Snow was falling in big clumps onto the ground. But the sales office was hopping that late morning. And it had been a good morning. The sales figures for last month were almost all in, and Ella knew her branch was going to come out on top this time.
"What? You think you can beat me?" Bill had said to her at their last managerial Zoom meeting. "Well, bring it on, baby. We'll just see who comes out on top!"
Ella snorted and stacked the papers on her desk that she'd just pulled off of the printer down the hall. We would see, she thought with a wry smile. We would see indeed!
Bill the Baller Balderson made it his life's work to make Ella and all the other managers look like chumps at every managerial Zoom meeting. Not only was his always the branch that had the most sales, he also loved to rub everybody's noses in it.
Frequently coming out of his mouth was: "First again, Eric! Snooze you loose!" Or: "Linc, just try to beat me this September! I dare you!"
Ella's branch was always one of the ones down towards the bottom, and for this reason, Bill usually left her alone. But today she was rehearsing what she was going to say in her mind when the Zoom call came later that afternoon. Bill was going down.
But when she glanced at the first page of the monthly sales report, she paused. She put her glasses on her face and took a closer look. She felt the heat rise up her neck and blossom out into her cheeks.
"This can't be right," she murmured, pausing. "Right before Christmas alone I know Randy sold two Cadillac Escalades. And she's got him down as selling three cars for the whole fucking month?"
Ella picked up her desk phone and hit zero. When it finally got answered, a timid little voice said: "Thank you for calling Wainwright Cadillac. This is Marissa speaking. How may I help you?"
Ella sighed and closed her eyes. "Marissa, this is an inside line."
There was a pause. "Oh! Ms. Oxford! Ma'am! I'm so sorry. I made a mistake."
"Well," Ella said, the heat now rising to her hairline. "That seems to be a trend of yours this morning. Can you come into my office, please?"
She hung up the phone and looked out the window. The lot was busy with car shoppers despite the snowy weather, and that was a good thing. Ella tapped her foot impatiently as she waited for Marissa. "Where is that receptionist?" She grumbled as the minutes ticked by.
Finally, there was a little knock on the door, and Ella huffed her displeasure. She was tempted to yell, "Get in here, you twit!" But instead she said, "Come on in, Marissa."
The door opened slowly and Marissa stood there in the doorway looking nervous. "You wanted to see me, Ma'am?" She asked.
"Have a seat," Ella said. While Marissa was closing the door, she took in the younger girl's appearance. She was wearing a plain red sweater and a thick black wool skirt with white knee socks and black Mary Jane shoes. She looked like a choir girl with her fine, baby-blonde hair that almost reached her waist, and her delicate features. She sat down in the closest chair across from Ella's desk and started twisting her hands in her lap.
Ella took her glasses off and pinched her nose. Marissa had to be at least fifteen years younger than her, if not a bit more. Ella ran her hand through her shiny brown hair - hair that Luis at the salon kept shiny and brown brown for her, anyway - and glanced across her desk at the elfin creature. Ella couldn't see the tips of her ears but wondered if they weren't a little bit pointy.
"Marissa," Ella began," her anger just barely under the surface, "where did you get these sales numbers?"
Marissa blinked. "From the box on my desk. Where they put the sales reports, Ma'am."
Ella narrowed her eyes. She hated being called ma'am. She was thirty-nine, not sixty-nine. "Just from the box on your desk?" She echoed.
Marissa nodded.
Ella sat back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. Her suit jacket pulled tight across her breasts. "Do you remember what I told you last month, Marissa?" Ella said.
Marissa looked like she was about to cry. She shook her head no. "No, ma'am," she whispered.
Ella's anger raged unchecked. She slammed her hand down on her desk, sending her glasses accidentally flying. Marissa flinched.
"Not every salesperson gives their sales reports to you, do they?" Ella said.
"Ma'am?" Marissa said again.
Ella stood up, her heels clicking on the tiled floor as she paced. "Not every salesperson gives you their sales reports! John doesn't! Sierra doesn't! And Randy is spotty at best!" She said.
"Oh. Ma'am," Marissa said again.
Ella sat back down. She glanced over at Marissa and the girl was actually wiping tears off of her face.
Ella frowned. "Don't. Don't you dare cry in here," she said.
But that just caused Marissa to cry a little bit harder.
Ella sighed and took a box of tissues from her big bottom desk drawer and pushed it over to Marissa. "Ma'am," Marissa said, as she dabbed at her eyes.
"Do you remember me telling you last month that you have to go collect sales reports off of the salespersons' desks?"
Marissa shook her head.
Ella's eyes widened. "You don't remember me telling you that?"
"I'd forgotten," she said.
"Marissa," Ella said exasperatedly, "go get the other sales reports for me. Now," she added.
Marissa scurried out of the office and was gone. A minute later she was back. "Ma'am?" She said.
Ella just glanced up at her, then went back to her computer. "Upstairs, Marissa. Did you get the ones from upstairs?"
Now it was Marissa's turn to flush. She immediately turned and breezed out the door again. Several minutes later, she was back with a bigger stack of papers.
"Close the door behind you," Ella said sourly. "Let me see those," she said. "You're sure you got them all this time? You didn't leave any in the boxes on their desks?"
Marissa firmly shook her head. "No, Ma'am."
Ella was quiet for a few seconds as she looked through the paperwork. It seemed like Marissa actually had gotten them all. "Okay. Now-" she said, but her cell phone on her desk beeped.
"Shit," Ella said, looking at her watch. It was the alarm she had set earlier that morning. She had a lunch date that she needed to go to. And it was a literal date. Her mother had set her up with a man from her church. Ella knew he was in for a surprise, but she was ready to go out and get it over with, anyway.
"Marissa," I have a lunch date that I have to leave for now," she said, standing up. "I want you to bring your file up on my computer from the shared drive and work on it in here. Close the door, do whatever you have to do to be alone so you can concentrate, but I need for you to add those sales reports to the grand December report that I'll be emailing to my boss this afternoon.
"The VP of sales?" Marissa said.
Ella nodded once. "Yes."
Marissa nodded. "Okay."
Fifteen minutes and a slushy drive later, Ella was at the Applebee's in the nearby mall. It wasn't fancy but it was close, cheap, and she didn't have much time for anything else. She brushed snowflakes off of the shoulders of her coat before she put it on the back of her chair and sat down.
"You know, I don't usually do dates," Trevor said.
Ella frowned at this man in front of her. He was a little bit chunky and it looked like he'd forgotten to shave that morning. He had nondescript brown hair and a nondescript face. He was somebody you'd pass on the street and would not look twice at. She saw what was either baby spit-up or bird poop on his shoulder. She wasn't sure which one at that moment was worse.
"You have children?" She asked tentatively.
