The doors open on Cammy’s floor, and she gets out without saying a word.
“Bye,” I call after her as the doors are closing. I pinch the bridge of my nose and take a deep breath. I need to get my shit together. It’s my first day of work. I’m meeting my boss. I need to handle this right.
The doors open on the next floor. My time to be sad is over. I step into the reception area and go to the reception desk to the left. Mary-Anna smiles warmly at me, adjusting her pink-framed glasses.
“Oh, good morning, Mr. Carr.”
“Good morning,” I repeat. “I’m starting today.”
“I heard,” she says with a smile. “If you want to head to your office, I’ll let Ken know.”
“Thank you.”
Harmon had given me a quick tour of this floor last week, so I’m familiar with it. I was introduced to Mary-Anna and Ken, who will be my direct supervisor.
My office is small, and unfortunately, has a similar view as Harmon’s since it’s on the same side of the building.
The room is spacious but empty, and the desk is facing the wrong way.
There’s a quick knock on the door
“Hey, good morning, Cassius. How was your weekend?”
One of the worst of my life.
Ken is in his late thirties, with light brown hair and dark brown eyes. Totaldadvibes, and not in a daddy way. But like he has a family and kids. Nothing wrong with that, of course. Family is great.
“It was good. How was yours?”
“Not bad. We took the kids camping for the weekend.”
“Wow, that sounds nice.”
“I mean, it turned out nothing like I wanted it to. The kids hated it. My wife got poison ivy, but that’s half the fun, right? The chaos of it all?”
“Uh, sure. Yeah, if you say so.” I laugh.
“Well, anyway. Welcome to your office.” He gestures around. “Maintenance will be here within the hour to move this around how you want it. They’ll set up your computer, phone line, and printer. If you need any filing cabinets or more desks, let them know. They’ll get you whatever you need.”
“Thank you.”
“Yeah, of course. We want all our employees to be comfortable in the space they’re in, so feel free to order a few things to make it yours. And bring in whatever personal items you want, too. Family photos, stuff like that. We like seeing that stuff.”
It’s nice that they encourage personal touches. I’m sure that’s not acceptable everywhere.
“I will do that, thank you.”
“Once your office is set up, you can review the meeting room schedule to familiarize yourself with it. When someone needs space, they fill out a request form which gets emailed directly to you. You will approve or deny it. If it’s denied, suggest a change. That’ll only happen if it’s taken, of course. Simple enough. And you can check out the stock rooms. People are supposed to subtract things from the list when they take them, but they don’t always, so don’t trust it. There’s a cheat sheet on each of them with the minimum number of items we should have in stock at a time. Of course, as you get going, you’ll figure this all out. And if you have any questions, let me know.”
“Sounds great.”
“Cool. I’ll see you later then?”
“See you later, Ken. Thanks again.”
He leaves my office, and I sit in the chair. It squeaks loudly. I rock back and forth, and it turns into a screeching sound.
“Looks like you’re going to need a new chair.” I turn to face the door. A young guy in jeans and a grey polo steps in. Longish sandy blond hair, glasses that give him a bit of a nerdy look. He’s built, like he visits the gym often, and his outfit shows off everymuscle there is to see. His sleeves look like they may tear if he moves the wrong way.