Office Subjugation

Chapter 4 - The Cruelest Day

Wednesday night she went looking for a cupless bra. Walmart didn't have them. Target didn't have them. Online: lingerie boutiques, all closing at five. It would have to wait for the weekend. She bought a pack of cotton thongs from Walmart -- cheap, multipack, assorted color's -- and heels from the discount shoe store two doors down. She practiced in her apartment, wobbling across thin carpet, her ankles screaming.

No bra tomorrow. It was fine yesterday. He'll understand.

She set her alarm for 4:30 and fell asleep with the heels still on.

---

Thursday. 6am. Same fitted blouse, same pencil skirt, new heels, cotton thong -- pink, small floral pattern, the least childish one in the pack. No bra. The heels changed everything. Her posture straightened, the arch in her lower back pushing her chest forward and her ass out, her hips swaying with each step in a way she couldn't control. She felt taller and less stable. Like standing on a cracked foundation.

The office was locked. She sat on the floor -- her spot now -- long black in hand, bought at 7:10, timed to his window. At 7:15, the elevator chimed.

Early. She scrambled up.

Williams came through in charcoal grey, phone to his ear. He unlocked the office without breaking stride and she followed, set the coffee on his desk. He sipped. Set it down.

No nod. No acknowledgement. Nothing.

He unpacked his briefcase in silence. Then he stood, came around the desk, and looked at her. The grey eyes were colder today. Flatter. Whatever patience had carried him through the last three days was gone.

"Is this the same blouse as yesterday?"

Her stomach dropped. "I -- yes, sir. I only have the one--"

"Theone." He circled behind her, and she could feel him cataloguing. The same wrinkled blouse. The same pencil skirt. The heels were new, at least. But the overall impression was what it was. "When a client walks through that door, you're the first thing they see. A direct reflection of me and my practice." His voice took on the measured cadence of a man laying down law. "I expect a rotation. Five outfits, one for each day. Dresses or skirt-and-blouse combinations. Skirts at mid-thigh -- not the knee, not below. Blouses fitted, top buttons undone -- the fabric is pulling across your chest and it looks cheap. A generous neckline is standard for client-facing staff." He saidstandardas though having her cleavage on display was professional hygiene. "I expect your nails polished, lipstick on, makeup done -- attractive, not cheap. Can you manage that, or is that beyond you as well?"

Five outfits, all mid-thigh, all showing cleavage, plus makeup and nails. The arithmetic was impossible.

"Yes, sir. I'll have it by Monday."

"You'd better." He stopped in front of her. His gaze dropped to her chest. Without a bra, her breasts sat heavy beneath the blouse, the cotton thin enough to show everything -- the shape of each nipple, the slight indent of her areola, the full curve swaying when she breathed. The cool office air kept them hard. Two points pressing against white fabric.

"Where's your bra?"

"The stores close at five, sir. I'm going this weekend--"

"That was aone-timeallowance yesterday. This isn't sorting it Chloe. This is showing up with your nipples on display and telling me you couldn't be bothered." He studied her chest the way he'd study a document with errors. "Keep those under control. Figure it out."

She crossed her arms over her chest. He was already moving on.

"Skirt. Up."

She didn't hesitate the way she had yesterday. She reached down and worked the pencil skirt up -- the same shimmy, hips rocking side to side, the tight fabric catching on the full swell of her ass. She tugged harder, the motion practiced now but no less graceless, her wide hips shifting, until the skirt jerked free and her cheeks bounced from the release. She bunched the fabric at her waist.

The pink cotton thong. Small floral print. A silence that lasted three seconds and felt like thirty.

"What is this?"

"It's a thong, sir. You said--"

"I saidprofessional undergarments." He snapped the waistband against her hip. The elastic stung. "This is what a teenager wears to a sleepover." He stepped back. "After this weekend, youwillhave the proper undergarments of a professional woman at this firm. Underwear, stockings, garter belt -- all matching, all adult. I won't be tolerating this little-girl nonsense come Monday." He held out his hand. "Give it to me."

A sleepover.Her face burned. He was right -- it was a Walmart multipack. Flowers. She was a grown woman in a professional office wearing little-girl underwear and expecting him to take her seriously.No wonder he's losing patience with me.

She stared at his palm.

"Chloe."

She hooked her thumbs into the waistband and pulled the thong down, bringing the skirt with it -- a desperate bid to stay covered. He allowed it. She stepped out, the thin cotton dangling from her fingers, and handed it to him. He dropped it in the bin without looking.

-

"Better you go without than wear that."

She smoothed the skirt down. The fabric settled against bare skin -- nothing between her and the thin pencil skirt. The slide of cotton where it shouldn't touch. The cool air finding her where nothing had been bare before. She was naked underneath her clothes in her boss's office, and the logic of how she'd arrived here was a trail of reasonable steps she could follow from Monday to now without finding the moment it went wrong.

-

He sat down. "Bottom shelves."

---

The day that followed was the worst yet.

She bent to pull a file and the pencil skirt stretched taut over her bare ass, the shape obscene through the thin fabric. He stood by the bookcase with his arms folded.

"Maybe if you spent less time eating and more time thinking about how you present yourself, your clothes might actually fit. You're practically falling out of everything you own."

She wasn't overweight. She knew that somewhere. But the knowing was small and getting smaller, and what she heard wasfat, sloppy, too much, and she believed it because the voice saying it belonged to the man who decided whether she ate tomorrow.

He's right, though.She glanced down at the blouse straining across her chest, the hips that made the pencil skirt ride up every time she moved.Look at me. He has to sit here all day looking at this. No wonder he's frustrated.

