Bring Me to Life Ch. 02

Nodding as she swallowed a bite of omelette Mikey replied, "Ok, I can see that. I mean, I personally love it, but I get it."

Taking a sip of my coffee I reflected on the conversation I had overheard between Mikey and her mother the day before, and realized that as important as it had been not to embarrass her at the time, I didn't want to keep any secrets from her. "As far as the rest, I know you didn't intend anything when you invited me for the week... and I have a confession to make."

Looking concerned at the turn of conversation, Mikey set down her fork and turned her full attention to me, "Is something wrong?"

I shook my head and grasped both her hands in mine, "No, completely the opposite... I didn't want to embarrass you, but even more than that I don't want to keep anything from you... so you need to know that I overheard you with your mother yesterday."

Tilting her head and looking a bit confused, she inquired "What do you mean?"

"When I was coming back from the washroom, your mother was talking with you about what she assumed was between us... and I heard you... how hard it was for you to not be more than just friends," as Mikey looked about to interject I continued forcefully keeping her from interrupting me, "More importantly... I realized in that moment that I didn't want for us to be just friends either. You were already so much more than that, and I just needed to let myself be with you. I'm not saying it will always be easy, but you know that already. This is what I want though and I just want you to know that as well."

Looking Mikey in the eyes as I finished, I saw tears running down her face, but the smile she wore removed any possible doubts I may have had as to how she felt. Pushing her plate away she practically pulled me off my stool as she wrapped her arms around me and captured my all-too-willing lips in a kiss that managed to be both incredibly tender and passionate and hungry all at once. Eventually breaking the kiss she pulled back slightly, while keeping her arms around me, and rested her forehead against mine, "I know you went through a lot, more than anyone should have to, and I know that you are just now starting to let yourself work through that. I don't expect every day to be easy, I just hope that each day will be a bit easier than the one before it, and I want to be there with you through every step to help in any way I can."

"I can't tell you how much just having you there for me means sweety..." brushing my lips to her forehead, I gently pulled away from her as I continued, "I'm going to go hop in the shower, why don't you finish up your breakfast and if you're quick about it you can join me?"

Her eyes lit up with mischief, and her lips pulled up in her trademark grin, "You know, I think I'll keep the rest for later, I'm not that hungry anymore...".

Shaking my head and giggling at her irrepressible nature, I started towards the stairs and called back over my shoulder, "At least put it in the fridge!"

The rest of the weekend passed by more or less the same way, Mikey and I traded off on the cooking, and shared the clean up, we'd watch movies, go on walks with Max, and at nights before going to sleep and in the morning after waking up we made love. All the while I couldn't remember the last time I had been so happy.

Alexis - Monday, December 29th, 2014

Where before I had always looked forward to the return to work that would spare me from being alone with my thoughts, this time as Monday had approached I felt a peculiar sense of unease and I couldn't quite figure out the cause.

Glancing at the time as I brought Max in from his romp in the yard, I called up the stairs, "Better hurry up, we need to stop at my condo to drop Max off before we go to work."

Mikey must have picked up on whatever was bothering me, and in her typical way had figured out why even before I had. As she came downstairs, I noticed she had an extra bag with her and in that moment my unease faded to confusion and a small glimmer of hope. Keeping her face straight and her tone professional, she teased "Sorry it took me so long Lexie, I wanted to put a bag together in case my new girlfriend invited me to stay over tonight. With how late we will probably finish tonight, I was hoping she'd take pity on me and spare me the long drive home."

Laughing at her, I smiled as I realized that the unease had been the doubts about going home to my empty condo alone. Although we had only been 'together', officially at least, a few short days, Mikey had become such a big part of my life over the last few weeks that the thought of being apart from her again so soon had been weighing on me. Realizing she was waiting for a response, and catching a glimmer of doubt in her eyes as I stood there, I answered, "Of course Mikey, I'd love to have you over. Max has grown rather attached to you the last couple days after all, and I'm sure he would miss you terribly otherwise."

