“She was
all sweet and forgiving and said she understood, and she would keep New Year’s
free for us. I managed to sound halfway coherent and told her she was mistaken.
I never called her, never emailed her, never made any plans for the holidays,
and I already had plans for New Year’s.”
“Doing
what?” I asked, feeling a little sorry for him. Now I suspected something of
what he faced, the intimidation and the guilt factors being piled on him during
that confrontation. All this despite my very sore brain refusing to accept the
horrified conclusions trying to solidify out in the light of day.
“Exactly
what she said. I told her it was business-related, so she’d be bored, and we
were still making arrangements.”
“Wimp.”
That got
a grin from him. I thought maybe I had done my good deed for the day, helping
him fight through the terror trying to smother him. If my still-nebulous
suspicions were right.
“Have
mercy?”
“Do I get
to dump the Terry column and take back my sports beat?” I burst out
laughing at the look of utter panic on his face. “I guess that’s a no. You know
something? You make a pretty pathetic Evil Overlord.”
“A what?”
“That’s
what I called you when you swept into the office back in November and
rearranged everything on us.” I had to explain, since I had let that slip. What
was wrong with me? Besides the fact that I actually liked fraternizing with the
enemy?
No comments:
Post a Comment