Thoughts and Plans

Running Joy through the work only took about five minutes. She was fairly dismissive throughout, and seemed to just want to see if you and the others hadn’t been doing something you were supposed to. When she didn’t find that was the case, she seemed to grudgingly accept it and went and sat in ‘her’ seat.

You got a text shortly afterwards, and felt thankful you had your phone on vibrate. You weren’t sure what Joy’s reaction to you using your phone during work hours would be - likely she was of the opinion she was free to, and you and the others weren’t. That would be right in line with her attitude.

You checked the text quickly under the lip of the table.

Gemma: Don’t do anything. We’ll talk to Carol about it when we go for a meeting.

You sent back a thumbs up emoji. It was a good plan - Ms Bellagamba’s announcement that Joy was your ‘leader’ hadn’t been mentioned before, and you’d all been working fine. Well, as a team at least. Andy was skating by on the fact that you, Gemma and Sabrina were overachievers and Eric did the bare minimum to keep up.

Still, though. It seemed weird that a woman coming off of vacation who didn't have any knowledge of how things had been going would just come in and disrupt the workflow.

Then again, you’d read reddit. There was hundreds of stories of stupid management fucking up a good thing. Maybe this was one of those things.

Either way, you kept your mouth shut other than answering Joy’s questions and tried to remain as professionally cordial-but-distant as you could. And you really made sure not to glance at that cleavage. Her chest looked as bolted on as her mothers, so either the two women shared underwear brand preference and wore bras with massive lift and support, or likely Joy had been treated to a similar procedure as her mother.

Gemma’s are way nicer, you thought errantly. Gemma’s breasts were about the same size, and you knew they had some sag from the weight when she was naked, but that was natural. And she didn’t dress to accentuate them - at least not in the office. Her dresses for your dates had been a lot more flattering in that regard, but they also had a casual innocence about them whereas Joy’s choice of dress in the office felt… predatory? Like a challenge, asking you to look even though you knew it could be deadly to do so.

Gemma and Sabrina eventually returned, and Joy started getting herself set up. The banter in the office was gone. Eric spent less time on his phone, which you guessed was a good change for now, but you, Gemma and Sabrina were all quiet except for trading occasional glances.

One thing you did notice quickly was that, for someone who had worked as a summer intern for multiple years, it was taking Joy a while to get herself logged on to the system and to start working.

Eventually lunch started to approach and you glanced at the clock on your screen.

“Hey Gemma, it’s 11:25,” you said.

“Oh, crap,” she nodded and closed her laptop. “Yeah, we should get going.”

“Where are you going? Lunch doesn’t start until noon,” Joy said.

“We have a meeting scheduled,” you said.

“I didn’t approve any meetings,” Joy said, closing her laptop as well and standing. “I should be made aware of any meetings you have with any of the Partners or Associates.”

“This isn’t a meeting with one of the lawyers,” Gemma said. “We have a meeting with Carol in HR.”

“Well, I need to get caught up on things so I’ll still come sit in,” Joy said.

“No, you won’t,” you said. There was no fucking way you were letting that happen. “This is an HR issue, so by policy it needs to be handled in a specific order. If you need to be made aware of the issue, I believe Carol will set a meeting time with you.”

Joy pursed her lips. “What’s the issue?” she demanded.

“This is an HR issue, so by policy it needs to be handled in a specific order,” Gemma repeated you verbatim. “If you need to be made aware of the issue, Carol will set a meeting time with you.”

“Yes, but I should at least know the topic of the issue in case I should be doing something to mitigate it,” Joy countered.

“Sorry, Joy,” you said. “This is an HR issue, so by policy-”

“Oh, whatever,” Joy scoffed. “Don’t be too long.”

On your way out you caught a look from Sabrina and sent her a little wink and a smile.

Once you were in the hallway, you felt yourself physically relax and realized you’d been tense for at least an hour.

“What a nightmare,” you murmured to Gemma, who also looked like she’d been holding back.

“You can say that again,” Gemma muttered back.

“I assume you told Sabrina about the meeting while you were out getting the laptop?” you asked.

“Of course,” Gemma said. “How was getting Joykill up to date?”

“Nice, and it was nothing,” you said. “She definitely did work here before, so that wasn’t some weird lie. I swear she was trying to catch me looking at her tits though. She was practically throwing them in my face.”

“I wouldn’t blame you for looking,” Gemma said. “But don’t you fucking dare think you can swing a third person into this thing we have going on. Especially not her.”

“Really, Gemma?” you asked. “You really think I’d even consider that?”

Gemma smirked. “No, but I also don’t want all the hmmhmm you’re getting to go to your head and inflate your ego.”

You smirked and leaned a little closer to her as you were walking down the hallway, speaking even softer. “God, I want to kiss you right now.”

“Me, too,” she said. “But that might not be the best idea standing right outside of HR.”

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