The CEO’S Sweet Nemesis

We were only five minutes away from the conference hall—Five minutes in which I never thought to receive a call that would come to change the course of my life. Click, clack, click clack. The sound of my heels peeling across the hallway spelt power. Power unheard of, power well-groomed, it was that in which I strutted with while being accompanied with a number of footsteps trodding behind mine. Those footsteps came along with caution, each one measured, careful not to be an inch faster than mine. They all knew better. Six figures escorting me down the hallway, and not one of them dare be a second faster than I. For I was the only woman who could kiss their jobs goodbye, and render them back on the streets begging for scraps. But I wasn’t here now to revel in my glory. Oh, believe me, there would be enough time for that after concluding the one meeting I had looked forward to all week. Cause take it from a lady who had been woken up by the intruding call of her employee as early as 4:00 a.m. being told that we had a meeting with the Executive Board of the Elite Football league . There were two things that got me off my bed the minute that call came in: one— In as much as I loathed it, I had to meet up with these esteemed persons who held the power to place my company on a pillar of success, and two, my legs ached from last night’s steamy s*x, but that was some story for another day. Ring, ring! Oh how much I detested that sound—It usually meant two things— Business or Ill news. I had grown accustomed to it being the former, if only life had me prepped for what was to come. “Hello” My assistant had accepted the call at once, going on to utter her usual signatory, but I noticed the hesitation in her voice when she spun, holding the phone out to me. “Ma’am, this is for you” We were still strolling down the never-ending hallway of the EFL sky scraper, marching our way down to the conference hall to show them what success looked and felt like. This victory was my company’s and mine alone, that, I would make certain of. “Emma Coleen speaking, who’s this?” I utter into the cell. “Emma?” I recognized the voice at once, for a moment, rendering my steps slow. I can’t remember the last time I spoke to her. It’s been what seven years now, and as far as it went, it was that time at father’s funeral. She was there as every other person, to sympathize with mother and I. One minute she was in my embrace, and the next, she had walked out on us all, just like she always did. “Lily?” I suck a breath. “What’s wrong?” For a moment, all I got on the receiver’s end was a minute of crippling silence. Oh how much I loathed it, cursed it even, and if only I knew the words that were to follow after such silence, perhaps, I would have ended the call before the words came settling. “Mother’s dead” How quick just those two words left the hairs on my arms on stiff ends. I lost grip of the cell phone in my hands, mind gone blank, feet coming to a halt, managing to render everyone behind me paused in their tracks too. The quietude derided me for a moment, mind lodged in sheer chaos while I gazed at nothing but the glass walls of the EFL building. “Emma? Emma?… are you there?” I still could hear the voice of Lily on the other side of the call, but it soon followed with a beep, as Valerie hurried to retrieve the phone off the floor. ‘If anything happens to mother, I promise it would be on your head’ Those were the last words I heard from Lily that night we were sat in father’s study pulling away his things into old boxes. She blamed me for his death, saying I failed in noticing the rift in our family. All blame was placed on me yet, she was the one who happened to walk out on all of us all these years. How could they blame me for my parents stubble? Two people who had harbored nothing for each other but love all seventeen years long, and down the line, they began developing hatred for each other. It began the night I walked in on Father with Aunt Paula, Mother’s very own book buddy. On their matrimonial bed, he cheated with a Bimbo all because she bore breasts two sizes his fists, and hair that had been killed by hair dye over and over again. He made me promise never to tell mother, but tell me how I was to hold such burden of a news from her when I saw how much she smiled at Father every Sunday morning while serving him with his favorite meal which was nothing short of Turkey soup and raspberry pie. If there was anyone else who made me believe in true love, surely it was mother. That was until my fifteen year old eyes caught the naked body of Father wrangled with deceitful aunt Paula. Oh, curse the witch! I couldn’t bear living in such a lie anymore, and when I divulged it all to Lily, she begged me not to spew a word of it. But I never saw how she came to accept such. Most times I thought it had a thing to do with the fact that she was adopted, hence, knew not the burden of catching your biological father cheating on your own mother. But I know that was just cruel of me to think. Lily has been my sister from the moment mother and Father arrived home with her. I was only five then, and she was three. They had gone on a trip to Hungary and returned with the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. Lily was everything to me. We were inseparable. But all went downhill that evening I spilled the news at our family’s dinner. Mother choked on her food, the face of Lily had grown pale in worry, father couldn’t bring himself to gulp the orange juice in his hands, he only turned to mother with what I thought was remorse. “I’m sorry” Those were his words. And all the while mother ran out of the house with the news of her husband cheating with her own best friend, I only remained at the dining table, poking at my food. Lily spat at me that evening, running down the garden while the tears never dried up from her eyes. “You’ve ruined our family” She said to me the next day, and believe me, she was every bit right, cause in the years that were to come I watched my family become a den of strangers. Mother and Father never spoke to each other again. In fact, mother had developed a habit of waking up, serving father his meal, going out to her book club, stopping at the country club, and then returning home to a hot shower and red wine. Mother never even spoke to Lily and I. I believed it left her in ruins. But she never for once wished us the same fate as her. She would scold us whenever a boy came home looking for us, and even hated us going to parties. She detested us wearing those dresses that would cling onto our bodies leaving all for the eyes to behold. And even when we wore dresses that was all cleavage-revealing, she would smack us hard across the face, and cover us up with a shawl. She thought to have us groomed in her own ideal way, and believe me, not one of us could whine about it, but it all came crashing down that morning father died. That morning, I turned a Woman. Everything changed! It all seemed like in a moment, my eyes had been opened up to it all. I was in fact the first child of the family, and needed to act as such. I was my own person, as they would say. Lily in turn had a change of events—She left the house without dropping a letter for anyone. That year, I became the lady mother loathed me being. I graduated college, I snagged a job in one of the biggest firms in England, I lost my virginity, and even went on to burn all of those dresses gifted to me by mother. My wardrobe changed. I had grown to fancy those skimpy dresses which left your bosoms holding on for dear life. And if I ever was to wear a dress, I would make sure it was unaccompanied with panties, after all, a lady never knows when and where she would get laid. But amidst all of these, my mother and I were most alike in just one way—We both loathed men. “Miss Coleen?” The voice of Valerie was enough to snap me back into the brooding hallway of the EFL building. “Are you alright?” “Of course I am” I bat an eye. And with that, I pushed forward on my heels, matching my way down the conference hall, followed by those figures behind me. “Let’s go show these knockheads what it means to be head the biggest company in London” I uttered, pushing open the door which housed the conference hall.