She handed him a document and he glanced at her chest. "Cross your arms. I can't have clients seeing that."

She crossed her arms and kept them crossed all morning -- filing one-handed, carrying stacks pressed against her breasts, always trying to cover the nipples that were always showing. He noted, with a sigh, that she was slower than usual.

She refilled his water glass and he watched her wobble across the carpet. "You walk like a baby deer. If you're going to dress like a professional, learn to move like one."

The heels made her body do things she couldn't control -- hips swaying, ass shifting, her breasts bouncing beneath the loose blouse. She was aware of every movement. Every step was a performance she hadn't rehearsed, and the audience was a man who found every part of it inadequate.

-

Mid-morning, he called her over. She wobbled to his desk, arms crossed. Halfway there his phone rang. He held up a finger --wait-- and answered. His voice shifted to smooth legal argument. Without looking at her, he pointed down. One finger, aimed at the floor beside his chair.

She knelt. Thin carpet under bare knees. She kept her arms crossed over her chest and knelt there for twenty minutes -- bare under her skirt, arms aching -- while he conducted business above her. She could smell his cologne. The leather of his chair. The wool of his trousers an inch from her shoulder. She existed at his feet for no reason she could name, and she waited because she didn't know if she was allowed to stand, and she wasn't going to ask.

This is fine. He's on a call. I'd just be standing here anyway, getting in the way.She shifted her weight on her knees.Assistants probably wait like this all the time. I just don't know because I've never had a real job before.

The call ended. He made notes. Read a paragraph. She stayed.

He glanced down eventually, as though noticing furniture he'd forgotten. "You can get up."

---

Early afternoon. She'd been building to this all day -- rehearsing the words, discarding them, rehearsing again.

"Mr. Williams? I was wondering about the contract. When I might get paid."

He didn't look up. "I haven't gotten around to it."

"It's just -- I've been spending my own money on the coffees, and the lunches, and the clothes--"

He looked up. Not anger. Appraisal. A man deciding what something was worth.

"Do you think you deserve one?" He asked it gently. Almost curious. "A contract. Do you think you'veearnedit? Because from where I'm sitting, you've shown up every day in the wrong clothes. You can't dress yourself. You can't walk in heels. I'm spending my mornings teaching you things your mother should have taught you." He paused. "I'm not sure you've earned a contract yet. Are you?"

Her mouth opened. Closed. The argument -- the money, the lunches, the overtime -- crumbled under logic that wasn't logical but felt irrefutable. His voice was so reasonable. His expression so patient. And every point he made was true, if you stood where he wanted you to stand and looked at it from the angle he'd built.

"No, sir," she whispered. "I'm sorry I asked."

Of course I haven't earned it. Four days and I still can't dress myself. He's been spending his mornings fixing me instead of doing his actual work. And I'm asking him for money.

"Don't be sorry. Be better."

---

The afternoon was silent. Filing. The bare slide of skirt against skin. Every bend felt exposed. Every kneel pressed bare skin to carpet where the skirt rode up, the fabric pulling away from her thighs, the cool air on places it shouldn't reach. She'd stopped trying to hide. There was nothing left to hide behind.

At ten o'clock -- sixteen hours -- he capped his pen.

"Monday I expect the full uniform. Five outfits in rotation, proper undergarments, makeup, and heels you can actually walk in. If you show up looking like this again, we'll be having a very different conversation."

No warmth. Nowell done. Just the list and the sound of scotch being poured as she gathered her things. She said goodnight. He didn't respond.

---

The bus. Back row. Forehead against the cold window.

The day replayed in fragments. The thong in the bin. The baby deer.Less time eating.Twenty minutes on her knees.Do you think you've earned it?

She was going to quit.

-

The decision crystallized slowly, then all at once. The humiliation. Over two hundred dollars spent on a job that hadn't paid her a cent. The sixteen-hour day. The underwear in the trash. The contract she apparently hadn'tearned. She was done. She'd flip burgers, wait tables, anything -- but she was not going back.

For twenty minutes on that bus, Chloe was free. The conviction was solid and real, and she held it like a candle in cupped hands.

Then she got home.

The notice was taped to her door. White paper, official letterhead. Past due rent. Fourteen days to pay or vacate. She stood in the hallway, keys in one hand, heels in the other, and felt the floor tilt.

Inside, she opened her banking app. Negative. Not by a lot -- by exactly the amount of coffees and lunches and Walmart skirts she'd spent in four days. No savings. No credit. No one to call.

She thought about Ohio. Her father's silence before theI told you so. She couldn't. She thought about other jobs -- three months of applications before this one. Silence from every café, every store. No skills. No references. Nothing.

The conviction from the bus evaporated.

Shecould not quit.

She sat on the floor, knees drawn up, and stared at the eviction notice until the words blurred. Without him, she had nothing. Not just the job --him. He was the only person in this city who knew her name and hadn't given up on her yet. Then she thought about Mr. Williams. The warmth from yesterday --you're improving, well done today. He was hard on her because he had standards. He was teaching her. Maybe if she told him about the rent, the money, he'd help. He was a successful man. He could help if he wanted to.

Maybe if she just tried harder.

She set her alarm for 4:30. Laid out the blouse, the skirt, the heels. She didn't have nail polish or lipstick or five outfits or a cupless bra or stockings or a garter belt. She had nothing.

But she had tomorrow, and tomorrow she'd go back, because there was nowhere else to go.

She fell asleep on the floor with the eviction notice crumpled in her fist.