"Only Max?" she replied with her eyebrow arched and a grin playing across her lips.

"Well, I suppose I might miss you a little bit," I teased.

"Hmph, we'll see just how little I can make you miss me when we get back to your place tonight."

"Mmm, promises promises..." This time I looked her straight in the eyes and felt my heart skip a beat at the raw desire I saw burning there, "Umm... we should uh... get going."

Mikey laughed, knowing she'd scored that last point without having to say more, and led the way to my car, with me locking up behind and Max bounding along in the snow between us.

The drive into town was largely uneventful, we discussed our plan for the day and wondered between us how busy it might be. This time of year, between the holidays, was always a bit hit or miss. Some years it would be dead, with most of our clients focusing on being with their families, other years it seemed like they all felt compelled to call at once. We stopped briefly to drop Max off at the condo, and I let Gary, my neighbour, know that Max was back so he could check in on him during the day.

I had learned through our limited interactions that Gary had retired a couple years prior and loved dogs, but didn't have the energy to care for one full time. He could have gotten a small dog, obviously, but when I'd raised that suggestion in the past he'd just snorted and laughed that he loved 'real dogs', not 'those oversized rats old people always get'. Being able to watch Max during the day was, as he put it, 'the best of both worlds': getting to enjoy having a 'real dog' around without all the fuss of veterinary and grooming appointments. Mikey dropped her bag off at the same time, and from there we headed on to the office.

Once at the office, before heading upstairs, we stopped at the small coffee shop by our building where Mikey surprised me by ordering three coffees. Handing one to me as we left the shop, I wondered about the extra but was more absorbed in mentally reviewing my plan for the day again to be as prepared as possible. I was so absorbed in thought I nearly ran into her as she stopped by Jonathan's desk at admin and handed him the spare coffee with a bright smile, "Good morning Jon, how were your holidays? Not too stressful I hope?"

Smiling and closing his eyes as he took a liberal sip of his coffee, he returned "Ah Mikey, I really needed this, thanks. Christmas went as well as can be expected, only half the usual drama, but the rest of the weekend was quite nice. How about yourself, you're looking to be in particularly good spirits this morning!"

"Better than I could have ever hoped for," she replied, then nudged me and whispered loudly enough to make sure Jonathan overheard, "Say good morning to the nice man, Alexis."

Blushing, I offered Jonathan a smile, "Good morning Jonathan, sorry I was lost in thought. I didn't mean to be rude."

For his part, it seemed like he had nearly choked on his coffee at Mikey's comment and had tears forming in his eyes as he sputtered out, "Nothing to worry about Alexis, I hope you had a good weekend."

Her trademark grin flashing mischievously, Mikey added "She needs some work, but she's not a complete lost cause. Do be a dear and don't let her by without saying hello to you in the future?"

I attempted to glare at her, but the warmth and love that radiated from her eyes despite the impish look on her face took the sting out of her rebuke and I just nodded, "She's right, I suppose. I do hope I didn't offend?"

"Well..." with a look at Mikey which prompted a small nod from her, he continued, "I won't try to say you've always been the warmest person in the office, but you have always been professional and never outright rude, so no hard feelings. I did notice you've changed a bit these past weeks though, and I do appreciate you having Mikey grab a coffee for me whenever she runs out to get some for the two of you, it's really kind of you."

With that last my eyes flicked to Mikey who didn't appear the least bit apologetic for her ruse, "Yes, well, it was my pleasure." Not being comfortable with small talk, I turned to more practical concerns, "Is there anything planned for this week I should be aware of?"

"Not particularly, though if you could make yourself a bit scarce Wednesday, I'd appreciate it. The annual business strategy meeting is at 11:00 and I told the seniors that you had a prior obligation with a couple of your larger clients who wanted to touch base with you for their year-end."

I was caught off guard by this and lamely replied, "I thought those meetings were mandatory?"

