15:30

Thirty Four

On Thursday morning, Melanie Morrison , UniTech's key head hunter walked into her cubicle and saw Tracy sitting there, with her legs folded one on top of the other.

"Good morning Tracy," she greeted indifferently as she put her coffee next to her computer.

"A good morning it is, indeed!" Tracy said, in a happy tone.

"What work do you have ?" Melanie asked, getting to the point. She didn't want to have squeaky little girl conversations with Jay's secretary. She had more important  things to do.

"I want you to run a background check on this person," Tracy said, getting up from Melanie's chair and standing against her desk, crossing her arms.

"That's not my job. My job is to find people that UniTech might benefit from," Melanie said, taking her seat and giving the voice command to switch on her computer.

"But you have all the resources. And you're excellent at finding people. Your research skills are unmatched." Number one technique to get someone to do the job for you- flattery.

That was true. Melanie was a brilliant stalker. She knew how to extract information about people. She had plenty of resources, and in the digital age, she could access every fact about a person, with the touch of a button. Melanie was good at digging up dirt about people. In college she even made money out of it. For a reasonable price of thirty dollars , she could find out every thing about your crush, date, arch nemesis, ex boyfriend and just about anyone. She had been practicing for far too long and in absolute secrecy. It had been engraved in her genes by now.

"I know I'm good at finding out about people but that's not what I do anymore. You'll have to find someone else. Besides , it's a clear and unjustified violation of someone's privacy."

"This person that I'm talking about , could be a potential threat to UniTech's future. Then the invasion of privacy is justified, right? Come on. Can you not take one for the team?If something happens to the company, do you want to be blamed for it?" Second technique? Emotional blackmail.

"I don't see how I will get blamed for it. So no, sorry, still not doing it."

"Come on. For me? Please?"

"I couldn't care less about you. Now , some of us here have actual jobs. We don't get paid to look pretty and float around out bosses. So excuse me , I have work to do." Tracy sensed the satire.

"You don't have to be so bitter," Tracy said, with clear frustration. She decided to use her last resort to get Melanie to agree.

"I'm not being bitter. I'm just politely telling you to buzz off because I have a lot of work to complete today. Let me have some peace, please," Melanie said, as she stared at her screen and began typing something.

Tracy stared into the distance while saying , "so Wallace from Statistics huh?"

Melanie's face turned upwards like a reflex. Tracy got the reaction she was expecting, so she smiled.

"What about Wallace?" All her attention was now towards Tracy. She shrugged off the indifference and suddenly she wanted to hear what Tracy was saying.

"Interesting how I have your eyes and ears now."

"What do you know about Wallace."

"You, my dear friend make it too obvious. And I happen to be very observant. I know you have feelings for Wallace."

"Okay maybe I do. So what ? Are you going to go around telling everyone about my little crush? Ooh, how cute. But this isn't middle school. You can't use this technique to get me to do your work. Go ahead, tell who you want."