A week later, Angelica parked
her car behind the gigantic OG Marketing building as only the VPs,
executives and visitors had reserved
spots at the front of the building.
'I am officially an employee! she thought
realizing that she was officially
starting 'real life'.
She still couldn't get over it. As she got
out of her car, she looked again at the
large rectangular building surrounded
by panoramic windows and touches
of red representing the colours of The
OG Marketing logo. It was a luxurious
and modern building; the group did
not skimp on the architecture.
She was dazzled. Quite literally, too,
the sun blinding her and forcing
her to put her hand above her brown
eyes while continuing to admire the
view. She was completely lost in her
thoughts imagining her future in this
establishment when she felt a tap on
her shoulder. She startled and turned around.
"Hi!" said a man with thick black hair.
He reminded her of Sam, except
his eyes were not brown. They were
black.
"Oh, hi!" She answered with a smile.
He looked at her intently, and she
looked back at him, confused.
"You're standing in my parking spot,"
he finally said, pointing to the place.
"Oh, sorry!" she said, realizing that she
was blocking the parking spot next to
her car.
She immediately moved, but then
realized that there were many other
parking spots available. She couldn't
understand why he had to pick that
one.
She shrugged and started walking
away towards the front of the office
where the entrance was.
She soon heard someone jogging
behind her. She turned around, and saw the same guy who had asked her
to move off his parking spot.
"Hey, wait!" he said while catching up
to her.
'Freaking hell! What's his deal?!"
She looked at him, waiting for him to
tell her what he wanted.
"I've never seen you around. Are you
new?"
Angelica suddenly smiled, happy to
already be meeting new people.
"Yes, this is my first day, somehow!" she
answered with much enthusiasm.
"Oh, great! I'm Alex Denver, but
everyone calls me Denver. I prefer that
to be honest."
She laughed out loud. "Okay! I'm
Angelica, but everyone calls me Angie.
And I prefer that, to be honest," she
said slightly, mocking him.
"Great! We're on the same page. Sorry
about earlier, by the way. I know there were other parking spots, but I've been
parking my car there for years, so...it's
stupid, I know."
"Oh, no, not at all! Don't worry about
it! It's fine. I'm probably gonna start
parking my car at the same spot as
well."
They continued walking together to
the front of the building, Denver telling
her that he was a senior architect in
the company. Contrary to the first
impression she had of him, he seemed
like an actually decent guy.
She was completely oblivious to the
fact that he was already hitting on her.
When they entered the reception, a
short chubby girl with black natural hair
was leaning on the reception desk and
chatting with Lynn.
When she saw Angelica, she immediately
walked up to her and extended her
hand. "You're Angelica ? I'm
Tamima, HR COordinator. You
are spending the first half of the
day with me. This is your bag with
The OG brand goodies... but you work in marketing, so you'll have access to
all of that stuff literally every day, but
still!" she said while shoving the bag in
Angelica's hands.
"Oh, okay, thank you," said Angie,
slightly overwhelmed by her
welcoming.
"What's up, Denver?" Tamima said,
looking at Denver with squinted eyes.
"Hi, Tamima," he answered, bummed
out that she had cut short his time
with Angelica.
"Come with me, Angelica," continued
Tamima, as she turned back to Angelica.
"We will start with your orientation.
First, we have to go get your picture
done for your employee card," she said
while walking towards the stairs.
"I'll see you later!" yelled Denver,
feeling immediately embarrassed by
his sudden ardor.
Angelica didn't have time to answer back.
She had to follow Tamima who was
already way up the stairs.
"Already getting hit on by Denver, eh?"
said Tamima while climbing the stairs.
Angelica's eyes grew wide. "What?! No!
Why are you saying that?!" she asked
scandalized.
But Tamima did not pay her any
attention. She right away started
babbling about the company and how
things worked there.
At first, Angelica was dazed by Tamima;
she was like a tornado. But after a
while she liked her; Tamima talked fast
and was funny. Plus, they were about
the same age.
'Maybe we could be friends. Maybe
she'll like me. Maybe I could have
a work bestie ... probably not, but.."
Tamima gave her a tour of every floor,
except the fifth floor; it was the top
floor where the executives' offices
were located, and she did not have
access to that place.
Angelica was amazed by the beauty of the
offices. The building was surrounded
with floor-to-ceiling windows and
lots of natural light flooded the space.
The high ceilings made the place
spacious and airy.
As they visited the company, Tamima
had noticed how men would look
intently at Angelica and were way too
zealous in greeting her. She naively
warmly greeted them back, completely
oblivious to the fact that they were
hitting on her. She had been in a
relationship for so long that she was
walking around with blinders on.
She always thought people were
just nice and wanted to network for
professional purposes.
