World's Greatest Boss (2k words)

Another stupid one <3 Nothing gendery in this one I'm afraid!

“I think you deserve a raise,” said Michael, “And some PTO. And I’m gonna hire another staff member to take some of the pressure off you.”

He took a sip of coffee and nodded to himself thoughtfully.

“Wow,” I said, “What prompted this?”

He shrugged, “It just seems fair. I like to take care of my employees.”

“Well, thanks,” I said.

“I’ll write up your new contract right now,” he said, “You can go ahead and take the rest of the day off. And you know what? Take my car.”

He reached into his pocket and tossed me the keys to the Jag. The Jag was what he called his car, a Lambourghini that had a custom paint job with the cast of the tv show JAG. 

“Thanks,” I said again, but it didn’t seem like enough, so I added, “I love you.”

Michael raised his mug in salute. The mug said World’s Greatest Boss.

—

“He just gave you his car?” my wife said incredulously. 

“No, honey,” I explained, trying to remember my wife’s name. I loved her a lot but for the past twenty years we had just called each other honey and darling and stuff like that, “He not only gave me his car, he also gave me a raise and stuff.”

“That’s not the sense in which I was using the word ‘just’,” said my wife, “And you knew that. You’re being cheeky again.”

She flicked the tea towel at me and I giggled and hopped out of the way. She was right, I was being cheeky. After all, I was in a very good mood. 

“Sorry honey,” I said, “Anyway, how was your day? How were the kids?”

“Great!” said my wife, who, again, I love her so much, but I had long covid and it made it hard to remember stuff sometimes, such as names, “Kids! Come show your mum what you learned at school today!”

“We already showed you, mum!” yelled my oldest daughter, Khaleesi. 

“Not me, your other mum!” yelled my wife. We’re both women by the way. That’s allowed. And now you’re probably thinking, oh, their kids must be adopted. Well, that’s wrong. There are other ways two women can have children other than by adopting them. 

Khaleesi rushed down the stairs, followed shortly by her siblings Varys, Joffrey, a little girl whose name I couldn’t remember because I played rugby on weekends and I had been hit in the head really hard and got a concussion and sometimes it messed with my memory, Grey Worm, and another little girl I also didn’t remember the name of. 

Grey Worm was holding a boombox which he pressed play on, and the six of them began performing a choreographed cheer routine. My kids go to a performing arts school, so they learn boring stuff like maths, but also cool stuff like this too. I clapped along to the music.

“So where’s your normal car?” my wife asked.

“I parked it on the street,” I said, “I drove the Jag here and parked it in the driveway because I wanted to show you when you got home. You weren’t home yet, because you were at your job. We both work, which is normal in a modern marriage. Then I caught the bus back to work and drove my usual car back home, but there wasn’t room in the driveway so I parked it on the street. I had time to do this because my boss said I could go home early today.”

“Yes, that all makes sense,” said my wife. 

“And then the reason that the kids had already showed you this routine, even though I was home before you, is because you work at their school. You’re the cheer instructor,” I added, “You brought the kids home and then they all went straight to their rooms to do homework while we were talking about work.”

“Ta-da!” said Khaleesi. My six beautiful kids were stacked into a human pyramid. 

We both applauded.

—

“So I don’t have any real-world experience in the field, like an internship or anything,” said Krutika, “But as you can see, I did a group assignment at the end of my degree. I spent a whole semester doing a group assignment, and that’s just as good as an internship.”

I nodded wisely, scanning over her CV. Sure enough, she had done a group assignment at the end of her Marketing degree at Macquarie University. All the other business majors did internships, but the Marketing majors just did a group assignment, and that was meant to be just as good. And she had paid something like $2000 for that course.

“That’s great, Krutika,” Michael said enthusiastically, “And I noticed that you took a semester off from uni in your third year. Was that for mental health reasons?”

“You for sure can’t ask that,” I said.

“Oh, no, it’s not a bad thing,” Michael said warmly, “I would totally understand if it was for mental health reasons. A lot of people start having mental health issues during university. Like, if you start smoking weed, or doing shrooms, or LSD, that can trigger schizophrenia. If you do a lot of shrooms that can make you have schizophrenia. Stuff like that.”

“You can’t ask that,” I said again.

“Actually, he didn’t ask anything that time, he was just explaining himself,” Krutika piped up. 

“Suck up,” I muttered. 

“Anyway, your job would be to assist our marketing team with social media stuff,” said Michael, and he took a big sip of his coffee, “And if you took a break from uni because you have OCD, that’s okay. And if you took a break from uni because you have borderline personality disorder, that’s okay.”

“I don’t know why he’s saying this stuff,” I said, “He was nice yesterday. He gave me his car. It’s a Lambourghini.”

“Actually, if there’s only one, it’s called a Lambourghinus,” Krutika said smugly. She leaned over the desk and pointed at her CV, “Intermediate proficiency in Latin, as you can see.”

