Big & Beautiful 3: Shapely & Stunning

“Thank you all for coming. I know this process has been a long one, but we wanted to be sure we got it right. As everyone knows, the plant hasn’t been moving in the direction we’d hoped for a while, and corporate EAAC Pigments needed to make sure we were putting the best person in place to get back on track. I believe we have.” Nick Cavanaugh, the Regional Manager for our division, paused. I’m sure he thought he was being dramatic, but I was just annoyed. I wanted him to get on with the announcement.

“I know you all already know your new boss, but we wanted the opportunity to meet together, for us to all have a discussion and to introduce you to the new Plant Manager for the Winterville site.”

Next to me, Mike Peterman, my friend with benefits over the last year, nearly vibrated in his seat. I knew he was just as anxious for this to all be over with as I was. As the Lean Manufacturing Manager, it only made sense for me to apply for the job. I had a degree in chemical engineering from Cornell, was a Black Belt in Lean Manufacturing, and knew the plant as well as anyone after dipping my toes into every department.

Mike ran one of those departments, Building X-7L. He applied for the job also, but judging by his bouncing knee and the anxiety rolling off him, I was pretty certain he didn’t get the job either. Whoever got the job had already been notified and accepted the position or Nick wouldn’t be in town to announce it had been filled.

I just wish he’d get on with it.

“Mike Peterman, would you please join me? Everyone, meet your new boss.”

I gaped at Mike. He glanced quickly at me, winking as he stood. He smoothed the front of his navy uniform and wiped his hands on his matching blue pants. I dressed the same, along with everyone else in the room, but Mike carried himself so well he could have been in a three-piece suit.

He walked to the front of the conference room and shook hands with Nick, exchanging a few words as everyone clapped for him. I couldn’t move. Shocked didn’t even cover how I was feeling. He knew he’d gotten the job and didn’t tell me. I was hurt, not that I would admit it, but I was pissed.

Yeah, the realistic part of me knew Mike was a good candidate. He had the same degree I did, just from Pitt, held the same certifications, and had been successfully running his department for the last four years. He was good at his job. But I had a hard time admitting he was better than I was.

It didn’t matter though. Nick and the rest of the selection committee believed in Mike enough to give him the job instead of me. It didn’t make a difference in my life.

Except the part about Mike and I having to stop seeing each other.

“Thank you for that reception everyone. I know it can be difficult to go from coworker to manager, but I strongly believe we can all work together to bring the Winterville plant up to where we all know we need to be. There’s a great group of employees outside these doors working hard to make the rest of us look good. I have no doubt we will all do the best thing for them, and for EAAC, and work together to make this plant the best one in the system again. Obviously, my position is now vacant. We will be posting it today and interviewing over the next few weeks. I will still oversee things there until someone else can fill that spot, but for the most part my supervisors will be handling things. I know all of you will help out if they ask, especially since many of you will likely be interested in that position.”

A rumbling of laughter went around the room. X-7L was one of the most coveted buildings to manage because it was highly visible. They did all the new product testing and were known as the most productive building on plant site. Everyone wanted that job.

Including me.

“Over the next few months I will be meeting with each of you,” Mike continued, “to determine where things are going and how you’re doing. We all know each other well, but once everything falls out and new people are put in place, there will end up being a new face in this room, either from the outside or someone moving up the ranks. We all need to work together to make this all work. And I have no doubt we will.”

Nick grinned as Mike took his seat again. The room was filled with congratulations as Mike worked his way across it back to my side. When he finally sat next to me he winked. I offered him a tight-lipped smile, but couldn’t manage more than that. He cocked his head at me, silently asking if I was okay, but I turned my focus back to Nick. I couldn’t think about Mike right then. If I did I might end up breaking up with him in the middle of the meeting.

And that wouldn’t be a good idea since no one at work knew we were sleeping together.

Nick went on with the meeting, reporting the latest results for the company and all the facilities, including Winterville. As usual, our results were in the lowest group, not lowest overall, but not far from the bottom. It was a curse we had to bear. In our area of the country, wages were high for factory workers so our expenses were higher, but we had some of the best employees so it was a pretty fair trade-off.

Mike kept throwing me glances, but I ignored him. I watched Nick and the presentation he had up on the board. He ran through the projections for the upcoming quarter and where they were hoping the company was going. Overall, things looked good, but they were putting a lot of pressure on Mike to make improvements at Winterville.

