When She Was Bad (30 page)

‘So she backed down?’

‘No. She said she couldn’t work with me because I was so bad at my job. And I said she was discriminating against me for having small children as well as for getting pregnant.’

‘Good for you.’

‘Yes, except I was practically in tears by then, and she said that she couldn’t deal with staff who were so overemotional they couldn’t take criticism. So Mark Hamilton suggested I could be moved into a different department. As if I was some sort of item of unwanted furniture. Honestly, Chloe, it was so humiliating!’

Her voice had risen until she was practically screeching and her fingers clasped around Chloe’s narrow wrist in an uncomfortable echo of the way Ewan’s hand had gripped hers on Saturday night. Sarah was so quiet normally.

‘Any idea what’s up with Paula?’ Chloe asked, changing the subject.

The disappearance of the deputy manager the morning of the previous day had left her deeply perplexed, but when she’d tried to discuss it with Charlie and Amira they’d frowned at her as if she was being out of order in even bringing it up. Charlie reckoned Paula probably felt ill, while Amira just said, ‘None of our business, is it?’ Neither of them seemed bothered by how out of character it was. Even when Rachel came in at lunchtime, showing off that plaster on her forehead, and made a great big fuss about Paula not being there, and got Chloe to leave hundreds of messages on her answerphone asking where she was, Charlie and Amira hardly looked up from their desks. They’d said they were really busy, but later on she’d seen them huddled together by the lifts looking as if they were arguing about something, so clearly they weren’t as busy as all that.

‘No idea,’ Sarah said, dropping her fingers from Chloe’s arm. ‘Maybe she’s having some sort of post-traumatic meltdown after the rope-bridge incident. I’m surprised we’re not all falling apart right, left and centre. The atmosphere in this place is so toxic.’

‘Are you OK, though?’ Chloe asked. ‘With the baby and everything?’

To her consternation, Sarah put her hand to her mouth, as if she’d said something shocking.

‘God, I’m sorry. There’s nothing wrong, is there?’ Chloe asked, alarmed. ‘Have I put my foot in it?’

Sarah’s voice, when she finally spoke, was choked.

‘No, don’t worry. It’s just that you’re the first person who’s asked me anything about it. Anything nice, I mean. D’you know, in some ways I wish Rachel
had
sacked me. It’s so horrible, knowing everyone resents me. Even Charlie.’

That reminded Chloe of the argument she’d witnessed between Charlie and Amira, but just as she was about to ask Sarah if she knew what was going on with those two, the door to the toilets was flung open and Rachel came stalking in on those vertiginous heels. Click clack, click clack.

Chloe’s throat turned instantly dry.

‘Chloe, I assume you’ve finished those reports?’

‘I was just . . . going to the toilet,’ Chloe muttered, before slinking back, humiliated, to her seat.

After she’d finished the dreaded reports, which she knew Rachel would anyway find fault with and get her to change, Chloe logged on to her emails. Her inbox was reading 73 new messages. Chloe’s heart sank. She’d never been particularly ambitious, always imagining that life would come and find her rather than the other way around. But still, the idea that she’d gone through all those years of education – those private tutors who’d shown up at the door on a Wednesday afternoon with cycle helmets swinging from their hands and hi-vis reflector strips around their ankles, the 9 a.m. university lectures she’d dragged herself up for, the heart-stopping moment where she held the results envelope in her hand – all in order to sit at a desk in a demoralized office on a Tuesday morning dealing with seventy-three emails about health and safety initiatives, the new canteen policy, plus numerous queries from the Accountancy, IT and HR departments filled her with sudden panic. She glanced over at Paula and shuddered: a fleeting glimpse of an unwelcome future.

Chloe tried to push aside these morbid thoughts. She was normally such a positive person, regularly posting gratitude lists on social media, but the oppressive atmosphere in the office (‘toxic’, Sarah had called it) was seeping into her. She didn’t look at Ewan, sitting two desks away, yet she was acutely conscious of his every movement, the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed, the flick-flick-flick of his pen against his desk as he held his phone to his ear, waiting for someone to pick up.

