Morning all. Have you ever woken up when your dreams are in mid conversation? I did that today, In my dreams I was having an conversation with someone and they cut off mid sentence. I don’t know where the sentence was going and that is going to bug me, at least until the dream fades. For now, lets get on with the prompt and hopefully a new sentence will knock out the old. Timers set and off we go.
Sort of worked. I like the thought of the relationship between the characters and the rest of the family, but I need a better story line for it I think. But at least there is something to bookmark for later use.
Wednesday, August 14th: Tim stopped listening.
Tim stopped listening. It wasn’t really all that surprising. He rarely actually listened. He was firmly of the conviction that he knew best in any situation and that any other information was irrelevant. I was used to my words more or less being dismissed. Usually though he made the pretense of at least attempting to pay attention. To pretend that what I was saying mattered in any way. Now, that was gone. My words were waved away and completely dismissed. I took a breath and let it out slowly.
I was reaching my limit with Tim. ‘It will be over soon,’ I told myself. It wasn’t the first time and even though the project had only a few more days with my involvement I suspected it wouldn’t be the last.
‘I have documented all of my concerns and registered them,’ I repeated another oft used phrase to myself.
I was brought in to set up the project. I was given the details of what they wanted and I set things up accordingly. As family and the one who would be tapped to run things, I reported the details to Tim. I also filed them with the upper echelons of the company. I knew that this could be a successful project. The company knew I could make it so. I suspected that all of my efforts would be pointless as once I left Tim would do exactly what he wanted.
He wanted to be in charge. He wanted to run things. He did not want me here. He did not see me as a professional. He did not see me as an equal. In fact I didn’t think he saw me as anything other than the woman his brother was once married to. I was fairly certain that he thought of me as Mike’s widow and nothing more. Somedays I was fairly certain he didn’t even remember my actual name.
I had not been married to his brother for long. We were married for only six months before the car accident took Mike from me. In the fifteen years since, I occasionally spoke to Mike’s family, but I separated myself, moved on. We exchanged cards and I occasionally met his mother for lunch but that was all. Until this project arose and the family business realized I had the skills they needed.
I was asked to come in, partially because I was family but mostly because I was the top in my field. I agreed because of Mike’s memory, but I couldn’t say I was thrilled to be working with his family. There were reasons we weren’t close and why the only one I met for lunch was Mike’s mother. Time hadn’t mellowed them any and I found them more or less as I left them.
I agreed to do the job however and made certain to leave a very deep ad very official paper trail so they would know that I did what I was asked to do. I knew that if it didn’t fail, Tim would place the blame squarely on me. I wanted confirmation that I was not at fault.
I left Tim in the office. He was scrolling through his phone, more to show how little he valued my words than for any real reason and I saw the corners of his mouth flick up before I turned. It was an irritant and I remembered some of the less flattering terms Mike had for his brother Tim. It made the irritation slightly easier to accept.
Ten til Midnight 