Somehow Paul managed to get Stephanie up and out of the house so that they would get there on time.
Pulling in to the parking lot he didn't know if Stephanie knew where they were or the significance of this place. "Okay so we're here. Are you ready?"
"Sure." She wasn't sure what she was meant to be ready for but she was willing to go with it.
Helping Stephanie out of the car they slowly made their way into the building and over to reception. "Good morning. We are here to see Anthony Doyle."
"Good morning. Take a seat and I will let him know that you are here."
"Thanks." Showing Stephanie over to a seat he helped her sit down before he took a seat beside her. "Hopefully they won't be too long."
"Who? Where are we?" She had been so focussed on not falling into any of the potholes that littered the car park that she didn't look for a logo or a sign or anything.
Not wanting to overwhelm her too hard right now he focussed on who they were going to be seeing. "We are here to see Anthony Doyle; we'll explain it all once we're all together."
Confused she just nodded and waited for the mystery person to arrive so that she could find out more. The one thing that was really confusing her was the way everyone was staring at her as they passed. "Why is everybody staring at me Paul?"
He didn't want to answer her and luckily he didn't have to as out of nowhere a man appeared in front of them. "Good morning. I am guessing you are Paul?"
"Yes I am. I'm guessing Anthony?"
"Yes I am. Why don't the two of you come through?"
Before she got up Stephanie just stared at the strange man. "But where am I?"
Not knowing of her reaction on finding out the truth or why she didn't already he just motioned to the corridor behind him. "Why don't you follow me and we can talk about it more in private?"
Despite not really getting an answer she followed Paul's lead and got up from the seat and then followed this Anthony guy down the corridor.
As they walked down the corridor she kept looking at all of the doors and all around her until they stopped outside of the conference room. Being nosey she looked all around her noticing in the distance a door that she swore looked like it had her surname on and she found herself moving closer to the door until she could read it. "Vince McMahon, Chairman. Isn't that . . . my Dad?"
Anthony looked at Paul for him to take the lead as this was the furthest thing from inside his comfort zone.
He thought about the best way to approach it but Paul knew they were here for the truth so the truth it shall be. "Yes Steph, that is your Dad's office, this is your Dad's building, this is your Dad's, or well your family's company. Why don't we all go in to the conference room and talk?"
Not answering him she just made her way towards the conference room taking the closest seat to her. "I'm here."
Paul and Anthony both took a seat at the table with her. "So do you have any questions for Anthony or would you just like him to talk and explain things that he knows?"
Her brain couldn't even think enough to come up with questions even if she wanted to. "I can't think of anything so I'm happy for him to explain things."
Taking a deep breath he pulled out a piece of paper from his book. where he had been jotting down everything he could think of. "Okay so I worked closer with your Dad than I did your Mom so I can't tell you a lot about her. The only thing I really know about your Mom is that she had the biggest heart and was the warmest and kindest woman to work for. As for your Dad, well your Dad was a huge character and you couldn't miss him when he entered a room."
Just knowing something about her parents made her smile. "Was he a bad boss? Were people scared of him?"
"Do you really want the complete honesty?" The idea of giving her complete honesty and her not wanting the real story on her Father and just wanting the Fairytale version terrified him because he had no idea what he was doing.
She wanted the real story on her Father, she wanted to know who he was as a person, what kind of man he was, just who he was. "I want the truth please; I just need to know who he was."
"Okay so the truth is that yes, sometimes people were scared of your Dad but not because he was a bad person or mean but he could be loud and passionate and he knew what he wanted so sometimes he could be really frightening but he didn't mean to make people scared of him, it was just the way he was."
She didn't know what to think or feel, people were scared of her Dad but he wasn't really scary, what did that mean? "Can we look around please and then talk some more?"
"Of course." At this very moment he was so grateful that he had held a meeting yesterday and told everybody to continue with their work and not say anything directly to Stephanie unless they were spoken to first.
Paul decided to follow behind, let Anthony show her around and just be there as a support system for her. "Alright, let's do this. I'm kind of excited to see the behind the scenes working here because I have really enjoyed your work."
"Thank you. It is always nice to hear from actual people and not focus groups or people whose interest it is to blow smoke up your ass that they enjoy the work you do."
Laughing he shrugged his shoulders, the idea of being in a focus group did sound pretty cool though. "I don't know, focus groups sound pretty cool but not if I have to actually lie and just tell you it's all awesome even if it wasn't."
"I'll have to bear you in mind; if we need honesty I'll be calling you." Opening the door he motioned to the right. "Okay so go to the right and to the end of the corridor and then we'll go to the left."
As they made their way around the office she noticed the looks and how nobody was talking to her. "I'm not fragile. Why is everybody acting so weirdly around me?"
Placing his hand on her shoulder he squeezed it gently. "Relax; I'm sure it is harmless."
Anthony gulped, he was hoping that she wouldn't notice or not say anything at least. "That would be on me. I didn't want them to overwhelm you so asked them not to approach you unless you approached them first."
