Fatshionista Read online

  “Yes, I am fine. Just had a crazy dream and wanted to check on you.”

  I hit the send button before I realized that by connecting the two he would figure out that the dream was about him. Maybe he was too sleepy, maybe he had already drifted back…

  Buzz.

  “I’m fine. I assume I was in the dream, hence your worry? Hopefully I was well dressed. J”

  Daniel, Daniel, Daniel. You were wearing the best outfit I had ever seen you in. Of course I couldn’t actually text that because then he would ask for a description, and I was horrible at lying.

  “You looked wonderful, as always. Go back to sleep; I’m sorry I bothered you. Goodnight.”

  I reached out to lay the phone back on the table, sure he would recognize my ending the conversation when he read the “goodnight,” but as soon as my head hit the pillow, the phone buzzed again.

  I reached over and looked at it with one eye, the other one now buried into the pillow.

  “Funny that I was in your dream; you were in mine as well, and this time you weren’t wearing any stains on your shirt. J”

  “Well, good, at least I am clean in your dreams” was what I was in the middle of texting when I got his next text.

  “Actually you weren’t wearing anything at all, hence the lack of stains. See you later, goodnight.”

  I knew a conversation-ending text when I saw one, and as much as I wanted to dial his number and find out just what the hell I was doing naked in his dream, I knew that nothing good would come out of it. Gay, straight—it didn’t matter. There was nothing between us but work, a budding friendship, and an amazing amount of sexual frustration, at least on my part. I punched my pillow and rolled back over to try and get at least a little rest before I had to face Scarlett and Marta on Monday.

  CHAPTER 11

  Sunday came and went with no Daniel. He sent me a text saying he had a friend in from out of town. I was insanely jealous of this unknown friend, but I managed to put it on the backburner and concentrate on my bigger problem: Scarlett.

  On Monday morning, I avoided everyone except Lizzie when I got to the office. She was always in early, but I kept our conversation to just a “hello” and “how was the weekend.” She didn’t act strange, so whatever was going on, I didn’t think Lizzie knew anything about it.

  I settled into my chair and set my laptop up while continuing the career discussion I had been having with myself ever since I got on the subway this morning. On the one hand, I had offers coming in all the time from other companies to work for them. The only downside was that these were all much larger organizations and I would be one of many assistant producers. I also didn’t get the impression that I would work as closely with the designers as I did here at Marta’s, and with so many producers on staff, I wouldn’t get to pick my clients; I would take whomever was assigned to me.

  I toyed with the idea of chucking this side of the career altogether and making the leap into writing full time. My goal had always been to become a full-time writer, and the success of the blog put me much closer to that goal. The problem with that was the only thing I had professionally written about was fashion. And if I were no longer employed in the industry, it would make it very difficult to get first crack at the big stories. If I lost that competitive edge, then advertisers might back out and I might lose readers, all of which would affect the money I made from the blog.

  Writing a novel had always been a dream of mine. I had enough stories in my head and from the blog to put together something that would have an audience and intrigue some editor at a publishing house. I had several acquaintances who were in the publishing industry, some who even commented from time to time about loving the blog; they just had no idea they were complimenting the author when they shared that with me. One of the challenges of authoring the blog anonymously was that I limited my ability to network; I couldn’t use it as my calling card. It was a double-edged sword; with the anonymity, I was able to scoop the big stories, but I couldn’t brag about it or put it on a résumé.

  I was still mulling over all my choices while I pulled up my email to see if anything major had happened over the weekend or if there had been any word from Marta about when she would be back in the office.

  Aha! An email from Marta sent late Sunday evening saying she was back in town and wanted to see me in her office on Tuesday. She said she had something to discuss with me before the weekly staff meeting on Thursday. Well, great. Now I had to sit and stew for a whole day about what it could be. I hated anticipating conversations that might suck.

  I tried to turn my attention to the last details I had been putting together for Daniel’s show. I was due in his workroom this afternoon to go over the final proposal and get his blessing on everything before I started ordering the supplies and organizing the crew. At least his warning about Scarlett and Marta kept me from continuing to think about the super-sexy dream or the one he apparently had about me—naked me, to be exact. I hoped it wasn’t one of those dreams where people you knew were naked in it, but they were doing regular things, like having coffee or riding bikes (eeew, yuck). I hoped that naked me in his dream was having as much fun as naked me in my dream. Yes…this was a nice break from all the worrying and hand-wringing. I would think about naked Daniel and his super soft hair for just a…

  “There you are! I was hoping to catch you first thing this morning and have a little chat with you before the week took off. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’ve been running around here like a madwoman lately. I am single-handedly bringing in so many clients; I don’t think Marta was prepared to have this many designers lining up for our services.” And with that, Scarlett effectively ruined my little mental naked interlude.

