She looked around in the lobby, occasionally
smiling and nodding to familiar faces. Lisa couldn't imagine handling more than
three men. In fact, she had thought three would be her limit, until she had her
little negotiation with the three big black external auditors. She heard the
sounds of tapping to see Ally making her way towards her, her bright red heels
clacking against the tiled floor.
"I can't believe it Lisa, twelve percent for the
both of us!" Ally exclaimed.
"Wow! So how much money are we talking about here?"
Lisa asked.
Ally leaned in and whispered a figure. Lisa's eyes
widened and she moved back in surprise.
"You're serious?"
"Yes! If we can get this whole union to cool down
and get them to agree to back off, well..."
"Unbelievable..."
"I know, right? I'll tell you more on the way
down," Ally said as she pressed the button for the elevator.
As the elevator made its descent towards the
basement, Ally leaned in close to Lisa.
"So, I hear this group is a bunch of black guys.
They own a lot of votes apparently and they also talk with the guys off duty
who are black," Ally informed.
"So... this is like the black vote?"
Ally laughed and lightly tapped Lisa's shoulder.
"I guess you could say that. They are the last
folks to put in their votes and if we can convince them today to not strike,
well, then we win," Ally said with a wink.
The elevator dinged and the doors opened leading to
the basement. Lisa and Ally walked out into a barely lit hallway and made their
way towards to large double doors at the end. Lisa's palms sweat at the thought
of multiple black men surrounding both her and Ally. Once they reached the
double doors, Lisa paused and took a deep breath.
"Here we go," Ally said.
The two walked through and paused. It was a large
open room with random boxes, crates and machinery lying around. There were no
workers in sight, only one pudgy white man sitting against a wall staring at a
Playboy magazine.
"Uh... hi," Ally greeted.
The man looked up and then put his magazine down.
He stood up and adjusted his hat.
"Sorry ma'am, this is the basement. I think you
need to go up a couple of floors," he said.
"Oh... we're here to speak with the foreman and his
crew," Ally said.
The white man's eyebrows furrowed and he looked at
the two women.
"I'm the foreman. And you two are?"
"I'm Ally and this is Lisa. Mr. Craft mentioned
that he wanted someone to... speak with you and your crew?"
There was a small smirk on the pudgy white man's
face. Lisa could see small drops of sweat running down his forehead.
"OH! Well, I'm Jackson Drew, and uh... here, follow
me," he said as he hurriedly made his way towards a row of crates.
Lisa figured that this was the white manager that
Mr. Brown had told her about. He seemed rather harmless and didn't really
strike her as a white supremacist of any sort. Though, he did have a bit of a
creepy, sleazy vibe about him.
They stopped once they reached a slightly cleaner
area of the basement. Jackson took off his hat, wiped his forehead and eyes the
two girls. He pulled out a small walkie talkie.
"Shawn, you there?" He spoke into the walkie talkie.
"Sup?" A deep bass voice answered back.
"Get yourself and the boys over to the corner
by 3H. The uh..." Jackson's eyes shifted from side to side and his face
grew red as he paused.
"The negotiators are here," he continued.
"Negotiators? As in more than one?" Shawn
questioned.
"Uh... yeah. Get over here ASAP."
There was a click on the walkie
talkie and Jackson put it away. Lisa looked around the large basement. It was
quiet the warehouse full of materials. The two turned and looked down an aisle
full of crates when they heard something coming their way. It was a large
forklift with several men clinging onto it as a large black man drove it
towards Lisa and Ally.
"Fucking crazy ass nig.." Jackson paused.
Lisa could count at least at least six or seven
guys somehow on the forklift as it drove closer. A couple more black men walked
out from a nearby small office. They were all relatively big and muscular, just
a couple were rotund and overweight.
The forklift stopped and the various black men
hopped out. A large, muscular, extremely dark, and shirtless black man made his
way to the front of the group and extended a hand.
"Sup ladies. I'm Shawn. You's
da negotiators?" He asked.
Ally shook his hand, followed by Lisa.
"Yep, we hear you've got leverage over the vote on
this new thing the union wants or something?" Ally asked.
"Oh yeah, those fuckers are trying to cut off our
breaks. We barely get enough breaks as it is. We're voting to keep our breaks
and be able to include some smoke breaks in between too," Shawn replied.
"Well, maybe less breaks is a good thing. It does
help make it feel like work goes by faster..." Ally started.
"You shittin' me? That's
just fucking ridiculous," Shawn replied.
"Yeah, fuck dat," another
black man yelled.
"Well... what if we offered a different kind of
break? Maybe... after hours?" Ally suggested.
"The fuck is after hours breaking?" Shawn asked.
Ally seductively walked towards Shawn, making sure
to sway her hips. Lisa could clearly see that the black men were enjoying the
view. She looked down to see something move underneath Shawn's jeans.
"We can give you a preview right now," Ally said as
she softly rubbed on Shawn's leg.