Mailgirls Down Under Pt. 08

"Other things?" Jackson asked, confused.

"You know..." Lindsay stumbled, tried a goofy smile.

"Oh, my sex life." Jackson realised, wondering if this was a strategic intrusion.

Lindsay leaned forward the way she must imagine friends do when they are sharing deep secrets. "It must be a bit spicy..."

Jackson found she was continually being taken aback by Lindsay's one sided attempts at intimacy. "Spicy?" Were they on the same wavelength?

Lindsay had held her forward pose fixed with a smile, trying for that connection which was not quite there. "Are you wearing any underwear?" she asked.

"You're not very good at this," Jackson retorted. Lindsay lurched back.

"I thought you Aussies liked to be straightforward," Lindsay recoiled.

Jackson chose not to read Lindsay's feelings. "I'm being straightforward, you're being offensive. You have to at least try to win my trust first before we try to get intimate."

Lindsay backed off. "Okay, I'm sorry. Will you let me start again? Sorry," she muttered again, appearing to Jackson to mean it.

"Why not?" Jackson allowed. She reasoned that since arriving in Australia Lindsay had no options to play anything but the boss with everyone she encountered. Okay, she would give the American a second chance. There you go again, she quietly scolded herself, thinking good of everyone no matter the evidence.

But Lindsay must have realised what she had done, as she now tried to be more conciliatory. "I'm a boss, and I am kind of boxed into that role and always aware of it. You're a mailgirl. And that's who you are." She smiled at Jackson hoping that was better.

Jackson crossed her hands over her chest and nodded. "Slightly less offensive. And at least there's an explanation there that makes some sort of sense. But no, I disagree. I'm a mailgirl inside Harada Industries between eight and four-thirty each weekday. Outside of there, I am who I have always been."

Jackson stared at Lindsay who nodded, although unconvinced. Jackson wondered whether twenty-four hour total mailgirl control was on Lindsay's mind. After all, that was what Heather Mckay was telling her they do in the States. And clearly Lindsay was planning something. Jackson though continued to try to explain herself. "Maybe it's a cultural thing. Here, we are not completely defined by our jobs. Is that how it is in the States? You tell me? When I'm at the gym, I am not at the gym to become a better mailgirl. I am me at the gym, I'm a gym bitch at the gym."

Lindsay smiled. "Gym bitch? That's an interesting term."

Jackson smiled back with intent. "When I'm in the zone, don't get between me and the rowing machine."

But now Jackson was wondering. Was she wrong? When she was in gym, was it so that she could be a fitter, better mailgirl? When she was out with friends, fobbing them off about what she did, was she merely a mailgirl in denial? Was Lindsay right and her identity had already been set? But more seriously, Jackson sensed that Lindsay's aim was to make it an undeniable fact for the mailgirls, to stamp them with that identity. As Heather had described with the T-shirt and the insulation suit. Heather insisted that they were celebrities of a sort in the States. Which Jackson found it hard to credence despite Heather's insistence of the cache associated with the Stateside mailgirls' lower status. Now Jackson was confusing herself. What did she want -- and was it that, to become a total mailgirl? She needed to speak to Fanny. Fanny had the psychological insight and could explain that better than Jackson could conceptualise it. But first she had to go shopping with the boss.

*

Jackson and Belinda Clarke, the head of HR, were arranging the chairs in the big meeting room when Lindsay strode in. They had arranged five chairs in a sort of circle.

"Not how I imagined a tribunal," Lindsay sneered. She looked around, anticipating some sort of action, expecting more than the two of them.

"It's not a trial," Jackson responded, possibly a little sharper than she intended.

Belinda's phone rang. She checked it and headed away for some privacy to take the call. Lindsay strode over to stand close to the mailgirl who was still adjusting the seating, making sure that the chairs were equally spaced in a ring. "You're not hiding anything from me now," she hissed at the naked woman.

Jackson looked hard at her boss. Then she smiled, recalling Mitch's advice. If only you knew, Jackson thought, saying nothing.

Lindsay tried to change the mood. "I'm wearing the shoes you suggested," she offered. Then because she could not help herself she added "when you were wearing clothes. I like them."

