Story Summary. This story is inspired by the Lily Allen Song 22. Bella Swan is climbing the ranks at a large, multinational conglomerate, lovingly referred to as Big Bad Corporation. She is finally given her first chance to manage a person, an underling. What happens when all she can think about is being under her underling? Slightly OOC characters BXE.
A/N: I own nothing and only claim the premise and the storyline. I do not own the characters. I am just playing around. Thanks to LouderthanSirens, Poo235, IsabelGrace and LittleSecret84 for beta'ing, pre-reading and helping me with this story. I would also like to thank the hotness in my office who serves as my inspiration.
The Bottom Line -
Isabella Swan looked down at her computer. She hated Mondays. She made a habit to skim her blackberry every Sunday night; that way there would be no suprises when she walked into the office on Monday. It, however, did not lessen the blow that it was still Monday. Itwasn't that Bella, as she preferred to be called, minded her job; she loved it. She just enjoyed her weekends too.
Work hard, play hard. She thought to herself. It tended to be the company motto for those under a certain age. However, at 29, Bella was torn. She didn't feel like she was 29. She surely didn't look like she was 29. She still wore her dark brown hair with auburn highlights long; her pale skin was wrinkle and blemish free as well. The one sign of aging Bella had begun to notice, besides the occasional wiry gray hair, was her metabolism was slowing down. Her size six pants had started to feel a bit snug and she swore lately whenever she ate hamburgers and fried foods she could feel her hips spreading.
Bella didn't think she acted like a 29 year old. She enjoyed going out to bars, dancing at clubs, and listening to undiscovered bands out in Brooklyn.
Bella's apparent youth was a good thing, as Big Bad Corporation seemed to be run by forty year olds. She had only once witnessed a person retiring. Once. Usually, the company found a reason to downsize before it had to shell out a retirement package to its employees. For this reason alone, Bella was very cautious about her retirement savings account and, therefore, always tried to max out her 401(k).
It was hard; living in New York City was expensive. Her company was known to underpay its employees but the benefits were what kept the employees happy. She did have great healthcare benefits and always had access to discounts on a wide range of products - either ones the company itself manufactured or ones its customers did. Besides, it wasn't like she worked for a Fortune 500 company. No, Bella Swan was climbing the ranks at a Fortune 10 company.
Her job was more than just a job, but Bella was still unsure if this was her career. She had started in the company's exclusive trainee program immediately after she graduated from the University of Washington. The trainee program consisted of four six-month rotations in various businesses that the corporation owned. Ah, the joys of working at a multi-national conglomerate. Bella Swan could converse in all of the company's product lines - from bottled water, to financing, to even underwear manufacturing. After being a rotationer, as they were called, she accepted a full-time position. She currently worked with the financing arm of the business and had been in the same department for almost five years. In those five years, Bella had been promoted once, from analyst to senior analyst. It was a bump in pay but the responsibilities were still the same - crunching numbers for the bigwigs.
None of Bella's friends had stayed at a company that long. Most of her friends, as well as most people in her generation, tended to jump from one company to the next, always trying to get paid just a little bit more. Bella had never seen the need to do that. She liked working for the Big Bad Corporation. True, it was far away from her family, but she was loyal to the company. Besides, in this current economic climate, where was she going to go? Bella hated the thought of starting someplace new, having to make new work friends with her coworkers.
"Espresso?" Alice Brandon, Bella's closest friend, both in and out of the the office, asked.
Alice Brandon did not look like the typical person to work in the technology department. She was short, she had spike black hair, wore high heels, loved to wear trendy clothes, and had a wicked sense of humor. Alice had once confided in Bella that she actually considered taking a job as an assistant buyer for Bloomingdales, but she thought that the job would not be challenging enough. "Once you learn how to pick out the clothes, the only thing that changes is the styles. What's the fun in that?" Alice liked technology. She liked that it was forever evolving and now ten years after the Internet bubble had burst, there were more women in the field. At least enough in Alice's mind that she felt comfortable wearing pink. Not that it would have stopped Alice before, but finally her department was not male dominated. Alice managed technology project development for new systems that the business used. At least that was how Bella understood Alice's job to be.
"Sure." Bella said as she hit the control-alt-delete to lock her computer. Bella didn't drink coffee but would usually get a water, tea, or hot chocolate when Alice attacked the Illy machine.
As she and Alice walked to the kitchenette, Bella took the opportunity to complain. "Alice, are we ever going to upgrade to the latest Office suite. My clients keep sending me Excel 2007 documents. We are running what, Office 2003?"
