There was a point in time when I have grown to hate my job.
The job in and of itself wasn't bad, if anything I enjoyed it, I was a salesman for a Business to Business company, and it was our job to offer up accounting services to other major companies that didn't have an in-house accounting department.
We'd usually get flown out to give presentations of the advantages of using our company to the executives from the client companies, and salespeople like me would get commissions based on how many deals and how much money in general we'd close out every quarter.
So far I enjoyed the parts I've explained, the part that kept getting on my nerves is that, despite having the highest KPIs in the company, I was still considered the second best salesperson in the company.
Enter Brooke, the (supposedly) best saleswoman in the company, despite her performance paling in comparison to mine, she was always receiving commendations that would have gone to others, major assignments, bonuses and raises, even getting considered for future promotions before me or anyone else for that matter.
I'm not one to dwell on rumors, but every time I heard that she only got to where she was by sleeping her way to the top, I couldn't help but think if it really was true, and it's not like I wanted to believe those rumors, but Brooke didn't exactly make it easy to brush them away.
Brooke walked around the office like the bitchy head cheerleader who had all the jocks wrapped around her finger and all the nerds like me running for cover, her behavior stank of that sort of condescension, most likely because she actually WAS the head cheerleader of her highschool back in the day, and that was also another reason why those rumors kept rearing their ugly heads; nobody could understand why someone like Brooke was allowed to behave the way they did.
And now that, as far as I knew, the biggest contract in the history of our company presented itself, quite literally three times as large as our biggest client, and it was given out to Brooke without even thinking.
Worse yet, I was told to tag along as an assistant, as if I couldn't have handled this contract all by myself, I was being treated like some novice schmuck who needed to watch and learn how it's done.
Which is why I felt so despondent, wondering if maybe it was a good idea to just start looking for a new job where I would be more respected, then again the job market wasn't quite so hospitable at the moment, and there's really no guarantee that the new place would be any better.
Maybe something will happen on this trip and I'll get the chance to turn things around, but I doubt it, if it really is some sort of favoritism, there's no chance any amount of hard work would change that.
And just like Brooke, she deemed fit to foist all the preparation on me, I had to book the hotel rooms, set up the meeting, and even prep the presentation and contract for the clients, I was doing all the work and Brooke was just going to waltz in there and take all the credit.
We flew out to the hotel where we were staying and were meant to head out to the company to give out our presentation the very next morning, not much time to take in the sights, but this was work anyways.
At the hotel, we got booked two separate rooms opposite of each other in the hallway, I settled in to review our notes and powerpoint presentation that night, making sure everything was ready to go, Brooke had decided on her own that I should take care of the technical side while she gives out the presentation, she had the charisma to close the deal after all, or so she bragged.
After a few hours of work, I heard a knock coming from my room's door, putting my laptop aside, I sighed and walked over to open it, wondering if the front desk forgot something important.
I was treated to the image of Brooke standing there wearing nothing but a towel, for a second I wondered if this was some sort of hallucination or if I was being pranked, but no, she was scowling like someone had left out a rotten piece of cheese for too long and now it looked like it was beginning to grow mold, only that piece of cheese was me.
"There's no hot water in my shower." Was all that she said before she pushed past me and barged into my room.
I was pretty much flabbergasted, not even sure what I should say in this situation, just tell her no? Kick her back out in nothing but a towel?
What's worse, she seemed visibly inebriated, I remembered her saying that she was going out to a networking party, I was guessing she had just gotten back from that and tried to take a shower to no avail.
She immediately put her room card next to the TV and walked towards the bathroom, turned back to me and began threatening me:
"If you so much as breath in my direction while I'm in there, you creep, I will report you to HR and get you fired before you know what happened to you."
I was stunned, yes Brooke was often bitchy to anyone in the office who didn't worship her feet, but her vitriol never reached this extent before, maybe she was annoyed at the lack of hot water in her room and having to walk into my room in her towel, maybe she was just a mean drunk.
