Hot Chips and Sand
Copyright © 2012 Mary Hughes
All rights reserved
So she was going to
manage a huge project with a ginormous budget and a team of the best tech
people, many of whom also happened to be friends. So what? It wasn’t anything
she hadn’t done before.
Been there, done that.
Failed miserably.
Chapter 5Five
Her favorite work was
as part of a team. Every team she was on bonded well and generated tons of
energy and ideas. She loved the work, but more, she loved the people, the
environment.
But she especially
loved facilitating other people’s success. Her own work was good, but helping
others shine made her glow with happiness.
In those days she made
many friend, but two were special.
One was her BFF Elissa,
a tall hip-haired brunette who favored cowboy boots, pipeleg jeans and hugs.
She introduced Vickie to bar shots and line dancing. But when the job needed to
get done, no one stayed later or worked harder than Elissa. And she loved
Vickie.
The other was Ron, who
was classic tall, dark and handsome. A decent analyst and a sharp dresser,
Ron’s goal was to run his own company and retire at fifty. Vickie was flattered
the first time he asked her out and thrilled when six months later, he
presented her with the pearl and diamond engagement ring.
Then the first
promotion came, to project manager. It went to Vickie.
Ron took an active
interest in her success and at the time she thought he was being helpful,
although later she would see it as living vicariously through her. Only months
after it was over would she see the latent jealousy.
But she was ecstatic
when he brought her books with titles such as Top Down Management—Being Hard But Fair and The Stick, Not the Carrot: Why
Workers Don’t Want To Work.
She tried following the
books’ instructions, following Ron’s daily and sometimes hourly advice. She
really did. But she was never good enough for him. Never autocratic enough.
And things changed
around her. When she had to reprimand Elissa—hard but fair—their relation was
never the same. Workers who had been friends grumbled. She found herself using
the Stick far more than the Carrot. Even teams she’d worked so smoothly with
before disintegrated.
Ron went from
disappointed to criticism to outright scolding. She never quite figured out how
it happened but they argued more and more until he broke off their engagement.
Those were her memories
of being a manager.
She hated it. She hated
what it did to her, making her sharp and critical. She hated what it did to her
relations, breaking friendships.
To top it all off,
upper management was disappointed in her performance and froze her out. She
received no more promotions, only the worst of projects, and was stuck in a
position she hated and wasn't good at. She left.
Now Cliff wanted her to
do it again.
* * * * *
As
she swept out of the meeting room[MH2] , Mel Pinlow waylaid her. in the hall. “Nice going, Ms.
Executive. You’ve certainly proven how easy you are to work with. You’re sure
to get on Mr. Hawkesclyffe’s good side with your winning attitude—and Jerry
Fitzwater’s, too.”
Vickie
kept walking. “Cut it out, Mel. I’m not in the mood for it.”
“You’re
sure in some kind of mood. What’s the matter, Vickie? That time of the month?”
She thought
about yanking her screwdriver out of her purse and excavating him a new one.
Decided she didn’t hit him, but not by
much. want to dig in that morass. [MH3] “That has nothing to do with what kind of job I can
do.”
He
laughed, a kind of a wheezy, choked sound. “Oh, that’s rich. You’re so
sheltered, Vickie. It’s not what you
know, it’s who you know. And Sir Humphrey Hawkesclyffe
could open doors for you that you’ve never dreamed of. Too bad forAll you have
to do is cooperate. But you’re too stubborn.”
“It’s
Cliff now, is it? Well, maybe you can get back in his good graces…and saying
yes is not such a bad idea for a girl in your position.” He winked slyly at
her. “Or rather a girl in the right position might get
him to say yes.”
He
gave her one final leer as he, and
left. Vickie’s
Vickie
kicked back into motion, her heels clickedclicking
sharply on the tile floor. ‘I’ve got to get out of here ,’ she realized[MH6] , ‘before
I killhurt[MH7] someone. Preferably Mel, although I’dshe’d
give that truck of a man in the conference room a try.’
Tess
caught up to herVickie in
the main lobby of Fitzwater Software. “Don’t let Mel bother you
Vickie. He . You
know he does that to all the women.”