"Try Office 2000. Babe, it's not up to me. All of those decisions are made by corporate." Alice replied.
Corporate. Big Bad Corporation oversaw each of its divisions from offices in the suburbs of New York City. Most decisions were made at the corporate level. It was an honor to be asked to work for Corporate, but Bella had no desire to do so. She had heard from various sources that everyone who worked there spent most of their time managing upwards, kissing butt, and pushing paper. Bella hated the idea of doing any of that. It was bad enough that corporate usually put forth various initiatives to stimulate the company's culture. Not only did BBC create values which it tried to instill upon its employees, but for the annual and semi-annual reviews, employees were then measured on how well they met those values in their job. Even though Bella was happy with Big Bad Corporation, she found it to be almost cult-like.
"That blows," Bella said with a shrug, If someone higher complains enough, then maybe things will change." Executive complaining was the only way for anything to ever change.
"So, Saks Fifth Avenue's friends and family sale starts today. Want to hit up the shoe department after work?" Alice asked. Her face had instantly lit up as she turned the conversation toward one of her favorite activities, shopping.
"Alice, I'll have to see. I have a pitch-out tomorrow," Bella replied, cringing at using the word pitch. It was a presentation but Big Bad Corporation bastardized the entire English language into corporate-speak. "I should get back to my cube before anyone notices I am gone, or rather, before anyone notices I'm even here."
"Bella! When was the last time you went out and had fun?" Alice asked, trying to get her friend to stay and chat just a bit longer.
Bella knew she was really asking when was the last time Bella got laid. It had been awhile. Long ago she had ceased one-night stands and dating was starting to seem pointless - being set up, speed dating, even the internet, no one seemed to click.
"A few weeks. Work has been really busy. We are trying to make our numbers," Bella lied. It had been four months. Four grueling months. Four months where her vibrator, George Jetson, had become her nightly pal. She had named it after the cartoon character from the future because Bella was not sure if she really needed a man. These days with sperm banks and vibrators, George really was the man of the future.
"Alice, I gotta get back. Ping me later." Bella replied, hurrying down the hallway back to her cubicle. Ping, another corporate-ism for the online chat tool used by Big Bad's employees.
"Bella, you are getting as bad as Rosalie. Don't make me sweep the cobwebs out of your who-ha for you," Alice called out to Bella as she was walking back to her cube. Alice didn't care that she had said who-ha a little too loud for the workplace.
Bella's love life had become nonexistent after her one friend with benefits, or as he called himself, her fuck buddy, Jacob Black, met someone else. Jake worked in a garage with a bunch of his friends out in Glen Cove on Long Island, fixing up cars they could only dream of affording. He and his friends would take the train to the city on the weekends to go to clubs. With too much cologne, too much hair product, and their discounted designer clothes, they would travel in packs at bars and clubs. They always got bottled service and invited all the pretty ladies around them to join in on their alcohol on the small chance one of them may talk to them. Bella had been one of those ladies.
Jake made her laugh and a friendship quickly developed. They tried not to hang out around their friends. Bella did not care for Jake's pack of guys, as they always walked around the city like they had something to prove and wanted to be seen. By whom, Bella was unsure of, still to this day. Her friends thought Jake was B&T, bridge and tunnel – someone who lived outside Manhattan, and a little too rough around the edges. Bella liked that Jake was nice and when he had come into the city, he had happily scratched Bella's itch. Bella suspected that Jake was just glad to have had a place to crash in the city and didn't have to worry about getting the last train out at two in the morning. She hadn't seen him that often, and when they were together, she compared their relationship to ordering flour-less chocolate cake for dessert. You could get it anytime but it wasonly special if you got it on occasion; otherwise it wouldn't be special and it would go straight to your hips. Their relationship ended amicably as these things often do. They still texted occasionally, but Jake was fully committed to his girlfriend, Vanessa.
Alice Brandon had done the single gal routine with Bella in their early twenties but had recently taken her casual relationship with Jasper Whitlock to the next level. They were getting serious and Jasper, a tall southern boy, who worked as one of the curators at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, was head over heels in love with Alice. Bella was happy for her friend, but wished she could find something similar.