"So they're not gossiping about me?"
"Not unless they want to get fired. At the end of the day you are technically their boss, whether you are in charge right now or not, so they should treat you with respect."
Paul could sense the fear in Stephanie's body language, she was clearly nervous about what people were saying about her and how they would react to her, he only wished that he could take the fear away. "It'll be okay Steph. Don't worry about them; once they relax around you they'll be fine."
As Stephanie looked around she saw two people bent over looking over the shoulder of a third person who was sat at a computer. "Hey. What are you looking at?" She wasn't sure if she was being too nosey but she really was curious.
Gulping both people who were bent over stood up and looked around anxiously. "Who? Us?"
"Yes, you two, well three. Is it about me?"
"No, oh God no." Stepping forward the woman motioned around frantically. "We have a deadline for this new show outline that we need to send off but we're stuck on one detail so were trying to brainstorm it out."
"What if you talked about it out loud? Do you think that would help you?"
They had no actual ideas so they were willing to try anything. "Yeah sure. Scott, read it out please."
Gulping he didn't know whether he should stand up or not because this was his boss. Awkwardly shuffling in his seat he turned to look at her but didn't quite look her in the eyes. "So the premise is a fifteen year old genius gets her first job but there is just something missing."
"And that's all you've got? What area was she a genius in?" Anthony missed this; he missed bouncing ideas around when they were stuck on where to go.
We were thinking something like maths or science, something where she would be working on like robotics or something fancy."
"What if she had to move and live with a family member that wasn't the most responsible in order to do it?" Every eye in the room turned to look at Stephanie which just made her self conscious. "What?"
Nobody knew where the suggestion had come from, especially Paul because she could barely remember his name but yet she could come out with that. "Where did that come from?"
"I . . . I don't know, it just came out. Is it bad?"
Scott was furiously typing away so that he didn't forget anything but Ellie who had thrown him under the bus in regards to explaining it moved closer to Stephanie. "It wasn't bad but it . . . it was you. That was the kind of thing that you did before; it would be so random but so amazing, just like your Dad."
"My Dad? What was he like?" As she looked around for answers she realised that she wouldn't remember a word of what people told her. "Actually, does anybody have a pad and pen that I can borrow before you do please?"
Within a minute a pad and pen was in front of her and a chair was pushed closer to her. "Take a seat; you will be much more comfortable that way."
Paul was quickly at her side and helped her in to a seat even if he was afraid about what all of the information would do to her brain. "Just take it slow and if it gets too much, stop."
She sat there listening to their every word and was amazed by what she was hearing about her family. Once they had finished telling her what they had experienced they continued on with the tour.
"And the final spot is the break room, I couldn't leave anywhere out even if it is boring and unimportant."
As she looked around the room she noticed the stain on the worktop and the cups in the sink. "Is it always messy?"
"Only when there is a tight deadline and people are in a rush, we have always been given a pass at those times but it was drilled in to us that as soon as we have finished the pitch we are working on then we are to clean up after ourselves."
True to his word no more than fifteen seconds passed before the woman from earlier came walking through the door. "Sorry for the mess, I promise I will fix it all now."
The tap was soon running as she went about cleaning up as she went moving the picture on the top to a slightly higher placement to make sure that she cleaned everything thoroughly.
The movement of the picture caught Stephanie's eye and she found herself drawn to look at it. "What's this?" She crossed the room and picked it up to examine it.
"That is an outtake from some press photo shoot your family did, apparently Shane and yourself were messing about in between takes. Vince wanted to display the picture here in the break room to let everybody know that no matter what the business environment that you should always make time to have some fun and he told us as long as we worked hard he wanted us to have fun as well."
Stephanie was stunned that her Dad took such a relaxed approach to work. "Really? He doesn't look like he'd be relaxed like that."
"You'd be surprised by exactly how relaxed he could be. Your Dad was a good guy and so was your Mom and brother. Steph your family were good people and everyone was so excited to work with you before the accident."
"Work with me?"
"Yes, well your Dad was hoping so anyway. You were all going on holiday and he was going to give you the hard sell about coming to work here but he was really hopeful that by the time you came back you would be officially joining us as you'd done a few short stints working here already."
"I was going to work here? What was I going to do?"
"Steph you need to sit down and not push yourself. To be honest we should probably think about heading out as this has already been a long morning for you." Paul had looked at her he could see that she was flagging which is what motivated his comments.
"I'm fine, stop fussing." She wasn't fine but she didn't want to stop finding out about her life.
He wasn't sure if this was overstepping a massive boundary but Anthony had one idea. "We could always go back to the board room, take a seat, have a drink and a snack and then talk some more if you want?"
She looked at Paul hopefully and as he could never say no to her he nodded his head. "Sure. Not much longer though."
She couldn't argue with that as he had done so much for her. "Not much longer."
