Tablets by Tom

“The paper is so nice.” I think to myself as I feel the soft texture in one hand, and dab my eyes with the tissue in the other. I am still holding back tears, but my makeup is already destroyed.

I fling the letter and the opened envelope onto my desk, bouncing them off the new Tablet, which is still processing the last voice prompt.

Processing...

I roll my eyes hard and get up from my chair, pull a new tissue and start dabbing the continued tears away from my eyes. I grab the letter and stuff it poorly back into its envelope, and shove it in the back pocket of my jeans.

I stare at the device and exhale hard. “Ugh, c’mon.” my voice just a whisper, and barely holding back a wobble and full on crying fit.

I give up, grab my coffee cup and leave my office. Walking past two doors and the supply nook, I turn left into the breakroom. The change in scenery does not help.

The coffee maker is empty and on.

I exhale hard as I pull out and empty the grounds of the filter basket, and shut the power off to the burner. I plop the basket down, open the jar full of bent up and mashed together filters and carefully repair the chosen filter by shoving it in the basket and punching it over and over until it stays. I grab the carafe and toss it in the sink under the faucet and turn it on. I hear footsteps behind me.

“Deb Deb!” Diane calls out as she comes up beside me and hip checks me, our most common gesture and greeting. I am not paying attention at all, and the move from the stout Diane, ‘DD’ as I affectionately call her, Director of Sales, nearly knocks me over.

“Holy shit!” She proclaims as she grabs me to keep me from falling, the water now running over the carafe and down the drain in the sink.

“Debs, what's up?” Diane inspects me, seeing the blurred makeup and held back emotion.

“Holy crap, girl, what is going on?”

I say nothing and hand her the envelope from my back pocket. She opens it and reads, her face betraying nothing and growing with anger and disbelief.

“That fucking turd is letting you go?” DD proclaims loudly.

“Shhhh!” I say, batting my hands up and down in the please-be-quiet gesture.

“Oh fuck them!” DD says again, louder this time than last. She grabs me and gives me a big hug, I lose it and start bawling.

DD. My hero DD. We have been friends for going on twenty-seven years now, back when this was just an office phone company. We started on nearly the same day, and two weeks into employment, DD, then just a salesperson, yoked one of the senior sales staff up after he got a little too ‘friendly’ with me in the hallway one day. Whilst grabbing his testicles she explained that if he ever touched me again she would ‘effin feed them to him’. She has long been my companion, protector, and dear friend. She is amazing, and I love her.

She lets me go and we stare at each other. My lips are quivering, and my eyes are filling with water. DD tosses the envelope with my separation notice over her shoulder in a very animated fashion, making a ‘whatever’ face and paints her huge smile full of bright white teeth on to try and cheer me up.

It works.

“When did you get the letter?”

“This morning. It was on my desk in front of the Tablet when I arrived. Tom beat me in today too, so I bet that conniving weasel came in to put it there without having to look at me when he did it!”

“What a shithead.”

“Right?” My breath stuttered. I went back to the sink, turned off the faucet and grabbed the carafe. I flipped the lid back down, and started to pour the water into the coffee maker.

“You want a donut?”

“No, thanks.” I managed to squeeze out. I put grounds in the filter in the basket, and returned it to the coffee maker and flipped the switch to brew.

“You want to go to Murphy’s tonight?”

DD puts her hand up with her fingers together, silently asking for a high-five. I comply.

“There we go!” she says, satisfied that she had again, saved the day. “You want me to go grab Tom and throw him down the fucking stairs?” she continues, a devious grin on her face, eyebrows raised.

“No.” I specify forcefully, knowing she would absolutely do it if I even hinted at yes.

“What are you going to do Debs?”

“I don’t know. I have to finish today. Part of the deal is I have to finish training that piece of shit Tablet. I started working on it before I read the letter and that hunk of shit still will not make the calendar entries I need it to make.”

“Tom needs a massage again?” DD winked at me. “From that special place?”

“No.”

“What a fucking asshole.”

“Yepp.”

“Why are you even working? Fuck them.”

“I don’t know... I can’t help it. I was trying really hard not to cry, and I was hoping that working would help, and that fucking Tablet keeps saying processing...” I was rambling.

DD hears footsteps that grab her attention. She turns to me and loudly whispers “Effin Susan is coming!”

General Office Manager Susan Fitzgerald, the bane of the breakroom, generally disliked by all, and absolutely-not-affectionately named Fuck You Susan, by DD and I, was coming, likely to get a donut.

“Hi Susan.” DD and I say in unison, in our best pretending to give a shit about you voice.

“Hi ladies, TGIF!” says Susan, as she opens the donut boxes.

