On the other side of Gregory’s while Bianca and David were getting to know one another, a group of about eight people walked in and took their seats at a large table. They ordered their first drinks and toyed with the idea of getting dinner. Gregory’s offered a great deal of meal options so there was a lot to choose from. There was one member of the team that was particular in their order so they spent a lot of time going over the menu.

They had come from a local IT company down the street. They had originally left their boss working late at his desk. He had bid them a fond farewell for the evening. It was about an hour later that he walked into the restaurant and went to the hostess’ podium.

She had seen him before as there were few food options in town. Still, every time he came into the restaurant it was shocking. He was so handsome, a tall darker skinned black man with a shaved head. His eyes were kind and he had an easy but subdued smile. He dressed professionally in buttoned down shirts with a tie when on the clock, a few buttons unbuttoned at the top when it was party time. The comfiest that anyone had ever seen him was when he was the gym in his workout clothes.

“Hello,” he said to her.

“Hi, table for one?” she asked.

“No, unfortunately I won’t be enjoying the ambience tonight, pick up, two orders for Patrick.”

She checked something on her tablet.

“They should be ready in a matter of moments,” she said.

“Thank you. Having a good night?” he asked.

“Not that bad. Kind of slow.”

“Hm.”

He looked into the restaurant and saw his employees. He let out a slow smile and turned to the hostess.

“I need to pay for those meals, don’t I?” he said.

“Yes, would you like to pay by cash or card?” the hostess asked.

“Card. That table of eight, would it be possible to keep my card on file so that I can pay for their meal as well?”

“Feeling generous?”

“They’re my employees. I think they deserve a free meal. Though don’t tell them until the end. I don’t want them taking advantage of my generosity.”

“That’s fair. Would you like to leave a tip?”

“Twenty percent of their meal. Don’t tell them that either, please. I want to see if they know enough to leave a tip as well.”

“I will make the arrangements. Thank you.”

One of the bus boys came out and handed him the meals in a to go bag. Patrick took it, thanked the staff for the food and left.

As he left into the night, Patrick left behind an existential crisis for one of his employees, Adam. He had looked over when he saw movement at the hostess stand and saw Patrick. His face went pale when he saw him.

“Shit,” Adam said dropping back into his seat.

“What?” Charlotte, one of his coworkers said.

“I saw Patrick at the the hostess stand. He knows we come here.”

“I mean, he knows we came this one time,” Trent, their other coworker said.

“And there’s no law against us getting together,” added Georgia.

“Yeah, but we like purposely excluded him,” Adam said.

“I doubt he’s going to care,” Charlotte said.

“Yeah, I’m sure he has his own life to live,” Melanie said as she stirred her drink.

“You need to calm down, dude,” Pablo said before taking a bite of his mozzarella stick.

“Yeah, I’m sure it’s fine,” Adam said.

“I mean, he might fire you but that’s to be expected,” Tabitha said.

“Don’t say that,” Georgia said.

“I’m kidding.”

“Not funny,” Arjun added staring at into his drink.

“Sorry,” Tabitha said sincerely.

“Let’s just enjoy the night and we’ll deal with it tomorrow,” Georgia said.

“Yeah, he’s a good boss anyway, I doubt he’s going to care,” Trent said.

“Eh, good bosses don’t make you work on your birthday,” Tabitha said.

“Getting your birthday off is not a thing,” Pablo said.

“It should be.”

That led them to another discussion while Adam had an internal conflict. After a little bit longer, they asked for the bill.

“A gentleman paid your bill already,” Heather, their waitress, said.

“Who did?” Adam asked.

“A man named Patrick.”

“Shit.”

“I’m sorry?”

“No, it’s nothing you did.”

“Well come on, we still have to put in a tip,” Georgia said.

Everyone shelled out enough for twenty percent and got up. They went home that night and Adam spent a fair amount of the night being worried. He eventually fell asleep and woke up on time for work.

His office was in the four corners buildings in the southeast side of Ravenwood. They were so known because they were four ten story buildings that were part of a larger office park. His office was on the third floor and looked fairly normal. There were eight cubicles in two little pods with Patrick’s office down a different hallway. He was near the offices of his assistant manager, Bobby and Katherine the HR lady.

Adam sat at his desk and the others filed in looking different levels of tired and hung over. Patrick allowed them to dress casually so most of them were in jeans. They kept buttoned down shirts at their desks on days that they had to have zoom meetings with clients and they only came in khakis when they met clients in the office.

When they were all in, Patrick called them into the meeting room. Adam felt a cold hand wrap around his heart. They all filed in and sat down around the table. Bobby was standing next to Patrick with a strange look on his face. He was looking up at the ceiling like his eyes had gotten stuck mid roll. Adam wasn’t sure what that was but he thought it wasn’t good.

“Okay everyone,” Patrick said. “We have a new client that wants us to do backups for them at the end of every week. They’re a pretty big client thus it’s a pretty big job. Now, what I want to do is have us take care of it during their downtime. So, either Friday night or Saturday morning. This won’t require us all to be part of it, just one. What that means is that the person for that week can either take four hours off at some point throughout the week and make them up pulling that shift or they can have four hours of overtime. It’s your choice. Questions?”

Georgia raised her hand.

“We’ve been over this, Georgia, you don’t have to raise your hand,” Patrick said exasperatedly.

“I know, I do it because it’s funny,” Georgia said. “When does this start?”

“It would start tonight. So, we’re going to need someone to volunteer for it.”

