Mike was back at the office on Monday. Scott sent me a flurry of messages early Monday morning telling me exactly what Mike was looking for, suggesting exact phrases for me to say, buzz words to throw in, what not to say and do, etc. I totally get that Scott wants to make a good impression on Mike, but chill. I’ve never been someone who tries really hard to impress the higher ups. I believe in doing your job well and not having to pretend. That usually works pretty well.

The sales meeting went fine. Scott tried to do all the talking, but Mike told him that he wanted to hear from the team and basically shushed him. I wasn’t dying to talk to Mike or anything, but it was nice that he at least wanted to hear from me.

Mike concluded the meeting by saying, “Okay,” and then packing up his stuff and leaving the conference room. Kelsey quickly unplugged her laptop and chased him out of there.

“I’m happy with the way that went,” Scott said, as if the meeting went well by chance, not because I’d done well. It kind of felt like he wasn’t giving me credit which I didn’t like.

Later on in the day, Kelsey had to go run some errands for Mike, including overnighting something at FedEx. She stopped in the open area where Scott, my team and I were working to get something and informed us that she was running errands and would be back.

“Oh, while you’re at FedEx, do you think you could drop two boxes off for me?” I asked her. “They already have labels.”

“Did you just ask her to drop off a box at FedEx for you?” Scott asked like that was the most ridiculous thing he’s ever heard.

I thought I was missing something, like an inside joke so I said, “Uh… Yes. Please?”

“Um, sure, that’s fine,” Kelsey said and she took my boxes with her.

After Kelsey was gone, Scott said, “I cannot believe you just asked Kelsey to run an errand for you.”

I gave him a weird look. “It wasn’t really an errand. She was going there anyway.”

One of my team members snickered and Scott turned to look at him. The two burst into laughter – incredulous laughter.

“I cannot believe you asked our senior Vice President’s assistant to run an errand for you! She’s his assistant, not yours, Reese. One of us would have been happy to go to FedEx for you.” Scott started off laughing, but got more serious as he finished his statement.

I was really surprised that it was such a big deal. I guess I didn’t realize that we have to worship Kelsey too, even though she is just an assistant. This company is weird.

I ended up staying at work really late because every time I tried to leave, Scott would pile more work on my desk. And the most annoying thing is that the work was really petty stuff like data entry and putting post it notes on things. Really just things that an assistant should be doing. Which is why I need one.

By the time I got home, I didn’t want to see anything work related ever again. Brady was sitting on the couch doing work and I sat down next to him.

“I’m so annoyed,” I said.

“Really?” Brady replied, not even looking at me.

“Yes! I’m exhausted. I hate having to be super fake for my superiors. We were all on pins and needles all day,” I went on.

Brady didn’t say anything so I added, “Don’t you hate that?”

“Mmhm,” he said and I could tell that he wasn’t even listening.

It kind of hurt my feelings so I left to take a shower. Then I made some tea and got in bed. Even though Brady and I are doing good, I’ve been looking at apartments. You have to keep your options open! Plus I’ve been seeing a ton of really cute and girly apartments on Instagram and I miss having my own space to decorate however I please.

Anyway, I’m dying to tell y’all this. Yesterday Carly randomly sent me a picture of guy with really nicely styled brown hair, a beard, and greenish eyes. He kind of looked like Chris, but smaller and more put together. Chris would never style his hair that nicely.

I texted her back saying, “Cute. Who’s he?”

And she said, “:-). Isn’t he? He’s a guy I’ve been talking to.”

I obviously wasn’t thinking she meant “talking to” like romantically because she’s engaged so I’m like, “What do you mean talking to?”

“Reese, don’t judge me. I met him on Tinder.”

Ew.

“Carly, wtf. Why do you have Tinder? You’re about to get married,” I said.

“Omg, I know!! Stop judging me. I want to have fun before I’m an old married woman.”

As you can imagine I was sitting there, trying to understand what I was reading.

“So have you hung out with this guy?” I asked.

“We met on our lunch breaks and got drinks lol. But I might see him on over the weekend because Chris is going out of town.”

I didn’t respond for a little while because I honestly couldn’t think of anything to say and Carly went on, “Don’t say anything!”

I finally said back, “Carly, don’t. That isn’t right. Chris doesn’t deserve that.”