Once she was back at her desk, Bella plunged into her daily routine. She opened up her web browser and set it to iGoogle. Big Bad Corporation blocked the chat feature, but she could at least check her gmail. After seeing no interesting personal mail, she opened up her ancient version of Excel and began crunching numbers. Halfway through the morning, Sam Uley, Bella's boss, stopped by her cube. Sam was young, incredibly handsome, with dark, jet black hair, piercing brown eyes and a knack for being able to pull together a financing deal from the brink of disaster. He had made a name for himself at Big Bad Corporation and was on is way to being a Chief Financial Officer, CFO, or even a CEO of one of the many divisions.
"Isabella, how was your weekend?" He didn't wait for her to answer, as he didn't care about the answer. "So, come into my office in five minutes. I have to talk to you," Sam said as he rushed back to his office. He was a very straightforward manager; she always knew where she stood in his book ,and despite appearances, he was compassionate. He happily allowed his employees to work from home on sick days and holidays.
Taking a deep breath, Bella prepared for the worst. She was getting laid off. The company had to reduce costs and downsizing was one way to do so. She quickly typed a message to ping over to Alice.
Isabella Marie Swan: Omg Alice. Sam wants to see me in his office. I am getting canned.
Alice Brandon: B- You are totes fine. Retail therapy tonight?
Isabella Marie Swan: Maybe. Gotta go.
Bella grabbed her notepad, blackberry and a pen and hurried into Sam's office.
"Shut the door, Isabella," Sam stated sternly from behind his cherry desk. He was still reading emails on his screen while also talking to her. Sam was the king of multi-tasking.
Nervously, Bella shut the door and sat down in one of the two chairs across from her beautiful boss. She bit her lip with anticipation. "You wanted to see me?" Her voice cracked as the words left her mouth. She looked around. On Sam's desk were three silver picture frames. The first was a wedding portrait of his wife, Emily. The second picture was a family picture with Sam, Emily and their son Ephram. The third picture was the CEO of Big Bad Corporation shaking Sam's hand at an awards dinner. Next to the pictures were tombstones from finished deals. Tombstones were momentos from closed deals that signified the amount of money Bid Bad Corporation had loaned to each specific customer. Bella herself had a few tombstones, but Sam had multiple ones displayed on his desk and on his bookshelf.
"Isabella, are you nervous? I didn't call you in for anything bad." Sam finally turned to face her, only to glance back at his screen when a notification popped up announcing a new email had arrived. The entire company was addicted to being connected - all of the time.
"You didn't?" Bella was pleasantly shocked. For once, she had not done something wrong. Maybe she would celebrate with a pair of shoes after all.
"No, I wanted to let you know that I want you to manage the rotationer who will be starting with our team next week."
"You want me to manage someone?" Bella replied . She was in shock that she was being given more responsibility. She had waited for this day for so long. This was a chance to show she was ready for more.
"Yes, you haven't been pushed enough and I wanted to start to develop your managerial skills. Corporate let me know that we will, in fact, be getting a rotationer and I thought this would be an excellent opportunity for you. Do you not want it? I can ask someone else. I'm sure either Mike, Eric, or Lauren wouldn't mind..."
"No! I'd be happy to manage a rotationer. That's great." Bella was excited. She had loved being a rotationer. Rotationers were fresh out of school, moving to a new city every six months, always having challenging work assignments - it had been an exciting time in her life. Bella began thinking about the rotationer she would get. She wondered what school they had graduated from. She hoped they would at least be 21; there was one rotationer in her year who had started at age 20 and could never go out to happy hours.
"That's settled then. I will let corporate know today. I will forward you any emails on your rotationer," Sam said, turning back to his email. He then glanced back at Bella. "Did you want something else?"
Bella shook her head, afraid that Sam would get mad and take away her new responsibility already. She could not wait to get back to her desk to let Alice know that she was getting a rotationer. Alice would be thrilled. It was like bringing home a new baby - would it be a boy or a girl? What would they call it? Most importantly, what work was Bella going to give this new rotationer?
Alice pinged Bella back, indicating she hoped for a girl. Maybe even a nerdy, bookish girl similar to the way she had found Bella. Alice had done an extensive makeover with Bella when they first met. Alice loved introducing people to the wonders of make-up and the art of fashion. In fact, Bella needed a little maintenance work, which was why Alice had suggested Saks.
As the minutes closed in on 5PM, Bella looked down at her ever-growing to-do list and sent Alice one final ping of the day:
Isabella Marie Swan: Too much work for Saks. FML.
A/N: Let me know what you think. Fics that have sucked me in recently:
-The Cannabean Betrothal
-The University of Edward Masen
-Geek Love
-The Naked Guy Upstairs
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