He could handle it. I knew that without a doubt. Even though I was jealous that he got the job and I didn’t, I was proud of him, and happy for him. Deep down. Way deep down.

Nick finally finished up his portion, and Stephanie Bryant, the Winterville HR Manager, stepped up. “First, congratulations to Mike. I think we all agree he’ll be a great leader for the plant. Now, on to the other stuff. We’ve been doing well lately. Our turnover rates are down, and consequently, our average employment duration is up. As you all know, we’re coming up on a bubble. The plant is forty years old next year, and the retirement option will open up for a lot of our employees. Many people will choose to stay on because they aren’t old enough, but we’ll have a good run for the gates. We’re looking into options for filling those positions, but there will be some growing pains.”

Stephanie shuffled her paperwork. I liked her, but she always appeared disorganized to me, flipping pages during a presentation, desk full of stacks of paper instead of filed away, and the conference room table in her office covered with file folders. I couldn’t survive the way she did, but my job was born out of the need for organization and order, eliminating waste, including the waste of time that it took to find something you were looking for.

Which was exactly how I felt watching Stephanie shuffle, like she was wasting my time.

She finally found what she was looking for and smiled at us. “Here it is. What you’ve all probably been waiting for. Building X-7L job description and how to apply. I know this isn’t new, but we don’t have these jobs come up often so we’re going to go over it.”

I sat up a little taller and listened. Mike leaned forward and looked at me. I still refused to look at him, but I could feel him watching me as I listened to Stephanie.

“I won’t read through the description and qualifications for the job, but wanted to remind everyone how to apply. All our applications are online now. Go to the website and submit your resume, cover letter, and fill out the application. You will need a written letter of support from your manager. For those of you in the room, that means Mike now. This position will be open to anyone in the company and anyone outside because of the level. The posting will be live for two weeks before we close it and start going through applications. Once it’s closed we’ll take a few days to eliminate applications that don’t meet the requirements and then start calling people for interviews. We expect the entire process to take about a month, maybe six weeks, and then we’ll make a decision and keep going to back fill, if necessary.”

I grabbed a copy of the description when it was passed around, handing the other copies over to Mike. He grabbed my hand instead of the papers I offered him and forced me to meet his eyes. I saw the question in his, hating how well I knew what his hazel eyes were saying. I tried to pull my hand back, but he held tight to it, shaking his head to tell me I wasn’t going to get away without talking to him.

Talking. That was still a novelty in our relationship. Mike and I had worked together for four years, ever since he was promoted to building manager. We flirted for three years before he kissed me one night. We were working late and it just happened. He apologized, but I just invited him back to my place. We’d been sleeping together ever since, but both agreed it was just sex.

Over the last few months though, Mike had been talking more. Asking me about my day and wanting to have dinner together instead of just sex. I thought he was trying to find out what my chances were at the job since we knew Gary was leaving. Maybe it’d worked since he’d gotten the job and I didn’t.

I finally nodded, indicating I would talk to him, and he released my hand.

Stephanie finished her presentation and Nick said a few more words, then we were dismissed. It was Tuesday, girls’ night, and I was ready to head out. Mike turned to say something to me, but before he could get it out, Luke Woods, the plant’s Maintenance Manager, called Mike’s name.

I took advantage of his distraction and snuck out of the conference room. He wouldn’t be able to follow me into the women’s locker room so I knew I was safe for a little while.

In front of my locker I sat down and sighed heavily. There were only about fifty women working in the plant out of almost two hundred employees so I knew I could hide out for a while, waiting for Mike to head back to his office, and not be seen.

I refused to think about breaking up with Mike. It wouldn’t really be a break up since we weren’t actually in a relationship, but it would be the end of whatever we were. I wasn’t upset about it being over, not in the emotional sense, but I was going to miss the sex. Mike was good in bed, a very thorough and selfless lover. I’d had plenty of sex in my thirty-one years, but no one had been as good as Mike.

But I’d find someone else. Because no matter what, I wasn’t going to be like my mother. I wasn’t going to sleep with my boss.

Once I finally got changed into my street clothes, I left the locker room. The halls were quiet, which I’d planned on. I pushed out the door and scanned my card to leave the gate. My car was parked toward the back of the lot, as usual. I loved my Audi Q5 and didn’t want it scratched, but I also knew I needed whatever bit of a walk I could get in every day. I’d gained weight since college and was comfortable as a size sixteen, but I didn’t want to push it.

