostly a crapshoot.

I cross that option off my list. It’s too uncertain.

I start considering jobs I may be suited for. I know how few respectable companies would look at a candidate without a college diploma. “Few” becomes “zero” when the stipulation that employment is good only until the start of the next school year is added to the mix.

Of course, I could lie and say I’m looking for something permanent. But that would feel sleazy.

What about freelancing? SAT tutoring? Something like that?

I frown and shake my head. Those may pay more than minimum wage, but they are unstable. What if I go through a drought and can’t find work? I need something guaranteed.

My only real option is a low-paying service job.

Like my mom.

“Dammit!” I smash my palm against the table. The laptop jumps. My biggest goal in life is complete self-sufficiency. No reliance. No strings. I want to make my own decisions, and have life be in
my
control.

I crave that. Growing up with an uneducated mother, I know how hard it is for someone without a degree to find work. I hated my teens. That’s when she started drinking. After Paul. We were always at the mercy of landlords and creditors and slimy exes she owed money to.

The key to having control is an education. If my mother taught me anything, it’s that—if only by showing me the flipside of the equation.

That’s why I work so hard in school. With a degree comes opportunity, which brings autonomy. And I
will
earn my degree.

The problem is, for the next year, I am forced to step into my mother’s shoes.

The apartment landline rings, startling me out of my thoughts. I look at the phone in wonder. Who could it be? I never gave the number out. Hell, I don’t even know it.

I pick up the phone. “Hello?”

A cheerful, young female voice greets me. “Hi, is this Lilly Ryder?”

“Speaking?” I say.

“Oh. Whew! Ha, ha. I’ve been calling every apartment complex in the area looking for you!”

“You have?” I ask, not following.

“Oh, yes. This is my first week on the job and I’m still trying to get the hang of things. You would think working a phone is easy. But in this office there are so many flashing lights and beeping thingies and like, a hundred different lines to keep track of…” she trails off and giggles. “I left so many voicemails on different machines asking for you, and now I’m paying the price. I’m getting dozens of calls back from different people, all of them confused about what’s going on—”

“Hold on,” I say. The girl’s talking way too fast, and none of it is making sense. Still, something about her enthusiasm makes me smile.

“Who are you? Why are you looking for me?”

“Oh. Oh!” She sounds startled, then seems to remember herself. “Jeremy always says I get carried away,” she admits, then quickly rushes on, making her voice an octave lower and a breath slower. She clears her throat. “I am calling on behalf of Mr. Stonehart, Chairman and CEO
of Stonehart Industries.”

I gasp. The sound must be loud enough for her to hear, because she returns to her real voice and asks happily, “Oh, you’ve heard of us?”

“Yes, I’ve heard of you,” I answer, breathless.

Stonehart Industries is the conglomerate that owns the tech company my firm was developing the ad campaign for.

Stonehart Industries is also a wholly private company and
extremely
secretive about its operations. Most people don’t even know they exist, but they have their corporate finger in all sorts of industry, from mineral mining to drug development to food production to God-knows-what-else. Chances are, if you’ve used an American commercial product that came out in the last ten years, Stonehart Industries has contributed to it one way or another.

“What I don’t understand,” I continue, “is why you’re calling me.”

“Oh, that’s simple,” the girl answers breezily. “Word of what’s happened to you has reached Mr. Stonehart. He heard about the promising young woman whose plans got derailed when ZilTech terminated the marketing campaign for its new television product. He wants to offer you his sincere condolences.”

That is the most ludicrous explanation I’ve ever received.

“Is this a joke?”
I demand, suddenly angry. “Amy? Is that you? Are you pulling some prank on me?”

Amy was the only one in the firm I did not get along with. Something about my being there was threatening to her, or some such nonsense.

“No joke, Miss Ryder,” the girl says quickly. “Mr. Stonehart says—”

“I don’t
care
what ‘Mr. Stonehart’ says,’” I spit. This is beyond insulting. “I don’t want to hear about false sympathies or any other bullshit. If ‘Mr. Stonehart’ is truly sorry, he’ll reinstate the contract and get me my job back!”

I slam the phone on its base with such force that a splinter cracks across the glass table.
Good.

The phone call has me really upset. I’m sure it’s Amy, just rubbing salt in the wound.

As if the CEO of a multi-billion dollar company would give a rat’s ass about what happens to me!

Just as I’m turning away, the phone rings again. I debate ignoring it, but I feel like screaming at someone.

I grab it and knock the base over. “Amy, I swear to God, when I find out it’s you—”

“
Lilly
.” A rich, deep voice answers me. I’ve never heard this voice before. But the two syllables of my name are enough to cut me off. There is an unspoken quality of command that naturally makes me want to obey.

I’ve never heard my name said quite like that before.

“This
is
Lilly Ryder, am I correct?”