Hana Pt. 01

Justin looked at his computer in disbelief. A wave of sickness washed over him. His brain couldn't connect with what his eyes were looking at, and that disconnect made him feel like he was suffering from vertigo.

What? Why? There is no way this is real.

There were so many betrayals here. He clicked on picture after picture, each one more horrifying than the one before. Together, they all told a full story of how stupid he'd been, how much of a fool she made him. But individually, they showed more details.

He saw smiling. Laughing. A woman happier than he'd seen her in a while.

But there's even more to this. This story was more complicated than a simple cheating wife. Justin was suffering from a full collapse of his world. In just a little over a week, he'd lost all sense of purpose. And all it took was for the two people he thought he could depend on to fail him in the most spectacular way. Never had he felt more alone

How could she do this to him?

Also, how could SHE?

.

***

You ever feel like the entire world is against you? Bad days happen to everyone. Things going wrong are to be expected. But when everything goes wrong for - not just days, but weeks - the weight of the world can often feel crushingly heavy.

It's even worse when it comes out of nowhere.

There is such a thing as too much success. That sounds ridiculous, but it's true. Success can be addicting. It can give people a false sense of security, making them complacent and causing them to take "the struggle" for granted. After winning so much for so long, a person can forget how to lose.

Game of Thrones put it best. In the summer, life is grand. Everything is warm. Everything is easy. Living is good, and it's expected to always be like this.

But...winter is coming for us all.

It doesn't matter how smart you are, or how talented, or how much money you've made for yourself and others. Once that snow starts to fall, you only have two choices: endure the cold and survive the frost, or die.

For Justin, the change between summer and winter seemed like it only took a single weekend, but truthfully things for him had been unraveling for quite some time. He just didn't see it until it was too late.

Justin was a project manager for a major contract company who does a lot of work for the city. His company had been involved in everything, from planning new apartment complexes to putting together new downtown developments. He was directly responsible for a team of 12 people, but under his umbrella were countless more. He and his core team took care of the planning and putting everything together. Once everything was planned out to the smallest period, he then handed off different slices of the pie to the various others. Construction crews, engineers, licensing boards, inspection officers; you name it, he dealt with it.

Even after hand-off, the project was still his baby until it was finished. After all, he and his team were at the center of everything. Anything could go wrong, and often does. In fact, the general rule was to make plans A and B so rock solid that when they inevitably fail, your plan C isn't so much of a clusterfuck. When problems arose, he and his team were the ones who had to solve them. It wasn't until the final nail was hammered in that Justin could take a much needed breather.

For a while, at least. After all, there was always a next project.

Justin couldn't call in sick. He didn't get mental health days. He was always on call. And he was only able to take vacation once a project was completed.

The best part about being the main guy in charge is that when everything goes right, people want to bathe you in praise and gratitude. However, the worst part about being the guy in charge is, well, the flip side to that.

Things for Justin began to unravel slowly. It started almost a year ago, when two of his teammates started dating. Hana and Chris.

At that time, Chris was fairly new to his team. He'd only been on for about 2 months. Hana had been with the team since the beginning.

Justin recruited Hana fresh out of grad school. She was literally one of the smartest people he'd ever met, including himself. Not just book smarts. She was a person who put pieces together inside of her head to learn how the overall system worked, then she would use that to her advantage. Even though she was nearly 10 years his junior, she thought at a level that was way above her peers.

From the beginning, she picked things up quickly. Soon, she knew more about how things worked than he would ever know. She was the main brain behind all of their success. He eventually built a team around the two of them, but Hana was always his Kobe Bryant.

Truthfully, Hana could run her own team. She didn't need him. The only reason she didn't was because of one fact.

Justin was a leader. He didn't know everything, but he knew people. He knew how to bring them together. He knew how to motivate them to want to do his bidding. He rarely had to make anyone do anything. All he had to do was suggest what needed to be done, and his team would take over figuring out how to accomplish it.

