Thank You, Mr Garrison

Once Eric’s message had been sufficiently wordsmithed and debated over, he and Sabrina joined you in your final morning of chipping away at the never-ending list of tasks that made up the work queue on the tracking programs the firm used. It felt sort of weird, looking at that list of stuff to accomplish and feeling like your entire summer had been spent not really… affecting anything.

Which wasn’t true. Particularly for Garrison’s case and all the extra work you’d done helping him and his team of associates slog through the raw files that needed sorting and organising. Or making things better for the firm overall by getting Joy and her Mother outed as evil, manipulative witches.

Still, seeing dozens of tasks on the list after four months, like nothing had changed in all that time, was a bit of an Oof moment.

The nice thing, at least, was that over the course of the morning, several of the associates, paralegals and even a couple of the Junior Partners that you all had been getting ‘emergency’ tasks from all summer came by the conference room to thank you and wish you luck. The recognition and getting back into the flow of your day-to-day helped ease that feeling of an unending list of tasks.

You really hoped that wasn’t all becoming a lawyer would actually feel like and that having cases wouldn’t just feel like an unending list when you were finally working.

Eric got a response from Beth about an hour after he sent it.

“It says, ‘That’s really sweet, Eric. Are you free tonight?’” Eric said. “She didn’t say it back.”

“It’s not like you told her you loved her,” Sabrina said. “And you did say she was hesitant at the end of the night last night. Now she’s going to be thinking of you telling her how you feel all day instead of how awkward last night ended. That’s a good thing!”

“Fine, fine,” Eric sighed. “I trust you.”

“Good,” Sabrina smirked. “Because I’ve earned it.”

The three of you got an email at the same time from Garrison, a little before 11:30 AM, telling you not to head out to lunch at your usual time. That signed to you all that you were being taken out to lunch - exactly what you’d been expecting from Garrison. He seemed to be the kind of guy who rewarded with food more than anything else. Maybe his love language was gift-giving or something.

“You’ve got them?” Eric asked Sabrina.

“Of course I do,” your girlfriend said, lifting the larger-than-usual purse she’d brought to work that morning. “Do you guys have your cards?”

“Yes,” you smirked a little, knowing that was a dig at you and not at Eric. You’d almost left yours back at the apartment accidentaly before Sabrina had reminded you to grab it on your way out the door. Now you took it out and slid it over to her. “Can you carry it? I don’t want to hide it in my pants pocket or something.”

“Y-” Eric started to answer, then quickly double checked his bag and sighed and nodded. “Yeah, got it.” He passed his over to Sabrina as well.

Garrison didn’t come around until almost 12:30, and you were feeling your hunger starting to rise. Yesterday you’d gone half the afternoon without eating lunch after meeting up with Becca until you’d buckled and slipped down to the bodega attached to the building to grab a couple of snacks to eat while you were working.

“Well, folks,” your boss said as he entered. “Ready for lunch?”

You all agreed, and the three of you eagerly shut down your laptops and followed Garrison out and towards the elevators. Sabrina held you back just a little, and as you were walking down the corridor, she motioned for you to lean closer.

“What if, when we get wherever we’re going, I pull a Becca and get you to do me in the bathroom?” she whispered, and then snorted softly as you pulled away and she saw the look of mild panic on your face because you weren’t sure if she was joking or serious. Thankfully, her eyes said she was joking.

Because getting dicked down in a restaurant bathroom, creampied, and then going back out to do a Thank You speech for your mutual boss was totally something she would do.

Garrison made some small talk as you waited for the elevator and then rode it down to the lobby, and he said hello to Becks on his way by. She smiled and waved, and since you and Sabrina were taking up the back of your little group, she gave the two of you a wink when Garrison and Eric weren’t looking.

The one other disruption to your workflow that morning had been a pair of texts. One had been from the sexy secretary, an upskirt shot of her ass as she peeled one cheek out and flashed her buttplug. You were fairly certain it had to be hot off the presses, so to speak, and not something she’d saved from earlier. The other disruptive text had been from Tasha. The blonde apparently didn’t have a shift at the bookstore today so it had been her lounging on her bed at her place wearing a tanktop and smiling, but with her bare ass in the background and an angle from a mirror looking between her legs from behind - a quick zoom gave a look at her pussy and the hint of a buttplug hidden between her butt cheeks as well.

It really wasn’t fair how easily women could physically tease a man compared to the other way around. No matter how much your girlfriends or other partners made comments about your butt, you knew it wasn’t like seeing a sexy female ass. Let alone the rest of them.

You gave Becks a wink back and blew her a kiss, making her smirk a little wider and then bite the inside corner of her lip, telling you exactly how horny she was for that night.

