(Many thanks to KittyKatBC, my editor on this one. I'm glad she was on board, it made the story easier to write.)
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Lacey was my boss, I do emphasize the word was. The company I work for is a family owned and run architect business and since the only child the owner had was a daughter who had no interest in the company, we all knew that once he retired then the company would either close or be swallowed up by a bigger company, but we all liked it here. So we all stuck it out since the owner was a man who believed in running his company just as though it was a family, the atmosphere was great to work in, we all knew each other by first name and on many an occasion it was that closeness that saved us more than a couple of embarrassing mistakes.
I'm an architect by trade, geek by habit and sadly a loner through being a workaholic, and so one sunny spring Tuesday morning, in walked Lacey. All five foot six of her, her brown hair pulled back and set in a pony tail, sunglasses that hid her eyes, and a business suit that screamed 'take me on if you dare.' My boss introduced us both and I was asked to help design her summer retreat for her. First meetings are so difficult at the best of times but over the years I have worked out a series of questions for our clients and that helps me get to know what they want and help give them their dream. However Lacey wasn't going to be our average client. The boss stuck around for a few minutes, then left us to it.
I have a small area at the back of my work station that has a couple of comfortable seats in it. I talk to my clients there and get a feel of what they want incorporated into their designs. It's always worked until the day I met Lacey. I sat and pulled out a sketch pad and started asking her some general questions, amount of bedrooms, closed or open plan kitchen, split level day room, that sort of thing and rough sketch a drawing and take it from there. This system has worked for me for close to ten years now. But like I said, then I met my new boss. We had both been at this for close to two hours now; I had already gone through one sketch pad and was more than halfway through another when she said.
"Look, are you actually any good at this, I came here with a simple design in my head and you can't even get that down into a simple drawing." She stood and rummaged in her purse and pulled out a card. "Here's my number talk to my secretary and arrange a time I can have you to myself outside of this cupboard as I want to show you where the cabin will be located. Perhaps then you can actually do your job."
With that she strode off, and at that point I would have loved to have been able to add out of my life but a contract is a contract. I talked to my boss about being moved off the project, he said he would talk to Lacey and see whether a change of designer would help. A week later I got a call from a man telling me that he was Lacey's secretary and Lacy would be outside the office in ten minutes and I was to be on the steps waiting. He then promptly hung up. So much for my boss talking to her, I checked and he was out of the office at the time so I was left with a dreadful feeling this was going to be a long day.
Eleven minutes later I strolled out of the door, Lacey was waiting. Judging by the look on her face she wasn't ever kept waiting. I sat in the car and the seatbelt barely around me when the g-forces hit me, my only thoughts were if I had written my will properly and when was the last time I told my parents that I loved them.
"Why are your feet on my dashboard?"
"I'm bracing myself for impact." Was my only reply.
There was a screech of all four wheels locking, the car behind had to swerve to avoid rear ending us. Lacey got out the car a face like thunder, walked around to my side and said. "Well if you can do any better you drive."
So there we were, me being the chauffeur, while Lacey sat and boiled in the passenger seat, I swear if it wasn't for the fact she had to give me directions she would have sat in silence the whole three hour journey. I must say when we got there I could see why she had chosen this spot. Her plot had an acre of wooded land behind it set on a slight hill, that overlooked open fields, with a small brook running out of the woods and gently down the hill, even her mood changed as she got out the car and she set about telling me where everything was going to go and what directions she wanted the windows to encapsulate the view.
As she was striding around telling me all this, I was frantically drawing on my pad. I knew what would work here and got it all done in minutes. Lacey on the other hand wouldn't shut up now, this was a different Lacey to the one I knew and soon figured out why so far away from the city. This was her escape; this was where Lacey wanted to be Lacey, without the world being allowed to see her as the person I see now. She hadn't realized she had let her guard down, I don't know why I did it.