She forced herself to focus on her screen and began scrolling through the endless emails until her eye snagged on a familiar name. Gill Marsh.
Greetings Fledgling!
read the email. It was the nickname Gill had affectionately given her right from when she first took her on as a green intern not long out of university, but it no longer invoked that warmth of feeling. Instead she felt a prickling of unease.
Just checking in for news of the weekend. Any gossip I should know about?
Chloe glanced around the the office, feeling as if everyone must be looking at her, knowing what she was doing, what she’d done. Even when she’d reassured herself that the others were all occupied with their own stuff, she couldn’t shake off the idea of being judged.
It’s not my fault
, she wanted to say to them.
I’m only twenty-four
.

She wouldn’t answer the email, she decided. She’d done enough. Gone above and beyond what Gill could expect, really. The trouble was, she’d been so grateful to Gill – for giving her a full-time job, for taking her under her wing and being so nice to her, even at the start when she got everything wrong. Gill was the kind of patient, understanding boss everyone should have at the beginning of their career. She’d stood up for Chloe on the rare occasions when one of the others had got irritated with her for making a mistake, and she’d taken time out from her own busy schedule to mentor her, explaining how to prioritize her time and how to cope with criticism without taking it too personally. They’d been sort of friends, despite the age gap. Chloe had been outraged on Gill’s behalf when Gill had been so suddenly and summarily dismissed, as well as being upset for herself. She knew she’d miss her terribly. So when Gill had started pumping her for gossip barely hours after being escorted from the building, Chloe hadn’t minded in the least. As far as she was concerned, Gill had been treated appallingly and was still the rightful boss. Hadn’t all the big clients they were working with been secured by Gill? Weren’t all the systems they used ones that Gill had come up with? So when Gill had suggested that some gentle, behind-the-scenes ‘disruption’ might ensure that Rachel didn’t get past her probation period, Chloe hadn’t needed too much persuading. It was second nature for her to do Gill’s bidding without questioning it.

Changing the time on Sarah’s whiteboard so she’d messed up that meeting had been easy enough to do, but Chloe had felt a real pang of guilt when she’d seen how upset Sarah was, and how much flak she’d got from Rachel. Crushing up the laxatives to sprinkle in with the sugar had been Gill’s idea. ‘Just a tiny bit,’ she’d said when they’d met for an after-work drink and she’d handed Chloe the blister pack of pills. ‘Don’t worry, it won’t do any damage, just the odd dash to the loo to shake things up a bit.’ Obviously Chloe hadn’t done a good enough job of mixing the pills in because poor Charlie seemed to have borne the whole brunt of it, but Gill had been right. There was no long-term damage and he’d been right as rain after a few hours.

Gill had left the team-bonding weekend up to Chloe.
I bet Mark Hamilton will go along
, Gill had emailed Chloe.
‘Any excuse to get away from his wife. So it’s a great chance to do some low-level sabotage and make it really obvious Rachel isn’t in control. Just keep your eyes open for mischief-making opportunities.’

The safety-cord thing had been a momentary mad impulse, and of course it had proved to be a terrible mistake. When she’d realized how easy it would be to loosen the strap on the clasp that linked to the harness, she hadn’t thought for a minute that she might put anyone in danger. She’d been so angry with Ewan at that stage, she’d decided to give him a scare, ruffle him up a bit – maybe even humiliate him a little (that word again). When she’d got to the top of the first tower and everyone was in that euphoric giggling mood and helping each other up, she’d noticed the line of safety cords hanging from the top wire, waiting to be attached, and she hadn’t even stopped to think. She knew Ewan was second from the end because she’d seen him lining up before they started climbing, and she counted and recounted to make sure she got the right cord. How could she have guessed he’d switch with Paula at the last minute? Chloe hadn’t known what the expression ‘having your heart in your mouth’ was about until she’d stood on the far tower watching poor old Paula wobbling around in the middle of that rope bridge, scared out of her wits.

While she was waiting for Paula to be rescued, her stomach folding in on itself like cake batter, Chloe had made a mental vow to stop doing Gill’s dirty work. But then had come that moment during the orienteering when she’d entered the clearing and seen Sarah asleep and Rachel with her back to her, standing at the top of the bank by the stream, and she hadn’t been able to resist. One little shove. Not even a shove really, more of a tap, and down she’d gone. Chloe hadn’t wanted to hurt her, hadn’t even known there were rocks down there. All she’d been thinking of was how mortified Rachel would be, to be found sprawled in the mud in front of her staff.

