Chapter 4. Broken Glasses

Elaine stood in front of the executive secretary’s desk.

When she left her small apartment, she had anticipated that she could breeze into the Swernbach office, drop the letter that Jean had written requesting for an interview and receive an answer quickly. Instead, they kept her waiting, taking her from floor to floor until she finally stood in front of the executive secretary’s desk, waiting for the woman to get off the call with her boss.

“What did you say you wanted again?” The woman stared at her.

The executive secretary had neat black hair packed in a high ponytail and minimal make up that highlighted her rosy cheeks and dark brown eyes.

Elaine forged another smile, passing the white envelope across the wide breadth white wood table. The woman looked down at her, with the higher chair acting as a boost.

“I’m a representative of ROI Pen, a publishing company, and I serve as the acquisition editor of…”

“Can you be direct about what you want?” The woman raised a smooth lined eyebrow.

“I’m here to request an interview with Mr. Swernbach-”

“Which one?”

Elaine’s brow furrowed. Would the woman ever let her complete her sentences? Maybe this was why no one could get book interviews with the CEO’s of such big companies. Because the secretaries wouldn’t allow people to speak clearly.

“How many Swernbachs run this company?”

“Are you sure you’re really here for an interview?”

“Wait.”

Elaine turned to her handbag and felt her glasses slipping off her face. She pushed it back and pinned it on her face. She produced her ID card and held it up for the woman to see.

“It says here that you’re a junior editor. This interview was scheduled for an acquisition editor.”

“I was recently promoted.” She wasn’t even sure if she still had a future beyond her current post at ROI Penn.

“Ma’am, there are four Swernbachs in this company. George Swernbach is chairman of the board. Stephen is the CEO, but he’s currently ill disposed. Melvin is the image of the company,” the secretary added in a quiet voice. “He is really just a figurehead. And Andrew is the acting CEO. Now, you’ll save us a lot of time if you can tell me who you want to see and why.”

“I want to make a book proposal to any of the chief executive officers that currently run these companies. They can’t all be running the company at the same time.”

The secretary shook her head, while her free hand fingered the pearls around her neck. “You have no idea. I’ll pass your letter off to the Swernbach on the seat, and we’ll contact you if we’re interested in buying your book.”

“No, we’re not selling books. We want to-”

“Good day, ma’am,” the secretary said.

Elaine marched away from the table, toward the elevator in the hallway. Her eyes caught a small green blur beside the elevator door. That had to be a plant. She leaned closer to it and it took more shape and definition as the edges sharpened.

She was right. Her lenses were as good as gone.

She straightened as the elevator dinged and the doors opened. The blur figure of a human stood in the hallway. She guessed from the wide shoulders and gray suit that he was a man. She walked to the side and tried to get into the elevator. She couldn’t go to Dr. Roberts anymore but she could go back to the office and try to reduce the pile of unrequested manuscripts she’d received.

The blur began to take more shape and definition as she moved closer to it. Wasn’t he supposed to step out of the way?

She moved closer until she hit a block in the way and she knew she’d hit the man. Her glasses slipped off her ear and she tried to catch it but between looking out of a falling lens and moving her hands, she missed and it landed on the floor.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t quite see you.”

She saw a fuzzy vision of black shoes walking backward. “My glasses!”

The crunch of the glass under his glasses snapped the thread of patience that Elaine had hung on to since receiving Jean’s letter yesterday.

She straightened and eyed the figure even though all she could see was a fuzzy picture of a man. The glasses were bad but at least, they’d helped her to see better than her eyes could.

“How could you do that? I’ve had it with you people in this company.”

The man bent over and picked up the glasses. Or what remained of it – shards and a broken lens. “I am so sorry. I didn’t know your glasses were there.”

Elaine grabbed the frame out of his hand and tried to put it on. There was only a tiny shard of the glasses on the bottom of the left eye lens. The right eye lens was completely missing. There was a bit of a finger smudge on the rest of the left lens.

“All I wanted to do was to get Timothy’s book written, and now I’m going to be as blind as bat because some jerk doesn’t watch where he’s going.” She ripped the glasses from her face.

“I said I was sorry.”

The man’s voice was deeper now. Smoother. Elaine would have appreciated it if she wasn’t planning a thousand ways to kill him.

“Do you know what it’s going to cost me to replace this? I don’t even know how I’ll get home.”

“I’ll replace them and I’ll drive you home.”

“Sure. Sure.”

Elaine stepped aside, not even bothering to look at him. It wasn’t like she could see his face. She tried to walk into the elevator. The sooner she was away from this mess, the better for her. Her face bumped into a cold metal and she knew she’d hit the outer elevator wall.

“Don’t be in a hurry to leave. I promise I will fix your glasses and you can go back and help Timothy write his book.”

The secretary’s voice came from behind her. “Is there any problem, sir?”

“Don’t worry about it, Annette. Just tell Melvin to fill in for me in any meeting today. If it’s something he can’t handle, postpone it, and I’ll see to it after I deal with this.”

“Yes, Mr. Swernbach.”

Swernbach? She walked into a Swernbach, or rather, he’d walked into her? And she yelled at him!

He would probably have her and ROI Penn blacklisted from the company and when the management found out she was the reason, she would be fired.

She leaned against the wall. “Just end me now. It’s over.”

“Annette, to whom do I have the pleasure of talking to the optometrist?”

This was it. He would get her name and banish her from every Swernbach establishment ever and then she would return to the office, receive her final query, and find herself in the latest bus to Kentwood where her aunt and uncle would be ready to drape her in an apron and taunt her for the rest of her life.

“My name isn’t important. In fact, I was never here.”

“She’s Elaine Johnson, an employee of ROI Penn, and she’s here to interview you about something,” Annette’s voice sharpened. “She wasn’t very clear about what. She was your 2 o’clock interview.”

“Great. We can have the interview on the way.”