A/N: This story is set before Ana came along, before Christian got fixed :-P Please tell me what you think :-)
Tell Me...
1
As Olivia folds the paper hat in two and throws it in the bin, she thinks to herself What is the point of even trying. This is about the 30th job she's lost because she can't stand to take orders from someone less skilled than herself. She had finished university last year with an English degree and a bright future, but instead of finding a place in an office, where she would definitely get paid more than she had working at that place, she has been reduced to working in a minimum-wage hell. While she hasn't ever wanted to work at that fast-food restaurant anyway, she shouldn't have had to, there was nowhere else. Now she is jobless... and broke. At this rate she wouldn't be able to keep up the rent on this apartment for much longer; She sees people living on the streets all the time, she knows how her life would be if she ever lost her home.
As his eyes roamed over her, she felt her insides turn to jello. Whatever she tried to do, her boss was shameless in his blatant attempts to get her alone. She would do anything to not be alone with him, but he was the boss and as long as she wanted to have a job at McDonalds she could not do a damn thing about it. All he needed to do was ask her to see him alone in his little office in the back and she would have no choice but to go there... If she wanted to keep her job. She didn't like to think about it.
It's time to look for another job.
The internet site listing all the positions available in Seattle is scant, but then it usually is whenever she checks it. For such a large place, work is hard to come by. Any jobs that appeal to her are either already taken when she rings the number to reply, or requires things that she does not have—like a car. She doesn't want to just settle for something for the sake of getting a job, though. She is almost at the bottom of the listings when finally, at-last, she can see something that had some potential. The ad reads:
PERSONAL ASSISTANT
NEEDED FOR IMMEDIATE PLACEMENT
PAY SCALE TO BE DISCUSSED
That is the best offer of a job that she has seen for quite a while, and starting right-away would not be a problem. She won't have to give much notice before she leaves the job she has at the moment. The amount she might get paid never really occurs to her, but she would bet that she will make more than she does now. What's stopping her? Nothing. This is like a sign from fate; she is meant to have this job, she knows it. Bringing up her e-mail program, she clicks the new messege button and switches windows to find the e-mail address for Grey Enterprises Holdings Inc.
To: Careers...GreyEnterprisesHoldingsInc . com
From: olivia-lawson...hotmail . com
Greetings,
This email is in response to the advertisement in the Seattle Times newspaper 4th March 2007. I am available for work immediately.
Look forward to knowing when I should come in for an interview.
Olivia
She presses send before she can change her mind. Even as she had been writing her response, her gut had clenched so tightly it was painful. Would she seem too brusk, to whoever read her application? She reads over the e-mail and cringes. She bet she would sound like a robot when his current assistant read her words, or worse, someone who would not be commited enough to warrent being hired at all. She had had the same problem all her life; she can speak with feeling, make her words ring with honest emotion even when she does not feel it, but in her writing she has never been able to do the same. Maybe she should have applied to the Library instead... she shakes her head. She can't go back there... not after what happened to make her quit her job there in the first place.
She had been twenty-one when her boss there had cornered her in the storeroom, using his greater size to overpower her in a matter of seconds. It still gave her nightmares when she remembered how the man had made her cower in front of him that afternoon at the library, still made her shudder. She never wanted to feel that helpless again, wanted to be stronger, which was why she knew she needed to work for Mr Grey, the would-be boss she hoped could give her an opportunity to excell and find her potential.
TBC