And Ewan especially.

Then that had gone wrong too, when Rachel hurt her head. There’d been a sickening moment when Chloe actually thought she might be dead.

Well, no more. Chloe understood why her former boss felt aggrieved, and she’d have loved to see Gill triumphantly reinstated after the department fell apart under Rachel’s leadership, but she’d done her bit, and now two people had very nearly come to harm because of her, and she felt grubby and guilty and didn’t want any further part of it.

In truth, Chloe was beginning to feel a bit freaked out by how Gill had acted since her sacking. On the surface of things, she always pretended things were great, as if she’d been deluged with offers and was just taking her time deciding which one to pick. But Chloe knew from things she’d let slip that prospective employers weren’t exactly beating a path to her door. And while no one could blame Gill for being resentful of Rachel, there was something about her obsession with her successor that was kind of creepy.

If only she could talk to Ewan about it. All of it.

Hurriedly she tapped out an email:
Cheeky pint in the Blue Posts after work?
But then an image came into her head of his face looming up over her in that hotel room in Derbyshire, and she quickly pressed delete, feeling lonelier than ever.

With a leaden feeling like there was a large lump lodged inside her gut, Chloe went back to dealing with the mass of unanswered emails in her inbox, but her focus was once again interrupted when the door to the main office swung open and Mark Hamilton walked through. His appearances on this floor were rare enough for this to pique Chloe’s curiosity, especially when he paused by Amira’s desk. To Chloe’s astonishment, Amira nodded at him before pushing back her chair and following him across the office to Rachel’s door, where Mark rapped once before barging in, Amira on his heels. From inside came the sound of raised voices. Chloe locked eyes with Sarah, who shrugged almost imperceptibly in an
I don’t know anything either
way.

The mystery intensified a few minutes later when the door was once again flung open and Rachel appeared, looking unusually agitated.

‘Charlie. A moment.’

Charlie? What now?

At his desk, Charlie exhaled, a lengthy sigh that whooshed across the office. Then, slowly, he got to his feet and he too disappeared into Rachel’s office. Chloe tried to catch Sarah’s gaze again, but Sarah had turned away when Charlie walked past. Chloe felt for her. Losing an ally was gut-wrenching. Still the voices in the office went on. And now the door was opening yet again to reveal a very pale Rachel.

‘Paula. Can you join us, please?’

Chloe’s head swung around towards Paula’s desk, expecting her to be springing to her feet as she normally would. But the deputy manager remained still, gazing ahead at her screen with that strange look she’d worn all day. Something was very wrong.

‘Paula, did you hear me? I’m asking you to step into my office.’

Still Paula didn’t respond, just stared at her screen as if she was playing a videogame and they – Rachel, Chloe, Amira, even Mark Hamilton – were just characters in it, not real people at all.

‘Paula?’

For the first time, Chloe detected a waver in Rachel’s voice and was astonished to feel a pang of sympathy for her. There was something so weird about Paula’s refusal to engage. So unsettling.

For a few seconds, Rachel stood in the doorway of her office as if uncertain what to do next. Paula didn’t alter her expression at all, didn’t give anything away.

The silence stretched out across the office like an elastic band until it was tight enough to snap.

35
Sarah

‘You’ll just have to tell them he’s ill. They’ll understand.’

‘Are you insane? There was a meeting yesterday basically trying to work out how to get rid of me. If I get the sack there’ll be no maternity pay, no nothing. And no one will give me a job while I’m pregnant. So unless you’ve suddenly had a pay rise that can support us all,
you’re
going to have to take the day off.’

‘But I’ve got a ton of stuff to do today . . . Oh, bloody hell. All right then, but I’m telling you, Sarah, you’d better not come home in the same state you did yesterday.’

Oliver glared at her as if she’d chosen to be bullied at work and have her job threatened. Then he relented.

‘Come here.’ He opened his arms and she gratefully fell against his chest, wishing she could climb inside his ribcage and be someone else for a while. She was so tired of being herself.