DD and I eye each other behind her back, and silently lip read “Fuck You Susan!” while throwing up the requisite hand gesture at one another. Susan grabs a donut from each box, puts them on a napkin and starts to leave the breakroom.

“Don’t hang out too long! Bye!”

“Bye Susan!” We say in unison again, with a carefree tone. We ensure our duty to the great universe by following up with more hand gestures.

Susan has absolutely no authority over DD, and DD sure as hell would never listen to a single thing that droning woman would say, and me, executive assistant to the CEO, had no one above me, including that fucking douche-bag Tom, the CEO.

“I gotta go, I have a meeting.” DD says, as she walks by and hip checks me again. I return the bump this time, and smack her on the butt.

“Go get em tiger!” I say, being silly, and DD puts her hands up like tiger claws as she walks by and exits the breakroom.

I turn to the still brewing coffee maker, pull the carafe and hear the sounds of coffee sizzling on the heating element, fill my cup, return the carafe, and exit the breakroom. Back at my desk, I sit my coffee down, and have the joy of seeing the Tablet has moved from Processing... to connection error. I sit down, hold the power button down, and decide that from here on out, for my last few hours here, the tablet would now be known as Fuck you Tablet.

The Tablet comes back up. “Add a massage appointment to Tom’s calendar!” I say, loudly, trying and succeeding at being an ass, to break my mood.

Processing...

I shake my head, disappointed, and sit back in my chair. When I started here, working for Tom’s dad Joe, back when we sold office phone systems, this job was a dream come true. I was young, feisty, and damn well great at running the executive offices. Slowly, over time, as this place began to shrink, I never expected I would be one... that my job would go away. How could they do this without me? I have been here for so long? I have seen too much!

The Tablet buzzes, and a reminder pops up on the screen. The nine o’clock with Ms.Smythe from Ciel & Pierre, a fancy interior design place downtown, potential customer, and potentially mistress number three for Tom. She wasn’t my favorite, was a bit snooty, but wasn’t bad. She prefers tea, and I enjoy offering her coffee.

I get up and beat on the wooden door, to remind Tom of the upcoming appointment.

“Hey fucker, your stinky dopey lady friend will be here in ten minutes!” I think to myself, as I knock for the third and last time.

“Ten minutes!” I say through the door.

I sit back down. Shortly afterward the door opens.

“Good morning, thanks. Did you see the thing?” He looks over at me.

I don’t get up. I look at him straight-faced, one eyebrow lifted and flatly say “Yes.”

“Ok, we can talk later. Do I look ok?”

Without even bothering to look, I swing around in my chair back to my desk and again flatly say “Yes.”

I hear Tom shuffling away as I interact with the Tablet, using my fingers as opposed to the voice commands I am supposed to be using.

“Fuck you Tom.” I think, as I close the reminder, and pull up the rest of the calendar by tapping instead of talking.

I answer a few emails, again tapping instead of talking, anything I can do to be spiteful.

“Yes, I am fine if you reschedule to next week. No, you can’t reschedule for today. Yes, the pest service can come first thing Monday morning.” I laugh to myself.

“Yes, yes, no, yes, no.” I have a small giggle-fit.

I continue my destructive planning, and get into it way more than I expect. DD would be proud. Without my knowledge, Ms. Smythe, and her overwhelming perfume arrive. I get up and hug her aggressively, she pulls back, looking very uncomfortable.

“Hello Ms. Smythe!” I say in my best faking-that-I-like-you voice. I go on without giving her time to speak.

“Right this way!” I step into Tom’s office, and wave her in frantically. As she passes I whisper to her “I’ll bring you some coffee.”

“Tea please, Debra, but I will take a coffee.” Says Fuck You Tom.

“Why don’t you jump out of that window after having sex with yourself!” I suggest to his smug damn face, but only in my head.

“On it!” I state, way too keen to pretend. It isn’t missed by either of them.

I flash a big smile, and skip out of the room, bopping up and down, and close the door behind me. I sit back down at my Tablet, happily poking and prodding instead of talking, and get lost in my new schedule mis-management job, grinning from ear to ear. I move meetings around and cancel some interoffice appointments.

I get up and head to the breakroom, and bump into Susan, who is heading for Tom’s office. I look her up and down, say nothing, and side step her in the hall as she attempts to speak to me.

“Head right in, they aren’t doing anything naughty yet!” I say, shocked at my own irreverent attitude and comment, and clearly shocking Fuck you Susan as she says nothing, and heads into my office.

I make my way to the breakroom, pass by Tom’s cup to grab two Styrofoam disposable cups, and start filling one with hot water from the faucet. I rip open a shoddy looking teabag, plop it into the water, and put it aside. I fill Tom’s cup with coffee only to the halfway mark, deciding to myself that I am calling it there for both my and his personal safety, grab the lukewarm tea, and head out back to my office, still skipping and chipper.

