"I'm leaving BU," Matthew said as we walked down the sidewalk. We just finished breakfast, which was a first for us. Everything seemed to get quiet as we continued to walk. The past few months swam through my head in that moment. I had been thinking seriously about ways to find a new, more satisfying job and Matthew had been there to listen and offer help. We would usually go to a bar for a drink after work to strategize the next steps for me, but this came as a shock. He's leaving first.
"I took a job in industry. I'm going to work for Takeda." he said
Matthew and I were both Associate Professors of biology at Boston University. We had labs and offices on the same floor of the Biology Research Building (BRB) and our research was in a similar area of cancer biology. We occasionally tried to collaborate on research, but Matthew was so competitive it wasn't productive. He was always interested in talking science. We talked about our projects all the time. He was free with his ideas, willing to share anything that came to mind. He helped me a bunch of times with problems my lab would be having.
I can't remember exactly what else we talked about for the rest of our walk, but I do remember wanting to have a drink and start forgetting about it immediately. How could he do this? He's such an asshole. I was so open about my plans to interview at other places and my intentions to go. He never once mentioned an interview, or an offer, or negotiations. What a prick. He's always been kind of a prick.
We walked back to the BRB and continued our day. It was such distracting news. I could barely get anything done. Later that afternoon, I texted him.
"Before you leave, we should have lunch to celebrate."
"That would be great"
"A nice lunch. On Gilead ;)"
"Awesome, great idea!"
I had recently interviewed with Gilead. As part of the interview process they sent me a $300 prepaid Visa card to cover incidental expenses related to the trip to their site in South San Francisco. I had only spent about $12 on Starbucks and still had the balance to spare. Matthew knew all about the interview with Gilead. He knew all about the trip out there and the Visa card they gave me. He's such an ass for not telling me anything about Takeda!
We planned the celebratory lunch for the following Wednesday. With the prepaid Visa and my ID in one pocket, my phone in the other, we walked to Eastern Standard. They had terrific cocktails, which I planned to have a couple given the occasion. I can't believe he's leaving. We took a small table for two on the patio outside.
"So how much notice did you give BU?" I asked.
"About 6 weeks. I start on September 1," Matthew answered.
"That's a generous amount of notice. Did Takeda mind that you weren't starting until later?"
"No, they understood that I have students to transition and other things to take care of."
We ordered a bottle of fumé blanc and an appetizer. We talked about science. We grazed on the appetizer. We complained about students. We poured more wine. We gossiped about other faculty. We ordered another appetizer. We killed about 90 minutes and ordered another bottle of wine. Lunches like this weren't unheard of in the summer. Shitty undergrads were off campus. Lectures were light or non-existent. Postdocs and grad students were hammering away at experiments before the distraction if TA-ing crept back in the fall. Long, liquid lunches were a faculty indulgence during the summer. Especially in Boston, where nice weather was an important event to celebrate all on its own.
"Fuck that! I'm not dealing with her shit!" Matthew barked, his cockiness floating up on the wine. He was complaining about his nemesis in HR. Matthew routinely got in trouble with the administration for bending some rule he didn't feel applied to him. This time he was ignoring HR's requests to set up and exit interview. Matthew thought it was a thinly veiled disguise to accuse him of taking BU intellectual property to Takeda. His cockiness was such a turn on. When he wanted something he usually got it.
"Why do you spend so much energy on this?" I asked.
"It's the principle of it. They're bullies." He said.
"It's summer, why let it bother you? Don't turn everything into a dramatic conspiracy theory."
"Are you lecturing me?" he asked with a facetiousness in his grin.
"Let's not build further tension. We're celebrating, not getting all riled up."
Two-thirds through the second bottle of wine and he was driving me insane, but in a very good way. Watching him talk with conviction like that did something to me. The wine definitely helped too. My pussy was getting wet listening to his agitation. The intensity in his voice was commanding. Yet he was so provocable.
"Tension? What tension? There's no tension," he argued.
"Haven't you felt the tension building between us?"
"Why, because I didn't tell you about Takeda? I told you first. I'm not mad at you. Are you mad at me?"
"Not that kind of tension Matthew, c'mon."
"What do you mean?" he asked naively.
"What kinds of tension are there Matthew?" I asked, exasperated.
"Well, there's physical tension, like the opposite of compression." he said.