For Now and Forever

“I thought you were going to propose!” Emily finally cried, throwing her napkin down on the table.

The hum in the room stopped as people stopped eating and turned and stared at her. She no longer cared.

Ben’s eyes widened with fear. He looked even more scared than he did when she mentioned the possibility of starting a family.

“What do you want to get married for?” he said.

Emily was hit by a moment of clarity. She looked at him as though seeing him for the first time. Ben would never change. He would never commit. Her mother, Amy, they’d both been right. She’d spent years waiting for something that was so obviously never going to happen, and this miniature bottle of perfume had been the straw to break the camel’s back.

“It’s over,” Emily said, breathlessly, her tears suddenly stopped. “It’s really over.”

“Are you drunk?” Ben cried incredulously. “First you want to get married – and now you want to break up?”

“No,” Emily said. “I’m just not blind anymore. This – you, me – it was never right.” She stood up, discarding her napkin in her seat. “I’m moving out,” she said. “I’ll stay at Amy’s tonight, then fetch my things tomorrow.”

“Emily,” Ben said, reaching for her. “Can we please talk about this?”

“Why?” she shot back. “So you can convince me to wait another seven years before we buy our own home? Another decade before we get a joint bank account? Seventeen years before you so much as consider the thought of getting a cat together?”

“Please,” Ben said under his breath, looking at the approaching waiter carrying his dessert. “You’re making a scene.”

Emily knew she was but she didn’t care. She wasn’t about to change her mind.

“There’s nothing left to talk about,” she said. “It’s over. Enjoy your salted-butterscotch mousse!”

And with those final words, she stormed out of the restaurant.

Chapter Two

Emily stared at her keyboard, willing her fingers to move, to do something, anything. Another email popped into her inbox and she looked at it blankly. The sound of the office chatter around her swirled in one ear and out the other. She couldn’t concentrate. She felt like she was in a daze. The complete lack of sleep she’d gotten on Amy’s lumpy couch was hardly helping matters.

She’d been at work a whole hour but hadn’t achieved anything more than to turn on her computer and drink a cup of coffee. Her mind was completely consumed with memories of last night. Ben’s face kept flashing through her head. It made her feel slightly panicked every time she relived the terrible evening.

Her phone began blinking, and she glanced at the screen to see Ben’s name flashing at her for the umpteenth time. He was calling, again. She hadn’t answered a single one of his calls. What could there possibly be to talk about now? He’d had seven years to work out whether he wanted to be with her or not – a last-minute attempt to save things wasn’t going to do anything now.

Her office phone began to ring and she leapt a mile, then grabbed it.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Emily, it’s Stacey from the fifteenth floor. I have it down that you were supposed to attend the meeting this morning and wanted to check in to see why you hadn’t.”

“SHIT!” Emily cried, slamming down the phone. She’d completely forgotten about the meeting.

She leapt up from her desk and ran across the office toward the elevator. Her frantic state seemed to amuse her co-workers, who began whispering like silly children. When she reached the elevator, she slammed her palm against the button.

“Come on, come on, come on!”

It took ages, but at last, the elevator arrived. As the doors slid open, Emily went to rush inside, only to slam straight into someone coming out. As she drew back, winded, she realized the person she’d slammed into was her boss, Izelda.

“I’m so sorry,” Emily stammered.

Izelda looked her up and down. “For what, exactly? Slamming into me, or missing the meeting?”

“Both,” Emily said. “I was on my way there right now. It completely slipped my mind.”

She could feel every eye in the office burning into her back. The last thing she needed right now was a dose of public humiliation, something Izelda took great pleasure in dishing out.

“You have a calendar?” Izelda said coolly, folding her arms.

“Yes.”

“And you know how it works? How to write?”

Behind Emily, she could hear people stifling their laughter. Her first instinct was to wilt like a flower. Being made a fool in front of an audience was her idea of a nightmare. But just like in the restaurant last night, a strange sense of clarity overcame her. Izelda wasn’t some authority figure she had to look up to and bend to the whims of. She was just a bitter woman taking her anger out on anyone she could. And those colleagues whispering behind her back meant nothing.

A sudden wave of realization washed over Emily. Ben wasn’t the only thing she didn’t like about her life. She hated her job, too. These people, this office, Izelda. She’d been stuck here for years, just like she’d been stuck with Ben. And she wasn’t going to put up with it anymore.

“Izelda,” Emily said, addressing her boss by her first name for the first time ever, “I’m going to have to be honest here. I missed the meeting, it slipped my mind. It’s not the worst thing in the world.”

Izelda glowered.

“How dare you!” she snapped. “I’ll have you working at your desk until midnight for the next month until you learn the value of being prompt!”

With those words Izelda brushed by her, bumping Emily’s shoulder, as if to storm off, the matter clearly settled in her eyes.

But it wasn’t settled in Emily’s.

Emily reached out and grabbed Izelda’s shoulder, stopping her.

Izelda turned and grimaced back, brushing Emily’s hand off as if she’d been bitten by a snake.

But Emily did not give ground.

“I didn’t finish,” Emily continued, keeping her voice completely calm. “The worst thing in the world is this place. It’s you. It’s this stupid, petty, soul-destroying job.”

“Excuse me?” Izelda cried, her face turning red with anger.

“You heard me,” Emily replied. “In fact, I’m pretty sure everyone heard me.”

Emily glanced over her shoulder at her colleagues, who stared back, dumbfounded. No one had expected quiet, compliant Emily to snap like this. She recalled Ben’s warning that she was “making a scene” last night. And here she was, making another one. Only this time she was enjoying it.

“You can take your job, Izelda,” Emily added, “and stick it up your ass.”

She could practically hear the gasps from behind her.

She shoved past Izelda into the elevator, then spun on her heel. She hit the ground floor button for what, she realized, with absolute relief, would be the last time in her life, then watched the scene of her stunned colleagues staring at her as the doors slid shut and blocked them out. She let out a huge sigh, feeling freer and lighter than she had ever felt.

*