“Brady doesn’t deserve a lot of things you do to him. Hello, Devin??? Chris is going to be okay. It’s not like I’m going to have sex with the guy.”

I’m not sure what point she was trying to make by bringing up Devin because I definitely didn’t do anything wrong by talking to him.

And so now I’m sitting on this news. I don’t know what to do. Should I talk to Kendra about it? I don’t know if y’all know this, but I have a huge mouth and I’m dying to tell someone. Especially Brady. Not because I want Carly and Chris to fight or break up or anything, but I really want to know his thoughts. And if Chris suspects anything. And if Chris is doing anything sketchy himself. (Ballerina girl?) What if they’re both using Tinder?

Luckily Brady has been working late the past two nights so I haven’t had the opportunity to tell him, but I can’t guarantee that I can keep this in. I know I shouldn’t interfere with their relationship and should let them deal with it on their own and etc, but I’m dying right now. And Carly texted me today about rehearsal dinner details like nothing was wrong. What the fuck is wrong with my friend? I need to knock some sense into her.

Scott had been mentioning his boss a lot – our VP of Sales and Operations – a guy named Mike. During the expansion, Mike has been working out of New York City (apparently his office was getting a major upgrade). Scott was always saying things like, “If my boss knew we were doing this, all of us would be out of a job,” and “This is one of Mike’s biggest pet peeves, we have to fix this before he gets back,” and “Mike hates when people spend too much time planning and spend no time doing.” He sounded terrifying.

One day my coworker, Monica, asked me if I thought Mike was good looking.

“I’ve never met him,” I answered. “He’s been in New York since I started.”

“Really?” Monica asked, sounding surprised. “Why didn’t you have to interview with him? He interviews anyone we ever hire. Even the janitors.”

I shrugged. “It all happened pretty fast.”

Since I’d never met him and Monica wanted to discuss his good looks with me, she pulled up his LinkedIn profile.

“Isn’t he handsome?” she asked, once his picture was up on the screen.

“He is,” I admitted. He was probably around Scott age (mid to late 30’s) with close cropped hair, squinty eyes,  incredible jaw and a half smile. He looked like a former football player with his big shoulders and no nonsense haircut.

“He’s a pompous dick. I think it’s the power that makes him sexy,” Monica said.

The next day we were all scheduled a Skype call with Mike. Beforehand I asked Scott what kind of leader Mike was.

“I mean,” Scott began. “He might yell a little bit, but he knows what he’s talking about. If he yells he has a reason to so the goal is to make sure he doesn’t.”

So again, he sounded really pleasant. We gathered in the conference room where a projector was set up. Scott gave us all a quick brief about what to do and say during the meeting and most importantly, who was allowed to speak at all (I wasn’t, but Monica was which I didn’t like).

When we called up Mike on Skype, he appeared at this weird angle like his phone or iPad was sitting in his lap. We waited a few moments for him to get situated, but that’s how we stayed. Monica texted me, “I’m where I’ve always wanted to be: in Mike’s lap.”

The meeting lasted just over two hours. It was mostly Mike bringing up reports and demanding to know why things weren’t going the way he wanted them to. No one really wanted to answer him so he started calling people out. And he had a New York accent so everything he said sounded really rude and aggressive. Monica was right about him being a douche and I wished I could have told him that things weren’t going his way because he was all the way in New York, but obviously I couldn’t. At the end of the meeting, Mike said goodbye and that he’d see everyone tomorrow.

After the meeting, Scott was visibly sweating and let everyone go to lunch except me. He wanted to have a talk so after everyone left we sat down.

“So Mike is going to be here tomorrow,” Scott told me, confirming the comment Mike made at the end of the meeting.

“Okay…” I replied.

“He will probably request a meeting with you since you’ve never met, but I’ll make sure I’m there with you. Let’s get a game plan in motion because he’s going to ask.”

So we were in the office until literally 10:30 PM coming up with plans to show Mike (even though Scott told me Mike doesn’t like plans, he likes actions). I was just really annoyed because I’d spent the past few weeks doing nothing when I could have been preparing for Mike’s arrival.

The next morning, I got to work at my normal time (a little after 8) and everyone was already running around. I walked to my office and spotted Mike walking toward me. A little brunette carrying an open laptop was trailing him, his assistant I gathered.

