Pink Slip Party
Authors: Cara Lockwood
Tags: #Romance, #Humorous, #General, #Contemporary, #Fiction
At My Door, There’s an Electrical Charge in the Air.
I can’t decide if it’s the champagne I ingested, or the fact that Kyle is flashing me one of his deliberately charming smiles. I’ve seen him use The Smile countless times on unsuspecting women. He reels them in with a smile, and then when he gives them the “it’s not you, it’s me” speech six weeks later, they never know what hit them.
“Aren’t you going to invite me up for coffee?” Kyle asks me, still smiling.
It occurs to me that Kyle actually is quite good-looking.
“That’s pathetic,” I tell him. “You’re so used to girls fawning all over you, you aren’t even trying to come up with good lines anymore.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he says, pretending innocence.
“You know very well that most women, God knows why, find you attractive,” I say.
“Hmmmm,” he says. “Perhaps, it’s my boyish good looks,” he jokes.
He pauses. “So why is it that…you know.”
I smile, amused. “No, I don’t know.”
“That you never…”
“Yes?”
“Well…” — he’s squirming — “…wanted to date me?”
Praise for
I Do (But I Don’t):
“Lockwood’s debut has all the ingredients of a
good chick-lit novel…with a warm and friendly
writing style.” —
Library Journal
Also by Cara Lockwood from Downtown Press
I DO (BUT I DON’T)
An
Original
Publication of POCKET BOOKS
 | DOWNTOWN PRESS 1230 Avenue of the Americas New York, NY 10020 |
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2004 by Cara Lockwood
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
ISBN: 0-7434-8883-0
First Downtown Press trade paperback edition March 2004
DOWNTOWN PRESS and colophon are trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Designed by Jaime Putorti
Visit us on the World Wide Web:
http://www.SimonSays.com
For Daren,
for saying I can quit my day job if I want to.
Acknowledgments
I had tons of help in writing this book. I’d like to thank my parents, Jean Hass and Cary Tanamachi, for always encouraging me to do what I love to do: write. Much gratitude goes to my husband, Daren, for listening, supporting, and hiding the paper shredder. Thanks to my brother, Matt, who is, as always, my “inspiration.”
A heartfelt thanks to Elizabeth Kinsella and Stephanie Elsea, two layoff survivors who shared their stories and got the last laugh. I’d also like to acknowledge the many friends who make up my honorary publicity and marketing staff, with special thanks to: Kate Kinsella, Jen Lane Lockwood, Keith Lockwood, Shannon Whitehead, Mary Chalfant, Jane Ricordati, Kate Miller, Carroll Jordan, Linda Newman, Stacey Cohen, Amy Van Etten, Kelly Ballarini, Diane Nale, Eric Bryn, Stacey Causey, Cyndi Swendner, and everyone else who convinced strangers at book stores to buy my books.
As ever, I’d like to thank my agent, Deidre Knight, and my editor, Lauren McKenna, for their hard work and invaluable insight.
Contents
Up Close and Personal With the Author
To:
[email protected]
From: [email protected]
Date: February 15, 2002, 9:05 a.m.
Subject: FWD: RE: Notice of Indefinite Layoff
Jane,
Read message below.
— F
Dear [insert employee’s name here],
We regret to inform you that your job at Maximum Office Supplies Incorporated has been eliminated.
We ask you to do your part to leave on good terms:
| 1. | Clear your desk out by noon. Be considerate of coworkers who will be attempting to work this morning by doing so quietly. |
| 2. | Don’t take what isn’t yours! Any employee seen taking office supplies, furniture, or computer equipment from the building will be prosecuted for theft. |
| 3. | You aren’t an employee anymore, don’t act like one! You are no longer eligible for employee benefits, including but not limited to free coffee or soda and access to the company gym. |
| 4. | Profanity only reflects badly on you! Unruly behavior will be dealt with accordingly by our security personnel. |
Let’s pull together as a team to make this a great transition!
Go Team Maximum Office!
Mike Orephus
Vice President, Midwest Division
Maximum Office Supplies
1
I
think if someone fires you, they should have the decency to do it in person. My boss, lower than vermin on the food chain, was too chicken to actually tell me. Instead, I found out via email.
It’s not like I would have wanted a show of tears and prostrated apologies (although these would have been nice). I just wanted a minimum level of decency. Personally, I’d prefer a twenty-one-gun salute, but that’s just me. My dad always says I have an over-inflated sense of my place in the world.
Three days ago, on the day after Valentine’s Day, I was part of a massive layoff of 1,000 employees from my company (an office supplier that manufactures pink slips). The irony here is not lost on me. Technically, we print office supplies — your blue phone-message pads, your Post-it notes. I worked in design and development on such riveting projects as redesigning “While You Were Out” notes and writing instructions for the backs of correction fluid jars.
On my last day of work, my boss (is it wrong that I wake up and hope daily he’s reincarnated one day as toe fungus?), a bald, corpulent,
smelly
man with a shiny, greasy-streaked ring of hair around his ears and down the back of his neck, blinked his black, beady eyes at me and said, “Your severance package would be greater, but you’ve used up all your sick days.”
I suppose I should have been glad. Some people got laid off via voicemail. And others got the news scrolling across the screens on their Blackberry pagers.
The worst thing about being laid off is that it completely nixes your dream of storming into your boss’s office, telling him what he can do with his status reports, and quitting to internal audience applause.
“Does Mike know about this?” I asked my boss. Mike Orephus was the vice president of the Midwest Division, and just happened to be the same man I’d been dating for seven months.
“He knows,” my boss said. “He’s the one who signed your pink slip.”
The pink slip wasn’t actually pink at all. It wasn’t even a slip. It was just a regular piece of paper, white, with large even margins and a form filled out in Helvetica font, point size 12.
“Listen, we both know this isn’t working out,” Mike said, when I went into his office that same day. He couldn’t look me in the eye. He fixed his gaze on the framed picture of his chocolate Lab, Buddy, sitting on his desk. I didn’t know whether he meant my job performance or our relationship or both.
“You’re firing me
and
breaking up with me?” I squeaked. I thought he’d show me a little pity. I didn’t take him for the type who’d run me down with his car, and then throw it into reverse for good measure.