The Power

“Katherine?” he says, appalled, cringing into the open doorway of her office. His sweaty face strains to affect civility. So, he really had no idea. She feels a flicker of pity – but mostly, the urge to crush him.

She stands up behind her desk, and as she does, instinctively tugs at her skirt as if it’s ridden up, which it hasn’t.

“Theo! What’s it been? Twenty, twenty-five years?” she asks brightly.

She holds out her hand and his bloated pink fingers grasp hers – still soft and damp and cold, like used teabags kept in the fridge – and she has the nauseating sensation of those cold, damp fingers once again brushing the nape of her neck, beer-breath condensing on her cheekbone, the unnecessary closeness of him, drunk and spittle-shouting over the din of a bar. She shudders and snaps her hand away, wiping it on her skirt.

***

Theo is four pints down and already his jaw is slackening, his eyes drifting out of focus. The pretence that their pub trip is a genuine work meeting is wearing thin. “Theo,” pleads Katherine, waving his cigarette smoke out of her face, “it’s almost six. I need to pick my kids up by half past.”

He smirks, or perhaps he’s aiming for seductive, she can’t tell, what with his head swaying like that. “Hang on,” he says. “We’re not done yet. You haven’t briefed me on the – uh - on the new venue, for the Christmas party, where are we with that?”

“I’ll go through it with you tomorrow.”

“Let’s do it now” he says, slapping his notebook against the table, then peeling it from the sticky surface and wiping the well-worn cover with the cuff of his jacket. Does he think he's charming? He seems to have lost his train of thought. “I’m going for a piss,” he mutters. “Look after that for a minute, will you?”

Theo gets unsteadily to his feet, leaving the little black book on the table in front of her. For a moment, Katherine is so astonished that she forgets how angry she is with Theo and how much she dreads the tense exchange she’s about to have when she turns up late, again, to pick up the kids, knowing she can’t promise it won’t happen again because of course it will, there’s nothing she can do about it. Not with this arsehole of a boss.

But Katherine has never before been left alone with Theo's notebook – his most prized possession, in fact. No one has. Theo's little black book is legendary. His entire career, as he boasts to her on a regular basis, rests on the contacts it contains. Names and phone numbers he’s cajoled and bullied and blackmailed out of colleagues and acquaintances. Access to figures who are rich and powerful and influential – although Katherine’s not sure who, exactly. Most of his meetings and calls go through her, organised with other secretaries, an endless back-and-forth of diary negotiations and last-minute excuses when he disappears to the pub and doesn’t turn up. But the little black book is his precious, private collection – the people he only ever calls directly. Those whose numbers Theo is too paranoid to share with anyone, even Katherine. It’s a cutthroat business, he tells her. Access is everything. And I’m a lazy fucker. Without this little black book, I’d be out of a job.

Katherine runs her index finger over the book's scuffed, cracked cover, still sticky with beer residue. She imagines she can feel its power humming through the pages. Angling it towards her, she slips her nail between two pages at random and slowly lifts it up, straining to read the handwritten name underneath.

A fleshy pink hand slams down on hers, so hard that it snaps her nail. Theo snatches up the notebook, tucking it hastily into the inside pocket of his jacket. He catches her eye, gauging her embarrassment. She looks down.

“Right,” says Theo. “We’ve got work to do. I’ll get another round.”

***

“I’m sorry, Theo,” says Katherine, “I just don’t think you’d be a good fit for this role. You just don’t have the experience. Or the contacts. Not anymore. I don’t think you can compete in this market.”

As she speaks, she taps her nails distractedly on the cover of a small black notebook. It catches Theo’s eye. He stares at it.

“Oh,” she says, you had one just like this once, didn’t you? Almost exactly like this, if I remember correctly?”

Theo is eyeballing her now, upper lip hooked into a sneer, barely able to control his bubbling rage.

***

“You’ve done a fantastic job, Katherine,” Theo is yelling over the music, sliding his hand around her back to her ribcage. Instinctively she straightens up, trying to maximise the distance between his fingers and her breast without making her discomfort too obvious.

“Cheers!” she shouts back, beaming, raising her glass, hoping he’ll release her to raise his, too. Instead, his fingers travel to the nape of her neck, sweaty palm on her bare skin and he leans in, right in to shout into her ear, “I said you’ve done a fantastic job. You should be proud of yourself!”

He hovers there with a stupid grin, already drunk. He’s thrown his jacket over a chair and his shirt is moist with sweat. For a panicked moment she thinks he might actually try to kiss her. Here. With the whole office watching. With their advertisers and partners and investors all watching, too. Where she can’t run the risk of publicly humiliating him. She wriggles from his grasp and raises her glass again. “Cheers!” she shouts. “And you’re welcome! Looking forward to my Christmas bonus!”

He laughs, raises his glass. It worked. Thank fuck.

