Power Play - Episode 4

Text: @stsciurussimblr / Screenshots: stories4sims

On Monday morning, I was curious to see if Caleb would react when I came into the coffee shop. As it happened, Tiffany waited on me, so I didn’t have any direct interactions with Caleb. And even if he did recognize me, his usual apathetic affect made it impossible to tell.

I continued to see Caleb at Roughriders every once in a while. I didn’t make the mistake of approaching him again, but it was amusing to watch him. He would occasionally go into the notorious “back room” with someone, emerging ten or fifteen minutes later, usually alone. Once I saw a guy follow him out of the back room and try to engage him, but Caleb shut him down faster than shit off a shovel. I laughed so hard that Caleb actually looked over in my direction, and I had to pretend that Jack had said something funny.

Then toward the end of May, I stopped seeing Caleb at Brewed Awakenings when I came in for my morning coffee. I casually remarked to Tiffany about the change in personnel, but she was on to me. She laughed and said, “Caleb is gone—at least from the morning shift. He graduated last week and is spending his days job hunting, I think. You might still catch him here on weekends.” 

Well, I wasn’t that curious about what had happened to Caleb—at least not enough to change my weekend routine. So I more or less forgot about him until one morning about a month later, as I walked into the ad agency, I noticed Caleb sitting with a bunch of other young people outside of Gervais Bachman’s office. Gerv is the head of my creative department, and I figured he must be hiring new associates. I knocked on his door and went in.

“Hey, Gerv, you hiring today?” I asked.
“Looks like it! Where do all these kids come from?! I’m going to have to waste an entire day just to find one new designer.”
“There’s one kid out there, Caleb something-or-other. I want to sit in on his interview.”

Gerv’s eyes widened. “He something special to you?” And then I explained all my various interactions with Caleb—including the put down he gave me at Roughriders.

I make no secret about my sexuality at the office—it’s my company after all. And I pretty much don’t care what my employees do on their own time. My only rule is—and all new hires are told this: no office romances. I’ve seen too many of them come to grief and then ruin the work atmosphere. If I find out about a “special friendship” I tell the couple they have to decide who is going to stay with my company and who we need to help find another job. Gerv smirked,

“So are you going to ask the questions to this ‘Caleb’ guy?”

“Nope. I’m going to let you do your job. I’m just going to sit there and observe.”

“Okay, you’re the boss!”