There were groans around the table that led to a standoff between the employees. None of them wanted to do this but especially because the local food festival started that night. Main street would be lined up with food trucks as far as the eye could see. Beyond that, there would be games and rides set up in one of the parks.

“Okay, it seems like no one wants to do it, so I’m going to take tonight,” Patrick said. “I kind of figured it would happen this way and it’s only fair.”

“I’ll take next week,” Bobby said. “After that, we’ll have a signup sheet for the next ten weeks. You are required to pull one shift in that ten week period. You can put in for your preferred week or you can just leave it up to fate and we’ll assign it randomly. We will not abide one of you taking all the overtime. That wouldn’t be fair either.”

“I think that covers everything, so let’s get back to work. If you have any questions, please reach out to Bobby and me. Also, I considering I have four hours to kill tonight, if you have any movie suggestions, please reach out to me.”

“If we make a suggestion and you choose to watch the movie, do we get a PTO day?” Tabitha asked.

“What? No. Tabitha, we’re not giving out a PTO day for a movie suggestion, I’ll be grateful that should be enough,” Patrick said.

They left the meeting room and went back to their desks. Adam tried to pay attention to his work but found his mind wandering. He kept thinking about how nice Patrick was for taking the first shift for this new client so that the rest of them didn’t have to miss out on the festival. He got up and walked over to Patrick’s office. His coworkers watched him go and rolled their eyes or sighed.

Adam knocked on Patrick’s open door. Patrick was typing something as he stood in the doorway.

“Give me a minute, Adam,” Patrick said without looking towards him. “Have a seat.”

Adam walked into the office and looked over at the books in a bookshelf along the left wall. There were several reference guides to systems. To the right were management books of all kinds. In the corner was a well taken care of leafy plant. Behind Patrick was a large window showing Ravenwood and the ocean beyond it. Patrick finished typing and hit the enter key with confidence.

“Now, what can I help you with?” Patrick asked.

“I just wanted to apologize for last night,” Adam said.

Patrick looked confused.

“What about last night?” Patrick asked.

“That you saw all of us out and we didn’t invite you,” Adam explained.

“Oh, Adam would you close the door please?”

Adam felt dread run down his back. He got up, closed the door and returned to the chair in front of Patrick’s desk.

“I just wanted to apologize for the fact that we didn’t invite you out. We do that every Thursday and I just felt bad that you were excluded. I’m sure the others wouldn’t mind if you came out next Thursday,” Adam said quickly.

Patrick stared at Adam for a long time. He had hired the young man directly out of college about two years ago. He had been taken by Adam’s enthusiasm and knowledge. He learned though that Adam was not as knowledgable about being an adult and had done his best to guide him as gently as he could. He decided that today he would have to be a little more direct.

“Adam, if you had invited me when this started, do you know what my answer would have been then?” Patrick asked.

“Yes?” Adam answered cautiously.

“It would have been the same then as it would be today. No, thank you. I think that it’s great that my employees are that cordial with one another. It helps with team building and camaraderie.”

Patrick stopped speaking for a moment and hit a few buttons on his phone.

“Yeah?” Bobby said through the speakerphone.

“Was the word, camaraderie?” Patrick asked.

“Goddammit, yes! Thank you! That was bothering me to no end.”

“Yeah, you looked weird in the meeting.”

“Ah, well. That’s what happens. Thanks.”

“Welcome.”

He hung up the phone and looked back at Adam.

“Anyway, the fact of the matter is that you all also need time to air your grievances about me when I’m not around,” Patrick said.

“We-” Adam started to say.

“That’s your time. I don’t want to know about it. Don’t betray your coworkers’ confidence.”

“Understood.”

“Besides, I hope this doesn’t come through as too offensive but if it comes down to my employees or my wife, I’m going to spend time with my wife.”

“That makes sense.”

“I’m not Michael Scott, so desperate to be everyone’s friend.”

“You watch the Office?”

“Yeah, it’s a good learning tool. Whatever Michael Scott does, I do the opposite.”

Adam smiled.

“Is that everything?” Patrick asked.

“Yeah, thank you,” Adam said.

“Adam, on a personal note. If you exclude someone from a weekly thing, maybe try and not let them know that they’ve missed multiple events.”

“Makes sense. Thanks.”

“You’re a good person, I sensed it when I hired you. Just don’t get in your head too much.”

“I will, thank you.”

“Any suggestions for me?”

“Ah, I really like the movie Stepbrothers.”

Patrick wrote down the name on his notepad.

“Sounds good,” Patrick said.

“I’m going to get back to work,” Adam said.

“Good talk. Door open please.”

Adam got up and returned to his desk.

That night the employees left giving a wave to Patrick as they left. He explained to the others what had happened and they both told him it was unnecessary and appreciated.

“I give him credit, any other place I’ve worked, they would have made one of us stay,” Trent said.

“Yeah,” Georgia agreed.

“I feel kind of bad that he has to spend his Friday night alone though,” Adam said.

“He just told you he can handle it,” Tabitha said.

“It’s just-”

It was then that he saw a beautiful black woman approaching them. One he only recognized at their yearly Christmas get together. She strode with the purpose and strength of a woman who knew who she was.

Her long hair cascaded down her back. She was dressed as she always was, stylish. She smiled at them as she passed, recognizing her husband’s employees. She held two takeout containers in her arms. She strode to the doors of the office building, pulled them open and walked through.

“Well, never mind then,” Adam said.

They headed for main street.