Going To Work

Penelope ended up making a delicious gouda and spinach shells dish on Sunday and spent the rest of the day lying around. At least Roman was gone for a few hours playing basketball with some of his friends so she had a break from pretending.

She needed that break to mentally prepare herself for going to work on Monday. She had spent a good chunk of the day mentally reviewing everything about her coworkers, workplace, and responsibilities that she could find.

The journals, social media accounts, and the advertising agency's website were all useful tools but she wasn't sure if it would be enough. As long as she didn't make any major mistakes, she should be okay.

It took her a while to find an appropriate business casual outfit for work the night before because she wasn't used to dressing up for her jobs. At the call center, she was allowed to wear jeans and t-shirts because no one saw them behind the scenes and she had a uniform shirt at the drugstore.

Eventually Penelope settled on a floral skirt with a light pink blouse and flats. Her wardrobe in this world consisted of a lot of skirts.

If she could afford it, she would wear them back home too because they were more comfortable than pants in her opinion. But matching them with things would require a complete overhaul of her closet and she would never have the money for that.

In her world, she typically wore jeans and blouses to work and pajamas or sweats at home. She didn't own many dresses or skirts because there hadn't been any need for them given her lifestyle.

Feeling (mostly) ready, she headed out the door on Monday morning. Roman left almost an hour before she did but they ran into each other while she was getting ready and he kissed her on his way out.

Penelope was trying really hard not to let those simple kisses affect her. At least he had kept them short so far. She couldn't imagine her poor heart being able to handle any more than that.

She had to convince her boss to let her go to that conference so she could get away from him for a while! If this didn't work out, she would be in big trouble.

Once she pulled into the parking lot and got out of her car, Penelope was enthusiastically greeted by a curvy blonde woman with sparkling brown eyes. "Penny! I heard what happened from Darren; how are you feeling? Are you sure you should be back at work already?"

She recognized this face. Ada James, one of Penelope Cross's coworkers who seemed to be particularly friendly with her. Darren was their boss.

"I'm feeling fine but thanks for asking," she said with a smile. "Did I miss anything important while I was out?"

Ada made a face while she thought about it. "Let's see…Marianne ended up taking over a couple of your projects for you. Oh! And Richard might be taking your place in the conference. If you really are fine now, you need to talk to Darren ASAP to get him to give your spot back."

"Thanks for letting me know," Penelope said sincerely despite her internal panic.

She had to go to that conference! Not only would it give her an excuse to be away from Roman for a while, it might be her only chance to experience anything like that in the field she wished she could have gone into.

As they walked into the building and she scanned her employee ID badge, Penelope tried not to look around in awe as if she hadn't seen everything here before. This particular agency employed over a hundred people.

The account services department had slightly less than a dozen people in it and shared a floor with account planning and IT departments because they had about the same number of employees each.

The human resources, finance, and media-buying departments shared a floor as well. As did the production, research, and online development ones. Only the creative department—where Penelope worked—had its own floor.

She was one of the eight graphic designers on staff. Other people on their floor included copywriters, art directors, production artists, web designers, and creative directors. Darren was the head creative director and basically had the run of this entire floor.

Most of the departments were sending a couple of people to the advertising conference. Since the creative department had so many people, Darren was in charge of picking four.

Originally Penelope had been chosen because of how much time and effort she dedicated to this company after starting here straight out of college. She was on the fast track to being promoted to an assistant creative director—or so she believed, according to the journals.

The creative department's layout consisted of back to back desks with a foot-tall partition between. People couldn't see what their desk partner was working on while seated but could still see the top of their coworkers' heads depending on their heights.

She was only able to single out her desk because there was a trifold picture frame on it with pictures of her family and Roman. She was directly across from a woman she recognized as Julie Hofstader from Mypix.

Everyone who saw Penelope greeted her on her way to her desk and asked her about the surgery. She was overwhelmed with the attention from all these people she had never met in her life.

Some people she recognized and others she didn't. Trying not to panic, she simply smiled and thanked everyone for their concern as best she could.

"Penelope, Darren wants to see you in his office," Tom Myers, one of the assistant creative directors, informed her. "Welcome back, by the way."

Darren was one of the few people on this floor who had his own office. He must want her to come talk to him about what she missed while she was gone. Perfect. Penelope had been looking for an excuse to talk to him about the conference.

"Thanks! I'll head there right away," she said before desperately scanning the nameplates to make sure she went to the right office.