June 2014 (Present Day)

David sat alone in his office, staring at the spreadsheet on his screen. His eyes roved back and forth across the columns of numbers, but their meaning failed to penetrate. He minimized the window with an irritated click of the mouse. He was running too far behind at this point - hadn't been able to concentrate properly for days now. He leaned forward and rubbed his bleary eyes with the heels of his hands.

It had all started with her email last Friday: one week ago today. If only he'd taken it more seriously. Emailed back with some question or expression of concern. Something other than that thoughtless, semi-drunk reply: "Very funny, my love...."

Instead, he'd let the whole weekend go by without giving her email a second thought. He'd strolled into work Monday morning and saw she wasn't at her desk - and still, he hadn't felt the slightest twinge of concern. Late again, he'd thought with a grin. He'd spent the next 15 minutes rehearsing in his mind how best to give her crap about it.

"Why Penelope Stewart. Fancy meeting you here!"

He'd used that line too many times before, he remembered thinking to himself. He should probably have a serious word with her about the importance of punctuality. She wasn't doing herself any favors, career-wise, with the chronic lateness. But that wouldn't be any fun. He'd glanced down at his watch and smirked to himself as an idea struck him. Maybe he should run up to Chinatown and buy her one of those fake diamond Rolexes from the street vendors who line Canal Street. Leave it draped across her keyboard with a little note: "When the little hand points to the 9 and the big hand points to the 12...."

He'd sat there in his office imagining the scene. What kind of smartass retort would she shoot back at him? "Gosh, I'm sorry, Mr. Powers. Perhaps you'd like an accounting of all the unpaid overtime I've put in this month?"

It wasn't until lunchtime that the doubts had started to creep in. He'd tried to call her at noon, but the call went straight to voicemail. Then the kid from the mail room had come by and dropped that thick manila envelope on his desk. He'd recognized her handwriting, of course. She'd gone to some trouble to make it legible - better than her usual indecipherable scrawl:

Human Resources Department
c/o David Powers
Dewitt Hathaway Worldwide, Inc.
60 Wall Street, 16th floor
New York, NY 10005

He'd run his thumb across the thick block letters. Human Resources Department... Why was she sending something to human resources? And more to the point, why had she addressed it to him? It was her job to handle his correspondence, not the other way around.

He hadn't opened the envelope. Not right away. He'd set down his half-eaten chicken salad sandwich and picked up his phone to call her again.

And that was when he'd finally understood - that moment when he dialed her number and heard that thick manila envelope start to ring.

That had been five days ago already, and the envelope was still sitting on his desk beneath the ever-growing stack of mail. He'd gone all week without an assistant. He'd missed phone calls, left emails unanswered. It was starting to get out of hand.

He'd lost his temper at an intern this morning. Over some notecards. David squeezed his eyes shut and rested his head against his two clenched fists, digging the knuckles into his forehead. Not just any notecards. Pink notecards. Penny's pink notecards. Penny's things were all just where she had left them at her desk, waiting for her to resume her place among them. And when he saw that intern with her grubby little hands on Penny's things, walking away with Penny's stack of pink notecards... Well, he'd probably overreacted. People didn't know about the notecards.

People didn't know about a lot of things. He hadn't missed the looks that they were starting to give him the past couple days. Those darting glances, lifted eyebrows. "There goes the crazy one," those looks said. "Stay out of his way."

He knew those looks. He'd seen them all before. He'd gotten more than his share of looks like that, his first Christmas back at work after three long months away on disability. He'd been physically back to normal at that point - maybe lost a little muscle tone from the months of inactivity - but otherwise good as new. But that didn't mean he could sleep at night. Didn't mean he could walk two blocks down a New York City sidewalk without freezing like a deer in the headlights every time he heard a loud noise.

Penny knew. She was the only one who really knew. She was the one who'd sat there next his bed, day in and day out, and held his hand --first in the hospital, and then later by his bed at home. Hers was the first face he'd seen after the doctors had patched him back together. She was the one who squeezed his hand and ran her cool fingers through his hair and shushed him back to sleep. She knew. She shouldn't have known, but she did. He'd tried to tell her - once they finally pulled the tube out of his throat and let him try to speak - he'd tried to tell her to knock it off. There were nurses for that. There were home health aides.

"You need someone here who's not a stranger," she'd replied.

"This isn't your job."

"It is now." She'd smiled cheerily and shown him the temp agency timesheets from the past few weeks with his own name signed at the bottom. "See, I'm getting paid and everything."

"Is that supposed to look like my signature?" he'd managed in a hoarse whisper.

She'd squinted at the bottom of the page. "You don't think so?

"Your handwriting is atrocious."

"I'll work on that," she'd answered with a shrug. "Just look at all this overtime I'm racking up!"