“Very, very good,” said Michael, “Fluent in Latin at a conversational level. That’s very good. And if you took a break from uni because you have Capgras Delusion, that’s a delusion where you believe that someone you know has been replaced with an identical duplicate, that’s okay.”

“I don’t have Capgras Delusion,” said Krutika, “But I do have ADHD.”

“You’ve got the job!” said Michael. He stood up and tried to shake her hand, before realising that he was still holding his coffee mug in that hand. He handed the mug to me and shook her hand. 

I looked at the mug. It said You don’t have to be crazy to work here, but it helps!

—

“So his thing is that whatever it says on his coffee mug, that’s what his personality is like?” said my wife. 

We were sitting in the kitchen together. Our six kids had gone to bed, and we were looking over their report cards. I was rifling through my wife’s purse, ostensibly to get a stick of gum, but actually to look for clues about what her name was. 

“Yes,” I said, “Normally I would wait for a third example, but…”

“No, this is such weird behaviour it could only be the mug thing,” said my wife, “Oh, look at this. Fuck yes.”

She pointed to a comment on Varys’s report card. It said Varys consistently makes insightful, thoughtful and clever remarks during class discussions.

“Hell yeah,” I said, “That rules.”

My wife smiled and went back to reading. I found her glasses case and quickly looked it over in case it was monogrammed. No dice.

“So I guess it’s the mug thing,” I said. 

“Yep,” said my wife, whose Airpods weren’t monogrammed either. I love my wife a lot but her one flaw is that she doesn’t monogram anything, “Oh shit, check this out.”

She held up a report card for Littlefinger, which must’ve been one of our other daughters. She had an HD in maths and science, and she had a D in English.

“Oh get fucked,” I said, “That’s fucking sick. Our kids go to a performing arts school and they’re still really good at the other subjects too.”

“They spend like an hour plus every day just doing cheer practice,” said my wife, “And they’re still better at the boring stuff, like maths, than most other people’s kids. That’s so good.”

I let out a hiss of frustration. I had found my wife’s wallet, and only just realised that, obviously, her wallet would be full of stuff that had her name on it. I couldn’t believe I had forgotten that. Pregnancy brain I guess. I was pregnant. See, I told you our kids weren’t adopted.

I flipped open my wife’s wallet and took a look at her ID. Oh weird, her name was also Krutika. Weird coincidence. 

—

“I like your car,” said Krutika. The one I worked with, not my wife. Despite my fuzzy memory, i was certain that there was no chance I would confuse them. I love my wife, whereas this new Krutika was really annoying. 

“What do you like about it?” I asked. 

“I like the picture of Lieutenant Harmon ‘Harm’ Rabb Jr.,” she said, “It’s a good likeness and they got all his medals too.”

“Great,” I said. 

“And I like the picture of Lieutenant Colonel Sarah ‘Mac’ Mackenzie,” she said.

“You mean Major,” I said.

“Actually later in the series she’s promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, and you can tell by her uniform that the picture is her when she’s at that rank,” said Krutika.

“Well I haven’t seen up to that point, so thanks a lot,” I said, “Thanks a fucking lot. You spoiled it.”

“What are you doing with that mug?” Krutika asked. 

I turned away from her, “Nothing.”

A few days had passed since my wife and I had figured out the mug thing, and it seemed to hold true. When Michael drank from the I hate Mondays mug, he kept talking about how he hated Mondays. When he drank from the Don’t talk to me before I have my coffee mug, he didn’t talk to anyone before he had his coffee, but he already had his coffee because he was drinking from the mug, so it was normal. When he drank from his Keep Calm And Chive On mug, he kept very calm and chived on for the whole day. Even when the fire alarm went off, he chived on.

I was writing on a mug with a permanent marker. I had crossed out the original message, which was I’m still waiting for my Hogwarts acceptance letter. I didn’t want to put up with a whole day of Michael moping and sighing about not getting his Hogwarts acceptance letter. Waiting by the window looking for owls. 

I wrote my own message, which said I can levitate and shoot lightning. I was pretty sure the mug thing didn’t work like that, but I wanted to see what Michael would do. 

“Hey ladies,” said Michael. He was still wearing his cycling gear. He had been cycling to work ever since he gave me The Jag. 

“Hi Michael,” I said, “I made you some coffee.”

“Hi Mister Scott,” said Krutika. 

That’s right, my boss’s name is Michael Scott, just like the guy from The Office. Lots of people would find that pretty funny, especially since he’s a bit of a quirky guy, just like the character Michael Scott. To be honest it’s not that funny to me anymore, because I’ve worked here for a few years. I’ve already heard all the jokes about it, so now it’s not funny to me anymore.

“Thanks for the coffee,” said Michael, and then he took a sip and started levitating and shooting lightning.