“Yeah, I
know. . But as long as I don’t lower my
professional standards to his, I don’t really care what he tries to pull.” ‘Or lower my standards to match Sir
Humphrey’s bargain basement professional ethics[MH9] .’Or imply. A girl in the right position. I mean really.
Tess
shrugged. As if she
were reading Vickie’s mind, she said, “And I don’t think you’ll“Well,
hopefully you won’t have to apologize too much to Mr.
Hawkesclyffe.”
Tess
shrugged. “Well, Mr. Hawkesclyffe is
the floor again.
client. And our boss, now.”
“Oh, sure, Tess,
that’s different. He’sSir
Humphrey is the boss. Yes, indeed, Sir Humphrey. .
I’ll see to it that I do lower my professional standards for him.”
Tess stared
after
her friend as Vickie stomped out the door. “Lower her professional standards for Sir
Humphrey Hawkesclyffe?” she muttered. “Hmphf. “More like
lower her your personal
guard.”,” she yelled after
her.
She
left the freeway, unconsciously taking the route she usually did when she
wanted to work out a particularly knotty problem. But there was no problem
here. Oh, no, Cliff was not a problem.Sure
he wasn’t.
Sure he wasn’t. As for
She
consciously switched her thoughts away from Cliff, to Mel, the. Ah
yes, Mel. The best thing for him would be assassination. ‘No, best not.
It’s bound to Not really. [MH10] It
would get you talked about,her bad press
and he’she was
cruising for an early grave, anyway. His, his last
few performances were performance reviews pretty
pitiful, and he’s getting. Not to mention
a bad reputationrep for
throwing tantrums whenever his plans arewere
foiled by reality.’ …which didn’t apply to
her, right? She hadn’t thrown a tantrum. She had voiced reasonable doubt.
Cliff,
on the other hand, would probably be completely in control of reality, and would
be unmoved by aany
tantrum, let alone throw one.
[MH1]So
Eliza Knight's comment was--why doesn't Vickie want this position besides
Cliff? It's great money, prestige. I thought about that and realized she was
right (naturally :) and that Vickie, a strong, woman, would suck up her libido
and just get the job done.
So I needed more of a reason for her not to want the
management position. I already had a partial motive--she'd had a fiance at her
first job and when their relationship fell apart so did her job--but the more I
thought about it, the more that wasn't satisfying. It was backstory that could
have happened to anybody and indeed did happen to Liese in Biting Me Softly (and to my mind was much stronger there).
I wanted a motive that arose out of Vickie's character,
her particular strengths and weaknesses. And then I got it.
***Spoiler here***
Vickie is a people person. She loves being on a team
and is the person who smooths things over. She doesn't seem to be special in
and of herself but she makes everyone else on the team shine. She's the
synergy. She's the Dua in the three-way aliens from Isaac Asimov's The Gods Themselves.
It fell into place. The worst thing I could do to her
was push her into a situation where she's the sole lead. The hard-nosed
commander rather than the Earth Mother healer. And I added this snippet of
backstory.
[MH2]With
the inserted scene there's a delay between her leaving and Mel waylaying her.
This bridges the gap.
[MH4]One
of the things I've had to battle is a mushy progression of thought--that is,
"A, so C!" Clearer and better is "A, then B, then C."
[MH5]Tells.
I deleted this and put Vickie kicked back into motion, her heels clicking
sharply to SHOW that's enough.
[MH9]Sometimes
it amazes me how much I write based on character dynamics I've imagined but
haven't really shown. This seemed perfectly reasonable when I wrote it but
editing hit me as totally unfounded, coming out of nowhere. So I cut it.
[MH10]This
section starts with a single quote. In the old days, that was the way internal
dialog was noted. Now italics is the norm.
[MH11]I've
been editing this in chunks, working back and forth only as necessary. I think
I took out the section that introduces this concept (Mel and Cliff are cut from
the same rotten cloth) but don't remember.
When preparing a manuscript for final submission, I
follow a three-step process, of which the first is a readthrough for timeline,
character inconsistencies, and plot inconsistencies.
If I took out the introducing, that would be something
I'd catch in the readthrough.
