Britt Collier was perilously close to losing her shit. She was the only accountant on the payroll currently, and while she didn’t mind answering relevant questions, she didn’t need her smarmy boss leaning over her desk. He was obviously craning his neck to get a view down her blouse. Familiar with this tactic, she had her blouse buttoned up high and a tank top on beneath it so even in the case of some catastrophic button apocalypse; she’d still be safeguarded from his prying eyes. If the small company had an HR department, she’d file a complaint for sexual harassment. As it was, the hiring manager was also the COO’s assistant so it wouldn’t exactly be news. The COO, also called the chief operations officer, director of operations, is a position that was one of the highest-ranking executive positions in an organization. Maybe someday, she’d get that high up the corporate ladder. A girl can always reach for the sky, right? In fact, Britt was pretty sure the assistant got her cushy dual-title job by doing some horizontal interviewing with Mr. Freeman himself.

Britt would’ve liked to imagine herself as a no-nonsense woman, a feminist who took no prisoners. However, she slumped at her desk miserably and said nothing as Freeman reached across her to point at her monitor. He couldn’t stop staring at her chest. She slid back from the desk in her wheeled office chair and stood.

“That’s about enough,” she said.

“Pardon me, Miss Collier?” he said, eyebrows raised warningly.

“I explained all of this in my email. So if you don’t mind, I have expense accounts to update.”

“Sure. I know how busy you are.”

“If you’ll excuse me.”

He smiled.

She breezed out of her own cubicle and went to the ladies room just to be away from him. She wished she could have said something cutting and clever, something that humiliated him the way his attempts to brush against her breasts humiliated her. To make herself feel better, she checked the date on her phone. Six more days, she told herself with a nod. Britt managed to get through the last hour of work, briskly double-checking spreadsheets and crossing items off her to-do list. She finished up a healthy ten minutes before five, with time enough to tidy her desk and make her list for tomorrow’s workday. As soon as the minute hand hit the twelve, she was on her feet, purse in hand.

Down the elevator from the eleventh floor which Creative Consulting occupied, she reached the lobby just as Marjorie, her best friend, emerged from the stairwell. Marj was training for a half marathon and maintained that elevators would weaken her. They headed by mutual consent to Joe’s Java, the coffee shop around the corner from the office building. They had a standing Thursday after-work coffee date.

Settling into a booth by the window, Britt sipped her caramel latte and sighed with relief. It was quiet there, but not the kind of quiet that she got at the office, with its annoying buzz of fluorescent lights overhead and the expectant shark-in-the-water silence as she strained to hear if Freeman approached. He wasn’t really a shark, she reasoned, more of an octopus with all those arms and hands. Marjorie got herself something with soy and protein powder that had a greenish cast to it.

“That looks like paint. Ugly paint. Like doctor’s waiting room paint.”

“Thanks. It’s good though. Coconut water and kale and protein powder—”

“Sounds like paradise,” Britt groaned.

“No, paradise would be three weeks in Bali with Ryan Gosling.”

“Still Ryan Gosling? Can we please move on from the Notebook?”

“Never. I’m nothing if not loyal.”

“How many guys have you dated this month exactly, Miss loyalty?” Britt said playfully.

“That’s dating. Me and Ryan Gosling, that’s true love.”

“Does he know about this?”

“No, it’s better this way. I don’t want to break up his happy home.”

“How selfless of you. Freeman was in my office this afternoon pointing at my monitor.”

“Ugh. Did he drop a pen so he could peek up your skirt?”

“I wear pants for a reason.”

“So he went strictly for the boobs. I hear you,”

Marj said ruefully. “In a week he’ll be retired and groping his way through unfortunate bingo players down at the senior center.”

“Does he seem like a bingo guy?”

“No, he seems like he’d hang out down at the strip clubs and insist on making change out of the g-strings.”

“Ew. Yes, he does. At least he won’t be breathing down our necks anymore.”

“You mean heavy breathing down our necks. He’s such a pervert.”

“Believe me, I won’t cry any tears when he leaves but what if the next guy is an even worse asshole?”

“Is that possible? I mean, Hitler’s dead, right?”

“Yes, but there are plenty of chauvinist pigs out there in the world of upper management. They like positions of authority when they’re not sunning themselves on a convenient rock.”

