I don’t know why I thought BJ wasn’t going to tell anyone about our little tryst. Of course he was going to tell the whole office, this is BJ we’re talking about.

I waltzed into the office on Monday morning and ran into Whitney, who was walking away from the executive office area.

“Morning,” I said.

She looked weirdly surprised to see me.

“Hi, Reese,” she said shortly.

“Good weekend?” I asked.

“It was pleasant.” She continued walking without another word which was rude, but I don’t expect any more from Whitney.

I walked past the interns’ desks and the guys kind of snickered and Amanda gave me an unenthusiastic smile and an eye roll. BJ was nowhere to be found, but had obviously already told everyone about our weekend. Whatever.

I spent the morning replying to emails, and re-uping on tea/avoiding curious looks in the break room. BJ must have decided to play hooky for the day, which was not surprising because he’s a pussy and can’t handle the heat. 

Right before lunch Diana called me into her office. Call me naive, but I thought she was going to ask how the meeting with the magazine publisher went last week so I gathered the notes and walked down to her office.

“Shut the door,” she told me when I walked in. Her reading glasses were perched on her nose about to slip off and she didn’t even bother looking up at me.

I closed the door and sat in the white Hepplewhite chair in front of her desk. “I hope you had a good weekend. I have the notes from my meeting with the publisher from Thursday if you want to look over them. It went really well.”

Diana out her hand up to silence me. She slowly took her glasses off her face and stared at me coldly. “Reese, you may not realize this, but I know everything that goes on around here. Everything.”

I nodded. I knew exactly where this was going. She had obviously caught wind of what was being talked about in the office.

“When you started here, Reese, I saw something in you. You were ambitious, driven, aggressive, passionate. You reminded me a lot of myself.”

I nodded again. 

“And you’ve done some amazing things in your time here – things no one has thought to do. You’ve created valuable relationships and outstanding partnerships.” She turned to her computer. “I just got an email from Martin, requesting we come to New York City on Thursday.”

I couldn’t believe it. I was actually getting fired. How was I going to explain this to my parents? They were going to have to help me with rent until I found another job. I have hardly any money saved. Would I have to move back home?

“You know about our no tolerance non-fraternization policy here, don’t you, Reese?” Diana continued. 

I nodded. I couldn’t even look her in the eye.

“Brandon is an intern and he’s your subordinate. What I’ve been hearing is extremely inappropriate and clearly against policy. I can’t believe that you would even put yourself in a situation to let something like this happen.”

I felt my eyes filling up with tears. This was mortifying. I wanted her to just fire me so I could get out of there and figure out what I was going to do with my life. I would probably have to sell my shoe collection and all my expensive designer furniture. I would actually rather die.

“You’re such a smart girl, Reese. I’m extremely disappointed in you. You are an invaluable asset to this organization.”

She paused for an uncomfortably long time. I thought about asking her not to tell my mom what happened and assuring her that my office would be cleaned out in an hour.

“And for that reason, I’m going to overlook this temporary lapse in judgment,” Diana said. 

I looked up at her, incredulous. I wasn’t fired? “Seriously?”

“You don’t see Tracey here, do you? I am keeping this between us.”

She was right. Normally Tracey would’ve handled a situation like this. 

“But you have to assure me that we won’t ever, ever have to have a conversation like this again.” 

“You won’t, I promise,” I said. 

“To be sure, we have already transferred Brandon to the distribution center to complete the remainder of his internship. This should prevent any further issues.”

Thank goodness. I don’t want to have to avoid him in the office for the rest of the summer. Although it’s going to suck to get my own lattes now. 

I scurried back to my office and took two deep breaths to calm myself. I could not cry at work. I wanted to though. I was so fucking embarrassed. I hid out in my office for the rest of the day. Diana sent me the itinerary for the NYC trip later that afternoon. We would be leaving at 3:00 on Thursday, staying at the W, meeting with Martin’s people then flying home at 1:00 on Friday.

I can’t wait to get out of Chicago.