Chapter 6: Zara’s “Blacklisted” Life
1011 Words
Zara did not cry in public.
She cried in the shower. And once in the car, which was a new and impressive achievement in misery.
But she did not cry in public.
Especially not after being fired live on camera.
Especially not after telling a billionaire tech CEO that he “couldn’t love at all” while 4.2 million people watched.
Especially not when she knew that within twenty-four hours, her name would be everywhere—and not in a “congratulations, you got a promotion” kind of way.
It was more like, “oh no, that’s the girl who told Adrian Vance he doesn’t have a heart and then got fired for it.”
She sat on her mattress, laptop open, phone buzzing like it was trying to vibrate itself to death.
Email after email scrolled across the screen.
Thank you for your interest.
We’ve decided to move forward with other candidates.
We’re not a good fit at this time.
Please remove your application from our system.
She stared at the last one.
“Remove your application from our system?” she muttered. “Why? Do you have a virus? Do I have a virus?”
She closed the laptop.
She opened it again.
She scrolled.
More rejections.
More silence.
More we don’t think you’re the right person for this role that sounded a lot like we don’t think you’re the right person for anything.
She stood up and walked to the kitchen.
She opened the fridge.
It was empty.
Well, not empty. There was a jar of mustard. A half-eaten container of leftover pasta. A bottle of water that had been sweating for three days.
But no food.
No real food.
Just the kind of food you eat when you’re avoiding your problems—and your problems are avoiding you back.
She closed the fridge.
She grabbed her keys and stepped outside.
The corner store was two blocks away.
She bought a bag of chips, a soda, a candy bar—and a lottery ticket.
When she got back, she sat on the mattress and ate everything she had just bought.
Then she looked at the lottery ticket.
She didn’t scratch it.
She just stared at it.
Because even if she won, she didn’t know what she’d do.
Would she quit? Would she cry? Would she buy a house? Would she buy a dog?
Would she buy a dog and name it Gatsby?
She didn’t know.
She just knew that she was broke, blacklisted, alone—and furious.
And she was starting to think that maybe, just maybe, Adrian Vance was right.
Maybe she was disruptive.
Maybe she was unprofessional.
Maybe she was exactly the kind of person who got fired live on camera and then spent the next day eating chips and wondering if the universe had a personal problem with her.
Her phone buzzed.
She didn’t look.
She knew what it was.
Another rejection.
Another we’ve decided to move forward with other candidates.
Another please remove your application from our system.
She ignored it.
Then she pulled her phone toward her anyway.
Because she was apparently a masochist.
She opened the email.
Subject: Thank You for Your Interest – Apex Innovations.
She blinked.
Apex Innovations?
She tapped it.
Dear Ms. Reed,
We would like to discuss an opportunity for you to work with Apex Innovations in a new capacity.
Please report to the main office at 10 a.m. tomorrow.
Signed,
Adrian Vance, CEO.
Zara stared at the screen.
She read it again.
And again.
“New capacity?” she whispered.
That sounded suspicious.
That sounded like a trap.
That sounded like we’re going to pay you to apologize on camera.
She tossed the phone onto the mattress.
Then she stood and walked to the window, staring out at the city as if it might explain something.
Brooklyn was quiet.
Streetlights glowed. Cars moved. Life went on.
And somewhere in a glass tower, Adrian Vance was probably looking at a schedule that read: Zara Reed – 10 a.m.
He probably thought it was just another meeting.
He was wrong.
It was the beginning of the end.
Or the beginning of something.
Probably something stupid.
Or something romantic.
Or something she absolutely wasn’t ready for.
She turned away from the window and sat back down.
She picked up the lottery ticket.
This time, she scratched it.
She lost.
Of course she did.
Of course nothing was going to work out easily.
Of course the universe was going to make her earn every single thing.
She tossed the ticket onto the floor and lay back on the mattress, staring at the ceiling.
Her mind drifted.
To Adrian.
To the cameras.
To that moment.
To the way he had looked at her when she said, “You can’t love at all.”
To the way he had looked at her when he fired her.
She didn’t know what to think.
She didn’t know what to feel.
She just knew that tomorrow, at 10 a.m., she was walking into Apex Innovations.
She was walking into the lion’s den.
She was walking straight into Adrian Vance’s office.
And she was going to find out what “new capacity” really meant.
Trap or not.
She closed her eyes and took a slow breath.
She wasn’t running.
Not yet.
But she definitely wasn’t walking in confident, either.
Because something told her tomorrow wasn’t going to be normal.
Something told her tomorrow was going to be the start of something messy.
Something dangerous.
Something she wouldn’t be able to walk away from.
Her thoughts blurred.
Spreadsheets. Cameras. Adrian.
Love.
The end. The beginning.
Something complicated.
Something she wasn’t ready for.
And somewhere in that half-dream, Adrian was looking at her.
Smiling.
That part was the scariest.
She exhaled slowly.
Maybe she was overthinking.
Maybe she should just sleep—and let the universe do whatever it was planning.
She closed her eyes.
And this time, she fell asleep.
The city kept moving.
The world kept turning.
And somewhere online, her worst moment kept spreading.
- Writer
