Overtime

By Zen Mackie
Copyright © 2008

Marcia Fischer, Head of Accounting, hated having to work late.  She had always prided herself on her efficiency; if there was more work to be done than usual, she just buckled down and got it done—even if it meant skimping on her lunch hour—and was out of the office at five o’clock sharp every day.  She had run the entire accounting department on the same principles, accepting no excuses or slacking off from her subordinates.  She had thought of herself as ‘no-nonsense’—and hadn’t cared what anyone else thought. She’d assumed that her employers appreciated her seven years of zealous devotion to duty and would reward her accordingly.

Until today. 

Earlier that week, a memo had been circulated, confirming the company’s long-rumored merger with SatCorp, a much larger corporation.   The memo had reassured everyone that despite the change in management, everything else would continue on as before.

Hah, thought Marcia, her fingers flying over the computer keyboard.

Her supervisor had taken her aside late that afternoon and asked—practically in a whisper, it now seemed to Marcia—if she would mind working late, just this once.  It seemed that the financial data involved in the merger was hopelessly tangled up, and Marcia, as Head of Accounting, was the only one who could untangle it, and ‘we’re really under the gun here, and you do understand, don’t you?’  Marcia, seething inwardly, had managed to smile and agree, with an appearance of graciousness.

Thank God.  Oh, I’ll untangle it, you bet, thought Marcia.

They had no idea just how tangled things had been.  Marcia sincerely doubted that they had noticed one particular flowchart: the one illustrating how much the newly merged companies would save by eliminating certain redundancies. 

Such as Marcia’s entire department.

A strand of her shoulder-length, black hair came loose from its clip at the back of her neck and hung in her face.  She blew at it impatiently as she continued to type, but when it refused to get out of the way, she stopped. With a huff of impatience, she trapped it under the clip again.  No nonsense, she thought grimly, and bent over the keyboard again.

She was doing what she’d been asked to do.  Just not quite the way they expected. 

It had taken hours—it was now practically midnight—but now all of the financial data was completely organized.  It was a thing of beauty, Marcia thought—almost like a symphony; each department a bold theme surrounded by the dancing melodies of cash-flow. Hundreds, thousands of them; a dazzling display.

So dazzling, in fact, that surely no one would ever notice one drab little tune in her composition.  Not much more than a steady, pulsing beat, really: a penny here, a decimal point there—a counterpoint to each and every transaction the joined companies would ever make in the future, flowing directly to an account she had set up in Barbados.

Which was where she planned to retire—in, say, a month or so.  Whenever management got up the nerve to break the news that Marcia and her department were, regrettably, no longer needed.  She planned to have no regrets.

Almost done.  Pull this file over here; bury that line of credit under there.  Just a few more keystrokes and…  Marcia had a sudden vision of herself at a podium, raising her baton to begin the performance of her magnum opus—and nearly began to giggle, something she hadn’t done since junior high school.  She brought herself up sharply.  No nonsense!  She rubbed her eyes wearily, and then checked her work one more time.  Then once more.  Satisfied at last that there was not the slightest hint of any flaw that could give her away, she raised her hands from the keyboard, pointed one finger downward… and hit ‘Enter.’  Her symphony had begun.

A few seconds later, however, a message window appeared on her computer screen.  It read:  Barbados IS lovely, Ms. Fischer.  Perhaps they’ll let you put up a travel poster in your jail cell.

Marcia recoiled from the screen in horror.  No!  Who…?

Additional words appeared:  CEO Suite.  Now.

Marcia had taken the elevator to the top floor many times for meetings, but this time the ride seemed both glacially slow and much too fast to allow her to marshal her thoughts.  Who was it? What would happen to her?  What possible explanation could she come up with to prevent being arrested, never mind fired?  Think, she told herself.  Think!

The elevator opened on the top floor, and Marcia stepped into the world of top-level management:  spacious, richly carpeted rooms, tastefully expensive furnishings, and a subtle fragrance she sometimes thought of as ‘the sweet smell of success.’  The CEO Suite, like a royal throne room, was at the opposite end of the floor, so that supplicants to power would have to travel the maximum distance and have plenty of time to consider their own insignificance—as Marcia was doing at that very moment.

She knew everyone on the board of directors, of course, at least to say hello to, and as she approached the elaborately carved doors leading to the suite, her mind whirled with possibilities.  The actual CEO was out of town, she was pretty sure, conducting the final negotiations of the merger.  So were most of the board members.  Then who?  Only one way to find out, girl, she told herself.  Get on with it.

She squared her shoulders, lifted her chin and knocked on the door firmly, before opening it and stepping inside.

To find herself confronting a complete stranger.

He was seated at the CEO’s desk with a laptop in front of him.  He looked up as Marcia entered, and she had the additional shock of discovering that he appeared to be nearly the same age as she, or possibly a little older—in his early thirties at most.  But she had no doubt that he belonged there. Despite his boyish, curly, brown hair and liquid, almost innocent-looking, dark eyes, there was an unmistakable aura of power about him, and his first glance seemed to go through her defenses like an x-ray.  She felt that in that one instant, he had already considered and thrown aside any possible explanation she might have to offer.  Still, she kept her spine straight and walked up to the desk with deliberate steps.

He rose from his chair and greeted her with an ironic bow of the head as she approached.

“Ms. Fischer.”  His voice was low—iron wrapped in velvet—and it unnerved her.  She began to speak before she was ready, three different speeches crowding into her mouth at once, and she found herself stuttering incoherently.  He held up his hand to silence her.

“Please.  First of all, allow me to introduce myself:  John Narducci—president, CEO and owner of SatCorp, which pretty much makes me your new boss.  And yes, to answer your unspoken question, I am rather young to be holding such an exalted position.  But since I founded the company, no one seems to mind.

“Second—we both know what you were doing, Ms. Fischer.  I’ve been watching your screen for hours.  I suspect I even know why, and I can’t really say that I blame you under the circumstances.  Your supervisor—and his supervisors—were very careless indeed, and I can promise that they’ll be unemployed well before you are.

“Which brings us back to the purpose of our meeting, doesn’t it?  What are we to do with you, Ms. Fischer?”

 To Be Continued...