Despite everything, I smiled slightly.
Richard continued.
“I’ve spent almost my entire adult life building that place. I always imagined I’d know exactly when it was time to leave.”
“And now you do?”
“I should have known five years ago.”
That sounded like him.
Then he became serious.
“The buyer gave me certain conditions.”
I waited.
“One of them concerned leadership.”
My stomach tightened again.
Richard continued.
“They wanted to bring in someone from outside.”
I nodded.
That made sense.
A new owner.
New management.
And apparently no place for me.
Then Richard said, “I told them no.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
“I told them they already had someone.”
I stared at him.
He held my gaze.
“You.”
For several seconds, I honestly thought I had misunderstood him.
“Me?”
“Yes.”
I looked around as if there might be someone standing behind me.
Richard laughed.
“Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Pretend there’s another person here I could possibly be talking about.”
My mind immediately went back to the folder in accounting.
The lawyers.
The meetings.
The whispering.
Richard must have seen the realization on my face.
“Yes,” he said. “That’s what all of that was about.”
“My name on the folder?”
“Legal documents.”
“The lawyers?”
“Transition paperwork.”
“The private meetings?”
“Negotiations.”
I stared at him.
“You let me think I was being fired.”
“I didn’t know you thought that.”
“Richard, people practically stopped breathing whenever I walked into a room.”
He winced.
“That part could have been handled better.”
I laughed.
Not because anything was particularly funny.
Mostly because the alternative was crying.
“So you’re not firing me?”
“Well technically…”
“Richard.”
He smiled.
“You won’t work for me anymore.”
Then he reached into the folder beside him and handed me several documents.
