My thanks to MormonJack for edits and crits.
Chapter 2
Annika showed up on time, for once. She'd been notorious at work for arriving at meetings late. Fashionably late was not fashionable at Elizabeth's company. Annika stopped just inside the front door of the restaurant and looked around for Liz. She did her usual model walk between the tables toward where Liz was sitting while every male head in the crowded room swiveled around to her like dogs spotting a squirrel.
Annika was as exquisite as Elizabeth remembered her. Platinum blonde hair, totally natural, flowed to her pale shoulders exposed in a silky, sleeveless, cream-colored blouse. She had a thin figure with just enough breast, legs out of a magazine ad, feet-- for men who liked feet-- in heels whose skinny straps, through no coincidence, Liz was sure, matched her silvery tresses. And a face that made a viewer think of Ingrid Bergman or Evan Rachel Wood.
Except for her expression. Annika, when she'd worked at Elizabeth's startup, had always looked slightly displeased-- unless she was looking very displeased or downright pissed.
Elizabeth stood and gave her a friendly embrace. "Good to see you again." She genuinely was pleased to see that Annika had accepted her lunch date, though not for the reasons Annika would ever think. "How have you been?"
They sat. Annika glanced at the menu, inspected the cloth napkin wrapping the dinnerware, wrung her hands, and gave Liz a wan smile. She hung her purse, a designer bag of some kind, on the back of the chair. "Great," she managed to reply.
"The place hasn't been the same since you left."
Annika's perfect eyebrows narrowed, but Liz hadn't lied. The company really was different since Annika had been laid off-- better.
Annika had been in sales. She'd started off well, turning cold calls with hospital chain execs, clinic managers, and the like into visits where the company could present its new technology. The presentations got good reports also. But somehow she couldn't close the deal. There were always reasons-- Annika excelled in finding flaws in others-- but nonetheless the deals didn't happen. Scuttlebutt was that as well as alienating her coworkers Annika was also eventually alienating her prospective customers. She complained about them too, of course. When the economic downturn happened and the company had to freeze hiring for a while and then go through some modest layoffs to satisfy the VCs on the board, dropping Annika was a no-brainer.
"So what have you been up to?" Liz asked. Annika was studying the menu. "By the way, my treat. I've been wanting to try this place." Not quite exactly a white lie. She'd wanted this place because it was trendy, which she knew would attract Annika, and it was a particular kind of trendy, a so-called Instagram restaurant, which had to be catnip for someone like her. The interior of this one, for example, sported an elaborate-- in Liz's opinion way overdone-- floral theme in which long vines stretched across the room and along the ceiling, sprouting multicolored blossoms of all kinds, even on the same vine, over walls already overpainted with floral scenes. The flowery vines reached into alcoves meant for selfies and out to a porch dominated by a fountain made to look like a tropical pond. All artificial, of course. Not a single real flower or plant in sight.
"It's really beautiful," Annika responded, looking around. She took out her phone and snapped some photos from where they sat. While she did that Liz checked on that purse on her own phone. As she'd suspected it was designer, a Furla, new style, retailing at four figures.
The waiter arrived and announced the specials. Annika chose some kind of scampi dish, overpriced. Liz ordered a broiled fish.
"Wine?" They took the waiter's recommendation on a bottle of white. Annika was known to drink her way through company parties. Liz thought she would want a little liquid courage herself for what she planned to propose.
Liz tried again: "I'd really like to hear if you're doing okay. I know that whole layoff episode must have been a shock. Was the counseling service helpful?"
"Oh, they were terrible, the worst. They made me take these absurd tests and kept trying to push me into other directions I'm really not suited for. I told them what I wanted but nothing came of it."
The service was top of the industry, highly regarded, with a placement rate the envy of their competitors. "I'm sorry to hear that. I'll let HR know." She still wasn't lying. HR would get a good laugh from it. "So..."
"I'm doing some reassessment. Taking some time to, you know, reorient."
"Understood. You have an important decision ahead of you." She clamped down on her expression so she wouldn't show the evil smile trying to escape. "That purse is extraordinary. Whose is it?"
That got Annika talking endlessly. The wine got poured, they toasted their friendship, and Elizabeth learned far more than she wanted or needed to, more than she thought possible, about designer accessories. While Annika downed more than her share of the wine. It occurred to Liz that if Annika had applied herself to the company's medical products with half the energy that she was to her new bag she would probably still have her job. It would have been sad except that, well, it wasn't easy to feel sad for Annika.
Lunch was mediocre, as Liz had expected. The fish was dry, the dessert overcomplicated. Between the meal and dessert Annika insisted that they take some selfies together, then spent much more time taking solo selfies in various poses and locations about the place. Over a round of too sweet dessert liqueur Liz decided to steer the conversation toward the reason she'd brought her former employee here. Annika looked just sloshed enough.
"But at least you're still tight with your boyfriend. Josh? Jason? Sorry, I'm not good with names." Annika had been complaining about her sister-in-law, and a few other family members Liz pretended to keep track of.
"I dumped him. He was too needy."
"Oh, that's too bad. I hate that kind of guy. You must have been broken up about that."
"A little, yes."
"That's why the retail therapy, right?" She nodded at the Furla.
"A girl has to take care of herself."
******************************************************************************************
It didn't take much to persuade Annika to continue the afternoon at a nearby bar. Over more wine, red now as the afternoon wore on, they sat on stools at the bar and talked. "So you need some financial help."
"I guess so."
Annika had hinted, among her complaints, about family members and her former boyfriend not, as Annika put it, cooperating.
"If you need help, you know, consider me a friend."
"I... I mean..." Annika was, for a moment, speechless. Liz suspected that offers of friendship might be rare for Annika. "Thanks."
"Can I ask you a personal question?"
"Sure."
"You agreed too quickly. I'm really talking about a very personal question. A sexual question."
The slightly pissed look appeared. "I'm not gay, if that's what you're trying to get at."
"Furthest from my mind. But I understand that a gorgeous woman like you must get offers from both sides. I'm not offended."
"You know, I really get tired of women who think because..." she looked down, then back toward a table with a group of guys who'd been there when they came in. One of them got up and walked past the bar where the women were sitting, checking Annika out on the way to the men's room. She ignored him, but checked herself out, up and down, as soon as he was behind her. "I get tired of them thinking I must have a terrific sex life."
"I'm not asking for advice."
"So you don't want to sleep with me and you don't want advice. I can't imagine why you would be interested in my sex life. Not that I have much of... well... you can ask. I won't promise to answer."
Liz took a sip of the wine. The alcohol was loosening Annika up and she was coming out of her passive-aggressive shell. Good. "I like a rich red. Nice and strong." She put down the glass. "You've met my husband, J. Remember at the party?"
"The kind of tall guy with you?"
