I have decided to start writing...again.
I have this Character in my head and have had her there for about 8 years. There are many different ways that I have attempted to execute this particular story line and feel that maybe I have finally found it. I wrote three "word" pages the other day and have not edited it for the sake of just puttingg it onto "paper".
I would like to add it to the body of a blank post, but I wonder if I should? Will you read it? Will you give me feedback on how you feel about it?? Yes I actually do want that! Good Bad and Ugly!!
Maybe I should post here instead of making you wait...
Here Goes....
Rena was a lawyer, technically speaking. There was a long line of lawyers in her family so it was expected that she would do the same. No one ever thought for a moment that the experiences she had would cause her difficulties in performing the job that was expected of her. That is until she was leading her first case in court.
She had done a great job in the three years since passing the bar, at avoiding any court time at all, by being a very good negotiator and settling to make everyone happy. That is until her most recent case. A very public and very nasty divorce that turned even nastier when the husband supposedly killed his wife. Being the husbands divorce lawyer, she was turned into his defence lawyer by her superiors.
That was when she lost control and began with tremors, sweating, dizziness, and progressed; in the middle of what was a very long and tumultuous day; to passing out cold on the floor as she rose to begin her round of questioning of a particularly vital witness.
She was relieved of the case by her superiors because they thought that she needed stress leave from overwork. And when she was given another hefty case upon her return, the same happened again. That was when she realized that she would never be able to stand in court in front of large groups of people and steer the case where she wanted it to go. While she was very good at every thing else a lawyer needed to do, she just couldn’t be in front of people.
That was when her superiors decided to transfer her to a different department within the firm, working solely with real estate high rollers. She was mortified. Her family would not accept the defeat and tried to convince her that she needed to appeal for her job, and had in fact tried to do just that behind her back.
She silently packed up her things from her desk and moved to her new job, with her head down and her heart stricken. No one spoke to her as she left. “So much for friendships” she thought to herself. “They obviously really weren’t her friends”. Sighing to herself as she waited for the elevator doors to open onto her new office floor she wondered if this was going to be better, or worse.
As she looked out of the elevator she noticed a lot of open space, big open windows, and desks in a large circle around the room. No cubicle walls, no offices, no closed doors, no roller shades blocking the sunlight, and lots of greenery. The people closest to her looked up and actually smiled at her. What a shock this was after the cold stares and smugness that came off everyone on the upper floors.
A redheaded woman with more curves than her small stature could handle came racing towards her with the biggest smile Rena had ever seen.
“Hi, Rena Doyle, right? I am Marsha Hicks. Let me show you to your desk so you can put this stuff down, and I’ll show you to the boss man”
“Um, Thanks, Marsha. How did you know?”
“Boss Man knew since yesterday and had a desk brought up for you and had me looking out for your arrival.”
“What did they tell you, from upstairs I mean?
“Did you come from upstairs? I had no idea, I thought you were a new hire”
Marsha wasn’t looking directly at Rena this time so she knew that she wasn’t telling her the truth, but was grateful that she didn’t seem eager to gossip, or to hold it against her.
After settling her things onto her new desk, she looked around and admired the layout, very personal but also social as well.
“Do you like the layout?” Marsha asked.
“I think that I do, there’s less ‘each man for himself’ and more ‘all for one and one for all’ going on here. Is that the angle?”
“It sure is, I’ll tell the Boss Man that you got it on the first shot. He’ll like you for that! The higher powers that be are constantly giving him a hard time for his layout, his work ethic, his candour with the staff, etc,etc,etc, you know how it goes, when someone does something differently he accused of rocking the corporate boat. Let’s go see him now”
They walked to the end of the large room and found a large desk joined in the circle inhabited by a man in his mid fifties.
“Hey, Boss Man, This is Rena Doyle, our new recruit…Rena, Boss Man.”
“Marsha, please, it’s Ron. Rena, welcome, Marsha is going to show you the ropes around here, but if you have any questions you can ask me or anyone else for that matter, and if no one here knows then you don’t really need to know! Kidding!”
“Rena likes your layout, Ron, she actually got the meaning, too”
“Good then we’ll get a long brilliantly. Now we are heading into morning meeting time so let’s gather everyone.”
All the associates in the office sat on or at their desks and put their full attention to the Boss Man, Ron, and waited silently for the days’ news.
“Good Tuesday Morning folks, a brief recap on our Monday progress, 5 closes…and three new bids put in, good work, Today has six closes lined up, and lets see what we can do to beat our daily best of 10 bids!
We welcome Rena Doyle to the group, let’s show her the ropes and give her a hand in settling in, professionally Mack, I mean it…I’ve got two new clients for us to work with. Marsha, since you are going to bring Rena up to speed you two will take a client and go through it together. Also, there are three new buildings that were put on the market yesterday, and they are hot properties, I posted them on the board and I want you to go over them carefully to see which of our clients are most likely to want to benefit from them in the immediate future. Any questions…No. Good. Dismissed.”
“Alright, So I have a full client list as it is right now, and that has me pretty darn busy, so we are going to give this new client to you to work with independently, but I will work with you to show you how it works here. Sound good?” Marsha asked Rena.
“That would be really appreciated, Thanks, So what exactly am I now? Am I a lawyer, or a Real Estate Agent?”
“Technically, you’re a lawyer, we all are, however, in this firm we have clientele that buy and sell real estate like they buy burgers and toss the wrappers, so they alone keep us in business full time. And many of them are busy trying to rebuild broken down properties to sell for profit so we find them properties to keep ourselves useful and profitable too.”
“Interesting, how then, do you know what to look for?”
“That’s what I think is part of the fun, when we get a new client, like this one that Ron handed over, we build a profile on their current businesses, past businesses, successes, failures, and all that. Then we interview them. Most times we interview with the assistant or secretary first, then the client themselves. It all depends on how much of a high roller they are in business. We build a profile on what they want, what they don’t want, and what they may be up for if the challenge in just right. This part takes a while because we need to be really thorough so we don’t miss our clients any opportunities. And then after that we put together a few prospective properties and go and meet with them.”
“So, we do research, on the client, on the properties, and then put the paperwork in motion for the sales of these properties”
“Exactly”
“This is so right up my alley!” Rena sighed deeply, and happily. It’s true, this is exactly what she could handle, and she knew that she was going to do very well in her new job.
