“I have been waiting a long time for you to show me that you were ready to really take the reins of this company, to stand up for yourself and prove to me and everyone else in this office that you are strong enough to be their leader. And now, you’ve proven this to me.”
“Really?” I had to laugh. “That’s what you’ve been waiting for this whole time?”
“Yes,” he said. “As a matter of fact, it was. And I don’t really see what you could possibly find funny about all of this.”
I shook my head and weighed my options. How honest was I going to be? I smiled at him in a way I hoped he wouldn’t find condescending because I didn’t mean it as such. “Do you want me to explain to you what I find funny, or do you have more you wanted to say?”
My dad’s face was getting a little pink and his cheeks were puffed out like he was an animal trying to assert dominance. I tried not to laugh again, but it wasn’t easy. I didn’t want to insult the man—not really. But I found the whole thing to be so ridiculous, and after everything I’d dealt with recently, I just thought it might be time to really level with my dad. Not that I thought he would listen, but still, I felt the urge to tell him what was going through my head calmly and logically for a change.
“Go ahead then,” he said, the snark dripping from his voice. “Tell me what’s so funny, why don’t you?”
“It’s not so much funny in a bust your gut kind of way,” I began. “It’s more funny in the sense that it’s ironic. For years, I’ve been asking myself what I could do to earn your respect as the new CEO. I kept thinking that if I could show you that I knew what I was doing, if I could demonstrate that my leadership style was effective and that the way I choose to run the company, even though it’s different than how you ran it, would still be financially lucrative—I thought you would eventually come around.”
I laughed softly to myself and rubbed the sides of my head. “I thought you would finally see that I have my own vision and that I am capable of bringing that vision to life in my own way. But instead, it turns out, the only way I was able to gain your respect was by acting exactly like you. I yelled at you in front of everyone, I talked down to you in the same way you used to talk down to those below you in the company, and onlythendid you decide I was ready to be CEO. You were never going to let me do things my way, which meant you and I were going to continue struggling, pulling at either side of the tug-o-war rope until eventually, I caved and just started doing things the way you told me to do them. I assume that was your plan all along, right? You just wanted to make things so impossible for me that the path of least resistance was the one where you got me to do whatever you wanted!”
He said nothing. He stared straight ahead, looking me right in the eyes, but said nothing.
“You don’t have to say anything. I know the answer already.” I stood up and started to gather my things. “I think I’m going to go work from home again. I don’t know if you heard through the grapevine, but I got a dog, and she needs to be let out soon. If there’s anything else you need from me, just type it up in an email and send it over. I’ll get back to you when I can. Have a nice day, Dad.”
I headed for the door and just as I was stepping out of my office, he spoke.
“Do you even want to be here?” he asked.
I paused. I didn’t respond right away.
“It’s a simple question, son,” he said. “I’ll ask it again. Do you even want to be here? Do you want to be CEO? Do you want to be in charge of this company, or should I have asked somebody else to take over?”
Itwasa simple question, and yet I wasn’t sure how to respond. If he was asking me because he wanted a truthful answer, then I would say no. I didn’t want to be CEO. I never did, and I still didn’t. But if he was asking as a way to undermine me, to make me feel like I had messed up so bad this time that he was going to try to have me removed from my seat, then I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.
“You don’t have to say anything,” he said after a while. “I know the answer already.”
Not enjoying having my own words used against me, I turned back to face him and nodded. “You caught me,” I said, throwing my hands up. “I don’t want to be CEO. If you have someone else in mind, someone you think could run this company better than me and have a nicer time doing it, then set up a board meeting, and let’s ask everyone else if they’re okay with it.”
He raised a brow. “Are you sure? You are my eldest son, I always assumed it would be you who took over Becker Tech.”
“You did alwaysassume,” I said to him, not breaking eye contact. “But perhaps you should’ve asked me what I wanted. Just once. Then you would’ve learned that your assumptions are not always spot on, Dad. Especially the ones you make about your own family.” Then I offered him a small smile because I truly wasn’t angry with him, I was just ready to be done with this conversation.
I spun on my heel and walked away, and he was either too stunned or too lost in thought to respond.
* * *
It was a lovely day outside, so I decided to take Rica, my new dog, out for a walk. When I’d walked past her cage at the pound a month ago, I knew right away she was the dog for me. She was half golden retriever, half something else—the kennel didn’t know for sure. If I had to guess, I would’ve said she had some husky in her for sure. Her eyes were two different colors, and her fur was thick as could be. She was a very sweet dog. They told me they estimated her age to be around 2 years old, and she was very well trained. She’d only had one accident since arriving at my house, and that was her first night in a new place, so I chalked it up to nerves. They weren’t going to let me take her the day I visited the humane society. There was still some paperwork that needed to be finalized. But I was in such a bad mood that day, and so much in need of some comfort that I wrote them a donation check for $5,000 right then and there, and they let the formalities slide.
When I arrived home that morning after walking away from yet another tough conversation with my dad, Rica wagged her tail and greeted me with enthusiasm as I came through the door.
“Hey there, girl,” I said, bending down to pet her. “I know you weren’t expecting me for another few hours, but here I am!” When I reached for her leash which hung over the hook by the door, she lost it. She started whining and spinning around in excited circles. It took me a while to get her clicked in because of how much she was moving around but once I did, she and I were on our way. We walked for a long time, just going through the neighborhood until we got to the downtown area. Rica liked to greet nearly every person we passed, which was sometimes an annoyance, but I didn’t mind so much. I had nowhere else to be. I wasn’t going back into the office that day, I had decided that the moment I left the building.
At some point, I stopped taking random turns and started to take stock of where we were and planned a route to get back to my house. We weren’t too far from the offices really, and even closer to another building…
I knew if I took a right at the next intersection, I would soon be walking right in front of Lily’s apartment. I thought about going because why the hell not? Then, I heard Matt’s voice in my head telling me that I needed to get over this woman, telling me that I was ‘obsessed’ which was a word I did not want to ever be used to describe me.
But the more I walked towards the intersection, the more I thought about how unwell she’d looked at the office the last few days, and again, the worry began to grow, twisting my stomach in knots. I decided to go to her place just to see if she was home, so I took a right and brought Rica with me down to the next block and stood in front of the staircase that led to her building’s front door.
There, we stood. Rica sniffed around like she was searching for something, meanwhile, I looked up at the window I knew to be Lily’s and willed her to appear behind the curtain and smile down at me. But she didn’t appear, and eventually, Rica began pulling on the leash. I thought about walking up to the door and buzzing for her unit, but then I thought better of it. She was probably still at work. It was the middle of the day after all.
Feeling like a weirdo, just standing around staring up, I let Rica pull me away and we headed back home. Once there, I let her off the leash and she ran to get some water out of her bowl. Then I threw myself down on the couch and called my brother, Adam.
“What’s up?” Adam said when he answered. “I’m about to go into a meeting.”