I assumed he was walking toward me to introduce himself so I stopped outside my door and waited.

“Can I help you with something?” Mike asked.

That’s when I realized that he was literally just walking past and had no interest in meeting me.

“Nope,” I said and went into my office.

I tried to avoid him and his entourage the rest of the day, but he sent out a mass email inviting us to a meeting that afternoon. Scott immediately called me and told me that Mike wasn’t happy about the way things were going, hence the emergency meeting. I was feeling like since I was so new that it wasn’t my fault that things weren’t going well, but Scott assured me that it was all of our faults.

Mike started the meeting by telling us he was disappointed with the way things were being run without him and gave a list of five things he wants us to focus on in the next few weeks.

“The way things are going right now, we won’t make any money. We will go out of business. Does everyone realize that?” Mike said.

We all nodded. We went through his list (things like “follow up and follow through” and “all hands on deck”) then he told us that he couldn’t possibly go back to New York with the way things were going so he was going to leave his family there and stay in Chicago with us. Great.

Later on in the day, Scott called me to his office. When I arrived, Scott was sitting at his desk, Mike’s assistant, Kelsey, was sitting in a chair and Mike was leaning against the desk.

“Reese, come in. Grab a seat,” Scott said, sounding overly cheerful.

I sat.

“So Mike, this is Reese. We’re very excited to have her,” Scott went on.

Mike and I obviously already knew each other even without the formal introduction, but I still said, “It’s nice to meet you.”

He stared at me with his beady little eyes and intimidating eyebrows. He placed a hand on his chin like he was thinking and then Mike said, “I’m not going to settle for less than ten percent over plan this quarter.”

I nodded. “Me neither.”

“Do you know where we are now?” Mike challenged.

Before I could even prove that I did know, Scott cut in, “Reese and I have had many conversations about our sales being down. With your goal of being up ten percent, we do have some ground to cover.”

Mike didn’t even look at Scott and continued talking to me. “Our P&L is a direct reflection of you. If your team sucks, you suck and ultimately we all suck.”

I nodded.

“Kelsey, pull up the financial statement for last quarter,” Mike said.

Kelsey nodded and began looking on her laptop for it.

“I need a Redbull, Scott,” Mike said.

Scott jumped and announced he would go find one. Poor Scott. That’s totally something Kelsey should have been doing, but with her being tied up, someone had to do it.

When Kelsey pulled up the document on the laptop, she sat it on the edge of the desk and Mike motioned for me to come look.

“How much did we bring in last quarter?” he asked me.

The pressure of them both watching me made me nervous and I scanned the document for the answer even though I’d seen similar ones tons of time at my old job.

“Um,” I began, buying myself some time.

Mike’s huge arm came down in front of me, almost grazing the side of my face, and pointed at a place on the screen.

“It’s right here. Have you seen this document before?” He sounded annoyed.

“I have.”

“You need to get better acquainted with it because this is your job.”

I nodded.

“Kelsey, send last year’s P&L to Reese. I know she hasn’t seen it,” Mike said.

For the next few minutes none of us said anything and it was uncomfortable. Finally, I said, “Do you need anything else?”

“No,” Mike said like it was the most ridiculous thing I could have asked.

When I got back to my office, I texted Monica, “He’s so nice and personable! I can’t believe you said he was a dick.”

She replied, “Really? He must like you then.”

I never got a chance to tell her that I was kidding. The following day was Friday and Mike was working from home, thank goodness. Scott called a meeting with me and my team so we could discuss the game plan we’d come up with. Scott assured me that when Mike came in on Monday, he would want to know exactly what I’d done since joining to company.

Needless to say, I was ready for the weekend. On Friday night, Brady and I got dinner with his friend, Jacob, and Jacob’s girlfriend, Stacey. Apparently Stacey had been bugging Jacob about hanging out with us, which is cute, so we got pizza and beer. Afterwards, they went home and Brady and I went to a bar to continue drinking. I’m not sure why, but the bar was super dead for a Friday night. It was fine though because we didn’t have to fight for the bartender’s attention. While we stood there drinking, I planned out our Saturday: shopping, grocery shopping, then doing some projects around the house. We are officially an old couple.

Brady pulled out his phone because he had a text and I couldn’t help leaning over to see who it was. Hailey!

I rolled my eyes. “What does she want?”