Within a few minutes, I heard the shower turn on and, seeing how she didn't emerge from the bathroom, I assumed that my hot water ran just fine.
I sat back down on my bed to continue reviewing our presentation, and as I felt like I was getting some work done, a shrill sound rang through the air.
It was a fire alarm!
I was panicking for a second, I stuffed my key and Brooke's into my pocket, knowing full well that she would probably forget it, before I yelled out to her:
"Brooke, fire alarm! we need to get out of here." I yelled out, and I could hear the commotion from inside the bathroom, and the "shitshitshit!" before she stumbled out of there with her towel on.
As the two of us quickly got out of the room, I enjoyed the view of a barely dressed Brooke having the unfortunate luck to be seen by others also leaving the building, we finally managed to get outside, where a crowd had formed of guests waiting at the designated fire point, I could tell that Brooke was sobering up extremely quickly from both her shower and the sudden shock of the cool air and sudden onslaught of eyes focused on her, because she had gotten really quiet all of a sudden.
Fortunately for her, the alarm turned out to be false, so were let in within five minutes, and since the elevators were now out thanks to the alarm, we had to make our trek back to the room up in the same fire escape we descended through.
The look of relief on Brooke's face crumbled just as she stood in front of her room's door, her face going pale.
"I don't have my key..." Brooke whispered in a hushed voice, it dawned on me that when she looked over in my direction that she did not remember bringing her key over to my room at all, her drunken state having erased that memory entirely "What am I going to do!?"
A tiny idea was forming in my head, some way to get a little bit of revenge on the biggest bitch in the office and vindicate myself for all the credit she kept stealing from me.
"I... Guess you can go downstairs and ask them for a new key?" The moment I suggested this I saw Brooke's face turn several red shades brighter, it took everything I had not to burst into laughter.
"What!? Can't you get it for me or something?" She was beginning to panic, realizing what was in store for her.
"Nope, it's your room, they wouldn't give me the key to someone else's room." Brooke was trying her best to think her way out of this predicament, but on top of being such a massive pain in the ass to everyone in the company, she never struck anybody as particularly bright, adding more fuel to the idea that she didn't get to where she is by merit.
"W-well then you better come with me!" Brooke didn't realize the gift she was handing to me, but it did go against what I had in mind.
"Uh, sure, but can you go on ahead? I'll get my phone first." I lied, knowing full that my phone was in my pocket going back to my door, making sure to avoid accidentally pulling out her card along with mine, she simply rolled her eyes and turned around, making her way to the elevator, I caught a glimpse of her letting out a groan as she realized that the elevator was still out of commission, good, that will give me time to do what I needed to do.
As soon as I was certain she was out of view, I moved fast, pulling out her card and going into her own room, I looked inside and saw that yes, she had thankfully not really made much use of it just yet, I pulled out my phone and called their reception.
"Hello, front desk!" I heard the voice coming from the phone's speaker.
"Hello, yes, I have a booking for two rooms under North Ridge Accounting? Turns out we only need one room, can you cancel the second one, the one booked for a Brooke Smith?" I tried to sound as natural as possible, thanking my lucky stars that Brooke just pushed most of the work, including the job of booking the rooms.
"Yes sir, I have that here, but it seems that the room has already been checked into since the other one was as well, so we can't just cancel it for you." the voice said, giving its best faux apologetic tone it could offer.
"Huh, well that's too bad... Well, can you just check the other room out early? I'll just have to see what I can do on my side." Playing along, I also gave my best disappointed yet accepting tone.
"Certainly sir, so I see you still have another night booked here, since you are checking out early, we won't charge you for the second night," I could hear whoever it was on the other end tapping away on their keyboard, "I'm assuming no amenities were used since that room is supposed to be empty?"
"Pretty much, yeah." I confirmed the formality, hearing the clicking continue on the other side.
"Alright then, your total should come out to about two hundred dollars, would you like me to use the credit card we have on your file?" After the clicking stopped, the person on the other side of the phone asked.
"Yes please." Once again, I passed it back and heard the clicking continue.
