7/20/22 Just Walk Away

 Just Walk Away

“You promised you would send me back!” Lizelle angrily yelled, “You said I would only be here for a little while, what happened to that!?”

“Oh my dear Lizelle,” Nash said, in a soft tone, “It was meant to be that way but…”

“But what?” Lizelle grunted through clasped teeth.

“You are just so good up here. I have plenty of workers who can do the job down below,

but so few thrive as you do up here.”

“Thrive? You think I’m thriving up here?!” she said, her voice getting louder with each word. “I may be doing the work well, but I am far from thriving. I liked my work down below, I was happy there, but now…”

“Oh Lizelle, don’t be so harsh,” Nash pouts his lower lip, “I want my workers to be efficient, I want strong people to be where they are needed, and that is you, up here.”

Lizelle calms down and lets out a disgusted chuckle, “You never meant to send me back down did you? You wanted me up here all along.”

Nash shakes his head, “No, I wanted you down below at first, but then I saw you grow, become a respectable worker. It was then that I knew I didn’t want you down there anymore, I needed you to be up here.”

“Then why even tell me that you would eventually send me back?” Lizelle asks on the verge of tears, “Why not just move me up here permanently? Why give me that hope that I would be going back?”

“Because I didn’t want you to leave,” Nash replies in a more serious tone. “I knew how happy you were down there, I knew you wouldn't like the move. I was hoping after being up here for a while you would find that same happiness, and no longer want to go back.”

“Well I guess you thought wrong because that is not what happened,” Lizelle says sternly.

“Now that you know, will you leave?”

“I have been a loyal worker to you for years now, I like the work here, I don’t know what else I’d do. But if you won’t put me back, I think I have to, for my own sanity,” her tears turning from anger to genuine sadness.

“You will be missed if you go, you are such a great worker, a true gem of the team.”

“Then why not just put me back down? Why risk losing me, when you could just put me in a place where you know I will stay?”

Putting on an almost evil look Nash responds, “Because I don’t think you will leave, even staying up here. Like you said, you are a loyal worker, I’ve seen that. I know you better than you think.”

Lizelle knows he is right, it is not in her to just leave, she has always been the one to fill in where she was needed without complaint, but this time was so different. Trading genuine enjoyment for a clean conscience was not easy. Even though it went against every fiber of her being, she knew it had to be done.

“I guess you lost your bet then Nash,” she said solemnly, “I quit.”

Nash’s eyes go wide with shock, “Lizelle?” He cannot manage anymore words before she turns and walks away, never to return.


The End

7/20/22

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