“She was asking the name of a bar I was telling her about-” Brady began and I cut him off.

“Is she even old enough to drink?”

He put his phone back in his pocket and changed the subject. I don’t even feel threatened by her or care about her anymore, I just think she’s annoying.

Anyway, I spent all day dreading going back to work and seeing Mike. He’s already invited everyone to a sales meeting tomorrow first thing in the morning and I don’t know what to expect. Luckily though, I pulled together a list of some of the things I’ve done like reevaluate sales goals and stuff, even though I know none of it is going to be what Mike wants to hear.I texted Scott asking what I should expect and he hasn’t responded so I guess we will see.

I love Philadelphia. I honestly didn’t think I would, but I had so much fun. When we got there on Friday we went to a bar attached to its own craft beer brewery. Brady and Chris, being the frat boys they are, could not pass up a good craft beer. It’s a place Chris spends a lot of time and  he knew a lot of the workers plus gave us a ton of tidbits that made it obvious that he’s done the brewery tour more than once. It was cute.

“They have these really good pizza grilled cheeses, Reese. You’ll love them,” Carly informed me. It sounded right up my alley so I ordered that along with a citrus beer.

“So how’s the wedding planning?” I asked, while we waited for our food. Brady and Chris were next to us carrying on with their bromance.

“It’s going surprisingly well. My mom has been a huge help. Oh! Let me show you which bridesmaid dress we decided on,” Carly replied. She had sent out an email with all the dress options to all of us and asked our opinions. I wanted to go with a long, strapless blush pink option with an attached beaded belt. It was the most expensive so no one else chose it.

Of course, the girls chose the $160 blush high neck option. Carly also showed me her wedding dress options, all of which were super sparkly vintage inspired gowns with intricate back detailing and sleeves. Totally not my style, but they were all beautiful. Carly couldn’t decide on one so she’s still looking. In case you’re wondering, I want a strapless mermaid gown with a ridiculously long train and no lace anywhere. I hate lace.

After the bar, we headed back to Carly and Chris’ place. Brady and I had gotten a hotel, but it was still fairly early so we decided to continue hanging out. Their apartment is so cute. Super updated and trendy with the historical charm it was built with. They got a cat named Olive, who is actually so cute and I’m not even a fan of cats.

We played some drinking game that involved pennies, I can’t even remember the details because we all got so drunk so fast. I think it was pretty fun though.

I woke up to the cat walking all over me. We’d passed out and Brady and I were snuggled on the couch.

“You guys!” Carly called out, in a really unnecessarily high pitched voice. “Get up. We are taking you to the best brunch in America!”

I just looked at her.

“They do tequila sunrise mimosas,” she added.

“Okay, I’m getting up,” I said.

In total it took us about three hours for all four of us to get ready in their one bathroom. Then we trekked a few blocks in the cold to the restaurant. I complained the whole time that we should have called an Uber and Carly said, “Gosh, Reese, have you always been this much of a complainer?”

I gave her a dirty look because that’s rude and she smiled innocently. I know she was kidding, but usually Carly would never make snide comments like that. But whatever.

When we sat down I immediately started grilling Chris about what he wanted his groomsmen (Brady) to wear for the wedding.

He shrugged. “I dunno. I was thinking everyone could just wear their own suit.”

I gasped. “No way! Carly is going to be standing up there in a freaking beaded gown and y’all are gonna be wearing your work suits?” I made a face.

Brady and Chris laughed.

“Does it really matter what the guys wear? A black suit is a black suit,” Carly said.

“But don’t you want everyone to be uniform? Think of the pictures!” I said.

She shrugged. “We are going for a more rustic theme anyway.”

I gave Brady a look that told him that our wedding party is going to dress exactly how we want. I’m not sorry.

So Carly started going on about her rustic inspired wedding, all the mason jars and wooden pallets and burlap she planned on using. I almost asked if she was renting out a barn for it too. It sounds like my Pinterest nightmare. Not my style at all.

That night we went to a party at a beautiful townhouse on the river. It was hosted by some girl named Lena, who apparently Chris knew from work. She was super, super pasty white with white blonde hair and wore a white lacy bra top and a white maxi skirt. She looked fucking creepy. Her townhouse was bomb though. It had that historic firehouse look complete with exposed brick and the spiral staircase. She had it decorated almost like an Anthropologie store with candles everywhere, plants hanging from the ceiling and a ton of mix matched furniture. I was totally into it.