  “Good morning, Scarlett. I can’t say that I noticed how busy you’ve been lately. I am usually in and out so much with my own work that I’m in the office first thing in the morning or late at night, and I don’t think those are times that you’re normally around.” Read: You work 8 to 5 and then go out and party, so no, I haven’t seen you do any actual work around here.

  “Well, you know so much of what I do is promote the company at the many social events I’m required to attend in support of my father and his various enterprises and charities. I myself am actively involved in so many charities I can barely keep up with them. I can’t say that it makes for a quiet life, but it certainly makes it interesting, if you know what I mean.” Her look conveyed very clearly that she was most assured that I could not possibly conceive of the challenges associated with a full social calendar. She wiggled her way through the stacks blocking the door and perched on the edge of the chair.

  Make yourself at home, you hateful hag.

  “Was there something you needed this morning, Scarlett? I was just about to finish up, then head out for a client meeting.” I started to pile up some papers on my desk and shut down my laptop. I wasn’t suppose to meet Daniel until two, but now that I knew Marta wouldn’t be around and I needed to escape Scarlett, I figured I could just pack up and go finish what I was working on at Starbucks.

  “As a matter of fact, yes, there is something I need. Marta has asked that I spend some time shadowing you, watching you work with our clients, see how you approach your duties. She feels like with business expanding, thanks to my new leads, we will need another producer on staff, and I told her I would love the opportunity to learn the hands-on side of the business. I had IT give me access to your calendar so I could see what you had and work my schedule around it. I saw you have a two with Daniel Singh this afternoon; is it at his workroom? I didn’t see the location listed on the invite.” She smiled sweetly and sat back, crossing her legs. She gave every appearance of being willing to sit back and quietly wait while all the various bombs she had just dropped went off.

  Okay, so lots of information just shared. The hag was after my job, the hag had access to my calendar, and the hag wanted to come along and watch me work. So much wrong with all that, I didn’t know where to star
t.

  “First, Scarlett, I don’t think it’s appropriate that you have access to my calendar. If you need to know my schedule, just ask me. As far as my appointment this afternoon, you are more than welcome to accompany me; I only ask that you come as a silent observer. I know that might be a stretch for you, but I don’t have time to answer the inevitable questions you will have and also give my undivided attention to my client. If you are agreeable to that, then you are more than welcome to come with me.” If not, don’t let the door hit your tight, perky ass on the way out of my office, Hagatha.

  Scarlett smiled that sickeningly sweet smile again. I swore at times she reminded me of Christian Bale in American Psycho. She could easily be a serial killer, as she had all the tendencies. Maybe I should be worried about more than her stealing my job…

  “You are welcome to take your concerns to Marta; I saw a need, and I satisfied it. I needed to know your schedule. You’re never here and you have no assistant, so I bridged the gap on my own. You will find the more you get to know me that I refuse to be limited by other people; so if there is a way to get what I need without having to get everyone’s buy-in, then I do it. Besides, there is no expectation of privacy in a work environment anyway.” Snarky, snarky, snarky. She was such a little… “Oh, and you said you were leaving right now to meet a client; who would that be? There was nothing on your calendar this morning. That was why I came down—I knew you were free until lunch.”

  “This is last minute, so there’s nothing on my calendar. I was asked to take a meeting with a designer who might be interested in joining our company.” Grrr. Let me get out of here and get to the Starbucks. It was like suddenly she was a CIA agent and I was the one with the secret code. Too bad I couldn’t pull a Jason Bourne and mow her down while jumping out the window. Ahhh, a girl could dream.

  “That’s certainly something I don’t need to observe. My God, it’s what I’ve been doing for the last four weeks. Welcome to my life, right? Hahahaha.” Why in the world she thought she was the only person at this company who had ever had to go out and schmooze to hustle business was completely beyond my realm of understanding. There were no words; I had no words to describe her. Thankfully I had the laptop packed up, the paper sufficiently shuffled, and I was already standing up and moving around the desk toward the door.

  “Yes, well, I’ll see you at two then. Do you know where the workroom is? I know you recently had dinner with him; I didn’t know if during that conversation he had mentioned where he had set up shop?” I said sweetly with a smile. Yes, that’s right, Scarlett. Just so you know, I know about your little dinner conversation. Stew on that. And if he told me that you all had dinner, maybe he told me WHY you all had dinner. Betcha never thought of that, hmmm?

  Scarlett was in the middle of standing when I made the comment about dinner with Daniel. She paused mid-stand, her smile frozen in place, but she quickly recovered. “Yes, he did mention where the workroom was located. I’ll see you this afternoon then.” And finally she left my office.

  Too bad I already had everything packed up and the fake meeting now ahead of me. All I wanted to do was flop back into my chair and compose the scathing speech I was going to march into Marta’s office on Tuesday and throw down on her. For two cents, I would quit today and spare myself any more worry and stress about this place.

