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Onika had been so grateful for this job. She still is, really. Truly. Chris's girlfriend didn't have to go out on a limb for her, and either tell her about the open position or recommend her for it. The Knowles Ivy is a wonderful company to work for, in many respects, and Onika has been determined to do her best from the very beginning.
It's her boss, that's the problem. Or perhaps it's her. She isn't so sure anymore.
Onika tries her best. And to her credit, she's improved a great deal since her first day. But all her life, her anxiety has always gotten the better of her. Her heart races and she'll get clumsy. Her chest tightens, and the words swim on whatever document she's reviewing. And Mrs. Knowles, oh, she makes her so very nervous, even without saying a word.
Just the way she looks at her sometimes.
So yes, she's made mistakes. They're minor, for the most part. A typo here and there, a phone call she forgets to return. She forgets to pick up Mrs. Knowles dry cleaning or that she prefers two creams and one sugar, not one cream and two sugars, in her coffee.
This time, though. One of their biggest clients had requested their contract to be delivered by a very strict deadline. It had fallen to her to get those documents in order, to double check that they were all signed and dated and that everything was correct, to run it through legal and all the necessary departments. And there's no excuse, really, for the fact that page 50 was missing a signature, therefore rendering the entire document null and void, and after production had already been started on the client's products.
The end result is an expensive renegotiation, and the Knowles Ivy takes a financial hit, albeit a small one. Onika does her part to help fix it, but it doesn't escape anybody's notice that this is her fault to begin with, especially not hers.
She can't even blame Mrs. Knowles for being furious, when she calls her into her office at the end of the day, once the mess has finally been sorted out. Onika clasps her hands in front of her, hanging back from her desk as she feels that familiar tightness in her chest. She's going to lose her job. She's going to be fired and broke, and how is she going to pay for Nana's care now, and-
Mrs. Knowles is speaking, Onika vaguely realizes at some point, but she's not hearing the words. Lecturing her, really, rehashing the details she already knows. Until they get to the end of it, and Mrs. Knowles is staring at her again, as Onika twists her hands together.
"But I don't want to fire you." She concludes, and that certainly is surprising, as is what she says next. "So I'll give you a choice." She leans back in her seat. "I'll dock your monthly pay. One thousand dollars. Or," Her head tilts, and Onika feels a prickle of unease as her stomach drops. A thousand dollars ? Mrs. Knowles expression is a familiar one. It's smug, far too pleased with herself. It's the expression she wears after landing a contract or a client. Sometimes before -- unearned victory, though it's always earned in the end. "I'll spank you."