“Right. Well, let me see the houses.”

“Apartments. I’ve found three properties to choose from. I’m so excited to show them to Kevin tonight.”

“Six months is a long time. Where are you going to celebrate?”

“They just reopened Tamarind after a remodel, and we’re dying to try it,” Britt said excitedly. “I bought a new dress and everything.”

“You shopped? You must be excited about this.”

“Well, we’re moving in together after all these months. I’ve been looking forward to it. No more watching back to back episodes of Flip That House because I’m lonely and bored. We’ll be together and really start our life. I wanted to get someplace we could fix up together, make it our own, but Kevin isn’t really into DIY.”

“Do it yourself? Neither are you.”

“In all fairness, no, I don’t have a lot of home improvement skills but I’d like to learn. I watch those tutorials on how to strip and paint a bench from a yard sale and stuff and I’d like to try it.”

“You watch videos about benches? Honey, you need something better to look forward to than that.”

“What do you suggest I do?”

“Find yourself a nice video with Ryan Gosling in it.”

“You are impossible.” Britt shook her head and finished her latte.

“I like this first one.”

“Me, too, but I think the kitchen’s too small. What if I had to assemble a lasagna or something. There’s no space on the worktops.”

“What are the odds that you’ll be assembling a lasagna? Are you counting taking one out of the freezer as assembly?”

“No, I’ve been watching these cooking shows and—”

“We have to get you premium channels. You’re watching lasagnas and benches, and you think you like it. There’s more out there. Movies, shows about zombies and shit.”

“I’ll stick to the cooking. You can have the zombies and shit.”

“Thanks. What about the third one?”

“It’s my favorite. It has a rooftop garden. We could have one of those tables with the market umbrella, and we could eat antipasto and watch the sun set.”

“If that’s your fantasy, go for it.”

“What?”

“It’s just that Kevin doesn’t seem like the antipasto at sunset type, unless he’s playing on his phone in the fantasy. He has a serious problem with the phone addiction.”

“Says the woman who calls Siri her BFF?”

“She knows everything! Besides, you know she can’t replace you.”

“I think if I set the scene, maybe some terracotta pots with flowering plants or herbs in them, a chilled bottle of white wine, fresh blood oranges...”

“Is this a fantasy about Kevin or a fantasy about living in a magazine spread about Tuscany?”

“It’s my house fantasy, ‘kay? Let me have it. This may be my last chance to think about it. He may hate the idea of the roof garden.”

“Only if he has to climb stairs or anything else that requires putting down his phone. Seriously, Britt, I’m not sure you’ve thought this through. Do you want to live with someone like that?”

“He’s perfectly fine. He remembers my birthday, and he always calls if he’s running late. What more could a girl want?”

“Attention. Excitement. Someone with a personality.”

“He has a personality.”

“Liking his phone and being afraid of olives is not a personality.”

“He isn’t afraid of them. He just doesn’t like them.”

“He practically laid an egg when the waiter put olives in his martini last week. I mean, what did he think came in a martini? A whole pineapple?”

“Okay, so I can forget antipasto...but he’s a great guy, and we’re going to have a fabulous life.”

“I hope you’re right,” she said. “Anyway, we’re unloading the bastard boss, so that’s a good thing.”

“Here’s a picture of the dress...” Britt pulled up a photo of the dress she’d bought for their dinner.

“It’s stunning.”

She smiled. “Thanks.”

“I bet he rips it off of you.”

“Highly doubtful.”

She sighed. “Yeah, we are talking about Kevin here.”

***

When Kevin called to ask her to meet him at Tamarind, so he didn’t have to drive back across town just to pick her up, Britt told herself he was remarkably practical. He would probably get there first, secure a romantic table with a waterfront view and order her favorite wine so it would be waiting for her. She parked, got out of the car and smoothed the hem of her new dress. It was a little daring for her taste, but the saleslady said it was sexy. It was a deep eggplant purple, fitted and off the shoulder. It hugged her curves in all the right places, and she’d worn long silver earrings with it, a plummy pink lipstick and smoky eye makeup. She felt more glamorous than she ever had, more ready to be a real, grown-ass woman who made a commitment and lived with her partner.