When Lena let us in, she squealed with excitement then air kissed Chris on both cheeks.

“These are my friends, Brady and Reese. And you know Carly,” Chris introduced us.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever. Come in,” Lena said.

I looked at Carly as we walked in and she shrugged.

“Help yourself to the bar,” Lena instructed, pointing to a bar with a ton of various liquor bottles out and colorful mugs stacked up.

“Cool, open bar,” Chris said so we walked over there and made drinks.

At this point there were only a handful of people at the party, probably four little cliques of people so Lena left us to go entertain another group.

“I think I’m going to cut my hair,” I announced. “Maybe like a blunt bob.”

“Reese, no!” Carly gasped. “Not before the wedding. What if I want you to wear an updo?”

“It’s fine. It’s rustic,” I replied.

Carly rolled her eyes at me and mumbled something and I sipped my drink. I wasn’t even completely serious about chopping my hair off, but jeez. The guys can wear whatever humdrum suit they have in the back of their closet and I can’t cut my hair? Rude.

A few minutes later, Lena came up behind Chris and wrapped her arms around his torso. “I’m so glad you’re here!” she exclaimed.

Chris turned, but didn’t push her off. I glanced at Carly, who was looking down at her drink.

“So!” I said. “Lena, you and Chris work together?”

“No!” she laughed. “His company works with my company. I’m a dancer.”

“Oh! What kind of dancer?” I asked, barely able to keep a straight face. This broad was a stripper.

“Ballet,” she said as it was obvious. Although after she mentioned it, I did notice her rigid ballet posture. “I work in the city.”

We all looked at her and she added, “New York City.”

“Nice. Like Black Swan?” I said.

I heard Brady chuckle next to me.

“Black Swan…cute. No, it’s nothing like that,” Lena said. “Honestly, it’s not really like a job. Ballet is what I live and love and it just so happens to pay my bills.” She gestured around her apartment. I don’t know why, but I couldn’t get Dance Moms out of my head even though she was an (tiny) adult.

“So what exactly does your company do with ballet?” I asked Chris.

“We deal with all of the scheduling. They have a certain budget and our systems guarantee that they stay within that budget,” Chris explained.

“Oh,” I said, not following. “So are you the liaison, Lena? How did you and Chris become friends?”

Lena, who still had one of her little white sickly hands on Chris’ side, glanced up at him then back at me. “I don’t know. What’s with the interrogation?” She kind of laughed.

“What interrogation? I asked you like two questions.”

Lena looked down her nose at me and rolled her eyes then turned to leave.

“Bye, White Swan,” I said, not even loud enough for her to hear.

“Reese, stop,” Brady said.

“I hate her,” I told the group. “What a bitch. Chris, you can find better friends.”

“Well, I don’t think you have to worry about me being friends with her anymore now,” he laughed nervously.

“Reese, you are so immature sometimes. Like, I can’t even deal right now,” Carly said.

“What did I do?” I exclaimed.

Brady grabbed me, shushing me again.

Carly turned to Chris and said something, probably apologizing for my behavior even though I think I was doing her a favor. Someone has to stand up for their relationship.

Needless to say, we left soon after that. Lena didn’t dare come back near us so Chris went to find her to say goodbye then we all walked (in the cold) to a bar for food. Carly and I were totally back on, ordering mozzarella sticks and screaming when the techno remix of “Rude” came on.

We ran to the bathroom to have a heart to heart, just like old times.

“You didn’t care when that girl had her hands all over your fiancé?” I couldn’t help asking.

Carly shook her head. “No. I’ve met her before. She’s like a hippie. She doesn’t mean any harm.”

“Yeah, but still. It was kind of inappropriate, don’t you think? Like, hands off,” I said.

“I don’t know. Who cares. Everything isn’t a huge deal, Reese. You’re so impulsive. You can’t let things get to you.”

“I’m just really protective of my man. I think it’s weird when people aren’t.”

“Yeah, well. I don’t have a reason to be.” She held up her left hand and flashed her ring.

Which I guess is a valid point.

“I have something to tell you, but you have to promise not to say anything or make it a big deal,” Carly said next.