I get to Tom’s door, put down his half cup of coffee, and without knocking, turn the door knob, kick the door open, grab the coffee cup, and waltz right in, smile beaming.

“Coffee and tea!” I exclaim, sick of myself even, as I walk right past the group, continuing to ignore Fuck you Susan and hand the drinks off to their respective claimants. I keep the big, pinned-on smile on my face and rock my head far to one side as I hand the tea to Stinky Smythe.

I say nothing, and bounce my way out of the office, slamming the door closed with just enough force to say “Fuck you three, entirely!”, but not enough that an ‘it was an accident’ excuse would not cover how rude I was clearly being.

“Well then.” I say out loud. “Back to Fuck you Tablet!”

I sit down and do some real work. I can’t help myself I guess. It comes to me naturally, and my little outburst earlier was truly relieving. I am going through my emails when I see one pop up from DD, with the subject “Early lunch”. I open it and see an invite to go get breakfast from the cart down the street and “talk shit.” I like this idea and reply “Yes, see you in five.” By breakfast DD means a hot dog with all of the fixings at 9:10 AM, a rare but not unheard of escape, and by ‘talk shit’ she means ‘talk shit.’

I look over to the Fuck you Tablet, and say “Schedule a massage.” as I get up.

Processing...

Is all I get from it, which makes me happy, and I leave to go meet DD. We have hotdogs and share gossip and split a Coke. After, even with that terrible hot dog gurgling in my stomach, I am fully relieved and feeling normal, especially after telling my tale to DD and getting a good full, rolling laugh from her.

I get back to my office and Tom is waiting in his doorway. He isn’t waiting for me, but takes the opportunity to pretend like he was.

“Where have you been?”

“Where have I been? At lunch. What do you need?” The forced smile never leaves my face.

“I want to chat, Debra. Is now a good time?”

“You're the boss, at least through today.” I say, keeping the smile plastered on my face.

“Thanks. Listen. I wanted to tell you that I appreciate you very much, and all that you have done for Dad and me and our...” he stumbles a little. “Our company over all these years, and how much I regret having to let you go and...”

“Save it Tom. I read the letter. It’s fine.”

“That’s not what I meant. It's not fine Debra. When we made the change from phone system to Tablets, then Tablets to Tablets with AI.. well. Well I bet the farm the change would work.. Be gang-busters. This is my baby and we are so close to landing some great deals, and I never thought I would have to start laying people off, and I wasn’t sure how to..”

I cut him off. “Tom, you knew when you asked me to start training that awful thing that you were going to let me go. You knew. You may have been talking yourself out of it in your head, but you knew the deal. I’ve been good to you. I’ve covered for you. You damn well knew Tom.”

“Listen, Deb..”

“Don’t you call me Deb!” The sharpness of my voice is a little overdone. My smile fades.

“Debra, we have to set the example! We are selling this product to our customers. It has to work. We have to show them it works. I can't have a human as my secretary..”

“Assistant.” I corrected him.

“Assistant, yes, while we are trying to sell an AI solution to them! This has to happen! I don’t like it anymore than you do..”

“Oh Tom, shut the fuck up.” I shock myself as it comes out of my face. I can’t do anything to stop it. “Just stop. If you are worried about what the customers think, then you most certainly would not be offering them that fucking piece of shit Tablet!” I pause and collect myself.

“Don’t come at me with this sorry it's not you it's me crap. To hell with you, to hell with the customers, to hell with this place!” I get pretty loud at the end there.

“Debra, don't get ugly about this. Like I said this is my baby, and I am going to make it work no matter the cost.”

“No matter the cost?” I repeat. “Like running this company into the damn ground?”

“Debra please.”

“No. No, I don’t think so, you sleazy jerk. How dare you ask me to teach that damn... Tablet when you knew you were going to fire me? How dare you!”

“Your severance package..”

“Oh, be quiet!” I exhale hard. “I am leaving. I am not training your little AI toy.”

“Debra please.”

“No, we’re done here. Good luck selling this crap to your customers. I hope your baby here grows up smarter than you..” I stop as I hear footsteps behind me. I turn around. It's Larry Patel and Tracy Goodman, members of the Board of Directors. They clearly heard our... discussion, but are too professional to say anything. Larry walks over and greets me in our long standing way “D!”, I smile and repeat back to him “P!” He smiles and we shake hands.

I wave at Tracy, who waves back and queries “Are we interrupting?”

“No, come in!” says Fuck you Tom, waving them into his office. Larry walks by, raising his eyebrows. He moves to show me his hands as he walks by into Tom’s office.

He is carrying an envelope.