  I started down the hall to the elevators, mentally adding up the money in my savings, 401K, IRA, and money market accounts. I had started out poor in this world, but saving every penny and the recent windfall of blog advertising over the last two years had allowed me to build up quite a nest egg. Of course, the original plan had been to buy a little place here and then use the rest to buy a place in Delhi. I had been saying for years that I would try and go back on a more permanent basis. My exchange family that I lived with while studying there was really the only family I had. They had practically adopted me. But the once a year that I was able to make it back just wasn’t enough for them or me.

  My phone beeped with a text as I stepped on to the elevator. I couldn’t stop the grin that took over my whole face when I saw it was Daniel. I hadn’t heard from him since the text yesterday about the unexpected guest.

  “Have to reschedule; guest still in town. Family friend, so Mother is pulling strings all the way from India. Can you meet Tuesday at 2:00?”

  I frowned when I read the part about his mother being involved. Surely his family knew his situation. I shuddered to think he was stuck playing tour guide to some woman his family had picked out for him. I knew a lot of friends in New York whose parents were pressuring them to marry someone they had picked out. He was a big boy; whatever it was, I was sure he could handle it.

  I sent him one back saying tomorrow was fine and briefly considered sending one to Scarlett to let her know the meeting was off, but decided against it. Let her head all the way uptown and find out Daniel wasn’t around. She could add that to the list of things she was going to complain to Marta about tomorrow. And speaking of Marta, if she wanted Scarlett to take over and do my job, then she was going to have to tell me that to my face.

  ****

  “I want Scarlett to take over your role here at the company, and I would like for you to consider a different set of responsibilities.” Marta never bothered with small talk. She said this before I even got my butt into the chair on Tuesday morning.

  I settled into the seat and took a deep breath while mentally rehearsing the major drama I was getting ready to unleash on this woman. I always knew that if I were going to go down, I would go down swinging. If she had the balls to up and fire me and replace me with Scarlett, then she was going to have to call security and get them to haul my fat ass out of here, kicking and screaming. I was going to make such a scene that twenty years from now people would still be talking about that girl they fired that had to be dragged out of the building by force.

  “Marta, I don’t understand what you want me to do. What other job is there for me to do here? I started at the bottom; I have done everything you have ever asked of me. If there are ‘different responsibilities’ you want me to take on, I can only assume that would be working my way back down to the bottom.”

  “Millicent, if you would give me a moment to explain, I will be more than pleased to share with you what I meant. Scarlett coming on board has made me reevaluate how we have our resources aligned, and I plan on announcing some changes in our staff meeting Thursday. Since these changes directly impact you and your role at this company, I wanted to do you the courtesy of having a conversation with you prior to the announcement so you would be prepared.”

  Prepared for what? Did she honestly think if she was demoting me or, God forbid, firing me that I would stick around and see what everyone had to say about that on Thursday? At least she admitted Scarlett was involved in this. I was starting to feel the heat come up from my chest and my face get flushed. I didn’t deal well with confrontation, but I had learned how to handle it over the years. The one thing I couldn’t do was control the flush that came over me when I get pissed off.

  “Millicent, do you remember the first piece of advice I gave you when I hired you on as an intern?”

  Good Lord, there were so many. She even had me carry a notebook around for the first year so when she said something she deemed important, I could write it down. But I never forgot the first thing she told me to write in that book. I still had the book on my shelf in my office—a reminder of how far I had come since the first day here.

  “You told me I needed to lose weight, that no one in your industry would ever care to seek advice or take advice from a fat girl. You said that the message it sent to people was if I couldn’t manage something as simple as what went into my mouth, how could I possibly manage their show.” Yep, it was a red-letter start to my first day at this company. I had always been okay with my size. Don’t get me wrong, nobody loved being overweight, but I decided that of all the bad things in the world I could be—mean, stingy, cold-hearted, a liar, a
cheat, a thief, a killer—that maybe being fat wasn’t the worst thing.

  I had tried to lose weight as soon as I started here. I would starve myself and exercise until I collapsed in the bed at night so tired and hungry that I could barely get up in the morning to do my job! The very reason I was killing myself was jeopardized because I had no energy left to do it!

  So I stopped being crazy and started being more careful about what I ate—more fruits, vegetable, lean meats—and I would walk everywhere I could instead of taking the subway or the bus. I was fit, I was healthy, I was just also a size sixteen. But I was okay with that, and I was okay that Marta wasn’t. She never mentioned it again after that first day…until today.

  “Yes, that is correct. And while I still feel like that was excellent advice to give and that it is an absolutely true statement, I have also recognized that it has never been an obstacle to your career. You have actually turned it into an asset.”

  Whoa, where was this going? “An asset?”

  “Yes. You have become an invaluable asset to this company, not just because of the quality of your work, which you know is outstanding, but also because of how you present yourself to the world and in particular to our clients. You bring a unique perspective into this industry because you have all the knowledge and the know-how of a seasoned, fashion-savvy woman, but you have the body of every other woman in America. Designers know that your viewpoint is the best of both worlds; you give your opinion based on who you are as a producer and who you are as the everyday woman.”