Page 84 of Joy to Noel
When he hasn’t been at the plant, Liam’s been working in a different capacity over the past week. He’s officially going out on his own, setting up a consulting business to offer executive coaching andtemporary fractional COO services. He let me pretend to be useful by listening to my hard-won expertise in incorporating a business, as though he couldn’t have figured it out on his own. I made it crystal clear that this new business venture had better still hinge upon him wearing his fancy suits every day. I might just draw up an official contract.
I have a feeling that his independent consulting firm will literally skyrocket overnight once he puts the word out, very unlike Madison Joy Editorial.
“How much longer will you be officially working for Holden?” I ask.
“We don’t have a specific timeline—however long it takes to get Beau running things on his own. Which I don’t think will take long—he could probably take the reins right now and be fine,” Liam says. “I’m guessing just a few weeks. I’ll have to take a trip back to Houston to wrap things up at the office there and pack up my apartment, but I’m hoping to have everything closed down there before Christmas. I don’t want to be distracted while celebrating my first Christmas with you in Nebraska.”
He kisses me again, and I contemplate convincing him to ditch the run this morning. When I clasp a hand around his neck, he senses my evil plan and smiles against my lips.
“You’re trouble,” he says with a smirk. “Will you be here before I leave for work or are you meeting Clara early today?”
“I should be here,” I reply. “I’m supposed to meet Clara at Emily’s office at nine to go over the plans one final time before I leave for Nebraska tomorrow.”
“I’ll run extra fast,” Liam promises. “See you soon.”
While Liam is on his run, I take a quick shower and get dressed in jeans and the Christmas sweatshirt that Clara bought for me last year—it has a skeleton wearing a Santa hat beside a Christmas tree, and it is the greatest holiday sweatshirt ever designed. I know it will make her happy seeing me wear it. Maybe Clara can Christmas-magic a long-term job solution for me today.
I eat a quick breakfast with Liam before he dips me back in a dramatic kiss on his way out the door. Hamlet stands in the entryway, meowing loudly afterhim.
“I know, Hammie, I’m pretty obsessed with him too,” I say, leaning down to scratch Hamlet under the chin. He leaps onto my shoulders and makes himself at home there as I walk around putting dishes in the sink and wiping off the counters.
When my phone starts ringing, I expect it to be Clara calling with some last-minute urgent need before our meeting. I’m surprised when I see “WritInc” as the contact name displayed. I never deleted the office number from my phone contacts, but I never expected to hear from them again. Worried that they might need updated contact information for my tax documents, I answer.
“Hello?” I don’t try to hide the contempt from my voice, even though, if it’s some poor HR soul, they don’t deserve my unbridled wrath.
A throat clears before I hear, “Hello, Madison, this is Chad calling from WritInc.”
Well, at least we know my unfiltered contempt was deserved.
“What do you want, Chad?” I ask. There is zero reason to dance around with niceties.
He clears his throat again, rather aggressively. Gross.
“I’m calling because our decision to rely on AI at the editing stage of our process may have been . . . premature,” Chad says. “I mean, I’m not entirely convinced it was amistake, but we’re reevaluating the decision-making process and—”
I roll my eyes so aggressively, I nearly give myself a headache. Even though he can’t see me, I hope he can sense the eye roll in my voice. “Cut the crap, Chad. Why are you calling?”
“We’d like you to come back to WritInc. Back into your same position,” Chad states.
My mind floods with emotions, thoughts, and hormone chemicals that I can’t identify.
“You what?” I clarify.
Chad sighs heavily. “We’ve decided that it is a worthwhile cost to have a human proofreader doing the final checks on all of our publications. We’d like you to come back to your position. I know it’s a holiday week, but if you could come in next Monday, we could talkspecific details of your employment package and get you set up to start again right away.”
The world is spinning, and I need something grounding to latch on to.
“Why? What happened to make you change your mind?” I ask.
There’s a pause. “Chad? You still there?” I demand.
“Yes, still here. We, uh, we had a few complaints from customers about errors going out in the newsletters,” Chad admits.
I can’t help the smug happiness that spreads through me.I told you so.
“What kinds of errors?” I ask, trying to sound nonchalant and not like I am completely reveling in his mistake.
“Most of them weren’t significant, just some small things the AI didn’t catch that customers felt made the publication look unprofessional,” Chad says. I don’t say anything, forcing him to continue. “Last week we lost a customer because of a more . . . well . . . sensitive error. And Mr. Douglas insisted that we bring you back.”