The three of them walked back to the conference room and took a seat which Stephanie was actually really grateful for as the second that she took the weight off her body screamed in pain.
Once they were sat down Anthony felt like it was his duty to be honest with her as she wanted to know the information so he opened the file in front of him. "Apparently your Dad didn't leave really good notes but the information that I could gather was that the plan is for you to work in like every department doing everything."
"At once?"
"Jeez no, he wasn't sadistic . . . I hope." Flipping through a few more pages he finally found a handwritten note. "For the first couple of weeks you were actually going to be one-on-one shadowing your Dad and then the same with your Mom."
"Do you think that I could see my Dad's office properly please?"
"Of course. Why don't we make that it for today? If you want to meet again another day then that's fine but I don't want to get in trouble with Paul."
Paul laughed but didn't say anything, he was just glad that Anthony recognised that she needed the break right now.
"Thank you for everything today and thank everybody else too please."
"It was our pleasure." Getting up from his seat he quickly got his files together. "Give me one minute to run these files back to my office and I will grab your Dad's office key as I have kept it locked so that nobody could disturb it, but you."
As soon as Anthony left the room Paul turned his attention to Stephanie. "So are you sure about this? I know that I sound like a broken record today but I just have your best interests at heart."
"I'm sure, I need to see this."
When Anthony reappeared in the doorway Paul immediately helped Stephanie to her feet, the sooner they began then the sooner it would be over. "Let's do this."
He waited for them to be stood in front of them before he held out the key. "Take this and spend as much time in there as you want. I am going to go back to my office as I really should do some work but you can come by at any moment if you need anything."
"Thank you for everything Anthony. I will return the key to you when we are done and ready to leave."
Nodding politely he left them alone to go back to the mountain of paperwork on his desk.
Paul held out the key to Stephanie to allow her to take the lead in it all.
With a deep breath she took the key from him and then made her way towards the door that she spotted earlier. It took two attempts before she got the key in the slot and unlocked the door to let them inside. The idea of this both excited and terrified her but as she opened the door she felt overwhelmed. "I can't do this." Almost slamming the door shut again she was breathing heavily.
He knew that she would regret every minute of every day if they just walked away without going inside. Placing his hands on her shoulders he squeezed them reassuringly. "It'll be okay."
"Promise?"
"I promise you that I will be here with you every step of the way and I will support you." As soon as he had promised that it would be okay he regretted it so he was actually grateful for the opportunity to fix what he may have messed up.
Inhaling deeply she played with the handle a little bit before she pushed it all of the way down and opened the door. She wasn't sure what she was expecting but as she looked at her Father's office this wasn't it.
Stood in the doorway he waited for her to move but when she didn't he decided to be nosey and just have a look at the pictures on the wall. "Wow, your Dad sure met a lot of famous people."
She had drifted off in to her own little world at the sight of her Father's office, she had so many pictures running through her head and she didn't know if any were real or if it was just her imagination. "Huh?"
Looking over at her he could see the confusion on her face. "The pictures here on the wall of your Dad, he has met a lot of people judging by the amount of pictures."
She walked to the wall and began to look at the pictures, there were so many of them and she even spotted herself in some of them. "Do you think he took pride in meeting these celebrities and taking a picture with them because it meant that he was on their level or because he liked to brag?"
"Judging by the smile on his face I'd say that he takes pride in meeting them and being able to take a picture with them made his night."
After examining the pictures she moved over to sit at her Dad's desk and began to look through the things that were on his desk. "I feel like I am learning so much about him, it just sucks that I am not going to remember any of it."
"You never know, you remember my name now so you might remember it."
"I say your name a lot though." The entire thing was just making her heart hurt now. "Can we go home now and come back another day?"
The idea of keeping her here and making things harder for her to deal with made him feel really uneasy so he readily agreed. "Of course. Let's lock this up and I'll drop you home before I go to work."
"Thank you."
After locking up the office again Paul took the key to return it to Anthony. Knocking on the door he waited to be invited in before he opened the door. "Hi. I just wanted to bring the key back to you and say thank you. We'll be back another day to look through the office properly as it was a bit much for Stephanie to handle. Do I need to call you to set up a time for us to be able to come in?"
"Why don't you take the key with you and come by whenever you wish?" It was Stephanie's company after all. "This essentially is Stephanie's company, whether she can remember it or not, so she would and should have her own set of keys to the office but as she can't remember anything I'd prefer to keep it to just the key to the office and you come in on office hours for now please." He felt bad keeping her from her own business but it was the best he could do when he was trying to make sure that it stayed alive.
"Are you sure?" When he nodded his head Paul pocketed the key. "I promise that any time we come by will be during opening hours and I will also make sure that the receptionist knows that we are here too. Thank you for everything though; I know that Steph really appreciates it."
"You're welcome. Good luck with everything and I look forward to seeing you again."
Shaking Anthony's hand Paul was ready to get Stephanie home before she collapsed.