“A reorg?”  Cassie stared at Wanda. “No, fuck that. I survived one reorg, I’m not living through another one!”

Wanda rolled her eyes at her fellow executive. “It can’t be that bad.”

“You haven’t lived through them. Every policy changing every second, and then it’s never fault!” Cassie looked at her friend. “Trust me, by this time next year, you’ll be needing to dye your hair to disguise the gray.”

“Really.” Wanda ran her hand through her curly brown hair, the Latina rolling her brown eyes at her friend. “Seriously, Cassie you need to get laid. I mean, that or do something to keep from flying off the handle.’

“I’m not flying off the handle!” Cassie retreated to the door, then pointed at Wanda, her finger shaking. “You will come back to me and say: ‘Why oh why didn’t you warn me! Save me, Cassie!’ and I will say… ‘no.’”

“Great, now you’re emulating bad movie actors.”  Wanda said. “Look, the reorg is gonna start this week, so just try to not freak too loud. Remember reorg means changes in position. Don’t want to make people think you’re too flakey to run accounts.”

“Ha. Ha.”  With that, Cassie turned and left her friend/s office.

Ten stories, she thought. Ten stories of offices and secretarial floors and it was all gonna be reorged.  And there had been no warning, none at all. Something about the owner going to a special conference, and when she’d come back she’d been thrilled to try “new changes for a new world.”

“What the hell is a new world?” Cassie muttered, passing the cubical farm where the engineers were working. Tanya was frowning, looking at a complex diagram that looked like some magic spell to Cassie.

“What is that?” Cassie finally asked.

“Circuit board for a new cleaner,” Tanya said, brushing her red hair back. “It’s a bitch and a half, and now they’re talking about mixing teams.”

“Reorg?”

“Guess so. But we’re supposed to get our manuals this afternoon.”

“Yeah.” Cassie said. “Great.” She walked away, frowning at all the women working. Girls outnumbered guys by 3:1 here, which sometimes made finding a date hard, but made it easier to get stuff done. So long she didn’t—

“Good. You’re here.”

Ah fuck. Clarissa.  Slowly Cassie turned to see her boss. Clarissa was the head of finance, which meant that accounts directly reported to her. Which meant that Cassie might be head of accounts, but she was Clarissa’s subordinate and the woman didn’t let anyone forget it.

Clarissa had light brown hair, done in a bun, her clothing always immaculate, disguising her lack of a chest.

She was holding something… A pink booklet?

“What is that?”

“The reorg guidelines.” She gestured to a cart. “I’m ensuring that everyone gets their copy.”

Cassie blinked. “Why are some blue?”

“Those are the ones for the men.” Clarissa frowned. “No doubt some silly joke on the part of an immature intern.”

“Right.” Cassie decided not to say anything else. Getting Clarissa in a rant never went well for anyone. She reached out and took the book, frowning at the way it felt heavier than it should. “How many pages?” she finally asked, risking a Clarissa rant.

“150. It is a very detailed reorg manual.” Clarissa paused. “I haven’t read it yet. In fact, our instructions were to read only the first part over this weekend.”

“Arrrggghhh!” Cassie burst out. “Micromanaging! I knew it! We’re not allowed to read the entire thing?”

“It is clearly to make certain nobody skims over the important parts.” Clarissa said. “If you want to read more than you are requested, feel free, but I expect if you let others know, it won’t look good for you in the reorg.”

“What are they going to do, fire me?”

Clarissa said nothing.

“Clarissa…”

“I have heard rumors that it is believed that we have… too many workers, and the reorg is to help us become more… lean.”

Oh. Fuck.   “Lean” was a codeword for “layoff.”

Great. Just great.

“Fine, Clarissa, I’ll be a good girl. But any hints on what they’re thinking of when they talk about “lean?””

“No.” She sniffed and turned. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have other individuals to see.”

“Right.” I guess Clarissa is worried. She didn’t ream me out nearly as badly as I thought she would.

But I’ll hold on to this until I’m home. Because I know why they’re giving instructions now.

It had nothing to do with what was on the book. The people in charge of the reorg wanted to see who would play ball.

And Cassie wasn’t about to be one of the ones who got a “not a team player” notice in the mail.

When Cassie  got home, she glared at the reorg manual. 150 pages. Probably super boring. And she had to read only part of it, like some little girl given instructions.

Stupid manual.

Stupid, stupid manual.

And why did it have to be pink! It was aggressively pink, some kind of foofy color you’d expect to find in some cheerleader’s journal, the one where she talked about marrying the quarterback so she wouldn’t have to get a job.

