Six Years in the Shadows: The CEO's Discarded Love

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The night I lost the promotion, I crouched by the roadside with a box of fried calamari.

I ate them one by one, and the tears came down just as steadily.

I texted my girlfriend, Lucretia Henson:

【Kind of a rough day, but the calamari's good.】

No reply.

Half an hour later, I couldn't help sending another:

【You busy? I just want to talk to you.】

She finally answered:

【What's this supposed to mean? You want me to reimburse you?】

I stared at that line for a long time.

Lucretia's startup had barely gotten off the ground when her father drained every cent of her funding, and overnight she was buried under a hundred million in debt.

After that, the thing she hated most in the world was gold-digging.

And I killed myself proving I wasn't one.

In six years I never spent a cent of hers.

We split every bill, I returned every gift, and even at the company I laid all my project results out on the table for anyone to judge.

I refreshed my social media, and there was Clint Whitney, the intern who'd won the promotion, wearing a Philippe watch, captioned:

【Thanks to Ms. Henson for celebrating my promotion. I'll keep working hard.】

I'd seen that watch in a magazine. Three of them in the whole world.

In six years, Lucretia never gave me a gift worth more than a thousand.

And the watch on Clint's wrist was worth ten million.

The tears blurred the screen, and it suddenly hit me that all those years I'd spent proving I was clean,

in her eyes, probably weren't even worth the price of a single piece of fried calamari.

......

I finished the last bite, flagged down a car, and went back to the office.

The results were already posted.

But I still wanted to ask where I fell short.

Six years of project experience. Three straight years ranked first in performance. The most stable team in the whole company.

And I'd lost to an intern who'd just gone permanent.

The second I got out of the car, I saw Lucretia three meters away, bent over, opening the car door for Clint.

"There's no rush on this project. Get familiar with the process first."

"In a couple of days I'll take you to London to meet a client. Good experience for you."

"But I only just went permanent..." There was hesitation in Clint's voice.

"Doesn't matter."

Lucretia cut him off, her voice gentle.

"As long as you've got the ability. Your position isn't important."

"Besides, I'm right here. Anything comes up, I've got you covered."

The summer wind blew warm, and yet the soles of my feet went cold.

In six years, Lucretia had been to thirty-five countries, and not once had she taken me.

She always said, "We don't mix personal feelings into the company."

I'd asked, "What if I go as the project lead? Not even then?"

She'd looked at me and said, "Dudley Delgado, are you trading your project results for a business trip? You need to learn to mind your position."

Mind my position.

I minded it. I didn't dare arrive or leave with her, didn't dare post about her, didn't even dare ride the same elevator as her at work.

And then she turned to someone else and said, "Your position isn't important."

Clint spotted me and raised a hand. "Dudley!"

Lucretia followed his gaze and turned her head.

Her eyes didn't linger on me for even a second before dropping back to Clint.

"Come on, I'll drive you home. Get some rest."

Clint nodded, then smiled at me again. "Dudley, are you heading back to the office, or coming with us?"

Only then did Lucretia look at me.

"Just grab a cab home. Clint's place is the opposite direction. Out of the way."

But in the end she'd still come back to our home, so what exactly was out of the way?

Before I could say a word, she got in the car and started the engine.

I stood there in the wind and watched the car disappear.

That back, walking away, after six years.

Once, she'd have driven across half the city to pick me up when I had a contract to negotiate.

Now, it was out of the way.

On the HR department's computer I found the judges' evaluation sheet.

In the row with my name, Lucretia's score for me was: 58.

Six judges, and hers was the lowest.

I turned the page, and there was her score for Clint: 98.

I stared at that 58 and couldn't seem to catch my breath.

How could I have guessed it would be Lucretia?

She, of all people, knew better than anyone what I'd gone through these six years.

Every late night working overtime, every all-nighter before a pitch, every scorecard her eyes skimmed past. She'd watched all of it, with her own eyes.

And the score she gave me was the lowest.

"Why?" I murmured to myself.

The answer was the sound of a tear hitting the keyboard.

And, outside, the sudden patter of rain.