Leaning against the driver’s door of my car, out of sight from the security guards at the gate and the buildings near the lot, was Mike. I sucked in a breath at the sight of him, a sight that always took my breath away. He was tall and lean, with a swimmer’s body he’d cultivated over the years. His coffee-colored hair was just long enough for me to run my fingers through and hold on during sex, but not so long that it reached his collar. Mike was too pulled together for that.

His long fingers swiped over his phone, holding the attention of those hazel eyes that seemed to penetrate my every thought lately.

I paused, debating whether I could go back into the plant without him noticing me. He hadn’t seen me yet, but I didn’t want to be late for girls’ night either. Maybe a few more minutes and he’d give up waiting for me.

“Don’t even think about running now, Lexi,” Mike finally said. “You’re not getting out of talking to me before you go to Bite Me!”

Bite Me! was the cupcake shop my best friend, Charlie Black, owned. Our group of friends, Charlie plus four friends we met a few months earlier, got together every Tuesday night. Two of the other women were involved, one married and the other living with her boyfriend. The four of them had known each other for about a decade, but they made Charlie and I feel welcome when we became a part of their group.

“I guess I should say congratulations,” I said as Mike met my eyes. He looked at me carefully, trying to figure out what was going on that I wasn’t saying. I didn’t want him to know the truth behind my words. And I really didn’t want to break up with him at work. But I was pretty certain I wasn’t going to get what I wanted for either of those.

“You don’t want to say it though, do you?” he asked, hitting the nail on the head. “You thought you deserved the job.”

“Of course I did or I wouldn’t have applied for it. I know you’ll do well, but I wanted that job. You’re only four years older than me. You’ll have that job until you retire, which means I’ll be stuck where I am, unless I want to leave.”

I huffed out a breath, annoyed he could be so calm when I was an emotional bag of crazy. I hated being out of control, but that was exactly how I felt standing there. It would have been easier if I’d gotten the job.

No. That wasn’t entirely true. It would have gotten messy no matter what. Because no matter what, we were done.

“It doesn’t matter though,” I interrupted before Mike could say anything to contradict my statement. “What matters is we’re through. It’s been fun, but we can’t sleep together anymore.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Mike demanded, his 6’1” frame towering over my 5’4” one. He never threatened me or made me feel like I wasn’t safe, but his height was never something I thought about when we were horizontal. Being vertical I was reminded how much bigger he was than me.

“I’m not going to sleep with my boss, Mike. Especially when I’m putting in for your old job. I won’t let our relationship stop me from going after what I really want.”

Hurt flashed across his eyes before he turned away from me. I didn’t want to think about what that could mean. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t one of those women who were going to let a man take care of me. I would never rely on someone else to take care of me. I learned at way too young of an age how dangerous that was.

“Us sleeping together has no impact on you getting my old job or not getting it. Why would you think that?”

I shook my head. I knew he didn’t understand, I’d never shared my past with him, but it didn’t matter. I wasn’t going to bend on that. I’d made up my mind.

“You’re the plant manager now. You’re in charge of everyone at this facility. Every single person reports to you, either directly or indirectly. I’m not going to put myself in any position other than your employee. I’m not going to use our relationship to advance my career.”

And I’m not going to let you use our relationship to get your way either,” I added in my head. It worked both ways, and no matter what, I would be the one to lose if our relationship ever became public knowledge.

“I know you wouldn’t do that,” Mike argued. “But I don’t want what we have to end. I was hoping we could go out after your girls’ night. Celebrate…”

He trailed off, leaving me to interpret the unspoken parts as his request for sex. Usually neither of us actually came out and said the words, just intimated what we were after. It didn’t matter because we were both usually pretty ready for sex.

Except that night. It wasn’t going to happen. It wasn’t ever going to happen again.

“I’m sorry, but no. I hope this doesn’t affect my chances of getting your old job, but I can’t risk my career based on our relationship. Either good or bad. I need to go. If you’d let me into my car.”

Mike glanced at the driver’s door he’d been holding closed with his hand. I’m not sure if it was a conscious thing to keep me from getting in and leaving, or if it was coincidence, but I couldn’t leave without him allowing me to do so. Something that I wasn’t very good at. Asking permission. There were going to be a lot of things that would change about our relationship besides no more sex.

Things I wasn’t sure I would like.