– Angelika, come in.
I put aside the report lying on my desk, the one I had been working on since seven that morning. My coffee sat untouched beside me, completely cold — I hadn’t even taken a single sip. Timur Rashidovich stood in the doorway of his office, slowly turning the signet ring on his little finger, looking over my head as if I wasn’t even standing there.
He always looked at people like that.
He wasn’t looking at you.
He was looking somewhere behind you.
As if you were nothing more than a shadow in the office.
I had worked at the company for eight years. Four years ago, I received my last salary increase. Sixty-eight thousand rubles. Since then, nothing. Not a single extra ruble.
Eight times I had walked into that same office. Eight times I had brought calculations, charts, results, and evidence with me. Eight times I had explained the same thing.
And eight times I received the same answer.
– Sit down, – he said, pointing toward the chair.
I sat down. The old leather covering of the chair had perfectly taken the shape of my body. I had sat there so many times over the years that I almost knew every crack in it.
– I saw the quarterly report, – Timur Rashidovich said. – It’s not bad. Actually, it’s quite good. But you understand that this is not the right time to review salaries, don’t you?
I took a deep breath.
– Timur Rashidovich, the clients I manage brought the company fourteen million rubles in revenue last year. The three most important contracts are my responsibility. Besides them, I also work with twelve smaller partners. I have been building these relationships for eight years.
He raised his hand.
His ring caught the light from the ceiling lamp.
– Angelinka, let’s not start this again. You are a good employee, nobody disputes that. But the market is difficult. Everyone is going through hard times. Be grateful that you still have a job here.
“Be grateful that you still have a job here.”
That was his favorite sentence.
I had heard it for the third time in the last six months.
And every time, the same thing happened inside me.
It wasn’t anger that rose.
It wasn’t resentment.
It was exhaustion.
That strange, deep exhaustion you feel when someone carries a heavy suitcase for years — a suitcase without a handle — and in the end, someone asks:
“Why are you complaining? At least you have a suitcase.”
On my desk stood my little cactus.
In a cracked clay pot.
I bought it when I walked through the doors of this office eight years earlier. It had survived three office moves, two complete renovations, and even a ceiling leak.
It was the only living thing in that place.
If you didn’t count me.
I returned to my desk. Opened the report and continued working.
But behind the numbers, I no longer saw only numbers.
One question kept repeating in my mind:
What if he’s right?
What if I really am easily replaceable?
That evening, sitting on the bus home, I watched the city lights disappear behind the window. The glass shook every time we hit a bump in the road. A woman sitting beside me had fallen asleep, resting her head against the window.
I looked down at my hands.
Short nails. Dry skin. Small cuts on my fingers.
These hands had worked for eight years.
These hands had written contracts, called clients, solved problems, and saved deadlines.
Fourteen million rubles.
With these hands.
Sixty-eight thousand rubles a month.
At home, I heated up yesterday’s leftover soup and ate it standing by the kitchen counter.
My son was already grown and living separately. The apartment had become too quiet without him.
Only the soft hum of the refrigerator could be heard, along with the sound of the neighbor’s television coming through the wall.
I washed the plate and placed it in the drying rack.
And for the first time, I didn’t think:
“Tomorrow it starts all over again.”
Instead, I thought:
“How much longer do I want this?”
In September, Snezhnana appeared.
Timur Rashidovich introduced her during a short Monday morning meeting.
– A new manager. She will help develop the department.
She was thirty-two years old.
A white blouse, perfect hair, high heels that clicked loudly with every step across the floor.
Click.
Click.
Click.
And a smile that, for some reason, always made me think it would be better to check the contents of my bag.
I didn’t hate her.
There was no reason to.
I simply felt something.
Something I couldn’t put into words yet.
Snezhnana joined my department.
From the first day, her strong vanilla perfume filled the office. It was sweet — too sweet. After a week, the entire corner smelled like it.
I opened the window.
She immediately closed it.
– I’m cold, – she said with a smile.
And I simply nodded.
As always.
Because over the years, I had learned one thing:
A good employee does not complain.
A good employee adapts.
Even when, little by little, they disappear.
At Friday’s meeting, I prepared the materials for expanding the “Orion-Grupp” contract.
I had managed this client for three and a half years.
I knew Pavel Sergeyevich’s every habit.
I knew he drank his tea without sugar.
I knew he hated when someone was late.
I knew his wife’s birthday.
Not because I was special.
But because I had built that relationship over years.
– Timur Rashidovich, I prepared the proposal for Orion-Grupp, – I said.
He looked at me.
I thought he would finally recognize my work.
I was wrong.
– Good. Give the materials to Snezhnana. She will handle it from now on.
For several seconds, I simply stared at him.
– But the meeting is on Wednesday. They are expecting me.
– Angelika, Snezhnana brings a fresh perspective. It will be good for you to learn how to delegate.
He smiled.
It was the kind of smile that contained no kindness.
Only finality.
I handed over the materials.
Seventeen pages.
Three weeks of work.
During lunch, Snezhnana flipped through them. She held a sandwich in one hand and turned the documents with the other.
Crumbs fell onto the cover page.
I saw it.
I said nothing.
At that moment, I didn’t know that soon everything would change.
At the end of the month, accounting accidentally sent the salary list to the wrong address.
Instead of Timur Rashidovich, it arrived in my inbox.
I opened it automatically.
And I saw it.
Snezhnana’s salary:
93,000 rubles.
Mine:
68,000.
A difference of twenty-five thousand rubles.
A woman who had worked there for barely two months.
A woman who didn’t even know the financial director’s last name.
She earned more than me.
Eight years of experience.
Fourteen million rubles in revenue.
Dozens of saved deadlines.
And yet, in their eyes, I was worth less.
I slowly closed the email.
My fingers became cold.
Not from anger.
From something else.
It felt like the moment when the first crack appears on a glass cup.
It hasn’t broken yet.
But you already know.
Sooner or later, it will fall into pieces.
And it will never be possible to put it back together the same way.
