For me, it’s the feeling that no matter what I do today and tomorrow, I can’t avoid collateral damage. Anxiety rubs like a burr under my skin, its hooks sinking deeper with every move. To stop the fidgets, I pull out my phone and review the schedule for the hundredth time.
If I’d planned this retreat, I would’ve provided useful activitychoices, like “Option 1: The Competitor. Barricade yourself in a private room with your slide deck for twenty-five straight hours. Option 2: The Emotional Wreck. Unwind by crying under the luxe rainfall shower and making playlists of angry power songs on the complimentary Wi-Fi.”
Instead, today’s one option is: a Lighthearted Sports Day (plus Challenging Obstacle Relay with Accessible Stations!). Tomorrow, after a “restful” night in a four-person green glamping yurt, everyone will attend the pitch presentation.
My stomach squeezes into a terrified accordion at the thought. I tell it to chill, kicking my suitcase a little to show I mean business. The past eight weeks have been a fever dream of preparation. I have to believe I’m ready. Ready as I’ll ever be, anyway.
On the horizon squats a bank of dense, low clouds. I smell weather. Should’ve packed more socks.
Tobin wanders over from the Team West bus, jaunty in his strappy backcountry rucksack and classic tan leather boots with red laces.
“You want to sign up for the three-legged race with me?” Another genius idea from the organizers: split the office into two teams to promote “healthy” competition, but make an event where one member of Team West and one from Team North are literally tied together and call that “bilateral collaboration.”
“Don’t you think it would look… weird, if we were partners?”
“Weird how? Everyone’s doing it.” He drops a saucy wink to remind me of the three-legged race he and I were doing just hours ago. I slipped out of our bed at dawn to shower and dress at my parents’ house, keeping up the fiction that I’ve respected my rule about not moving back in even though I’ve slept over every night since the fracas with his parents.
“It might be good to pair up with other people. You know. Make new connections.” Every other year at this event, I never left hisside. From the moment we got together, my identity at this company has always been stacked underneath his.
This year needs to be the opposite. We drove in together because McHuge needed to borrow Tobin’s truck for a meeting this morning, but our partnership ends there. In a crowd of people who believe in nonverbal messages, my outgoing message has to be that I’m with him by choice, not necessity.
The rising wind fans a whisky-hued lock of hair across Tobin’s face; he frowns, tucking it behind his ear. “It’s just one race. And you and I are an amazing team. When we’re working together, no one can beat us.”
“What’s this? You two aren’t conspiring to rig the pitch competition, are you?” Craig’s hearty laugh cuts short when I jump away from Tobin.
“Craig! I didn’t see you there. I assure you Tobin and I have taken steps to avoid actual or potential conflict of interest around the pitch competition.” I glance around. At least a dozen people nearby have mysteriously discovered a need to fiddle with their suitcase zipper while staring anywhere but at our little group.
Craig looks between me and Tobin like each of us has the number two tattooed on our forehead and he’s just done the math. “So when you said no one can beat the two of you together, you meant…?”
Tobin’s sunny “Just the three-legged race” gets rained out by my guilty “Just the three-legged race!”
Craig lowers his voice, looking pointedly at our height difference. “No offense, but you two aren’t the obvious choice for the three-legged race. Are you sure Keller hasn’t sweetened the deal by offering for the pair of you?”
“Keller did what?” Tobin asks, looking at me sideways.
“Keller didn’t do anything! And we’re not racing together,” I add. Nothing sounds shadier than the truth, but improv didn’tteach me how to lie. I only learned how to work with “yes, and”—but Craig’s favorite things are conflict and competition.
Eleanor would call Craig’s laugh “angry-happy.” “Lewis, you’re a player. I respect that. When the two of you are ready, let’s talk.” He strides away.
Cool, wet terror eddies around my feet like mist in a graveyard.
“What was that?” Tobin wraps his arms over his ribs.
It was a mistake,I don’t say. I overplayed the hand Sharon dealt me with her headhunting hints on the golf course. At the precise moment when I need Craig to see me as a distinct person, he’s lumped me and Tobin together. Because why would Keller offer for just me, right?
I can’t make any more unforced errors on this retreat. Real life isn’t improv. You can make mistakes. Big ones. You can lose years of your life to them.
My whole life feels like a giant knot of mistakes, work tangled with marriage tangled with who I want to be. I said I didn’t want sex to confuse things, but I’ve been sleeping with Tobin for weeks. I’m supposed to be moving back in tomorrow night, even though Tobin and I will be trying to deny each other a promotion in the morning. And I bet it all on improv, but Craig doesn’t follow McHuge’s rules. Improv taught me how to survive social situations on my own, but I want to do better than not dying.
I want towin.
I have to show Craig what I’ve got to offer. Give everything to this retreat as myself—just me, and nobody else.
“It’s nothing,” I tell Tobin. “Look, I’m spiraling over my pitch and I’m not fit for human consumption. And it seems like Craig has some weird ideas about us racing together. We should find different partners for this one.”
Just like we took a break from reality on Béa’s wedding weekend, we need to take a break from being married until after the presentation.
He looks at me sharply, maybe sensing what I’ve left unsaid. “Okay,” he says after a moment. He reaches toward me, but I step back.