“What? Tell me!” I exclaimed.

“It isn’t even that big of a deal, chill,” she shushed me.

“Then tell me now,” I said.

“Okay. Chris told me that Brady asked him how he knew he was ready to propose to me.”

“Yeah? And what did Chris say?”

“Chris told him that he just knew. We both knew we wanted to spend our lives together and pretty much spoke it into existence.”

“So what now? Is Brady going to propose to me, do you think?”

Carly shrugged and shook her head, confusing me. “Chris said he asked and Brady kind of freaked out and said no. So I guess not?”

I pouted.

“You can’t bring it up to Brady though, okay? He just got freaked out and didn’t know what to say.”

“He should have said yes!”

“Me and Kendra were talking and we think Brady is afraid of you because you’re so unpredictable. I mean, it’s fun and all, but he can’t do unpredictable. He’s too type A.”

I scoffed. “He needs unpredictability in his life. Without me, his life would be boring and routine. He even told me that!”

I can understand where Carly and Kendra are coming from, but I think opposites attract just like a lot of y’all have said. Can you imagine if Brady dated a girl like him? How tragic.

So anyway, Philly was great and I already want to go back. I think I just really miss Carly and even Chris and how much fun the four of us used to have together.

My first week of work was pretty uneventful. I’ve been mostly shadowing Scott and getting settled in. I haven’t spent much time with my team, but they seem okay. There’s already one girl I’m not sure if I’m going to like. She’s really sarcastic, which is great because I am too, but that’s not exactly the best first impression you can make on someone especially your new boss.

We were in the office and Scott wanted to show me something on the computer, but my credentials weren’t working so he asked the girl (Jamie) to log in with hers. She began typing then snapped at me, “Don’t look at my password!”

Like, okay. As if I need your password, peasant. Later on we were talking about the dress code and culture of the office and Jamie said, “Honestly, I just wear leggings everyday.”

I replied, “I don’t even own any leggings.”

Which I guess technically isn’t true, but I probably only have three pairs total. Leggings just aren’t my thing.

“How do you not have leggings? It’s 2016,” Jamie said.

Stacey 2.0? I figured she must have felt like my leggings comment was shady, but it wasn’t and I was over the top nice to her the rest of the day. She didn’t really seem to warm up to me all that much though.

Brady had several friends coming to town for the weekend and the first arrived on Friday evening. He’s a kid Brady went to college with named Eric. He’s visited before and he seemed fine. He got in at around 6:00 and got an Uber from the airport because Brady and I were busy getting ready. We planned on going to dinner then having a few drinks. But when Eric got to the house, he and Brady were so excited to see each other that they immediately started drinking. At this point I’d decided I was limiting myself to two drinks at dinner so I just spent a ton of time getting ready while they drank. I put on a dress, leather jacket, booties and a shit ton of face highlight.

We met up with another of Brady’s friends at the restaurant and the three of them got a beer pitcher and I got a modest blueberry mojito. It kind of seemed like a boys night, but I felt like I had to stick around and babysit because Brady was getting really drunk. I know he can take care of himself, but I’ve really taken on the doting wife role. I was yawning all through dinner and Brady was like, “Aww, babe, are you tired? Let’s get you another drink.” And eventually I had two full drinks in front of me plus the one I was working on.

We didn’t get home until 3:30 AM. I was exhausted and crabby, obviously. At first every time Brady ordered a new drink, I’d tell him it was his last then he would pout and say he wasn’t ready. Have the roles reversed? That used to be me all the time.

The St. Patrick’s Day parade and dyeing of the Chicago River was the next morning so we had to wake up at 6:00 to get ready and meet the rest of Brady’s friends. I literally cried because we got no sleep. Brady made bacon, eggs and oatmeal for all of us then some sort of orange juice cocktail for me while they all drank beer.

I wasn’t feeling the super festivey St. Patty’s Day green so I wore an olive green shirt dress (still green though so it counts), my Converse, a jacket and Ray Bans. We met up with Lindsey and some of their friends from back home.

Lindsey, who was wearing white jeans and a green “Chicago” sweatshirt, took one look at me and said, “Reese, where’s your green?”

I replied, “Literally my entire dress is green.”

She laughed and hugged me.

After the parade, we elbowed our way to an Irish bar that one of Brady’s friends had VIP passes to. How do you have VIP passes to a bar? Some people take St. Patrick’s Day so seriously.

