Page 21 of Factory Reset

“Can she come back here after?” Leo asked.

“I guess? But she says she travels like forty-eight weeks outta the year, that’s not sustainable for a relationship.”

“Nope.”

“I’m not the guy who’s going to ask her to give up her career, but it’s not like I can follow her around the country like a damn groupie. My roots are all here so I’m not even sure how we can be together. Not that we’ve talked about it or anything, but I really want her to stay. I love her.”

“Does she know how you feel?” Lillian spoke up for the first time. “Because if you’re doing that stoic, nothing bothers me thing you usually do, she might just think you’re playin’ around and not serious. Women aren’t mind readers you know.”

“Or maybe she knows you’re getting too attached and she doesn’t want that,” Jimmy piped up. “Maybe she just wants to have fun and she’s trying to let you down gently.”

“I don’t think that’s it.” I sighed deeply. “I just don’t know what’s going on.”

“You need to talk to her. Like a grown-up,” Lillian chastised me. “And use your feeling words.”

The alarm on my phone beeped, letting me know our fifteen minutes was up.

“Our break is over, so I guess I’ll have to figure it out later. Thanks for listening to me.”

After doing some work on the line, I retired to the workshop after lunch. I’d been spending so much time the last month helping with Cassie’s project, I hadn’t gotten to some of my regular duties.

The project was still going well though. At dinner the other night David had shared that the big bosses were thrilled with some of the changes that Cassie had made, and also with how adaptable the teams had been.

I’d been confused by that until Cassie had explained that in some places she’d worked, the teams were so resistant to change, they’d outright refuse to try new processes. Even when she could show them the benefit to them, even when they knew their jobs were on the line, some teams just couldn’t get past the idea that some woman from corporate was coming in to tell them what to do.

It blew my mind that someone like Cassie was offering people a lifeline and they just tossed it away. I was glad that the teams at our factory wasn’t quite that stubborn. There’d been some resistance for sure, but once Cassie had explained the benefits and time saving potential of some of her suggestions, people had fallen in line.

It helped that she didn’t have that snotty attitude that some of the corporate suits had. She came off as ‘one of the guys’ and that made people accept her. And she knew how to put her degrees in engineering and project management into practice using real English instead of jargon, which garnered her a lot of respect. The fact that she was getting results helped too.

My team loved her. The other shifts loved her. My brother-in-law had shared that the front office loved her. And me, well, I loved her too. If I could just figure out why she’d been so weird and distant the last two days.

Lillian was right. I needed to talk to her. I needed to make sure she knew my intentions. I needed to tell her that I loved her, and even if she didn’t love me back yet, I wanted to try to make things work between us. I wanted forever.

Lost in thought, I slid a piece of metal into a machine I used to fashion the raw metal into replacement parts. As a machinist, a big part of my job was making custom pieces we could swap out if we had any problems with a machine, like a part that failed. Normally I liked to work ahead and make sure that we had lots of parts in stock, but with me spending so much time working with Cassie the last few weeks, I’d gotten behind.

I grabbed another sheet of metal from the shelf, getting it ready for the next step. Unfortunately, I leaned too close to the machine, almost catching myself in the gears, then overcorrected. I stumbled backwards, pulling the heavy piece of metal off the shelf with me. It flew through the air and nailed me right in the forehead a second before the back of my head cracked against the concrete floor.

“Oh fudge!”

The last thought I had before I passed out was that my brother-in-law was going to be pissed that I’d just messed up our safety record.

Cassandra

I walked out into the late afternoon sunshine, trying not to let myself get too excited. I’d just completed a full day of interviews at the management consultant company in Houston, and it had seemed to go well. Incredibly well. They’d even taken me out for lunch before having me meet other members of the team for afternoon interviews. The last thing the senior partner who’d interviewed me said as I left was, “We’ll be seeing you soon I hope.”

That was promising, right?

Even if things didn’t work out with George, I really liked Houston and could see myself being happy living here. Unlocking my car, I glanced at the clock, debating whether I should drive the hour back to Josie’s rental or find a hotel and hole up with a movie and room service. That certainly sounded appealing after the stress of a long day of interviews. Then again, I was totally keyed up, full of nervous energy.

Pulling my phone from my purse I turned it on for the first time all day. I’d turned it off last night to keep myself from texting George. The second my phone powered on and connected with a cell tower it started beeping like crazy with incoming messages. That was weird. Other than George, I maybe got two texts a day. Before I could look to see what was happening, the device started ringing in my hand with an unknown number.

“Hello?”

“Oh Cassandra, thank God you finally picked up.”

“Josie?” I asked in confusion. “What’s wrong?”

“Didn’t you get any of our messages?” Josie sounded freaked out.