But that's because he took care of them. He didn't treat them like workers. He treated them like people who worked for him. If they needed anything, he was there. He constantly fought for bonuses and raises for them, even if it meant him not getting one. He continually defended them when people wanted to assign blame if things went wrong. Someone wanting to point a finger at his team needed to come with receipts, because simple accusations got you dismissed.

He was a boss who cared.

His team flowed like a river. Whatever projects they were given, they carried them out with brilliant results. They were the most successful team in the entire company, and the margin wasn't even close. They were un-fucking-stoppable.

Until they weren't. But back to Hana and Chris.

For all of Hana's smarts, she was pretty naïve when it came to men. Everything else in her life was organized for maximum efficiency. She planned, then she executed. No problem was unsolvable.

For her, love should also work that way. You meet someone who checks all your boxes, the two of you get to know each other, you learn how to adapt that person into your life, you compromise in the areas that maximize your partnership, and you always keep your eye on the ball.

You plan, you execute.

But we all know that love and relationships don't work this way. It takes two people to be on the same page and have the same goals to make this work. The team model looks a lot different than the one in the office does. You can't just pull your romantic partner into the boss's office if he slacks off. There is no written policy or guideline to determine who is right or wrong in a relationship.

Chris checked all of her boxes in what she wanted in a man. She assumed she checked all of his. She was attractive. She stayed in shape. She was smart. She was funny. She was loyal. She enjoyed sex and was open to try almost anything. She was driven to succeed and wasn't lazy. What else could he want? She was the perfect package. If she were a guy, she would definitely marry herself!

But she wasn't a guy. She didn't understand how men, especially men like Chris, worked.

You see, Chris was used to female attention. He was born with good looks and came from an affluent family. So, he was always the guy who checked women's boxes. This meant that for him, there was no "the one". There was just right now. He was way too young, and there were too many opportunities out there for him to settle down. No matter how great a woman was, there was always one better.

He was young. He was successful. He was privileged. And he could pretty much get any woman he wanted. Chris was - for lack of a better term - a fuckboy.

For simplicity's sake, the story goes like this:

Hana wanted to date Chris, so she pursued him. He saw her as an attractive woman who he'd like to see naked, so he reciprocated her advances. In just two short months after he shows up, the two of them begin dating.

Only, "dating" holds a different significance to her than it does him.

To Chris, dating means the two of them meet up, enjoy each other's company, have sex, and then still live separate lives. No one had any claim on the other. They were still two individual people enjoying life.

But for Hana, dating meant something more. It meant that the two of them were pursuing something greater. It meant that she was safe with him because he had her back like she had his. It meant that they were in this together.

So, while Chris was fucking Hana for 6 months, she was in a relationship with him for 6 months.

Here's where things get sticky.

Chris was also fucking a few other women. His girlfriend (not Hana). His FWB/ex-girlfriend (also not Hana). The girl he met at the club who was a married mother of two. And some rando from a dating app who had nipple piercings and a lot of tattoos.

There was an explosion of emotions and feelings when all this came out. The altercation was public. It left the team splintered, with some agreeing with Hana and others agreeing with Chris.

Now Justin was faced with a problem. He was never one for getting involved in his teammates' personal lives. If they asked for advice, he gave it to them. If they needed his help, he gave it to them. But he never interfered, and he never chose sides.

He did, however, warn Hana about Chris in the beginning. He'd known a dozen people like Chris over his lifetime. Chris wasn't a bad guy, he was just a guy who wouldn't be tied down. Freedom is a hard thing to give up when the world is your oyster.

But Hana was young, and way too smitten. She couldn't see him for who he was because she was too blinded by who she wanted him to be.