I picked up my pad and drew Lacey as I see her now, her features had relaxed, and she smiled such a cute smile. It was at that moment I suddenly realized she had stopped talking, I looked up, and she was staring at me. A look of genuine hurt in those brown eyes of hers as she walked up to me and looked at the pad and her face stared back at her. She looked for a moment, closed the pad and tossed it onto the back seat, got into the car and started it. I thought it a good idea to get in quick before I was left here. We made it back to the office in two hours, the wheels of the car stopping just long enough for me to get out before she sped away again. Not a word was spoken the whole journey.
It was a month before the boss strode up to me and said that Lacey had agreed to the outline drawing I had made of the cabin. That was the good news, now he hit me with the bad news. He went on to say that Lacey would sign the contracts for the blueprints on condition that they were finished within two weeks and that I would be the project manager on the whole job. Then it got even better when my boss told me that Lacey wanted the whole project finished within three months and moved in within four.
"Not a chance, that cabin is a one off design, it would mean me working twelve hour shifts just to get the blueprints up to speck not to mention the planning permits and I won't even mention the men and materials. I won't have a life for three months; I would have to live there the entire time."
"You don't have a life at the moment as it is, Lacey has put aside two hours of an evening to be here to go over the specks with you. She won't take no for an answer and she has refused any other designer on this project. There is a lot of money involved here. It's just over three months of your life; you know I can't order you, so I'm asking you."
Now I knew the other reason why he likes to be more personal with his staff, he can use it as leverage when projects like this come up, none of us would ever let him down. My shoulders slumped as I nodded my head and agreed. So began my life in purgatory. Everyday Lacey would come in, hate what I had done and argue with me about what she wanted, reminding me that I had been there and she wasn't about to put this 'piece of shit' on her plot. By day two everyone in the office starting going home minutes before Lacey arrived. The shouting matches got even more heated when she didn't have an audience. Finishing up with me imagining the garbage can was her ass, it sure got kicked across the room.
The blue prints were accepted at the first request, which shocked the hell out of me until I found out Lacey went into the permit office with the drawings under her arm. She sure could move mountains. Things were just as bad when I moved into the hotel a few miles down the road from her plot. Most of the workmen kept there distance from her when she turned up and I seemed to get the sympathy vote from them that I was the one having to talk to her. It also gave them an incentive to get a move on with the cabin as well. The strangest thing was, the closer we came to completion the more shouting matches we were having.
We were now finished with month two; I had almost got through the day without needing to raise my voice, a landmark day indeed. Then Lacey walked in, I felt my shoulders instinctively slump as she started to tell me a list of things that were wrong today. I lasted for ten minutes, even wandering outside so I could breathe fresh air as I listened to her, it didn't work. Two months of twelve hour shifts today simply got the better of me, I was tired and when I'm tired I'm not at my best. By now I had been taken to the extreme of my patience and just a step or two beyond. In the end I told her to stand still and scraped a line in the dirt in front of her with my boot, I walked two paces forward and scraped another line. I then walked back to her. She looked on totally confused.
"You wanted me to design and be the project manager for your damn cabin even though our company told you we only design, yet at every turn you are in my face and changing things just for the sake of changing things. For some reason you have turned this into a pissing contest, well when you can piss as far as that line come let me know, because that's the day you will see me back on this site."
It was so unprofessional of me and I could hear my boss's voice in my head lecturing me about restraint already. I had lost it, there seemed little point me being there any longer so I left, went back to the hotel packed and went home. I even took the phone off the hook when I got there, the one thing I needed more than anything was sleep. I had managed a few hours at least so that helped. I was even brave enough to put the phone back on the hook. It rang. That sure spooked me, so I picked it up. Lacey was shouting down the phone at me, I didn't even bother to hear what she was saying, I put the phone down and unplugged it.
The next thing on my list was a shower and then something to eat. Still wrapped in a towel I searched the cupboards, 'darn nothing left,' I thought to myself looking at near empty cupboards. I moved into my bedroom and once dressed I walked out of the house and right into Lacey who was leaning against her car.
"I knew you had to come out sometime, get in I want to show you something."
She had already started to walk to the driver's side of the car, until she looked around and see me walking up the street. "Hey, where are you going?"
"You forget our deal? I'm hungry I'm going to the store to get some things since I'm home again."
