2: 2
2.
To keep it from spreading, Sylvia muted the chat for ten minutes.
"Polly, filing a police report — isn't that a little much?"
"We're all coworkers here. You just got confirmed, don't make a scene like this."
"Polly, Zachery meant well."
Reading Sylvia's private messages, I felt myself go colder by the second.
Every line made excuses for Zachery.
Every line hinted I had a sugar daddy.
"Meant well? Sylvia, if he'd said that about you, would you be talking like this?"
The other end went quiet. But not for long.
Then the messages came at me in a rush.
"Why would he say that about me? I don't chase sugar daddies, I don't sell myself, so he'd have nothing on me."
"You, though, Polly — fresh out of school, driving a luxury car, carrying an LV bag. Is that really your own money you're spending?"
"Stand straight and you don't fear a crooked shadow. But you don't stand straight."
"Sylvia, do you have proof? If you do, show it. If you don't, shut your mouth."
The grievance of my past life and today's anger fused into one.
I hammered at the keyboard.
Once she stopped coming at me, I saved the whole exchange.
Straight into the private folder on my desktop where I kept the evidence.
No. Not on my own.
I couldn't let this pack of people who'd smeared me get off without a lesson.
I stepped into the break room and called my cousin, a lawyer at a firm.
"Polly, don't try to prove yourself, but don't stay silent either. I trust you. Gather your evidence first."
He could hear I was low, so he tried to steady me. "A little case like this is nothing to me. I'll strike first, and your family's legal team backs the whole thing up. That Zachery is going to pay for this, guaranteed."
When I came out of the break room, a crowd was clustered around my desk.
I walked over fast and saw Zachery sitting in my chair, going through my computer.
"Who gave you the right? That's my desk."
My bag had been yanked open, the lipstick inside snapped in two, the compact smashed to powder.
Travel coffee, tampons, tissues thrown all over the floor.
Wendy was digging through it in disposable gloves, wearing a look of disgust.
"Wendy, those are my personal belongings. You're invading my privacy."
I opened my phone camera and aimed it at her.
She wasn't the least bit afraid.
"Polly Swanson, you think I want to invade your privacy? I'm just letting everyone see who you really are."
She stamped her foot down on my bag, grinding the lipstick and compact a few times like she was venting.
"This bag is Chanel's newest style, over two hundred grand. The lipstick and compact are Armani limited editions. You're an intern — six thousand a month before you were confirmed. How could you afford any of this?"
I was about to open my mouth when she smiled and said, "And don't tell me you earned it in college. Your college years, your family — the company's background check laid it all out."
Before joining the company, every intern went through a background check.
That file touched on personal privacy.
Only HR and vice presidents and above had the clearance to view it.
I glanced around. In the HR office, a figure stood behind the frosted glass, watching this way.
So they'd started closing ranks.
"Go on, tell us. Where did all this come from? What did you trade for it?"
I said nothing, only kept recording every move of everyone there.
"Can't explain it, right? Then I'll explain it for you!"
And with that, she pulled from my bag something that wasn't mine at all.