Jackson smiled warmly at Lindsay as she saw that Belinda had finished her call and was approaching. "I hope your heels are bleeding," she snapped back.

But all she got from Lindsay was a grin, a boss's grin. Lindsay turned to Belinda. "Five chairs?" she asked her.

"Yes," Belinda replied trying to look managerial. "One for Simon, and we're waiting for Fanny. She told me that she would like to observe."

Lindsay cavilled. "I am curious to see how this goes." She looked hard at the other two. "I'm not expecting much."

Jackson smiled sweetly. "Then you won't be disappointed."

Belinda quickly spoke up. "The aim of this meeting is to try to get Simon to acknowledge what he has done and to try to get him to see it from Annette's point of view."

"And yet Annette is not here," Lindsay observed.

"Correct," Belinda answered rapidly again, likely determined to keep Jackson and Lindsay from any further sniping at each other, and hoping that Simon would soon arrive. "The aim is to keep the temperature of the meeting down by not having the two of them in the room at the same time at least at this point. We talk to Simon, get him to tell his side of things, explain to him the reasons that Annette initiated the tribunal and then see -- with his input -- if there is value in sitting them down together later to finalise the matter."

"I'll say that all seems rather idealistic to me, but I am apparently obliged to see how it plays out," Lindsay sighed. "Now if only this Simon was here. I believe that we were due to start two minutes ago."

Belinda again tried to create the right mood. "We have only had one tribunal so far. Mitch, Mr Johnson, ran it, and I'm not sure that it was a complete success. Although we have had no more complaints about the area, so I guess something must have sunk in." Belinda was hoping that Lindsay would ask for details about that tribunal to keep her momentum going but at that point there was enough noise at the door to suggest that proceedings were very likely to start. The women found they were standing away behind the ring of chairs when the door opened. Simon O'Donnell came through with a brazen look on his face followed by two other men who seemed equally young and cocky.

He caught Belinda's questioning look as he approached. "I wasn't going to subject myself to this alone," he asserted. "Brought some support. These two are also from IT. Introduce yourselves, boys."

"Brian Taylor," one smirked, keeping his hands by his sides. He was being cautious until he stared at Jackson who had moved away from the group. He openly ogled the naked woman, concentrating on her.

"Mark Richardson, Rich," the other colleague offered holding out his hand to shake with both Belinda and Lindsay. Jackson came back, busy hauling over the extra two needed chairs and making the circle bigger. When she finished, Rich shook her hand too, giving her a smile that might have been embarrassment for her at her state of nakedness. Brian just stared.

"Sit anywhere you like," Jackson offered apparently not noticing or caring for either Rich's reaction to her or Brian's. "We're going to be pretty informal today, so it's not like we'll be facing each other across a table or anything like that."

Simon walked around behind the chairs deciding which one he would choose. "Where's the redhead?" he asked.

It took a moment of confusion for the women to work out what he meant while they all stood unevenly outside the circle. Belinda realised who. "Annette Kellerman. She chose not to come to this session. Although we called it a tribunal, it's not a court of law, it's going to be a discussion about workplace norms today."

"Oh great," Simon groaned. He leered at Jackson. "So there's only one naked girl here."

Belinda again found she needed to dampen the tone before there were any sharp words that could derail the discussion. "Yes, for the moment. And Jackson is running the meeting." Belinda's stare suggested that Simon should ease off the smart talk. He took the hint. "Where do you want to sit, Simon?" she asked to keep things moving.

Simon chose the seat furtherest from the door and Jackson placed herself a seat away from him. Rich planted himself between Simon and Jackson while casting side looks at both of them. He seemed to check with Simon that he was okay with things so far and then he stole a glance at Jackson's firm bust. Brian Taylor took the seat on the other side of Simon as if they were guarding him or something, Jackson wondered. Lindsay sat next to Jackson, and Belinda deciding her depressuring work was done, sat on the other side of Brian.

Jackson looked around at how the group had settled and then looked over to the door which was closed. "Sorry," she started, "Fanny must be running late. But let's put a few things up first." She looked over at Simon. "This is about you understanding what it is like to be a mailgirl, to get a sense about how we feel in the workplace and how we hope to be treated by the other staff."