After he'd started back at work again, she always seemed to know when it was getting really bad. "Does someone need a time out?" she would ask him. And then she'd shoo him into his office and shut the door, and play defense for a little while if anyone tried to interrupt. She did a pretty good job of it too - covering for him. But not so good that he didn't get those looks. Those looks that told him people were wondering if he'd come back to work too soon. Those looks that told him he was starting to unravel.

Leo's look the other day had been a little different. David's boss had walked into his office on Wednesday morning and given him that look where he tilted back his head and stared down the bridge of his nose. That skeptical, assessing look that said, "What did you do to her this time, Idiot Boy?"

He hadn't done anything! At least, David couldn't think of anything. And he'd certainly spent enough time going back over every second of the preceding week. He'd mentally sifted through every interaction he'd had with Penny, searching for any clue of what was coming. He'd come up with nothing. Nada.

Last week had been a good week. She'd still been at her desk last Friday night when he headed out for the evening. "Get out of here," he'd told her. "Don't you have some keg party to go to?"

She'd merely glanced up at him and then back at her computer screen. "Somebody has to get these steel numbers done," she'd said. "You go have fun with your filet mignon."

"Filet mignon is a girly steak, Penny."

"Since when are there girl steaks and boy steaks?"

"Bone-in ribeye. That's what a man orders."

"Interesting." She'd swiveled in her chair to face him and slowly looked him up and down. "Maybe you better go with the petite filet mignon." Smartass.

He'd gone over it and over it. Every little line of her mouth. Every little tic of her face. He'd ransacked his memory for any clue to what would happen next. There was nothing.

But there couldn't be nothing. Her email had said, "I am unable to continue my position with your company." Nothing more. No reason. No rationale. But he knew better than to take that at face value. You don't resign over email without so much as a goodbye for no reason whatsoever. You don't leave all your things behind at your desk and return your company phone by U.S. Postal Service because it's simply time to move on.

Maybe if he'd called her, he could have found out what was wrong. Maybe he could have changed her mind. But it was too late for that. Even if he wanted to, he no longer had any way to reach her. She'd sent back her phone. The only email he'd ever had for her was her work account, now deactivated.

He knew where she lived, of course. He'd considered showing up at her place and knocking on the door. And say what, exactly? She was his assistant. His temporary assistant. She gave notice and she left. That's what temps did. What did he expect? Take her out for some grand farewell dejeuner?

He probably would have, too, if she'd given him the chance. He'd have taken her somewhere fancy. Linked her hand through his elbow as he strolled up to the snooty maître d'. "David Powers, party of two." Maybe he'd have ordered them a bottle of Dom Perignon. Champagne in the middle of the day. Completely against the rules, of course. But for her last day of work, he could have bent the rules a little.

It didn't matter anyway. There wasn't going to be a farewell lunch. She wasn't going to stop by and collect her things. Time was up, and David knew it. He knew what he had to do. He was the Senior Vice President of Mergers & Acquisitions at a bank that was too big to fail. The world financial system didn't grind to a halt, just because David Powers' assistant had left him. He couldn't let things go another week. There was too much work that wasn't getting done. He had to call the temp agency - tell them to send a new girl over, first thing Monday morning.

And she was going to need a place to sit.

David stood and slowly made his way to the entrance of Penny's cubicle. Empty. She'd left a pale blue cardigan sweater draped across the back of her desk chair. Just left it there. Abandoned. He picked it up and held it in his lap as he sat down.

With a sigh, he leaned forward and opened her top desk drawer. His heart rate quickened slightly at what he saw inside: a confused jumble of office supplies and other accumulated objects. A total mess, of course. Messes always set him off. He had no tolerance for disorganization. He took a deep breath now to steady himself and began to sift through the jumble, sorting it into two piles: one for company property, and the other for her personal effects. Item by item, the personal pile grew.

A couple hair clips.

A pack of gum.

A used teabag, long since dried to dusty brown. Seriously Penny?

A little scrap of plain white copy paper, folded into quarters, wedged into the back of the drawer. He didn't even realize what it was until he'd opened it and saw his own handwriting.

Merry Christmas Penny! Somehow we made it through another year. You know I couldn't do it without you.

He remembered now - that hastily scrawled afterthought he'd given her for Christmas this past year. Not like the first Christmas. He'd done a better job of it the first Christmas. He'd meant to get her something thoughtful again this year, but it had slipped his mind until the last minute. He'd been too busy wrapping up his affairs before he headed out for his three-week-long holiday ski trip to Aspen.

He wondered why she bothered to save it. He hadn't even signed his name. He'd handed it to her on his way out the door, along with one of those poinsettia plants they sold on the street next to every subway station this time of year. He'd seen the look that flashed across her face for just an instant. Not even a look. Just the barest tightening of a muscle by her jaw. A glance downward. A too-bright smile. "Merry Christmas, boss," she'd said. "Try not to break both your legs out there."

Next year, he had vowed to himself, as he bid her Merry Christmas and made his way out the door. Next year he'd make it up to her. Next year he'd get her something really special.

How had it never occurred to him that there might not be a next year?

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