At my obvious surprise Jonathan looked up at me then looked at Mikey, "Yes, well, mandatory really is just a word they throw around for the most part, at the end of the day it all comes down to the money and... well, let's face it, your clients represent alot of money, and Mikey mentioned you would appreciate not having to go to these... how did she put it, 'cheerleader camps'?"

Mikey grinned at that and simply commented, "Yep, that's what I said"

"Umm, well thank you Jonathan. I appreciate it. If I'm going to be scarce on Wednesday I better get to work though, enjoy your coffee."

"Thank you again, Alexis"

Mikaela - Monday, December 29th, 2014

Closing the office door behind us, I caught the look Lexie gave me and grinned, "You're welcome."

Shaking her head, but not quite managing to hide a smile, she asked "Care to explain? Also, anyone else I've been buying coffee for that I should know about?"

Settling in at my desk, I turned toward her "Well, I was going to hold off a bit longer before starting you on the advanced courses of office politics..."

"Mikey..."

"Look, Lexie, when it comes to your clients you are incredible, and it's not about the money. I've seen you working with them, and you truly care about their financial success. They see it too, and that's why they trust you. When it comes to your colleagues though, you have some rather significant blind spots. It's not just Marc and the partners who can influence your day to day environment, the actual organization is handled by people like Jonathan. It helps that he happens to be a great guy, so spending a few minutes every now and then to build a connection there is no hardship, and the end result is that he lets me know which meetings you actually need to go to and when to arrange for convenient conflicts to get you out of them so you can focus on your clients. Think about it, how many meetings have you actually had to attend this month compared to last?"

Lexie looked stunned for a moment as she digested what I'd just said, "I just figured with the holidays..."

I chuckled and shook my head, "Sweety, they actually scheduled more meetings than usual because they figured everyone's clients would be too busy with the holidays to speak with us, and they wanted to make sure everyone stayed busy."

Sitting down at her desk, she paused for a moment before asking, "What type of coffee does he drink again?"

"Light roast, skim milk, no sugar." I watched as Lexie did her little ritual of silently repeating the information to herself three times to help herself remember, then turned to my computer, "So what did you want to start with, the energy reports?"

Turning to her own station and shifting easily into her work mode, Lexie replied, "Yeah, I've been going over some of the recent oil forecasts, and I'm worried that some of our open buy orders need to be re-evaluated. With how badly the market has done the last few months, I'm happy we dumped most of our holdings last summer, but if we're only seeing the start of something bigger we need to make sure not to be getting back in at the wrong time. Let's also reach out to our Asian market analysts to get their numbers too, a significant part of global consumption has been tied with China's growth the last few years and we need to know what's happening there to get a clear picture."

The rest of the day was spent mostly digging through market research, and gradually an image was forming to show that the initial forecasts on energy might even be overly optimistic. Our Asian equity team was reporting that they were projecting up to a 50% drop in growth projections in China for 2015, and with how big a consumer they were on the oil market that could prove disastrous to the energy sector.

After a quick lunch, eaten at our desks while doing more reading, Lexie asked me to start going through our client lists and prioritizing a contact schedule for any of her clients who had open buy orders on oil. Meanwhile, as was her habit whenever she sensed a major disruption, she had already scheduled a conference call with the head of our Asian markets to discuss his projections in more detail and determine just how valid she felt his concerns to be. Fortunately he was working from our London offices this month instead of Hong Kong which meant she only had to deal with a five hour difference instead of the usual twelve, and he was willing to stay a bit late to accommodate her this afternoon.

I ruefully reflected that as much as Jonathan had made up the cover about several urgent meetings with large clients for Wednesday, he might just turn out to be right after all. By 5:00 it was clear we weren't anywhere near done, but we needed a proper break if we were going to be at all productive. Lexie had just wrapped up her call and as clear as it was that she wasn't about to call it a day, I could tell she needed a break too.

As I grabbed our coats, Lexie looked at me and shook her head, "If you need to head out,..."