Rich ogled Jackson, for some reason, like Brian had been, he was now brazen. Although he also gave the appearance of considering what the mailgirl had said. He looked over at Simon. "Shouldn't you take your clothes off then, Simon?"

Simon looked aghast. "What?" He looked to Brian.

Brian appeared to be thinking about the logic of it. "Get a sense of what it's like to be a mailgirl. If that's what they want you to learn, yeah," he nodded, agreeing with Rich. Both of them kept straight faces as they both turned to directly confront their colleague. Their countenances seemed to suggest that they both thought that was appropriate.

Simon looked back to Rich who crossed his arms and held his neutral stare. Rich gave Jackson a look which suggested that she should give her opinion. She chose to say nothing. Simon noted Jackson's disinterest with concern and looked to Belinda.

Belinda crossed her arms. "Whatever makes you comfortable," she suggested. Then she thought for a moment. "Or makes you uncomfortable. Perhaps."

Rich chimed in. "She makes a lot of sense." He looked searchingly at Simon.

Simon now was concerned. "I thought I brought you here for support." He looked at both his mates, to either side.

Brian spoke up. "That's what we're doing. You told us why you had to come here and why you wanted us to attend with you. And now we see that this is a learning process. We'll make sure that you are supported if you choose to do that to understand them better." Somehow he managed to suppress a smirk.

Rich nodded sagely, agreeing with Brian. "I think it's a good idea. Yeah, you should take your clothes off. To understand." Simon's support team both looked at him earnestly, as if there was only that one way to proceed.

Simon shook his head. "I don't believe this," he complained. He looked at his colleagues one more time to see if he could read anything new into their stance. But they folded their arms, seemed decided on their view. Simon grumbled something about telling them too much before they came to the tribunal. He gave one final look at each of them. Then he stood up. He unbuttoned his shirt and handed it to Brian. He unbuckled his belt and slid his trousers down. And then his underwear which he folded on his pants to also hand to Brian. Sitting back down he reached down to unlace his shoes and remove his socks which he left under his chair.

Lindsay looked over to Jackson, agape. "Hold on," she wondered, "what just happened here?"

Jackson acted cool like it was completely expected, brushing off Lindsay. "Let's start," she stated in a flat voice as if Simon's situation was all in the plan. "A few ground rules. As you can see we are not taking notes or have our laptops or anything. That is so we can say anything we feel we need to with the knowledge that what we say won't be recorded or used in any way later. So we can all speak freely. I will start the proceedings after my Acknowledgement of Country." Jackson looked over at Lindsay who seemed confused. "We are on Wurundjeri land," Jackson explained. She then shared again with the group. "I'll quickly outline why we are here. Then we will hear your side of things. And after that, we'll have a general discussion to see where we land." She looked over to Rich and then to Brian. "And both of you are welcome to contribute as well. I only ask that everyone waits until the person speaking has finished, so no interruptions."

At that moment, the door swung open and Fanny rocked in at speed. She immediately noticed Simon since he was sitting facing the door. "What's going on here?" she demanded, in some sort of shock.

Rich was now completely comfortable. "Simon wanted to find out how it feels," he told her. "And you are?"

"Fanny Durack," she replied. "As you may have guessed, I am a mailgirl." Funny, she considered how they don't notice you are a person until you get them in a situation like this. She was sure that she had delivered messages for all of the males present despite them not recognising her. She felt a bit crafty. "And I am studying mailgirls for my PhD. So watch out." She smiled.

Jackson looked around the room. "Safe space," she reminded them. "And Fanny behave," she ordered lightly as Fanny took her seat, pretending to be demure but with those large breasts dominating any impression that she may have been trying to make. Lindsay tried not to look at her.

Chairing the group, Jackson intended to keep a lid on any conflict. She did not have to worry. Sitting there naked, Simon appeared contrite as he concentrated on what Jackson had to say. As she outlined the issue with Annette, Jackson crossed her legs, placing her palms on her knees. Opposite her, Fanny also crossed her legs but placed her hands on the sides of the seat as she listened.

Rich looked interested and interrupted. "This is new to me," he started. "I'm curious as to why you would become a mailgirl, why you would do it, why some women would choose to be mailgirls in this age. I'm sorry if I didn't make myself clear, do you know what I mean?"