During the lunch break, Tamima and
her headed to the cafeteria. Angelica
was surprised at how elegant and
enormous it was. Except for a few
white logos here and there, the whole
place was white and encircled with
huge windows, which gave
it a very peaceful atmosphere. The
smell of the food they were serving at
reduced price was delightful, and the
taste was as delicious as the smell.
"Ok," said Angelica, "Im supposed to
show you the organizational chart
now. But you decide. Do you want
the latest gossip or the organizational
chart?"
"Latest gossip?" questioned Angelica
confused.
"Oh yeah! You should know that the
OG Marketing is like a small village.
People date each other, dump each
other, cheat on each other. A real
drama scene! We always gossip in
the cafeteria. Tradition," said Tamima
shrugging.
Angelica laughed, thinking that she was
joking.
"No, I'm serious!" insisted Tamima, "For
example, see these two over there?"
She discreetly pointed a man and a
woman eating together ona table.
"Well, this guy was this woman's
boyfriend," she said while pointing
at another woman. "When this girl
started working here, he fell in love
with her, and left his woman to be
with her. Can you believe that?" she
asked bug-eyed.
Angelica actually could not believe it.
Not the story, but rather the fact that
Tamima knew about that stuff that was
none of her business.
"Yup! Pretty messed up if you ask me!"
added Tamima. "Be careful too, I saw
how guys were looking at you earlier.
If you don't want your business to be
out there, steer clear of them."
"No worries about that! I've been with
the same guy for A year and I'm not
planning on leaving him," responded
Angelica confidently.
Plus, she hadn't noticed that guys were
looking at her at all; she didn't feel
like she needed to worry about falling
into the gossipy world of the OG Marketing.
"Good for you!" replied Tamima. "Other
gossip or organizational chart? I have
gossip for days."
"Let's move on to the organizational
chart," laughed Angelica.
"As you wish!" said Tamima, pulling
out her laptop and opening a file out her laptop and opening a file
with pictures and description of
the executives. "So, at the top of the
food chain, we have none other than
Alexander Shum , founder and CEO of
the company. Very loud typical black
guy. I wouldn't want to report to him.
I've heard he's very picky to work
with, straight to the point type of guy,
hard in business and intimidating.
You'll probably never work with him,
so don't worry. He's very kind with us
mere peasants when he sees us in the
hallways."
Mere peasants? Angelica laughed
although she didn't want to be a mere
peasant in this company. She had a lot
of ambition and planned to achieve
great things here.
Tamima scrolled down on her file and
Tristan's picture appeared. Angelica's heart
skipped, suddenly remembering their
encounter of a week and a ago.
"Okay, next in line is Tristian Shum Jr.
Tristan, oh Tristian!" said Tamima while
pretending to faint. "You should know
that almnost all the young ladies in this
company have a crush on him. I have stories for days!"
"What? Does he sleep with all of
them?!" asked Angie scandalized, but
with too much interest to her own
taste. Why did she even care?
"Oh, they wish! Alas, we barely see
him. This man is inaccessible. He is
either hiding on the fifth floor where
only executives are allowed, or he is
out of the office, meeting clients. He
comes to the office at atypical hours
because of his meetings, and when
he doesn't have outside meetings,
he comes in very early and leaves
very late. He's a complete ghost. An
absolute sexy, handsome, dreamy
ghost," she said with hearts in her
eyes.
"I can see that he really has an effect
on you!" laughed Angelica as if she hadn't
been starstruck by him as well.
"Absolutely. Anything related to
Tristan's personal life in this business
is public information. Girls are very
invested in this. Anyways, if you
want to shoot your shot, the only time
you could try would be during the team building event or the Christmas
party. Those are the only times that
we actually see him and have the
opportunity to evern approach him."
"I'm not gonna shoot my shot! I'm not
even single!" said Angelica blushing as if
Tamima had unveiled something deep
within her. "Let's move on to the next
in line," she added not wanting to start
fantasizing about Tristan again.
"Fine!" replied Tamima, shrugging.
"Carmen Shum, VP of Legal Affairs.
Shum's daughter and Tristan's sister.
She is the complete opposite of Tristan.
She has a very entitled attitude, cold,
and she truly treats us like peasants.
And she's extremely intimidating too.
But I hear that she's nice with people
she knows. To be confirmed, if you ask
me."
"Whoa, okay. I'll make sure not to cross
her," replied Angelica.
Tamima continued showing her the
organizational chart while adding
crispy stories and rumours whenever
she could.
* * *
Later in the afternoon, Angelica now
had to join her marketing team and
her first meeting was with Sarah, who
happened to be her supervisor. She
had hoped that she would report to Lance since Sarah wasn't the easiest
to work with. But Angelica never backed
down from a challenge, and she was
determined to prove herself to Sarah.
