No matter what I say to myself or which one of my training partners calls me, I just can't bring myself to go to the gym. I can't handle seeing Tristan right now. Every time I even think about him it feels like another little piece of my heart breaks off. So, I continue telling my friends that I'm busy with a work project and settling into my new apartment. Only Hailey knows the truth, though I suspect Jax knows that something is up.
Instead of my usual workouts, I've taken to running miles and miles after work. I run as far as I can and as long as I can until I collapse from exhaustion. It's only then that I'm able to shut off my brain and manage a few hours of sleep without thoughts of Tristan's words to Jax echoing in my head.
I can barely eat anything. Even with the immense calorie burn of my runs, I just don't have an appetite. I feel constantly nauseous when I think of Tristan with other women. It's a struggle to force food down my throat. Hailey has tried cooking me different meals in an effort to find something that I can keep down, but it's no use. I've lost ten pounds in the past three weeks.
The weight loss is visible in my face—I can tell I look haggard from the way Hailey frowns with concern every time she comes over. My clothes hang on me, where before they were tight. My idiot salad-eating coworker badgers me every day about what I'm doing to lose the weight. I can't bring myself to tell her it's just a natural side effect of having your heart shattered into a million pieces.
I also throw myself into work. I'm at the office by 7:30 every morning and rarely leave before 6:00. I really do have work projects lined up but in a normal week I'd have them done in only a few days. Now, I'm constantly re-reading, re-writing, second guessing all my work. I can barely focus on my computer screen half the time and end up zoning out for an hour before I realize I haven't typed a single word. I can't concentrate in any of my meetings, which only serves to aggravate the engineers when I meet with them. In the past three weeks they've all snapped at me more than once, scolding me for making them repeat themselves. I don't even have the energy to fight them on it. I just nod and make a note to figure it out myself.
My days are long and tense. My workload piles up due to my lack of focus, and the engineers get increasingly disheartened with the quality of my work. And as much as I hate my job, it still kills me to hear that my work is suffering. I double down and try even harder.
It's a vicious cycle. Every day the people around me grow more and more frustrated, and every day I try to push through the resulting chaos—unsuccessfully. Until one day it all comes to a head.
Cassandra rounds the corner to my cubicle with a furious look on her face.
"What did you do?" she snaps by way of greeting.
I turn away from my screen to look at her with dead eyes. "What do you mean?"
"I just sent you the email," she snaps, her eyes blazing with rage. "One of our competitors is threatening to sue us for copyright infringement on one of the playbooks thatyouwrote." She's gesturing wildly with her hands and she's not bothering to keep her voice down. The entire office can hear her scolding me.
I look at her email in my inbox, trying to blink away my confusion. I've never once had legal issues with my work. All I can manage in response is a weak, "what?"
"How could you fuck this up?" she continues yelling. Heads are starting to pop over the cubicles like prairie dogs, trying to see what all the fuss is about. "That playbook was onmyproduct so now I'm being reamed out by my boss foryourwork! What is wrong with you?!"
I continue to stare at my screen in confusion. She's not wrong—this is a huge deal. Copyright infringement can cost companies a lot of money.
How did I miss this? What was I thinking?
Answer: I clearly wasn't. This non-breakup-breakup is officially ruining every area of my life.
I swallow nervously and finally turn toward Cassandra. She's got both hands planted on her hips and her eyes dance with angry flames, waiting for my response. "I'm sorry," I say simply. "I don't know what happened. How—how do I fix it?"
She throws her hands in the air, clearly exasperated. "Not my problem," she growls. "Butfigure it out. I'm not going down for your stupid mistake." And with that, she turns around and stomps away, people's heads quickly popping back in their cubicles in an effort to not give away that they were watching our scene.
I clear my suddenly very dry throat. A cold sweat rushes through my body as the nerves inside me skyrocket.
Fuck. How did I fuck this up? What do I do now?
Just then, an email pops up on my screen. My face pales further as I read through the body of the mail.
A meeting with the Legal Department at 8:00 on Monday morning.Fuck.
I drop my head into my hands and take a deep, shaky breath.Think, Remy, think. What do I do now? Who can I talk to about this before Monday?
The idea comes so quickly that my head shoots up with a jolt. I know a lawyer. I can ask him how deep the shit is that I'm in, and how I can get myself out of it.
I grab my phone and fire off the text before I can second guess myself.
* * *
A few hours later, I'm sitting in a crowded bar for happy hour, scowling at the massive amounts of corporate assholes that are all around me. Working in the business center of a city means the surrounding bars are all packed starting at 5:00. Like now.
My scowl deepens the longer I wait for Jason to show up. God only knows why he couldn't meet until now, or why it had to be in abar. But I'm so desperate for his help that he convinced me without much trouble.
Finally, I see his gel-greased head bobbing through the crowd. He's wearing his usual custom-tailored suit and, per usual, he reeks of money-obsessed Corporate America. His fake, used-car salesman expression splits with a grin when he sees me sitting on one of the lounges.
"Remy! There you are! I'm so glad you could make it." He roughly pulls me to my feet and into a hug before I can respond. He doesn't let go of me when he pulls back.