Anyway, we got in and ordered these disgusting leprechaun shots and two towers of green beer. Soon, Brady was super drunk and ordering rounds of shots for everyone. Maybe I’m getting old, but I just wasn’t in the mood to drink that early. But I figured if I started drinking, it would force me to be in the mood.

At around 3:00 pm I was sobering up after a long morning of obnoxious PDA with Brady. So sorry to anyone who witnessed us making out. We went to a different bar for food and I figured we were winding down and probably going to head home after we ate. But someone ordered more shots.

“Oh my gosh,” I groaned. “Can we not do this right now?”

Brady started dying laughing (how was that at all funny?) and said, “Do what?” Then he took his shot. I was not amused.

We were out until midnight. Fucking midnight. They were raging all day and every time I tried to go home, Brady would whine and beg me not to. And he was so drunk and cute that I couldn’t. Plus there were a lot of girls out who were also drunk and cute so.

On Sunday morning I woke up feeling like complete shit, but we had plans to have brunch with Brady’s out of town visitors. Can you believe Brady woke up at 9:00 am ready to hit the streets? Obviously I don’t know how to rage anymore because I could barely get out of bed. And then all those psychos ordered Bloodys at brunch. I never wanted to see alcohol again.

“How are you even alive right now?” I asked Brady.

“What do you mean? It’s St. Patrick’s Day,” he said as if that somehow explained anything. Brady and I weren’t together last year for St. Patty’s Day so I wasn’t aware that he’s so into it. He isn’t even Irish.

Tucker and I stayed in bed the rest of the day while Brady cleaned. Lindsey stopped by for dinner and I couldn’t even pull myself out of bed to greet her.

“Can’t hang, Reese?” she laughed.

Nope.

Luckily I was back to life on Monday for work. I’ve gotten pretty close with the girl who is in charge of our client experience, Monica. We usually go to lunch together and talk about our lives. She has a long term boyfriend who she’s hoping will propose soon. I know y’all are probably going to say that I need to stop going to lunch with her. Whatever.

But anyway, Monica doesn’t retain information well and it’s so annoying. Scott will tell us both something and literally five minutes later she will come find me and say, “Wait, what did he say?” and she asks me how to do stuff all the time. Like, it’s my second week! I’m honestly just not impressed with her performance. I wonder if that’s what people at my old job said about me, lol.

And another thing about work, I don’t mean to complain but maybe y’all can give me some advice. Scott has stopped really teaching me anything. Anything I want or need to know about my job I have to go find him and ask him, which is fine, but I feel stupid and like I need a ton of guidance. I don’t, I just want to do things correctly. I get that I’m in a senior role and have to be a self starter, but I can’t do my job without knowing anything. I feel like that isn’t setting me up for success. And I don’t want to sound like a baby and complain to him about it.

So Brady and I made last minute plans to go visit Carly and Chris this weekend in Philly. I’m so excited because I’ve never been! But whatever we do, I am not drinking. Did you ever think I’d say that?

Hey y’all.

I’ve been so bored. There’s only so much shopping and watching YouTube videos a girl can do. I miss you guys!

Ever since we got back from our week of vacation, Brady and I have been getting along great. We were in Houston for two days then spent a day in Galveston and then we went to New York. We had a really, really good talk one night and decided that we both needed a break, from life. I came clean about everything right before we left. Obviously he wasn’t particularly happy about what I told him (reading his messages, Marco, etc), but he took it better than expected. When I told him that I’d gone through his messages via the iPad, he swallowed hard and said, “You did?” Which made him seem kind of guilty and I don’t think he had any reason to be. And when I told him about Marco, he asked a ton of questions like, “Did he ever express interest in you other than strictly friends?” and “Why did you accept the bag?” and “Why didn’t you tell me about it sooner?” etc.

I did cry, but not because I wanted to get out of trouble. I cried because I felt bad that he was so understanding. He didn’t even yell at me like he probably should have.

Anyway, we got to Houston and I took him to my favorite taco place near the airport. We literally waltzed in there with all of our luggage and stuff. My parents met us there and we had a classy late night dinner at a hole in the wall taco spot. Valentine’s Day was cute – my dad and Brady got flowers and macarons for me and my mom. Plus Brady got me jewelry. We went to dinner that evening and ended our night at a bar, naturally.

