Free Legally Obligated by Jenna Amstel

 
    The rain streaking down the windshield reflected the tears streaming down Raisa’s face. Outside, a leaden bank of cloud veiled the city in a chilly twilight. Streetlights flickered on, and people scurrying by beneath a sea of bobbing umbrellas only added to the dismal mood of the late spring afternoon.
     
    Huddled behind the steering wheel, Raisa stared at the termination letter clutched in her hand with a mixture of shock and anxiety. Though rumors had circulated in recent weeks about potential staff cuts, her job as a marketing assistant had seemed secure and there had even been tentative talk of a promotion.
     
    Past tense, future tense ... the only thing left to focus on now was the present tense.
     
    Raisa thought of Nick, her charmingly eccentric gay boss. Colorful, energetic and buzzing with creative ideas, he and Raisa made a fine team that had earned her commendations and praise. She had been lucky to land the job considering that many of her peers from college still struggled to find work in an uncertain economy. After transitioning from intern to Nick’s assistant in barely over a year, a promising future in her dream career had run aground on the rocks like a storm-tossed ship.
     
    Perhaps the stormy weather was an omen, dogging her drive to work with flooded streets and sluggish traffic that had turned a normally thirty-minute commute into a hour-long headache. She had called Nick to let him know she was going to be late, but uncharacteristically, he had not picked up.
     
    Raisa noticed the somber mood the moment she stepped into the elegant Bahaus style headquarters of Danleigh Images. The receptionist’s glum greeting should have warned her, but Raisa was excited after staying up half the night brainstorming ideas that she had intended to present to Nick, but which now languished as an unopened document on her tablet.
     
    Retrieving a crumpled tissue from her purse, Raisa dabbed her swollen, mascara-streaked eyes. Her temples pounded from an incipient headache, her mind replaying the scenario like a horror film eternally looped at the bloodiest part.
     
    The atmosphere had not improved by the time she stepped off the elevator into the dramatic, starkly contemporary offices of the creative division. Nick’s team of twenty-three staff were gathered in his office. Agitated voices resonated, and through the patterned glass walls, Raisa noticed a couple of female staff members crying.
     
    At that moment, she had glanced at the clock in Nick’s office ... eight fifty-seven a.m., the day her life nosedived into the fear and uncertainty writhing in her stomach. Nick happened to glance her way and looked at her with sad brown puppy eyes. He came out, draped his arm around her shoulder and guided her into his office.
     
    “ I’m so sorry, Raisa,” he said, handing her a sealed envelope. “I fought for you. I fought for all of us.”
     
    For a moment, the floor seemed to lurch beneath Raisa’s feet. Her eyes bounced from face to face, each one representing a life suddenly hurled into chaos by the dictates of a company that cared nothing about the people affected. Raisa wondered about employees with families, or those that had recently moved from other areas, only to now find their lives in total upheaval.
     
    She looked at the envelope, thinking perhaps that if she didn’t open it, the sentence contained within could not be passed.
     
    “What ... what happened, Nick?” she had finally asked in a voice that she didn’t recognize. “What about the campaign ...?”
     
    “Executive decision,” Nick said. “Profits fell for the third quarter in a row, so now we all have. We’re just the first batch to go. Company’s relocating to smaller offices with a skeleton staff.”
     
    “Bastards,” Noelie, a feisty, older black woman, sniffled. “After all these years ... treating us like this. What happened to decency? They deserve to go under!”
     
    A clap of thunder startled Raisa. She