I thought it was nice of Marti to take the new guy in her office to lunch. The poor guy had been blind from birth and was transferred here from Nashville, where he'd grown up. The new office was a chore for him to learn and without Marti's help, he would have been having bag lunches every day at his desk. Marti took him out to her favorite restaurants every day, and they soon became like a pair of gossipy old women. I thought it was funny and a good thing for my wife, who didn't really have any friends at work.
The Periodical Groups had hired Marti to take charge of their proofreading section in High Point, North Carolina. The Groups published magazines in all kinds of fields, but had their editorial staffs separated and located in areas where the fields they covered were most prevalent. They felt that that gave them access to more potential staff who were already familiar with the jargon and nuances of their subject. Their Music Group was located in Nashville, their Fashion Group in New York City, their travel group in San Francisco, and so on. High Point was the furniture capital of the world (the city's claim) and their group focused on furniture making and home décor was placed there. The group's proofreading section was my wife's domain.
Marti had been hired when the previous supervisor was fired for incompetence. He had become friends with his staff, who soon began taking advantage of him. The staff, mostly young females, were taking longer breaks and spent time gossiping when they should have been proofing. The supervisor had to hire extra help to keep up with the articles coming in and errors began slipping through. When the VP of the Group became aware that his proofreading section was processing only half as many words per proofreader than other groups, the supervisor was immediately replaced by my wife. She had worked as a technical writer for one of the bigger furniture factories and had the background and editorial skills the Periodical Groups required.
She immediately set quotas on the workers, which didn't make her popular with the staff. Once the quotas were being meant, there were too many readers for the work coming in, so she laid off the three most popular, whom she viewed as the biggest troublemakers. That cemented the dislike her staff had for her. In the end, she had to replace three more of the staff before she had a workforce she could depend upon. But as new employees joined the office, the existing staff poisoned them against Marti for doing her job and holding them responsible.
It wasn't until Willie-Scott Jackson was transferred from the Nashville office. While an expert on the country music that group specialized in, Willie-Scott had also grown up in a furniture making family. He was considered a good fit and had applied for the transfer.
Marti was concerned when she heard that a blind man was being assigned to her. "A BLIND proofreader! What the hell are they thinking? The DEI group is fucking nuts." she yelled at me over and over. I never had an answer that satisfied her.
But when Willie-Scott showed up, he almost instantly became her star player. Working with a Braille keyboard and listening to the text through earphones, he proved to be much faster and more accurate than anyone else in the office.
And when his coworkers began to badmouth my wife, he shut them down. Hard. From then on, they avoided him. Mostly.
When Marti discovered that Willie was sitting at his desk every day eating a bag lunch, she offered to take him out into the neighborhood so he could learn his way around and see what restaurants appealed to him. At their first lunch, she found that he was Ubering to and from work. That led to her offer to carpool, although his home was out of the way for my wife.
It was also at lunch that he groaned, favoring his left leg as he sat down. When Marti questioned him, he was hesitant to answer that he was having trouble learning the office layout. He was bumping into more furniture than he normally would have.
"Don't you use your cane? Doesn't that help you navigate?" my wife had asked.
"Yeah, but sometimes people leave their desk draws open and I get caught on them." He showed Marti where his pants had caught and been ripped by a drawer that morning, one that bruised his leg.
Suspicious, Mart began reviewing security camera footage from her office. It was soon evident that several employees found it humorous to pull open drawers or shove wastebaskets into the aisles to trip up Willie-Scott. The other employees, who were not participating actively, did nothing to discourage the sabotage.
Marti fired the two worse offenders but decided not to replace them. Instead, she increased the quota the readers were required to meet. Willie-Scott Jackson was already surpassing his quota but upped his game even more. Suddenly, Marti's department was completing more work, faster and more accurately than ever before, with a reduced staff. Marti was a corporate star.
My problems began with the office Christmas party. Willie-Scott, her friend, wasn't planning to go, but Marti talked him into it. Because he lived on the other side of town, she decided that she'd go pick him up and meet me at the venue, since I was closing a project that afternoon and leaving work late.
When I entered the hotel ballroom, I found Marti and Willie-Scott at a corner table, with my wife in the corner and Willie sitting next to her. I was relegated to the opposite side of the table. Knowing how much Marti loves to dance, I immediately asked her to trip the light fantastic with me, but Marti demurred. She didn't want to leave the poor blind guy sitting by himself. Willie encouraged us to go ahead and dance, saying he was fine, sitting by himself and listening to the music. But Marti still wouldn't leave him.
I went to get us all drinks at one of the four bars set up around the room. The lines were long, and when I got back to the table, it was empty. It didn't take long to spot them out on the dance floor. Marti had solved the problem of not leaving Willie alone while she danced by dancing with him. Although it was a fast dance, they were in each other's arms as she guided him around the dance floor.
It was okay to leave me alone, but not the other guy she had dragged to the event.
The fast dance was followed by a slow one, and the pair never separated, just flowed into the next dance, and the next, before returning to the table. By now I was bored and a bit angry at being ignored. I listened to Willie-Scott enthusiastically telling my wife what a great dancer she was and how wonderful it was to be on a dance floor. I waited for the next song, before once again asking my wife for a dance.
Again, she was unwilling to leave poor Willie-Scott alone.
I sat quietly through the next two songs while the two of them chattily gossiped about their fellow office workers, when Marti asked if he'd like to dance some more. As they edged out from behind the table and headed to the dance floor, my wife told me, "Joe, why don't you get us some fresh drinks?" Not even a "Please" attached to the order.
By the time they reached the dance floor, I was headed out of the hotel and on my way home. I didn't like her office functions at the best of times and thought that sitting by myself would be easier with a TV in front of me.
I had realized that, with a 20--30-minute commute together, each way, and an hour for lunch, Willie-Scott was spending more quality time with my wife than I was. Sure, I got more hours, spent cooking, showering, sleeping, or watching TV, but he was getting two hours each day of actual conversation with my woman. Now he got to dance with her, while I was relegated to being their waiter.
It was 45 minutes later that my phone rang. It was my wife. I shut the phone off, unanswered. Almost an hour to realize that I was gone? Too little, too late.
Yes, it was petty on my part. Yes, I should have stayed and demanded my rights. But you know that everyone would have played innocent. It was all just in my imagination. Willie-Scott was another Slick Willie. If I'd stayed it would have led to a scene that would work out in his favor.
Yes, my leaving probably also worked out in his favor, but at least I didn't have to stay and endure it in person.
Almost three hours later, my very pissed off wife came home. "Why the hell did you leave? I was so embarrassed!" Marti had never been quite this shrill before. She had apparently built up a head of steam. "And poor Willie was mortified. He felt like it was his fault that you left. He insisted that I take him home right then."
That got my attention. "Wait a minute! It took you 2 1/2 hours to take him home?"
Marti looked at me blankly for a moment, then shook her head angrily. "Of course not. I was so upset with you, Willie-Scott had me sit down and talk it over with him. He was worried I might let my anger affect my driving, so he took the time to talk me down."
