@wildviolcts
Morgan could not remember the last time she had sat in an interview. It had been years since anyone had asked her to tell them about a time when… Nor had she updated her resumé since the heels of her shoes first clicked against the marble floors of the Charles Schwab lobby. Associate Financial Consultant, Global Equities was the entry-level role her Bachelors in Finance from NYU had afforded her. Twenty-five thousand hours spent pouring over financial models and equities. Twenty-five thousand hours spent calculating liquidity, assets and throwing around numbers with more zeros than any morality should allow. Twenty-five thousand hours spent missing sending apology cards and flowers for missed dates, calling her mother to disappoint her with her absence from Thanksgiving, Christmas and Birthday dinners. She was no longer the same greenhorn finance graduate, who wobbled in heels and fingers trembled when she spoke on the phone with investors.
She was a competitor, and it was the single advantage she had in the finance world dominated by men. Morgan expected perfection from her colleagues, and even more of herself. After all, they worked in a business of risk and assurance. Risk was always found in the unknowns- the single enemy of a good investment opportunity. Always first to the office, and last to leave, she stepped on the neck and suffocated any word to question her abilities, her determination, or her drive. Morgan presented herself as an assurance, a straight-forward, early investment opportunity for the firm to capitalise on. It was the reason she had risen above the rest of her graduate peers. She would win no popularity contests, but her insights had fattened the wallets of her clients, and added zeros to the portfolio of her firm.
Morgan prided herself on her keen eye, an ability to see value before the writing was scrawled on the wall. Something she was sure Maxwell from Human Resources lacked. She could only guess by her dismissal of her third executive assistant in as many months. (One mistake was forgivable. Two, however, was banishment. She could not miss investor meetings simply because of her assistant's moment of scheduling forgetfulness at best, ineptitude to operate a simple fucking calendar at worst.) 'A difference in selection criteria' was how she had carefully worded her nebulous rebuke of the failure to hire a competent candidate. Her email was polite, before closing with a demand an assurance that she was more of capable of conducting the selection process again, herself. She made multi-million dollar decisions, she could pick out an assistant that could answer her calls.
At least, that's what she had told herself. But after sifting through the first few resumés that had landed on her desk, with a hundred more still printing, the blue pen she had carefully selected for annotating and striking through the lifetimes of achievements, lulled in her hand. What was she looking for? An equal. Meticulous, driven, thick-skinned and not afraid of doing the work. Someone who would understand the pressure of her job, and clear the path of the menial, and trivial work that pulled her focus away from the decisions only she could make. Someone who could put up with her temper, and her direct words, and still perform at their best. She couldn't help but smile to herself, at the absurdity of it all. She doesn't exist. As far as her dating exploits had informed her- her equal was not wandering New York.
Of the few resumés that had not been culled for various reasons (spelling or grammar mistakes, menial college alma mater, unsuitable font choice, inappropriate use of colour on a formal document, an email address that was certainly set up as a teenager in the early 2000s, to name a few,) a single round of interviews began. She had scheduled them one after another, determined not to spend more than a day (let alone the entire week HR had taken previously). By the time she walked out of the building for the evening, she was confident she would have called to make an offer.
Midday had passed, as had half of the field of candidates. The sleeves of her neatly pressed dress shirt were folded up her forearms, her top button undone- signs of frustration by the lack of chemistry her efforts had yielded.
She stood in greeting from behind her uncharacteristically tidy table, unusually bare of the documents that required her sign off, investor reports, contracts from legal and the rest of the paperwork that plastered her broad, lacquered wood desk. Morgan noted the unusual light in her office- the early afternoon sun, streaming in from the floor-to-ceiling windows of the corner office, reflected off of the empty surface of her desk and arms of her cream leather sofa. All but four items had been cleared from her desk; a resumé, a notepad, a blue pen and her coffee cup. She appraised the woman as she had walked into her office- on time and neat in her appearance. A pretty face. A firm handshake. Morgan smiled politely as she gestured for the woman to sit across from her. "Miss Doss," she spoke to herself, her fingers finding the freshly printed resumé with the small blue asterisks and circles she had added in her preparation the evening before. Morgan let the silence linger as her eyes scanned the resumé, as if she needed a reminder of the life achievements of the candidate in front of her. As if she had not studied them carefully over tea late yesterday evening. After a few moments pause, she cleared her throat. "I must say, your resumé reads well. Scholarship at Barnard. Bachelors in English. Your letter of recommendation… Your professor speaks to your abilities. More than my own professors would have spoke of mine." She placed the resumé on her table, and picked up the pen, tapping the nib on the blank piece of lined paper. Her eyes locked with Violet's- the resumé sung, as did the commendations of her professor. There was assurance. But what was her risk? What was her unknown? "You tell a compelling story with all of these pieces put together. But there is one thing I'm left questioning. Why do you want this job? Judging by your major, and your extracurriculars, I don't see an interest in Finance, nor an undying love of organising someone else's professional life. By your professor's account, you have a promising set of skills for your area of study. So, why are we meeting today?"













