James - Part 7
The curve of skin is glowing a golden halo as it traps the winter sun perfectly through the floor-to-ceiling glass. My eyes fix on the highlighted softness exquisitely captured by the angle of the rays.
What the actual fuck, James?
I shake my head vigorously, trying to stop my mind from morphing my view and spiralling into the memory of Ana's naked form in my bed that it is evoking. This is wrong, James, so very wrong. I curse at myself and reassess the scene in front of me.
This time I frown at the winter light pouring through the window, cutting across the conference room like a blade, before landing squarely on the bald crown of my senior lawyer nemesis currently sitting in my usual seat, complete with his teacup, saucer, and biscuits. Thankfully now, my mind notes that the way the light gleams on his head is almost comical, perfectly serving as a spotlight for a man who loves to be the centre of attention.
On any other day in this office, it would irritate me, the way he primly sits there as if he owns the space, dunking his biscuits that no one else dares, or wants, to touch. But not today. Today, he can have the seat, the light, and the self-satisfaction. It's fine. He's welcome to it.
Because today, I'm here to set everything on its head.
I shift in the chair I've taken at the other end of the table, the one cloaked in shadows, furthest from the window. I crave being closer to the light, closer to the outside world, closer to escape. The angle of the light catches my eye again, and my breath falters, the memory rushing in uninvited.
Ana
.
Her skin had been bathed in golden light that morning; that perfect curve of her hip catching the sun would be seared into my mind forever. The memory is so sharp it makes me ache not just in the wistful way; my body physically aches with thoughts of how she ended up naked in my bed.
I blink, reluctantly forcing myself back into the present, pushing the inappropriate thoughts away. The room around me seems duller in comparison, the faces at the table blurred into insignificance.
But this isn't about her. Not now.
Because today, everything is going to change.
I lean back in the chair with no natural light to distract me; this time, his seat power play wasn't going to work. It's fitting, really. The shadows down this end of the table feel more honest for what I'm about to do. My fingers curl around the edge of the table, steadying myself as I scan the room.
The tension is palpable. People shuffle papers, clear their throats, and avoid eye contact, sensing the shift in the air but not yet understanding it. They're waiting for the usual: another meeting where nothing meaningful happens, the stalling game I have been playing with them since I arrived.
But this time I'm not here to play by the rules I set in place all those weeks ago. I'm here to rewrite them.
"This is how it's going to happen," I start, my voice colder than I intended, but maybe that was the point. Better to lean into it, to let them see I wasn't messing around, channel my inner father.
The assistant to my right shifts nervously, her pen stilling against the legal pad in front of her. Boobs Grad sits up a little straighter, her eyes fix on me with an unforgiving cold look of disdain. I lost that ally after our party dalliance, it would seem.
I adjust my stance, gripping the edge of the table harder, as if it were a climbing hold, and lean forward slightly. "The London office as you know it is to be no more. What I am about to outline will impact all of you, no deviations, no exceptions." I begin.
Silence stretches, brittle and uncomfortable, as I take control of the room. For the next thirty minutes, I lay out exactly what is going to change and why, holding nothing back. I don't sugarcoat the impacts this will have on their lives, nor do I hesitate before dropping the bombshell they've all been too naive to see coming. If any of them are foolish enough to cling to the fairy tale that I was sent here as some kind of ally or saviour, I make sure to shatter that illusion completely.
I am only here for one purpose: to enforce a major restructure.
Good. Let them sit with it.
I tell myself this is just business, that I'm not channelling my father, but the truth is harder to swallow. My words sound eerily like his—clipped, absolute, delivered with the kind of finality only he could master. It makes something twist inside me, sour and bitter, but I shove it down. This is how it has to be, I remind myself again.
***
I am back at the climbing wall; somehow it always gives me the headspace to sort through the crap going through my mind; somehow it dissociates me from my ADHD brain, something like that at least; whatever it does, it always seems to help. There is a kind of quiet that settles around me when I'm on the wall. The focus it demands, in those moments unlike the rest of my life lately, is that there's no room for overthinking or second-guessing, just movement, breath, and the weight of your body against gravity.
That's what I need right now. A place to think, to stop the constant churn of Ana's voice in my head, and escape from the fact that of all the things I am deciding at the moment, it seems to be the simplest of decisions that is messing with my head.
I pull on my climbing shoes, yanking the straps tight. They're as uncomfortable as ever, pinching in all the wrong places, but there's something satisfying about that; it's just how they are meant to be. My fingers fumble a little as I chalk my hands, trying to avoid stretching the tender skin across my shoulder. On impulse, the day after Boxing Day, I'd walked into a tattoo parlour, half on a dare with myself, half because I needed to do something, anything, that felt like a step forward. I hadn't expected to get an open spot, but there I was, sitting under the needle for hours while the artist traced out the intricate design on my skin.
Now, every time I shift, the new artwork pulls, a dull ache that reminds me it's there. It is a part of me now, Emily will hate it, and my dad even more so; it can't be seen under a shirt, but that is not what's important right now; this is new James.
I step onto the mats, my eyes finding that route almost immediately. The same one I fell from last time I was here.
It's been nagging at me ever since. Not the fall itself—that happens to everyone—but what it represents. I'd let myself lose focus, let fear creep in at the worst possible moment. And now, every time I think about it, it feels like a metaphor for everything else in my life: things I've let slip, chances I've let go, mistakes I have made. I am getting philosophical in my old age. I smirk to myself and clap my hands together, watching the cloud of chalk dust fly.
Not today.
I take a deep breath, shake out my hands, and reach for the first hold. My fingers flex into the moulded plastic, and I pull myself up. I relax as my muscles work in familiar motions and the world around me fades. It's just me and the wall, and the stupid thoughts circling around my head seem less significant with each move I make. I soon make it past the hold that I lost grip on last time with no drama. I relish in the ache of my forearms as I climb as many routes as I can throughout the evening before I find it too tough to keep shaking out the lactic acid in my arms. I relish the burn and what it represents.