It was the end of fashion week when we were in New York. We mostly just pranced around sightseeing and eating our way through Manhattan. Our hotel had a really good restaurant in its lobby and I don’t even want to talk about how much money we wasted ordering food from downstairs. Worth it though.

When we got back to Chicago, Kendra had a birthday dinner so Brady and I went. Preston and Joe were there along with Kendra’s friend, Lori and Lori’s hubby. We went to this really nice steakhouse which was perfect for my high protein, low carb diet I’ve been on. We ended up racking up a $1300 bill which Brady and John insisted on splitting. I was like, “Brady, what are you trying to prove here? If John wants to pay for his wife’s birthday dinner, then let him.” But he really wanted to.

Overall we’ve been really, really good though. And since I haven’t been working I’m playing the whole stay at home wife role, making breakfast, lunch and dinner and taking Tucker on long walks everyday.

Before I’d even started my new job, I’d been keeping in contact with my new boss, Scott. He started CC-ing me on all the sales emails and keeping me in the loop about how the expansion was going and any additional hiring he did. He kept saying things like, “You’re going to do so great. I can’t wait for you to start. If you keep up the intensity, you’re going to go far.”

Intensity? What intensity? But obviously my head was getting big and I was thinking about how awesome I must be if he was that impressed with me before I even started. And that I was going to like him as a boss because I love feedback, especially when I’m doing well.

One day he called me so we could talk about some things I needed to do prior to my first day and to just chat it seemed. He mentioned that he planned on going to a bar for whiskey that night and kept going on and on about how cool and fun the bar is. After we hung up, he texted me saying, “I’d love for you to join me for whiskey tonight. :-)”

I literally gasped and dropped my phone, having flashbacks of my old boss, Andrew. I started freaking out, thinking there was no way I was going to be able to work for him if he was hitting on me already. Luckily Brady came home a few minutes later and I met him at the door.

“Look what just happened!” I exclaimed, shoving my phone under his nose.

He took it from me and read the message a few times.

“Can you believe this? He’s married! Is there a faithful man left in this world?” I asked.

“Just reply and tell him you aren’t interested. That’ll put a stop to this quickly,” Brady said nonchalantly.

“I don’t even think I can work for him if he thinks this is okay,” I continued.

“Reese, relax. You have to remember that he’s European and comes from a different culture. It may be that he’s just being nice and you’re mistaking it for something else.”

I figured Brady was right and replied, “Haha, I don’t even like whiskey.” (Not true.)

What else is new? Oh, Luke has been texting me complaining about Stacey. Apparently she’s gotten even more out of control and shows up one to two hours late each day and bashes all his ideas even though she has nothing to do with product development. I’m like, “I told you she’s terrible,” and he’s like, “You aren’t helping, Reese!”

Oh, and Hailey is still around. It seems like she’s coming on even stronger now. She comments on literally every single picture Brady posts on Instagram, even the one he posted of me on Valentine’s Day. It was of me sipping a glass of white wine at dinner and she commented, “Where is this? It looks so nice!” and added a heart eyed emoji. Like, can you stop?

Also, Brady’s brother, Hunter’s wife is pregnant again. The thought of them having sex is honestly disgusting, but Brady is really excited about it.The parents are supposed to visit them in San Francisco next month and Brady suggested we go too and I can’t figure out why. I told him I would have to check my schedule.

And I crashed my car. I’m fine and my car is fine now since I fixed it, but I don’t want to drive anymore. So, this is going to sound really high maintenance, but I hired a driver to take me to work during the week. It’s actually a really good idea for anyone if you’re living in the city. It’s much classier than taking an Uber everywhere (is it me or did Uber lower their vehicle standards recently? I’ll never use that disgusting app again). Brady laughed when I told him, but totally understood my need for a driver.

Also, I finally started my new job today. Scott showed me to my new office and left me alone for the remainder of the day to get situated. Basically I just set up my email and hung out on Instagram all day. He didn’t give me a tour or introduce me to anyone, but hopefully that happens tomorrow.

Anyway, I’m exhausted from working after having almost an entire month off. Plus I made a really big dinner so I’m having trouble even moving. I’ll update y’all later this week and let you know how the job is going. Bye!