I want to shoot myself. I just ruined this company's shot at having big investors because of my stupidity. How could I have forgotten to add the title page. I stuttered throughout my entire presentation. I hate the way they're looking at me. It pisses me off so much. I want to cry.
The terrible taste of phantom coffee covered my tongue as I checked my phone: 6:47 AM. Three minutes before my alarm would have gone off.
I already know this day is going to be horrible. I think this dream was a message from God to not show up to work. I feel like I should just stay in bed.
After struggling to roll out of bed I walk across the hardwood floors of my apartment. Everything is exactly where it should be: throw pillows arranged with mathematical precision, work clothes selected and laid out the night before, not a single item out of place. My friend Carmen calls it "museum living," but I call it being normal.
Today is ConnectNow's launch day. We plan on making it number one in the dating app rankings on the app store. One year of brutal workdays, enough market research to paper my apartment walls, and more client revisions than I care to count. Our dating app is supposed to change how people meet. The irony of my job makes me feel sick. I'm launching a platform to help people find a partner while my romantic life feels like a really bad dream you get when you're drunk.
My last relationship was with some dickhead named Bryan. I still don't know how I liked him. He never seemed to care about what I did and only thought about his own interest.
Never understood why I liked him.
We ended things when he ditched me at a restaurant so he could "hang out with his friends." Carmen sent me a video of him cheating on me with some random bitch who lived five blocks away from him. Don't know how I never saw it either.
It still pisses me off whenever I think about it. Not even because I loved him, but because I felt stupid for even giving him a chance.
Of course, the train doors close as I'm about to enter. I guess I should've just made coffee at work like I normally do. I guess I could blame it on me spending ten minutes trying to pick out a burgundy lipstick that matches with the wine accents on my cream silk blouse, but that's not the point. I'm going to be late for work on the one day I can't afford to be.
"We should defund the MTA…"
"No way our tax money is going to this shit. We never get anywhere on time."
The train lurches to a stop between stations, and the conductor's voice crackles over the intercom about "train traffic ahead." Of course. Launch day, and the MTA decides to test my meditation skills.
The TechNova building cuts into the sky like a blade of glass and ambition. Forty-two floors of startup energy and venture capital pressure. I exit at Fulton Street and walk into the lobby, taking the elevator up while mentally rehearsing key talking points.
The lobby was as chaotic as I expected. It's the same situation every time a new project is being released. Loud chatter along with people speed walking across from side to side, like they forgot to take the chicken out of the freezer and they're mom is pulling into the drive way. I have no clue why most of these people are nervous, almost none of them are meeting the investors.
Of course, the elevator is packed with awkward silence and people not understanding personal space. Half the people get off at the twenty-third floor, going into their cubicle like usual. After awkward small talk, I finally got off my floor.
The moment those doors open, I know something's wrong.
It's dead silent. The smell of burning metal drowned my nose.
Our floor should be humming with pre-launch activity by now — developers debugging last-minute code, marketing reviewing final materials. Instead, there's an ominous quiet broken only by what sounds like someone attacking metal with tools.
I follow the noise to our break room and freeze.
Our coffee machine—the Italian espresso maker that cost three thousand dollars—sits surrounded by a puddle of brown liquid. Standing over it like a mechanic who's just destroyed an engine is Noel, one of our interns, gripping a screwdriver with white knuckles.
"Where is everybody? And why do you look like you just killed our coffee machine," I say.
Noel jumps like I've caught him stealing office supplies. His hair sticks up at impossible angles, and there's a suspicious brown smudge on his cheek. "Valeria! Hi! Technically.. I didn't break it. I was just trying to fix it. Everybody went up to the thirty-eighth floor. Apparently they weren't too fond of the burning metal smell."
I step closer to assess the damage. "I think you did the complete opposite."
The machine's front panel hangs open, exposing wires and circuits like mechanical organs. The smell of burnt electronics mingles with wasted coffee beans.
"So what exactly was wrong with it?"
"It was making this grinding sound when I got here early, so I thought maybe I could—"
"You thought you could repair a three-thousand-dollar espresso machine with a screwdriver?"
His face falls. "It sounded less insane in my head."
I take a slow breath. All I wanted was for the launch day to be smooth. In exactly three hours, investors whose net worth exceeds most countries' annual budgets will be sitting in our conference room. They'll expect flawless presentations and exceptional coffee. What they'll get is my pitch and whatever passes for beverage service at the bodega downstairs.
"Did you try turning it off and on again before you did whatever the fuck you decided to do?"
"That was step one. Then I googled 'espresso machine repair' and watched a YouTube video that made it look really straightforward."
"YouTube."
"Yeah, this guy in Portland made it seem super easy."
I stare at him. Noel has been here three months, and in that time he's managed to crash the printer network twice, accidentally delete a client presentation, and now commit mechanical homicide on our most expensive appliance. Somehow, everyone still likes him. I guess people are easily buttered up by someone who remembers their birthday and cracks jokes when you feel like you're about to meet Jesus.
"Okay," I say, pulling out my phone. "New plan. I'm ordering coffee service from Ninth Street Espresso. You're going to call maintenance and see if they can somehow resurrect this thing and remove the smell before the investors arrive. And next time you want to help..."
"Don't touch anything expensive?"
"Don't touch anything at all."
He grins, and despite the caffeine crisis he's created, it's hard to stay angry. I do feel bad sometimes, it's not his fault he has Patrick Star's IQ.
My phone buzzes with a text from my boss Jake: The investors moved the meeting up and it starts in 20 minutes. That conference room better be perfect. Also, don't be late.
I showed the screen to Noel, watching his face go white.