That Time She Lived Like a Man

That Time She Lived Like a Man

by Veronica Deronda Meyer

The only honest way to put it is to say that she lived like a man. Not any man you know. And certainly not the nicest man you know. What happened was, after a lifetime of living like an overlooked, increasingly resentful sheep, she fell under the sway, if you want to call it that, of Geoffrey Lane Gardner of Putnam City. While in his orbit, she observed and retained and surmised and concluded, and when the time was right, she moved all the way out of Putnam City.

She drove down the map about 4 or 5 biggish burgs, where it seemed unlikely GLG was widely known.

At that point, she simply began living as GLG. Not using his name or his personal history, but just living like him. She expanded, and she took up space. She lied. She assumed all sorts of things. She boldly leaned back and assessed people, sometimes with narrowed eyes and sometimes with a baby's frank innocence.

When it came time to find employment, she exaggerated her strengths (lied) and twisted some arms in a business 4 towns back, thus gaining some beautifully impressive references which would not stand up to sustained scrutiny, but at first glance, glowed with awesomeness.

Of course she asked for an obscene amount of money, and she got it. Once hired, she asked for nothing but expected everything and again, she got it. Just about the time she began seriously to wonder if all of this could possibly last, for her, or even for GLG back in Putnam City, she came down with a really bad cold.

She just woke up with it one day. Rolled over, frowned, but then remembered. Dialed her secretary, demonstrating humanity and magnanimity by recalling the office at all, and croaked that she would not be in today.

Three sweet days later (because what is sweeter than guilt-free rest when you need it) she woke up feeling feisty and zesty, and ready to Get Back to It.

You may imagine her surprise when she, redolent of rest and expensive shampoo, rolled into her private office, only to find another human being already there, a spindly, shiny-eyed thing, vibrating with self-importance, and obviously the Personal Assistant to Some Big Muckety-Muck, who was actually perched in HER fancy office chair.

Not for nothing had our heroine been the avid student of Geoffrey Lane Gardner. A microsecond's mental pivot prevented the fatal mistake of stopping short--let alone appearing flustered. Instead she simply forged ahead and took back her chair, just as if nobody was in it. Because of physics, her usurper tumbled out of the chair, and, points for her, immediately scrambled to her feet--her own mental pivot conceding hastily that to be sat upon is in no wise a power move.

Opening a drawer and deftly tucking away a swoonworthy designer handbag, our heroine meanwhile smiled at the intruder, cocked her head and chirped, "Did you get lost?" And then she winked.

The conquered, whose name was Paula Havergate, pretended to laugh in return, and sat hastily down in the other chair, tugging uncomfortably at her skirt. She then found herself stuttering over the speech she had had so much fun rehearsing on the drive down from headquarters. The speech was meant to deal chiefly with the affront of unverifiable references and other questionable assertions in a certain resume, but this address was delivered with less and less certainty.

"And, anyway, I'm sure you can see why," Paula abruptly summarized, so unnerving was the cool gaze opposite her, "--why, that is, that Mr. Layton himself asked me to drive down here to confront--to ask—to speak to you in person about it."

"May I be candid, Paula?" our heroine asked, leaning forward and templing her finger-tips. When Paula understood that she was expected to answer, she blinked, and licked her lips. "Well, yes, of course. Please do."

"I was warned," the avid student of GLG confessed. "I can't say I wasn't warned, because I was. 'Eloise,' Jonesie said to me--oh, pardon! That's just what we call him. Um, never mind. Let's just say that a well-placed person in the know tried to warn me against joining this company. He did! He went on and ON about the carelessness and the mistakes and the mix-ups, the lack of follow-through, and the absolutely endemic confusion. 'Eloise,' he said to me, 'Eloise, darling, those people will have you doubting your own history, your own fabled career.'

"And do you know," Eloise said, more candid than ever, "I refused to believe him! I did. I said to him, as frank as you please, I said, 'Jonesie, the Madelin Group is not that way. Yes, there are a lot of reports of a once-great organization slowly crumbling into decrepitude and senescence, a lot of reports of underqualified assistants and people just out of their depth, mismanaging this and misunderstanding that, but I for one refuse to credit it. The Madelin Group,’ I said to him, ‘has yet to see its heyday. And I for one intend to be in the vanguard of its future success.’ That," Eloise mused fondly to Paula, "is exactly what I said to him."

Paula opened her mouth, but slowly closed it, deep in thought.

Eloise reached across the desk, and took one of Paula's thin hands in her own, in the frankest of frank gestures. With a graciousness Paula would remember all of her life, Eloise smiled a gentle, secret smile and whispered, "It's okay. We'll just never speak of this again." And she winked.

That afternoon, over her favorite happy drink, Eloise concluded that not only had the GLG method yet to fail, in fact, in triumphing today over the likes of Havergate (proxy of Old Man Layton himself) Eloise might, after all, in full confidence rely upon it for the rest of her natural career. There were times, of course, in the years to come, in idle moments, moments of unguarded weakness, when Eloise found herself doubting the GLG Method, found herself wondering about potentially dangerous things.

Things such as new company policies which had occurred to her while showering or golfing or sunbathing, policies that Eloise could propose to the board which would definitely improve the lives of Madelin Group employees, probably improve the lives of Madelin Group clients, and possibly even improve the lives of nameless humans not even connected with the Madelin Group.

But of course, Eloise knew better than that. All she ever had to do in moments of such weakness was to ask herself, "Eloise, what would that iniquitous old sinner, GLG, do?" And if GLG would have hooted at the very idea of rocking the boat, let alone of extending a helping hand to flailing flotsam surrounding said boat, Eloise would obediently file the idea away in the most inaccessible filing cabinet in the furthest reaches of the back of her mind.

In the meantime, of course, Eloise thoroughly enjoyed her time living life as a man. Again, not any man you know, and certainly not the nicest man you know. But overall, and to the end, Eloise was satisfied with her choice.