After the nuclear detonation of their break up, Hana was left with a broken heart and no knowledge of how to move on. She was angry, she was bitter, and she was sad. She was living in hell; forced to come into the office every day and see Chris laughing and joking, as if nothing in his life had changed at all. Here she was trying to hold onto her last strand of sanity, and he was hi-fiving all the other dude-bros about this new chick he met the other night. All of them - from the middle aged men with families to the single men who weren't as blessed as Chris - lived vicariously through his exploits. It was as if she and her feelings didn't exist. Even Justin didn't seem to really care.

Eventually, she reached her breaking point. She could no longer work with Chris.

She set out to get him fired. Every mistake he made, from coming in late to missing a deadline, Hana made sure to point it out. At first it was subtle, but after a while it became so obvious that people started to notice. The more she did it, the less sympathetic her teammates became to her. After a while, the only thing she managed to accomplish was to make herself look like the crazy ex who couldn't let go. This only made people side with him more.

One day, she came to Justin with tears in her eyes. She literally begged him to fire Chris. She was his protégé. She'd been with him since the beginning. No one on the team was more loyal than her. She'd always had his back, even when she disagreed with his final decisions. If anyone had to sacrifice a weekend or pull an all nightery to make magic happen, she would be the first to volunteer.

Surely, she earned enough favor with him. He could understand her heartbreak and do this for her. Right?

But Justin couldn't do this for her. He couldn't fire Chris for being a player. In fact, if he fired Chris, he'd also have to fire her because the two of them broke the fraternization bylaws. No one really invoked them. Office romances happened more times than any of them would acknowledge. People get involved knowing the bylaws, finding ways to go around the bylaws, then want to invoke them when things go wrong.

Firing Chris would open himself up to the biggest wrongful termination suit this company had seen. A drunk lawyer who showed up to court taking tequila shots could win that case.

But more than that, Justin just thought Hana was being a bit dramatic about the whole thing. People broke up all the time. She and Chris didn't even date that long.

She was young. She was pretty. She had a well-paying job. She'd get over pretty-boy eventually.

His attitude when she approached him was a bit cavalier and dismissive. Perhaps that was his mistake, underestimating how heartbroken she was. For him, the equation was simple. Chris was so obviously beneath her level. What he wanted in a woman was a brainless sex bot. He wanted someone to stroke his ego, keep his dick hard, and have her entire life revolve around him and his desires. When he wanted her to come, she was there. When it was time to disappear, she was gone.

He wasn't ready for someone as serious as Hana. He couldn't keep up with her long term. She had her own life; her own ambitions. Her world would not revolve around his dick.

For her, multitasking was as natural as breathing. Her mind was always moving; always juggling. A guy like Chris would only slow her down. In the end, she'd leave him in the dust when she realized that he was nothing more than a pretty Peter Pan.

But Hana didn't want to hear that, especially from Justin. At least, not now. She was heartbroken. She felt betrayed by men in general. She wanted Justin to have her back like she had his so many times. But with the way he casually dismissed her pain, he now joined the pack of "men ain't shit".

So, to the shock and awe of everyone, she turned in her two-week's notice. It was handwritten and left at his desk.

By the time Justin realized it, she'd already gotten her vacation approved. She cashed in all of her days to be used at once. It was short notice, but Hana was so well loved that the HR rep put it in as emergency leave.

For the record, she was team Hana.

To make matters worse, she cut off all communication. All of Justin's calls went directly to voicemail, all of his texts went unanswered. Everyone else was blocked too, it seemed. The only way to get in touch with her was by email, and it didn't even seem like she was reading those.

Or so he thought. But that comes later.

Hana leaving was one of the most devastating days Justin had ever had (up until that point). He was hurt that she would abandon him over something so trivial, but besides that he knew what a massive problem he had on his hands. Hana was so instrumental to his team that she was practically irreplaceable. He'd have to find three people to make up for what he lost in her.

To make matters worse, this happened right in the middle of a multi-million dollar project. Had this happened at the beginning, her departure wouldn't have hit so hard. But Hana was the point of contact with a lot of these people. She was the one who gave up her nights and weekends to keep things flowing. She and Justin were often the last two to leave the office, long after the other teammates had gone home.