Lindsay looked at Jackson then spoke up. "Are we getting off the subject here?"

"I don't think so," Jackson responded. She looked to Rich to continue, to try to explain himself further.

"I'm trying to understand Annette's mindset leading up to the episode. And how we got there," Rich tried. He looked at Lindsay and addressed her. "With all respect, we are learning things we did not know about the mailgirls. If we had have known, I guess if we properly thought about the women who are mailgirls here -- he turned to Simon -- we might have acted differently. Sometimes you forget who you are dealing with." Simon sat quietly, his cock flopped to one side, a look of concentration on his face. Apparently this was a learning experience for him too, as Rich had suggested.

"We?" Jackson asked Rich.

Rich nodded at her. "We're all to blame. Put three blokes like us together and have naked women wandering around delivering messages and you can easily get some reinforcement of poor behaviour. Banter." He looked around for a response. For a moment no one said anything.

Then Fanny spoke up. "Can I say thanks, but I am surprised to hear you talking like that?"

Brian looked into the space in the middle of their circle. "It is hard in the workplace to demonstrate any level of self reflection. The nature of most of our work and the level of general interaction in the office does not allow for it. We seem to fall into established patterns of behaviour. And some of them are not good. Especially the banter that Rich mentioned. It's not always good."

Simon sensed that he needed to be the next to speak. "I agree with the others," he started. "Having realised from how Jackson has framed it, I'm obviously happy to express my contrition. But can I also point out along the lines that Brian was stating, that my behaviour was in part a reinforcement of learned behaviours in the workplace. The banter thing."

Belinda spoke up. "We have training in these areas and try to promote an inclusive workplace." That seemed to be for Lindsay's consumption although Lindsay did not give her any response.

Fanny went again. "Those courses are all good and well, Belinda. But you can see that a lot of that is just window dressing. We can say that we have shown the way that things should be. But we can't guarantee how deep they go. And as the boys say, established patterns of behaviour are hard to break, even if you want to."

Simon looked approvingly to Fanny. "That's what I was trying to say. To put it another way, you have your work to do, you concentrate on that. And to some extent, when you interact with others in the office, you fall back on what you have learnt to do from before, from outside. Not what is in those courses. They present an ideal. But it's one that doesn't seem natural."

Rich looked at Simon and smiled. "Next you're going to be saying that your thinking process was liberated by taking off your clothes in this meeting."

Simon chose to take that comment seriously. "I won't say that is the only thing behind it. But this discussion that we are having now is not the sort of discussion that you do not generally have in the workplace, a genuine exchange of ideas. There just never seems to be the right time or place for it. So yes, I have been liberated, Rich. And I'll be honest, I did not think that things would go like this today. Oh and by the way, I do intend to put my clothes back on when we finish this meeting."

*

From his office Shane heard Lindsay slam her door and storm around her office. He made a mental note of how thin their separating wall was. But he stepped out and looked to Betty who smiled back. She smiled further when he gestured that he would go into Lindsay's office and see what was up.

Being Shane, he strode in with his disarming smile.

Lindsay glared up at him from her desk although his typical grin quickly turned her flames to embers. "What do you want?" she asked with a show of existential exhaustion.

"How did it go?" Shane asked.

Lindsay shook her head. "They think it's a social engineering factory, not a workplace."

Shane smiled. "You are allowed to swear around me," he offered sweetly.

Lindsay crossed her arms. "I don't swear. If you hear me say 'damn' watch out." She looked like she meant it but Shane laughed. She shook head slowly maybe realising how silly that sounded. "If this was the States I could punish a mailgirl," she smiled weakly.

"Or two," Shane suggested. "That would cheer you up?"

Lindsay shook her head. "I'd be checking their demerits right now," she added sadly.

"I'm sure you have work to do," Shane suggested, deciding that he had done enough.

"I'm sure I do," Lindsay snarled, starting to return to her usual self. But then she stopped as her deputy was leaving the room. "Shane," she called to halt him, waiting until he turned to look to her, "thank you." And then she looked back at her screen but only for a moment. Perhaps she could check on the mailgirls anyway.

*

Jackson and Fanny wandered down the stairs still slightly buzzing. "I never thought it would go like that," Jackson laughed.