Accidentally Amy(57)

Blake pushed through the door to the stairwell and started down the stairs toward Izzy’s floor. It was a stupid move, going to her office, but he felt like he had to know that instant. He quickly descended four flights of stairs before straightening his tie, checking his phone, then coolly stepping onto the HR floor, trying his best to look casual and professional.
“Blake,” said a tall guy – John something? - with a nod, walking down the hall as if it was entirely normal for Blake to be popping out of stairwells.
“Adam,” Blake muttered in response. He turned the corner and --
“Hey, Blake.” Pam stopped walking. “I was just coming to see you.”
“Yeah?” He said, looking past her in the direction of Izzy’s office.
“Yes. We finished all twelve of the separations.” That made his gut clench, which was stupid because he’d known it was happening.
He tried for detached when he said, “Everything go okay?”
She nodded. “The Danovich employees didn’t seem surprised post-acquisition, for the most part, and I think they appreciated the severance package and support we’ll provide them in securing employment.”
“Good,” he said robotically, not even recognizing that he’d responded to Pam.
He couldn’t stop thinking, worrying, obsessing over Izzy; it was impossible for him to think about anything other than her at the moment.
“I felt really bad for my new generalist, though,” she said, pursing her lips. “She seemed shocked.”
He rubbed the back of his neck and wondered if he had any more Tums in his desk.
He said, “It’s never easy, is it?”
He swallowed.
“So what brings you down to our floor?” she asked.
“Uh.” He tugged at his tie and seemed unable to come up with a word. Any words at all. What the fuck was wrong with him?
He said, “I misplaced my phone and thought I’d check down here.”
She glanced down at his hand, where he was clearly holding the latest iPhone. He said, “I have to go now.”
Once he was in the elevator, he pulled out his phone and texted: Are you okay? He hadn’t realized how certain he was that she wouldn’t respond until the vibration of his phone scared the shit out of him.


    Izzy
Was he kidding with that?
Izzy shoved her phone into the pocket of her coat.
Nope. She definitely wasn’t okay.
Because getting fired was terrible. She felt embarrassed, rejected, sad, and stressed about her future. But what was even worse – devastating, honestly – was the fact that Blake had known.
Perhaps if she didn’t work in HR, she might’ve been able to delude herself into thinking he hadn’t been aware. She might’ve assumed he was too important to be in the weeds of a workforce reduction.
But Blake was the AVP. He was the one in charge of things like this. If he hadn’t been the one to make the decision, he’d at the very least signed off on it.
So when she’d been burying her face in his neck at the farmer’s market and thinking about forever with him, he’d been fully-aware that she would only be employed for a few more days.
She looked out the window, at the steady autumn rain, and the question came out of nowhere, nearly knocking the wind out of her.
Had her termination been the why and how of their relationship? Had Blake known she was getting fired, and that knowledge made him okay with more than friends??
Had she been fired SO they could be more than friends?
She shifted the box on her lap as the bus’s squeaky brakes squealed to a stop at the end of her block. Her cheeks burned as she stood and walked down the center aisle, hyperaware that every eye on that bus knew she’d just been fired.
And when she stood on the curb and watched the bus pull away, it somehow felt like yet another rejection.
Izzy pulled the hood of her jacket a little tighter as she walked in the rain. Everything sucked, but she was going to try her best to be positive.
It’s a gorgeous autumn morning, she told herself, letting her eyes wander over the rain-dampened yellow leaves that were covering the sidewalk. You have your health, she thought as she catalogued the lack of physical pain existing in her body.
You will find anoth—
“Oof!”
She tripped on a raised section of sidewalk, falling forward and all the way down to her hands and knees, spilling her I-just-got-fired box all over those wet leaves.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” she whined, though no one was even around to hear her.
It was a Tuesday morning. Everyone else was at work.


    Blake
After an hour, she finally responded.
Izzy: Fine. HBU?
Yeah, she wasn’t fine. He responded with: I just saw Pam.
Izzy: Haha samesies
He hated this. He didn’t want work to ruin what they had. He didn’t want this hanging between them.
He texted: So again - are you okay?
Izzy: I’m fine. Ellis is very generous with their severance packages.
He didn’t know what to say to that. He texted: Can I call you?
Instead of answering, his phone started ringing. Izzy was calling him. He lifted the phone to his ear. “Hey.”
“So I have three questions,” she said, sounding uncharacteristically serious. “I don’t want to be a hardass, especially since you’re kind of my favorite right now, but I need answers.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck. “Right. Of course.”
“Okay.” She cleared her throat before saying, “When did you find out Ellis was firing me?”
“You didn’t get fired, you were part of a workforce reduct--”