Rest and Relaxation by Evil Dolly [email protected] All Rights Reserved

Rest and Relaxation by Evil Dolly [email protected] www.evil-dolly.com All rights reserved. Prologue So you want to hear my story? My side of things? I don’t know why. I can’t imagine there’s anything about what happened that you don’t already know. Or do you just want to record it for posterity? Why? Who’s ever going to read it? And why would anyone want to? Maybe it would be good to get it off my chest, but… don’t you know how hard this for me? Not just in that it’s hard to remember everything that happened years ago, but it’s painful, too. Alright. I’ll try. I just can’t believe you want me to relive everything that happened to me. It was hard enough to just go through it all once, now you want me to do it again? You can’t imagine what it was like for me. I had thought after I finally left that house that I could put all this stuff behind me. You know, just try to get on with my life… and figure out how to live with what’s been done to me. Those were some awful times. The worst experience in my life. I just want to forget it and move on. I really don’t want to do this. Fine. You want me to relive everything that happened to me since day one? You want to see it through my eyes? Know my thoughts? You want me to dig through my memories and dredge up all the horrible little details? Fine. You’ll get it. You’re not going to like everything I have to say, but don’t blame me. Remember, you asked me to do this. Chapter 1 “You really need to relax, Katherine. You’re stressing yourself out. You can’t be in control of every little thing.” I rolled my eyes. Sure I can, just give me enough time. The company shrink could see he wasn’t getting through to me. I didn’t care. I didn’t want to be in this balding hippy’s little office to begin with. The cheesy motivational posters plastered all of the walls were enough to give me a headache by themselves. My leg was bouncing impatiently and I checked my watch again. “You’re spreading yourself too thin,” he advised. “I’m doing just fine,” I responded curtly. “Just fine? People don’t get sent to me when they’re ‘just fine.’ Yesterday you shouted at a temp and hurled a paperweight through a wall. Does that sound just fine to you?” I shrugged. “It was a thin wall. I can’t be held responsible for shoddy construction,” I said. He started to protest and I cut him off. “Look, this is all being blown way out of proportion. The guy did a bad job. It’s going to cost me days of work to make up for his mistakes. I don’t have time for that kind of thing! So I lost my temper. Sorry. Won’t happen again. Sometimes I feel like I’m carrying my whole department.” “You’re making your co-workers uncomfortable, is what you’re doing.” “So what? Hey, I’ve never been people’s best friend around here, but I get the job done. Okay? Honestly, I’m the only one around here who actually gets things accomplished. I didn’t get to be the head underwriter here by the age of twenty-nine by being laid-back and people-friendly.” That was sure true. I’d had to claw and scratch my way to the top, but I did it. People just don’t work unless you occasionally apply the whip. So what if I was hated? So what if there was the occasional nervous breakdown? That came with the territory. That’s what I got paid for. “This is an office, not a battleground. I’ll be frank and say that you’re not very popular among those who work under you since you got that position. And then there’s always the rumors about that business concerning your predecessor.” Another eye roll. “Oh, gawd, that.” My ‘predecessor,’ Alice Merryweather, had been a thorn in my side ever since I started to work there. For years we were silent enemies. Well, mostly the rancor was on my part. I always hated her. But she didn’t like me much, either. She stepped in the way of me getting promoted several times. She told me she didn’t like the way I did things. I figured she was just jealous. I was a young, pretty, and ambitious. She was a dumpy, frumpy, nearly middle-aged woman with bad hair and terrible fashion sense. People liked her because she didn’t make them work. I wouldn’t normally have cared whether she liked me or not, and I would simply have dismissed her, except that I needed to get her out of the way to get to the top. I wasn’t letting someone like her screwing up my career plans. Since I couldn’t go around her, I had to go through her. The problem was, even though she was lazy by my standards, she did her job passably well. The company had no reason to replace her. So I had to give them a reason. Turned out, it was easy. After a little investigating, I found out she was a dyke. She lived with her lover and everything. Not many people knew because she didn’t spread it around, but she wasn’t ashamed of it or anything. I was a totally closeted bisexual–having learned to keep it a deep, dark secret so that I could get ahead in the business world–and that just made me hate her more. It wasn’t fair that she got to have her cake and eat it, too; not while some of us had to repress ourselves just to have a chance at success. Still, it was something I could use against her. So I started by mending the bridges between us for a few weeks, then I began to lightly flirt with her in private. At the same time, I let slip a couple of rumors around the office that she had been making suggestions to me that had made me ‘uncomfortable.’ She was pretty devoted to her lover and wasn’t inclined to sleep around, but I guess her self-esteem was low enough that enough flattering and flirtation from a pretty younger woman eventually got to her. I executed a carefully orchestrated encounter in front of a hallway security camera. I got her alone and, while appearing to be formal and business-like, I pushed her buttons until she lost all sense of priority. She came up behind me, put her arm around me, and kissed my neck. I had asked her to do just that, to embrace me. But, to the camera, it looked like something else entirely. It was almost funny to see her expression as I reacted to her kiss with disgust and confusion. I pushed her off of me and hurried away, even managing to work up some tears on my way out as I left early for the day. A few days later I trumped up a false sexual harassment accusation that brought her under suspicion. It wasn’t quite enough to make her lose her job, but she was teetering on the brink. A week later, I had to take some papers to her in her office. With a smile, I quietly but viciously teased and goaded her until she lost it. She started shouting at me, pulled my hair, and then she struck me, all in front of several witnesses. Having been driven into a corner and pushed too far, it was a natural – if stupid – reaction on her part, but it sealed her fate. It achieved making her look like she was pissed at me for reporting her sexual harassment of me. She was let go and I got her position. A well-executed plan. It wasn’t the last time I manipulated people to get my way, but it was certainly the most devious. I know, I know. I sound like a total monster. Believe me, I would rather have found a way around her, but she intentionally kept putting herself in my path. She had been a random element I couldn’t control. She asked for it. Hell, she practically begged for it. I didn’t take any particular pleasure out of what I did. I just did what had to be done. It was strictly business. Sometimes you just have to look out for yourself, take care of number one, or else you’ll never get anywhere in this life. And I did have regrets and a sleepless night or two over the whole thing, but, dammit, this was a war and she was an unfortunate casualty. Dog-eat- dog. Law of the jungle. Survival of the fittest. That’s the most important lesson I had learned from my parents, before they passed away. Besides, I probably did Alice favor. A frumpy dyke like that was never going to get promoted. All I did was give her the chance to explore greener pastures. That’s all. “I don’t want to talk about that.” “Alright. There’s also your recent divorce. Maybe-” “My divorce doesn’t enter into this. It meant nothing.” The two-bit shrink was getting frustrated.

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