I hate it when my dad turns up, he’s always an asshole, especially in front of other people. It’s like he enjoys an audience to see his bullshit. He thinks it makes him a bigger person.
“Hello, everyone!” His voice booms through the office making my eyes slide closed. A strange fear grips hold of me, I know for a fact this can’t turn out well. The show has arrived, and I’m going to be forced to watch. “It’s good to see you all hard at work, earning me some cash.” He lets out a booming laugh. “And I see the prodigal son’s car outside, he’s actually here, which is a massive shock for me.”
“Oh, for fuck sake,” I mutter to myself. “Here we go.”
“What have we done so right to deserve his appearance? It certainly can’t be the numbers because they aren’t great. I have been looking through them and we’re still having financial issues, losing clients due to Isaac’s behavior. He might be here now, but it might be a little too late.”
I roll my eyes and sink back in my chair, feeling like a fucking teenager all over again. I can’t grow up with my dad around, he makes me feel like a child, about to be grounded or sent to my room. The rest of my life melts away, and I feel that I’m a naughty boy who’s been caught underage drinking in the park.
The world knows me as confident… so confident it often borders on arrogance. Not with Dad though.
“Do we need to have a big meeting about Isaac? All discuss our problems with him?”
He would fucking love that. It’s the reason that he’s booming it so loud that I can hear it. He wants me to freak out and get upset. He would love me to be humiliated like that in front of everyone.
“No? No one up for that.” It’s kinda nice that no one is leaping to his request, but this whole thing still sucks. “Okay, well I think that it might be just up to me then. I will go in there and do it myself.”
As he walks towards my office, I can hear his footsteps shaking the walls, he passes L
exi whose desk is seated right outside. As he passes her, he does a double take, but not the impressed kind. He looks shocked. I think she must be the reason he slams the door shut behind him. Normally, he leaves it open so everyone can listen in.
“What the fuck is going on?” he snarls. “Who is the new girl sitting out there?”
“Oh, she’s my new PA. She’s very good at her job actually, it’s good to have her around.”
He moves closer to me, his eyes flaring wildly with anger. “Good to have her around? Have you seen her?”
I bristle, angry for Lexi’s sake. This man has spent my entire life trying to make me feel small while trying to prove to the rest of the world that he’s ‘doing his best for me’ by giving me a good education and a job. But that doesn’t give him the right to treat Lexi like that. She hasn’t done anything to him.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I reply, far more bravely than he’d insulted me.
“The tattoos. The hair. The way that she dresses. She doesn’t exactly look good for business now, does she? Clients expect a certain type of person when they come here, and she isn’t that.”
I don’t like this, it really gets me riled up. “Just because she isn’t a clone like everyone else?”
“People look a certain way for a reason.” He shrugs, really not understanding the issue. “Because it’s the way that we’re supposed to look. Especially in business. If you ever bothered to show up, you’d know that.”
I think about Lexi’s comments about boring guys in suits, and I feel a weird affinity to her. I don’t see myself changing. Unfortunately, I was born in a suit and I’ll probably fucking die in one, but that’s because of how I’ve been raised. I don’t know any different, but we shouldn’t judge people who are different.
“I can’t fire someone because of how they look. There are so many rules about that.”
“I know, which is why you never should have hired her in the first place. Idiot. But I’m not telling you to fire her because of how she looks. Find a reason. There are always reasons to fire people. I do it all the time.”
“That’s fucked up, Dad.” I can’t help but consider Lexi’s desperate need for money. I don’t know why, but I know that it’s important. He won’t understand, because he’s never had to struggle for cash. Nor have I, but at least I’m trying to know that from other people’s perspectives. “People need their jobs. You can’t just fire people for no reason.”
“That’s how I’ve been so successful. Because I cut through the bullshit and I don’t get emotionally attached to people. There’s no quicker way to end up penniless with no business.”
He sounds like a real fucking asshole. More than usual. I roll my eyes and turn away from him, unable to see his face when he’s like this. I have heard him talk like this before, but it’s never felt quite as personal as this. Now I know Lexi well, or at least I have some sort of connection with her, and it hurts to listen something negative about her.
“Now, unless you want to lose your job as well, I suggest that you get rid of her.”
“You’re threatening my position now? Kicking me out of the family business that you so desperately wanted me to be a part of over one staff member? Do you hear how bad that sounds?”
Dad rolls his eyes, refusing to really react to me. “I don’t care how it sounds. I haven’t run this business for all of these years and made such a success of it because I’ve cared about the feelings of other people.”
I suppose the money from my grandfather helped. The cash that’s been passed down through generations for a long time. We’re the definition of old money, but he likes to pretend that its’s all down to him.
“Now, speaking of not giving a fuck about how people feel, we get to you. I don’t care about risking your job over this woman with tattoos because you aren’t doing what you’re supposed to in the first place. Your mother makes me keep you on because she knows that it’s always been a dream of mine to pass this company down to you. She also makes the argument that we forked out all of that money for your education so we should let you use it. I can’t argue with that. I did pay a fucking fortune for it, and I want to make the most of it… but when your behavior keeps getting worse and worse, what am I supposed to do? Keep cutting you slack because you’re my kid? No way. Not a chance. I can only do that up until a certain point. But now, I’m done.”