Claire Ward had never heard silence fall so fast. One moment, Darren’s coworkers were laughing around the picnic tables, holding paper plates and plastic cups, pretending the company BBQ was relaxed instead of carefully political. Next, her husband had thrown his arm around her shoulders and said, loudly enough for everyone to hear, “Claire? She’s useless. Pretty, sure, but useless. She wouldn’t last one day in a real job.”
A few people laughed because they thought they were supposed to. Others looked down at their plates. Claire stood very still, feeling the heat from the grill on one side of her face and the colder burn of humiliation on the other. Darren squeezed her shoulder as if he had made a harmless joke. “Don’t look like that,” he said. “You know I’m kidding.”
But Claire knew he wasn’t. Across the lawn, his boss, Vivian Harlow, watched with a polite smile that did not reach her eyes. Claire picked up her cup, walked toward her, and said quietly, “That’s strange. Your biggest client seemed to find me useful last month.”