“Just a couple of blocks over,” Garrison announced, leading the way left out of the building. He led you two blocks, just like he’d said, and around to the far side. It felt weird walking without taking on your usual pace and connection with Sabrina - it wouldn’t really be professional to walk arm in arm to a goodbye work lunch. You ended up at a little hole-in-the-wall looking place, its sign overtaken by a faded maroon awning that might have once had a name on it, but the lettering was so weathered it was just a speckle of concentrated, flaking paint. The menu mounted to the front by the door wasn’t any more help as you passed by - you could see there was a menu in the wood and glass case, but the glass was so filthy you couldn’t read it on the move.

Inside, the restaurant was cramped and dim, but everything felt… rich. Not in an expensive way, but in an old and well-cared-for kind of way. The wood panelling was dark and polished smooth. The carpet was plush and might have matched the colour that the awning used to be. Every table along either wall was in its own booth, creating pockets of privacy once you were sitting down, with coat racks stationed between each one, giving even more separation from your neighbours. All of the metal was polished brass, and the bench seating for the booths was plump and looked comfortable as hell.

A waiter met Garrison at the front with a polite smile and nod, but you didn’t get the sense that they knew each other like when he’d brought you to his favourite spot after the trial you’d sat in on. This was more of an ‘You are a recognised patron’ than a ‘Hey, it’s Terry!’ sort of thing.

Looking around, you did a quick count, and there were maybe twelve tables in total in the whole place, unless there was a second floor, but you didn’t see any stairs. Even accounting for the fact that most of the tables were filled with five or six people, you still weren’t exactly sure how the place stayed open when it looked like such crap on the outside and didn’t exactly pack in people for the seating.

After a slight jockeying once you were led to your booth of who was sitting where, you ended up sitting on one side of the table while Garrison sat opposite you, and between you was Sabrina on your left and Eric between her and Garrison. The waiter welcomed you to the ‘Au Jus’ and rattled off the specials before retreating to let you look at the menus, though a busboy almost immediately dropped off a basket of bread that smelled so fresh you were pretty sure you were inhaling carbs through its delicious scent.

“So,” Garrison said with a smile. “Your last day, folks. How are you feeling?”

Sabrina took the lead, and while she started mentioning how strange it felt for the summer to be over already, you glanced at the menu. This was obviously a steakhouse, based on the highly limited options. You also quickly noticed that there weren’t any prices listed.

Which meant it was expensive. That was how the place stayed open.

Eric agreed with Sabrina about it feeling like the summer sped by, and then all three turned to you.

“Honestly, I feel the same way as Sabrina and Eric,” you said. “But I also feel like it’s been a long summer. So much has happened - I mean, multiple lawsuits, the mock trial, helping with everything for your merger trial, everything with Andy, and Joy… I almost feel like going back to school is going to be relaxing compared to interning here in the city.”

Garrison cracked a smile and chuckled, nodding. “Believe me, John,” he said. “This was definitely the most eventful summer for the firm that I can remember, not just for a crew of interns.” He sighed heavily. “I have to say, it feels good to be taking over the program again, and you three - along with Gemma - have certainly made it worthwhile even if you are trouble magnets.”

“I promise we weren’t trying to be,” Eric laughed.

“Oh, if I thought that, things would have turned out differently,” Garrison said. “And as thanks for keeping things interesting and waking me up, this lunch is most certainly on the firm. I ran the numbers this morning and your crew, even carrying Andy and the troubles with Joy, have been the most productive interns we’ve had in eight years based on processed files per man hour.”

“Who beat us out eight years ago?” Sabrina asked with a grin.

“A crew of six interns who all worked together the entire summer just as well as you three and Gemma did,” Garrison said. “So replace Andy and Joy with two helpful, intelligent and industrious interns and you could have potentially matched or beaten them.”

“Did any of them end up at the firm?” Eric asked.

Garrison smirked a little. “A couple of them are currently associates on track for Junior Partner,” he said. “A couple ended up in New York and started a boutique talent agency firm together. Another one is in the DA’s office in Dallas as a prosecutor, I think.” His smirk dropped just a little. “The last one went into working behind the scenes in politics. I think she’s got some wasted potential to do some good since she works for the highest bidder, but she’s making a name for herself out on the West Coast. Always remember, you three, that there are two important elements of work, not just the law, that you should keep in mind. The first is that whatever you do, you need to be sure that at the end of the day, you can set your head down on your pillow and not regret what you’re doing with your life. The second is that whatever you’re doing, you need to be a whole, rounded person to consider it living - you’ll be tempted to hyper-focus, coming out of law school and starting your careers. Be careful and remember to be people, too. Relationships matter. Home life matters. Family matters.”