I cut her off, "Not at all, but you're no good to anyone, least of all your clients, if you don't take care of yourself too. Let's nip out for dinner and we can come back right after. I know we've got a lot left to do."

I smiled at the mixed emotions playing across her features, they were subtle but I'd learned to read her tells, and finally she relented, "Alright, but right back after?"

"Yes ma'am, I still need to work on secondary priorities for next week so that I can focus on your follow up items later this week."

Lexie smiled gratefully as she took her coat, commenting "I don't know what I'd do without you, Mikey."

"In more ways than one, I hope?" I quipped back, delighted at eliciting a blush from her before turning more serious, "In all likelihood you probably would have been possessed of some ridiculous notion that you could manage this all by yourself and killed yourself trying?"

Lexie's responding laugh drew a couple surprised looks, most people around the office still saw her as being cold and distant, and she had never given them any reason to think otherwise. I smiled privately as I saw a few people appearing to be reconsidering their impressions as they saw her laughing and smiling warmly on her way past. I knew Lexie didn't think it was particularly important, but it bothered me that people around the office saw her in such a negative light and I was hoping to help improve that image a bit.

I had started my private campaign to rebrand Lexie's image with Jonathan because regardless whether people realized it, office administration wielded the real power in the day to day planning of the office. The senior management team, as much as they were nominally in charge, were far more focused on the business performance and delegated the routine items to their assistants. It also helped that I already had a good relationship with him; not wanting to trade on my family name I had built up my own connections early and it was Jonathan who tipped me off when Lexie was going to get promoted and become eligible to have an Associate work with her. If I knew anything about office gossip, and unfortunately I knew more than I cared for, Lexie's apparent thaw would be the hot topic at the watercooler tomorrow. Smiling to myself, I considered that it would only humanize her to the rest of the office, which was ultimately what I wanted for her.

We went to one of our local favourites for dinner, a small hole in the wall sushi restaurant that was easy to miss if you didn't know what to look for. Despite its nondescript appearance, the food was phenomenal and reasonably priced. As we ate, I discussed my proposed prioritization strategy with Lexie, "So as you know when the price on oil started dropping we were initially chalking it up to the mild weather driving down consumption. After going over the energy forecast and looking at outlooks for China's development... I think the last few months are just the start. In the last five months the spot price on crude oil has gone from $105 to just over $60, a lot of our clients were seeing a $60 spot as a great point to jump in on the market: We need to kill those orders fast. I'd guess that we'll be looking at $50 being the new standard for oil for a while, but we may even drop below that before the end of next month." I paused to take a sip of wine before continuing, "I was thinking after that it would be good to look for clients exposed to secondary risks by being invested in areas that could take a related dive: Canadian markets have a strong relationship with oil, and any companies who do a lot of their business with OPEC could be affected as well. I've already sent in a request for analysis on past market corrections to see if we can spot key sectors or companies that might be affected, but if you have any specific insight it would help."

Lexie shook her head, but the smile she gave me let me know there was no disapproval in the gesture, "I swear you've thought of everything, as usual. When we get back, I need a list of all our open buy orders on oil, and which of those clients have given us discretionary trading. If we're looking at risks of a 20% drop over the next four to six weeks, we need to get those taken care of right away. Have you ever considered that your talents may be wasted as an Associate, Mikey? You could easily be managing your own portfolio."

"Maybe one day, for now I'm happy with what I'm doing. If there's nothing else I should be able to have a preliminary list for us to start contacting first thing tomorrow so we can start booking your appointments."

Having confirmed our strategy, and not being able to do anything more until we got back to the office, I changed the topic to a different type of strategy, "So I figure it's pretty much a given that we are going to be working quite late the next couple days, right?"

Lexie paused with a piece of sushi held delicately between her chopsticks and considered my question, "Well, I suppose I had assumed, but I really have no right to impose that heavily if you..."

Shaking my head firmly, I interjected "You're not imposing at all, but I may need to, impose that is... I'm not sure how late my train runs, I know we talked about me spending the night tonight, but..."