She knocked on Sarah's open door and
enthusiastically smiled at her. "Hi!"
she said with a pitch high voice while
holding her little notebook and pen.
Sarah was looking at her computer
screen and didn't budge. "Come in,"
she said, still not looking at Angelica.
Angelica dropped her smile before
entering the office and sitting down on
the black chair in front of Sarah's desk.
Sarah continued looking at her screen
and then proceeded to type out a
message, completely ignoring Angelica's
presence. Five minutes of complete
awkwardness. Angelica had no other
choice but to look at the notes she had
taken in her notebook.
"Close the door please," Sarah finally
said while looking at Angelica.
Angelica got up, closed the door and took
her seat again.
"So...my expectations," said Sarah
while crossing her hands together. "I
know that you and Lance have an
arrangement for the digital marketing
strategy. The thing is, I have to look
out for my team. I have six marketing
advisors right now that are pulling
their own data metrics . I
have to do my own data analysis as
well. This is quite franklywaste of
our expertise. I want to offload them
and myself as well. Also, Rose, our
administrative assistant, have you met
her yet?"
"Yes, I have," nodded Angelica.
"Ok, she doesn't have the skills to keep
our database clean and to maintain
our tools and systems. This is going
to be your job. So, bottom line my
expectation is for you to complete your
job as an analyst. If that is covered,
then there will be no issues. Do you
have any questions?"
"No. That's pretty clear," answered
Angelica, struck by her straightforward
and distant attitude.
"Ok. I'm sorry, I would have liked to
spend more time showing you around,
but I am swamped right now. Mary
will take over, she's aware. She'll start
training you on the data analysis and
the tools."
"Perfect. Thanks for your time,"
politely said Angelica trying to hide her
shock as she walked out of her office.
She couldn't believe how rude and
unbelievably cold Sarah was; not
welcoming at all. Worse than when
she had worked with her for the few days as an intern. Angelica was used to people not
liking her, but not that fast!
She walked towards Mary's office
located just beside her work cubicle
in the department's open space that
she shared with other marketing
employees. Only advisors and leaders
had private offices. The bigger the
role, the bigger the office; that's how it worked at The OGMarketing. Angelica
was content being in the open space
for now. She was motivated and
excited to work her way up the ladder.
Plus, although devoid of any privacy,
the work stations were nice looking.
She knocked on Mary's open door.
"Hi! Come in!" said Mary
enthusiastically.
Angelica was relieved that Mary
seemed jovial with her shoulder length
brown human hair wig and brilliant brown eyes.
After her weird encounter with Sarah,
she needed a little bit of hope.
She entered the office and sat down in
front of Mary's white desk. Instead
of the panoramic view, Mary had
two windows behind her.
Photos were pinned
to the wall just above one of her
computer screens. Angelica looked
at them and saw Mary making
silly faces with what seemed to be
her friends. She looked happy and
accepted in those pictures. She had the same photos with her two friends, Jess and Lucy.
"How are you? How is your day going?
Traumatized yet?" asked Mary
taking her out of her thoughts.
"No, it's fine! I'm fine!"
"You spoke to Sarah?"
"Yes, I just did actually."
Mary grimaced and said, "Ok, I
don't know what happened in there,
but I just feel like I need to tell you
this: don't take it personal. She's like
this with everyone. The rest of us are
cool."
Angelica smirked and bit her lower lip;
she didn't want to say something she
would regret.
"What's understood doesn't need to be
discussed," said Mary, tilting her
head and giving Angelica a quick wink.
"Okay! So, I'm Mary. Obviously,
the coolest advisor here. Been in the
company for what? Five years? No
wait..no yeah, five years in August.
Wow, that's a long time," she said
pensively. "Started as a coordinator.
Got promoted to this position last year.
I'm thirty-two by the way. Single and
ready to mingle, if you have any male
friends to introduce. That sounds a bit
desperate, but I'm thirty-two...so. Clock
is ticking. No shame in my game."
Angelica laughed out loud. "Sorry, I don't
know anyone. But Lance has a son
and apparently, he's single!" she said
jokingly.
Mary rolled her eyes. "Argh. No
thanks. Did you not hear me say I'm
thirty-two? I don't have time to play
games. I need a man. A real man."
After the two girls chitchatted some
more, Mary proceeded to explain
everything about the job to Angelica,
constantly reassuring her that she
could come see her anytime if she had
questions or concerns.
Angelica left that meeting dreamily.
Mary was the coolest person she
had met in a very long time, someone
she felt she could connect with.
"Maybe she will want to become my
friend.."