There might've been a lucky break if nothing untoward happened. Most of the leg work was done, so with a miracle, all Justin had to do was keep things moving until the project was finished. During the hiatus, he could solve his Hana problem.

But wouldn't you know it? Plans A and B always fail. It's practically guaranteed. Things started going wrong. Zoning problems. Truckers striking. A land dispute. Materials that were supposed to be delivered were delayed. People wanted to renegotiate their contracts because there was more work to be done than initially agreed upon.

And his Ace up his sleeve was taking a permanent sabbatical.

Chris - who was an Ivy League grad by the way - wasn't even half as talented as the woman who made the magic happen. Hana went to community college her first two years yet ran circles around all of her "highly educated" coworkers.

So yeah, things were stressful at work. Potential fallout was devastating. If he faltered, his company would be on the hook for millions of dollars in lost labor. That could lead to multiple lawsuits. His entire team would be disbanded.

Worst thing about the entire scenario was looking at Chris every day and trying not to see a massive fuckup who cost him his best worker. As smart as Chris was, he didn't hold a candle to Hana. He wasn't as dedicated or loyal. He didn't have the same relationship with the contractors that Hana spent years building. He didn't have the experience to foresee potential pitfalls.

He just wasn't Hana. No one was.

Now, maybe Hana planned her exit for maximum damage, or maybe it was just bad timing for Justin. With a planner and executer like her, it's more likely that she knew what she was leaving him with. And for a normal person, this would be enough vindication to make them sit back and smile.

But not Hana. She had one last "fuck you" to dump on him, and it was much worse.

***

A MONTH EARLIER:

Justin sat on the edge of the bed and looked over at his wife, Rochelle. She was standing in front of the big mirror over her vanity, putting on her make-up as she got ready for work.

"You're going out of town again? What's that, like the 5^th time this year? It's only July! Your company has never sent you out of town this many times before. And now you're gonna be gone for two weeks?"

Rochelle was irritatingly calm as she applied her lipstick. Looking at her husband via the reflection in the mirror, she said, "It's a conference, Justin. People from all over are gonna be there."

"But for two weeks? That seems a bit excessive."

Her forehead furrowed with annoyance as she stopped applying her makeup. Still looking through the mirror, she said, "I know you're not complaining about how much time I'm spending at work. You practically live in your office."

"Yeah, but I come home every night."

That got a snorted chuckle from her. "Really? You think walking in the door at 9 is coming home every night? That I should be grateful to you for at least sleeping next to me? Which is all we do these days, by the way. We literally sleep together."

"Ro, you know things get crazy when I have a project. This one is particularly stressful. The team has been working overtime."

"Right." Rochelle said as she finally turned around and looked straight at him. "The team." She used her fingers as air quotes when she said the team, then she sarcastically continued with, "Well, it's a good thing you have Hana to help you...err...maintain your stress."

Justin let out a long, exasperated breath. "Really? We going here again?"

"I'm just saying..."

Justin shook his head like he couldn't believe he had to keep repeating this. "How many times do we have to have this same discussion? For the last time, there is nothing going on between me and Hana."

"Sure. Sure." she said with a cynical nod. "Nothing at all. It's completely normal for a husband to spend 12 hours a day with another woman, then come home to his wife and not want to even touch her."

There was so much wrong with that sentence that Justin didn't even know where to begin.

"First off, I'm not spending that time with Hana. We are WORKING. With the rest of the team, by the way. We aren't taking shots at the bar or going out to eat. We are constantly on the move, jumping between making phone calls, driving out to different sites, and attending meetings. There are some days where I don't even physically see her. And secondly..." He let out a sad sigh before continuing with, "...it's not that I don't want to have sex with you, babe. I'm just so exhausted when I come home. It's all I can do to keep from falling apart."