She moves quickly to the bar, shoulders squirming to shake off the trace of his touch, and motions for another glass of champagne.

“That looked uncomfortable,” says the woman next to her.

Katherine looks up, swiftly resetting her sunny expression. “What’s that?”

The woman cocks her head to one side. “Come on. We all know what he’s like.”

“Ach, he’s fine,” says Katherine, looking away quickly. “Excuse me, I have to schmooze.”

She slips into the throng of people, smiling, laughing, complimenting, charming. Working the crowd. Topping up drinks. Remembering the details that Theo never does – names of spouses, children. Interests. Birthplaces. Making a mental note of unusual interests, milestones and anniversaries for thoughtful gifts and cards and flowers – thoughtful gifts that lead to phone calls and meetings and renewed contracts and bonuses – for her boss, at least. Always for Theo.

Drunk, swaying Theo, who at this very moment is stumbling towards her, moist shirt untucked, face white as a sheet.

“Katherine!” he hisses, grabbing her wrist. “It’s an emergency.”

She follows him out into the corridor, where he crumbles against the wall, head in his hands. She frowns, waiting for the histrionics to pass.

“It’s gone!” he wails, at last. “It’s fucking gone!”

“What has? Theo, pull yourself together.”

“My notebook. My little black book. Oh god, Katherine, I’m fucked!”

Katherine breathes in sharply and presses her hand to her mouth. For a moment, they are silent.

“Christ, Katherine! What am I going to do?” he’s sobbing now. She almost feels sorry for him.

“Okay,” she says at last. “Leave it with me. I’ll do my best. But get yourself home, Theo, you’re a bloody mess.”

**

“Fuck you!” says Theo. “Fuck you, Katherine. I fucking made you. I promoted you. I created an entirely new fucking job title for you. I tripled your salary. I signed off on a fucking $20K bonus - just like that, because you asked me to. And you stole my fucking career!”

“No, no,” says Katherine, beginning to enjoy herself. “You owed me, remember? That was the deal. I just gave myself everything you had. We levelled the playing field. And then you lost the game.”

**

Katherine is barely halfway across the driveway when Theo throws open the door, unshaven and in pyjamas.

“Any news?” he croaks. He looks terrible. He hasn’t been back to the office since the Christmas party, almost a week ago.

She nods. “Great news. I’ve got it.”

He ushers her into the kitchen, beside himself with relief. “I can’t believe it!” he squeals. “Can I see it? How the fuck did you get it back? What did you do?”

“You don’t want to know,” says Katherine. “But Theo – to be clear, you owe me for this.”

In his excitement, Theo is barely listening. He nods away, murmuring agreement, anxiously looking around for his book like a puppy waiting for a treat. Instead, she opens her bag, takes out a dense wad of paper and a pen and slides them both across the table.

“What’s this?” he frowns.

“What you owe me,” says Katherine cheerfully, flashing her brightest, work-the-room smile. “Sign here”

**

“Just tell me, for fuck’s sake,” groans Theo, pressing his fingers sharply into his temples. “Just tell me who took it. After all this time. Please. Tell me how you got it back.”

**

“Cheers!” shouts Katherine. “And you’re welcome! Looking forward to my Christmas bonus!”

Theo laughs, raises his glass and stumbles slightly backwards, knocking his jacket from where it’s slung over a chair and onto the floor. His little black book tumbles from the pocket and skids under the table. “Oh, Theo,” says Katherine, bending down to pick it up. “Careful with this!” But Theo is squinting in the other direction, too drunk to respond. Perhaps, she thinks, it’s better if she puts it in her handbag, just for now, for safekeeping. Give it back to him tomorrow, when he’s sobered up. When he’s less in danger of losing it.

Katherine heads to the bar, shoulders squirming to shake off the trace of Theo’s touch, and motions for another glass of champagne.

“That looked uncomfortable,” says the woman next to her.

Katherine looks up, swiftly resetting her sunny expression. “What’s that?”

The woman cocks her head to one side. “Come on. We all know what he’s like.”

“Ach, he’s fine,” says Katherine, looking away quickly. “Excuse me, I have to schmooze.”

Mortified, she slips away into the throng. Had everyone noticed, then, Theo pursuing her? Keeping him at arm’s length without actually offending him was getting harder and harder – and she is at a loss to get him to stop. She knows without having to ask that other women in their office have given in, that the ones who haven't are the ones that never get promoted, or don't last, or get damning references when they leave - or don't go back to work at all. They're all under his power. There's nowhere to turn.

And then, suddenly, there is Theo, completely at her mercy.

Begging for help. Begging for his little black book.

Or rather, her little black book.

Because it belongs to her, now, this peculiar superpower. Just like that, she is out of his reach. She understands this with perfect clarity.

It isn’t his any more: it is hers.

And now that she’s tasted that power, she’ll never truly give it back.