“You and the Company Reorganization!” the letters were pink. The font was silly.

Cassie  glared at it. She could read it later.

She went to get something to eat and came back much later, stomping into her apartment, glaring at the walls. Another miserable day, and the book was still there.

Mocking her.

Mocking her with its pink lettering and frilly, feminine font.

She finally sat down and looked at the fucking book. One hundred and fifty pages. How the hell do you spend one hundred and fifty pages for a reorg?

She shook her head and opened the book.

Moments later, her voice filled the room.

“OH WHAT THE FUCK!”

She stared at the cover of some busty executive with a pixie cut, looking nervously out of the photo at Clarissa. Worse, the lettering was in a spiral around her, forcing Cassie to read it by tilting the book so that she would be able to interpret the wiggly, pink letters.

Really? We paid money for this? I wonder what the guys are getting?

She shook her head and started reading. She had a hard time sight-reading the words because of the font and the way they were tilted, so Clarissa started reading aloud.

“Hi, I’m Tracy.”

Of course, she’s a Tracy. Cassie  fought the urge to go ‘hi, Tracy’ to the image.

Then it was time to turn the page.

And now the lettering was still pink, but moving up and down like waves, drawing her eyes to it. There were tiny letters and sentences behind the text, but Clarissa couldn’t read them. They kept sliding off of her eyes when she tried to look at them, like some of those joke images you saw at the circus.

“Whatever.” Then she peered down at the text.

It was still easier to read aloud for some reason.

“I know you’re worried about the reorg! I was as well, especially since I wasn’t certain if I was going to keep my job.”

Yeah, you got that right.

“Now the first thing to do is don’t worry. After all, the men will always want to keep people like us around.”

The fuck? The word ‘men’ wasn’t the same color as the rest of the text. It was red. A firm, dynamic color that stood out around all the girly bits. She shook her head and kept reading:

“But we all have to make adjustments. During the reorg, you have to be open to new ideas.” There was that red font color again. Now that Cassie  noticed it, she saw that it was scattered across the pages.

She would probably check out—then she started reading the next section.

“Like one idea is that you don’t read ahead.” That font again. “I used to skim and read ahead in my material, but it didn’t make me a good worker. A good employee, or someone they would keep around during the reorg.”

Cassie  bit her lip. She could imagine someone quizzing her and finding out that she had just skimmed some stuff, and didn’t really know it. Yeah, that’d be bad. That’d be very bad, especially during a reorg.

Tracy was right.

Cassie  fixed her eyes on the sentence after the one she’d just read, trying to ignore the words that came after it. She’d get to them soon enough.

“Now the important thing is to understand that we have to be willing to learn.” That red font again. “To accept new ideas.”

Cassie  wanted to say something snarky, but she didn’t. The words did make sense, after all, and if she didn’t want to be let go, she’d have to learn.

“To accept new ideas,” she said to herself, emphasizing the word. It seemed to be right.

“And part of accepting new ideas is to understand that we don’t know everything,” Tracy continued speaking, her words somehow sounding different in Cassie's  mind. “And we’ll have to take instruction. Doesn’t that sound exciting. We’re going to learn to be the woman we need to be in the new world of the reorg!”

Cassie  didn’t snark. It made sense. She would have to learn.

“So don’t just think of this like you’re reading from what I say!”

“Repeat after me!”

“Repeat after me!” Cassie said the words twice, and smiled. It did feel better.

“I will accept new ideas from the men during the reorg!”

“I will accept new ideas from the—the men during the reorg!” Cassie  flushed. She had stuttered, but like…

She needed to be open to changes and there were some men in the office, not a lot, but some. So maybe she needed to accept their new ideas.

“If I find myself not being open to new ideas, I’ll pause and think.”

“If I find myself not being open to new ideas, I’ll pause and think.” That made sense.

“And remember, a good office lady always accepts input, and listens to it, and takes it seriously.”

“And remember, a good office lady always accepts input, and listens to it, and takes it seriously.”

There was one last line. “Now get some sleep, and remember, you need to follow the reorg guidelines.”

Cassie  put the book down. The chapter was ended, and she wasn’t about to risk… risk…

Not following the manual. In fact she… Cassie  yawned, the action sudden, uncontrollable, and she was just so fucking tired.

She needed to get some sleep.

Like the manual said. After all, she was following the manual.

Cassie  nodded, got up, undressed, and then toppled onto her bed, asleep before she hit the sheets.