He stares at me blankly and then blinks. “I’m sure everyone can just figure out how to use it on their own. It doesn’t look that complicated.”
Embarrassment flushes through my body, causing me to sweat under my collar. “Oh. Right.”
All my gumption has fizzled into nothing, and I awkwardly turn to leave again.
This time Zoey grabs my shoulders and forcibly spins me around, pushing me back inside.
Roger looks at me questioningly and raises his eyebrows. “Something else, Ava?”
“Just do it,” Zoey hisses quietly from the other side of the wall.
“Roger,” I start, dredging up more gumption from God knows where, “I was thinking I could be more—”
“No!”Zoey hisses again, quietly enough for only me to hear her, and then prompts me with what Ishouldbe saying to him. “I would be more effective as…”
“...more effective if I…I mean, in terms of managing the break-out sessions…it might be better,” I flounder, my face still burning, “You know, if instead of me having to pass everything off to Macayla, I could actually…you know…go…you know, and do it myself. It would take it off her plate, and I’d be able to—”
“Oh. Well, Ava,” Roger says in a tone that indicates the topic was closed before I even brought it up. “You know that IOD is our biggest client’s largest event of the year, so the team we need on the ground there has to be made up of our most polished, top-notch project managers. An event of this magnitude doesn’t require just the logistics going off without a hitch, it also requires our team to finesse our interpersonal relationships with their team.” He pauses, and Iswearhe gives my totallynotpolished appearance a once-over. “We can talk about possibly sending you to the Tech Systems summer conference, but for this one, we need to stick with the folks who are already seasoned at client-facing interaction.”
For some reason, I force a laugh. “Right.” Walking backward out of the office, I bump against the doorframe and have to awkwardly shuffle in my heels to keep from tripping over my own two feet. “Yeah, Tech Systems would begreat.”
Roger offers another polite nod. “Keep up the good work, Ava.”
Back in the corridor, I shoulder past Zoey and stomp back to my cubicle while she marches after me.
“Arekiddingme?” she snaps. “Tech Systems wouldnotbegreat. A pathetic little local, one-day meeting, with what? Likefivebreak-out sessions? Andnobodyimportant there?” She scoffs and throws her hands down at her sides as we hook a left into my cubicle. “Why do you put up with this crap?”
I exhale long, but quietly as I sit down at my desk and reach for my phone on reflex.
Zoey drags a spare chair from the corner to the side of my desk and drops into it. “You’ve been managingallthe logistics for break-out sessions forevery single conferencesince you started working here. How long have you been here, Ava?”
I don’t look at her and open the Facebook app just to mindlessly doomscroll through the newsfeed. Maybe seeing the hot mess that the whole world seems to be will make me feel better about not being able to get ahead at my job.
People arguing about politics, Australian wildfires, the tragic death of an NBA legend and his daughter, a deadly virus spreading across Southeast Asia…
Yep, it’s all terrible.
But I don’t feel any better.
“Ava,” Zoey repeats, “how long have you been here?”
I shrug as I look at her. “Like three years.”
“Three years,” she echoes, “and you’re still in the same position they hired you for.” She points her solid, unpolished index finger at my face. “That’s not normal. You’relongoverdue for a promotion. And Roger’s not giving you one because he, Tony, and David arecheapskatesand benefit from yourslave labor.”
I flutter my eyelashes in indignation, which reminds me of my crappy, melting mascara, and I rub below my eyes in an attempt to wipe it off. “It’s not exactlyslave labor, Zoey.”
“It’s basicallymodern-dayslave labor, and you know it.” She folds her arms across her ample chest and sits back in the chair. “A normal,ethicalcompany gives employees an opportunity to advance their career. A normal company gives employees a raise each year after a good performance review. A normal company will promote their best employees after they’ve proved themselves. That’syou, and they haven’t done anything for you.”
I tilt my head, squinting at her skeptically. “I actually don’t know if that’s the norm anymore. Pretty much everybody I know—”
“The point is you’ve more than earned this promotion, you’ve owned this facet oftheirmultimillion-dollar accounts for three years, have never dropped the ball, always go above and beyond, and they still haven’t done anything to compensate you for that.” She leans toward me and points at the entrance to my cubicle. “You needed totell him, ‘Icanhandle this. This ismypiece of the project, so you need to let me own it.’ Andthatwas more like, ‘I can handle this? Maybe? Do you think I can handle this, Roger? Because I’m not sure.’ You need to be more assertive.”
I look back at the screen of my phone. “It’s not like I can force him to promote me to onsite project management. It’s his way or the highway with this.”
Zoey jumps out of her chair and snatches my phone away.
“Hey!” I protest, swiping at the air to grab it back.