You saw a regret in his eyes, then, and wondered about the skeletons in his closet. Maybe related to the divorce you’d heard about, and the whole situation that had led to him dropping the internship program from his plate to begin with. You could imagine that it was pretty easy to get wrapped up in interesting work when you were working on important topics or big money cases, letting the things he’d listed fall to the side while telling yourself it was only for now.

The waiter came back around and you all ordered, and then the conversation turned towards plans for the future. Eric had always thought he would try to get into a law school over on the west coast, likely in California, to try out a different sort of place. Now (unsurprisingly to you), he was rethinking that plan - you and Sabrina didn’t bring up Beth, but it was in the back of your mind that if things worked out for Eric on that front, it was entirely possible he could end up right back at the firm in a few years. Which would be a little ironic since he could start working off what he owed Garrison for covering his ass legally that summer.

You and Sabrina mentioned that you were both keeping your options open - even more open than Eric. You were considering US and international schools - the UK and Australia were top locations, but Canada might be an option too. Garrison got a look in his eye when you mentioned Australia as an option, and you once again wondered how much he ‘knew,’ or was guessing, about your relationship with Gemma and Sabrina.

The food was fantastic, and Garrison told you some stories about the history of the place - supposedly it had earned a Michelin star decades ago but the owner and chef had gotten tired of chasing that goal and wanted to focus more on perfecting classic food than keeping up with modern trends of food as literal instead of figurative art. There were stories of gangsters dating back to Prohibition frequenting the place, and supposedly, it had been the occasional site of a mob hit or major fight. But for the most part, it was a hotspot for bankers, lawyers and high-end business deals - and more recently for finance folks with a taste for the classics.

The lunch lasted over an hour and a half, your drinks - sodas for the three of you interns, making Garrison smirk just a little at your caution as he ordered wine last - getting refilled a few times. He told you stories about his own time in law school, about the difficulty but also the excitement for what they were doing. Who you could become.

“Take advantage of every opportunity,” he said. “And not just the ones that sound like you’ll get something out of it. Social events that seem silly or boring can help you make connections you won’t know are important for two decades until they are suddenly very valuable. Impressing a member of faculty you never even have a class with because of your writing in the school paper, or giving a speech in mock debate, or any other number of places they pay attention to because it’s their niche can lead to positive answers to questions down the line. Look, folks, there are too many lawyers in the world right now - our profession has been swamped out and gotten bulky because every university and college knows that because of long-term, limitless loans for education, they can set up a Grad school and charge you out the nose for the privilege. The only reason our profession has any real standard at all anymore is because of the State Bar exams. But hear me now - the upper echelons of our profession, and I don’t just mean the upper echelons like the top of the New York and LA food chains, but all the major cities, aren’t that big of a community. People ask people they know about you; if you have a reputation, what sort of person you are to work with, or to come up against. Whether you’re an interesting hire, have potential, or have enough dirt on your shoes to be someone to avoid. Make good impressions on your professors and on your fellow classmates. You never know when sharing a drink over memories of an awful fundraiser dinner on a shitty January night in the middle of a snow storm could help you close a business deal with an old friend, or convince a prosecutor to go a little more leniently on your defendant.”

“Actually, Sir,” Sabrina said. “On that note, we wanted to leave you with an impression, too.” She opened her purse and pulled out the first little trophy, grinning warmly. “We got this for you.”

She handed it over and Garrison was already chuckling as he took it, then laughed louder when he read the plaque on the wooden plinth under the gold plastic cup. “#1 Emergency Legal Back-up,” he read. He looked up to say something, but Sabrina was already pulling another one out of her purse and handing it over. This one had a golden plastic burger on top of it instead of a cup. “Best Food Tour Guide,” he read and started laughing again before rolling his eyes as Sabrina pulled a third one out of her purse. He accepted this one, too, which had a race car on top. “Most Valuable Mentor,” he read, a little quieter, smiling but not laughing.

“And there are cards,” Sabrina said, taking out the three envelopes and handing them over.

Mr Garrison took a breath and let it out as a short sigh as he accepted them. “Should I read them here, or do I want the privacy of my office?” he asked.

“You might want some privacy,” you said with a small grin. “Sabrina really went for the throat, trying to get you to tear up.”

“John,” your girlfriend scoffed, giving you a thump on the arm and making you chuckle.

“Thank you, you three,” Garrison said as he tucked the cards into the inside pocket of his suit jacket. “Sincerely. This summer has been chaotic and a bit much, but it’s also been very important for me.”

“Us too,” you said.

“Absolutely,” Sabrina added as she rubbed your knee under the table.

“I couldn’t imagine a better internship, Sir,” Eric said. “Thank you.”

Garrison took another breath, smiling and clearing his throat. “You’re welcome, folks. Now, I should see a man about the check.”

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