Free The Expat Diaries: Misfortune Cookie (Single in the City Book 2) by Michele Gorman Page B

winds of fashion. Her broad-shouldered frame is tensely still, as if anticipating attack, and she’s openly assessing me through rather beady, watery eyes. ‘Please take a seat. Josh will be out in a moment,’ she says, her voice imperious and clipped. I don’t get the feeling she’s going to head up my fan club.
    Josh. My new boss. Already I love him, just for hiring me. I’ve never been what you’d class as a strong candidate. I don’t generally ‘ace’ interviews; I’m more likely to be thanked while shown to the door halfway through the allotted time. And I don’t show up very well on paper either – my CV is more pixelated than high-def. So far, my career has included:
    1)                  A once-a-week job making pizza in college. I can actually spin a paper-thin pizza crust, but have found little use for this skill in the wider world.
    2)                  A brief stint working at a turkey farm. For the record I had nothing to do with the care, feeding or eventual dispatching of the fowl. I worked at the store that sold the farm’s output. I was fired for my lackadaisical approach to pricing. I don’t think minimum wage should require my encyclopedic knowledge of every vegetable’s price per pound. The turkey people disagreed.
    3)                  A summer waitressing in a pizza restaurant. After coming home for the umpteenth time with less than ten dollars in tips, stinking of cheese, I quit. The manager was grateful for this.
    4)                  Weekly babysitting during high school, for which there is not enough money in the world.
    5)                  My first ‘proper’ job, with my first proper title that wasn’t ‘Excuse Me, Miss, Where’s My Pizza?’ As a PR junior account executive, I had the noble task of proofing my boss’s releases, and eventually even writing my own, as long as the topic was sufficiently boring to risk tears or tantrums if assigned to the higher-ups. I was fired when they outsourced my job to Hyderabad.
    6)                  My second proper job, in London. Assistant party planner to initially uptight, ultimately poisonous Felicity. Things weren’t going so badly until I was forced to blackmail her to keep her from firing me. After our showdown, the cleaning staff had more sparkling career prospects than me.
     
    So my career was the twenty-first-century equivalent of Henry VIII’s marital record, from the wives’ point of view: graduated, fired, quit, graduated, fired, survived.
    ‘Welcome, Hannah.’ Josh grins as he shakes my hand. ‘Come through this way please.’ He’s a natural salesman, but not the kind who’ll peddle his grandmother. He’s the sort of person who puts you at ease right away. I knew in our interview last week that this was someone I could work for. Though after foul Felicity back in London, I’m still a bit punch-drunk. I’d now find working for the Marquis de Sade only mildly uncomfortable. My former boss started off dismissive and belittling, only to turn the dial to abusive and vengeful when I’d settled in. Who’d have thought that earning my stripes slaving for such a bitch would work in my favor?
    ‘Your desk is here.’ He points to the cubicle near the door. ‘Mrs. Reese will get you anything you need. Once you’re settled in, come into my office and I’ll give you the lay of the land.’
    Mrs. Reese stands beside my desk, ready for orientation. ‘This way please,’ she orders. ‘I presume you’ve worked in an office before, and therefore you know how they function. You will know that without clear rules, an office cannot operate efficiently. I run an efficient office. This way.’ She gestures to a doorway off the main corridor. ‘This is the kitchen. Coffee, tea and sugar are here. Filters are here, cutlery here. Milk is, obviously, in the fridge. That is where it must stay. In the fridge. Is that clear? It cannot be