[authors note]
If you love formulaic and, in my opinion, cringeworthy ‘Christmas Movies’ or similar ‘Made for TV Romances’ that use an ensemble cast of ‘almost perfect specimens of humanity’ then stop reading now.

I began writing this story as an alternative to the endless stream of smarmy if not downright awful Christmas movies that appear on TV starting in September and continuing until well into the new year. Many of these are very formulaic. Vis… A person goes to their old hometown under orders to close down a well-loved business ( e.g. a Christmas tree farm, coffee shop or a bakery). They may or may not get snowed in, but inevitably, they fall in love with someone who is part of the business. The keys are Christmas and all that the schmaltz that the greetings card industry wants us to believe about the holiday, a beautiful woman and a pretty good-looking man one of whom has left the small town to make it big in the city and is now coming home to put a lot of people out of work or variations on that theme. Oh, and don't forget the perfect teeth and plastic smiles.

While this story is not a million miles from that, I hope to introduce a certain amount of reality into the whole thing. Life is not as ‘sugar and sweet’ as those formulaic movies like to make out. Yes, those movies are pure escapism but honestly, they are so similar (and there are a lot of the same actors used in them) in plot and outcome that for me makes me just not bother to even start watching, but to reach for the virtual sick-bag aka the TV remote control.

Ok, that is a bit of an overstatement but honestly, come on US ‘made for TV’ cringe companies (also applies to the formulaic thriller genre), can’t you come up with something that at least pretends to be original or different?

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If the first time you meet someone who comes to change your life, it can be regarded as a memorable occasion. You can look back on that event with fondness in years to come.

If, however, it is even slightly embarrassing, then you may want to forget the whole thing.

This was the case when Casey Burbank came into my life although I was blissfully unaware of it at the time.

Working in an old Cotton Mill has both advantages and disadvantages. One of the latter is that we have to do a deep clean of the whole premises once a year. Despite the walls being sealed and painted, the dust and detritus from the 200+-year-old structure somehow manages to get everywhere so… we move everything out, get the industrial vacuums and steam cleaners going and after a lot of elbow grease and a huge amount of paint later, the place is clean for another year. As it was November, it was the turn of the admin offices. A team of seven of us had been in over the previous weekend doing the hard graft. Now the place smelt of fresh emulsion mingled with bleach.

Monday dawned and I was actively helping get the office up and running again. Even being the boss did not prevent me from pitching in and helping out. At the moment she arrived on the scene, I just happened to be lying on my back under a desk trying to connect up the cables for the computer that ran our accounts system.

I’d just reconnected the keyboard and the printer when I heard the sound of high heels. Thankfully, these were rare in an industrial setting like ours. Dress codes in our business were limited to the overalls and protective clothing that helped keep the employees safe when working.

I turned my head to see a pair of black Louboutins with at least a five-inch heel. The wearer had in my opinion, a very shapely pair of ankles that were encased in nearly black hosiery.

“I’m looking for Luke Beatty?” said the newcomer. Her American accent was also a rarity in this part of the world. I didn’t need any more introductions. I knew why she was visiting.

I didn’t hear any reply but the newcomer must have had a signal that the person she was seeking was under the desk that she was standing by. She crouched down and looked at me.

“Are you the boss here?”

“That’s me I’m afraid. I’ll be with you in a minute.”

I turned my head towards the desk where one of my staff was standing with a grin spread all over her face.

“Ayesha, can you show our visitor into the conference room and to the honours?”

Ayesha smiled and moved towards the visitor. The two women left the office and I was able to breathe again. I swiftly finished re-connecting the computer and waited while it started up. Once I'd seen that everything was okay and that the accounts department could get back to work, I headed for the toilets to wash my hands and put a comb through my naturally unruly hair.

I stopped at my office to collect my jacket and went into the conference room.

“Hello, I’m Lucas Beatty. You were looking for me?”

She stepped forward and offered me her hand. It was limp. I hated limp handshakes.

“Casey Burbank… Pleased to meet you.”

The name rang a bell. I knew the name and that confirmed my guess about her visit and it was not good.

“Welcome to Stuarts Mill, Casey.”

Ayesha appeared carrying a tray with cups and a teapot.

“Thanks, Ayesha,” I said as she put it on the large table.

“Ms Burbank, would you like some tea?”

“I’m not here to have tea.”

I ignored her while I poured myself a cup of tea. I added some milk and stirred it. I could tell that she was a woman on a mission and the sooner she could return to the relative warmth of Austin, Texas the better although the scenes of an almost frozen solid Texas in March 2021 came back into my mind.

“I get the distinct impression that you are here to close us down. Am I right?” I asked with a small smile on my face as I stirred my tea.

“That is correct. Head Office want this operation shut down before the end of the year. They can’t live with the losses that this site is continually posting.”

The indications that we were for the chop had been coming for at least five years. We had had two rounds of redundancies in 2019. Then COVID hit and stopped all that. Now, in late 2022, the cost-cutting and executive salary and bonus rises in the USA could continue its rapid rise. It didn't matter that our site was very profitable, someone in Austin wanted a new yacht, private jet or even an island home… Something had to give and that was us.

I supped some of my tea.

“Did you hear what I just said?” asked Casey.

“I did. You are the Head Office Axe Woman. You were told to shut us down because someone over in Austin thinks that we are making unsustainable losses and were probably told not to argue with me about it, but to go in hard, take no bullshit and get the job done without delay. Am I right?”

She went slightly red in the face.
“What carrot did they dangle in front of you? Your own corner office perhaps? Managing your very own plant in China?”

“This is no laughing matter.”

“As the person who is responsible for the future of all the employees who work here, I know very well that it is no laughing matter. That said, I am perfectly serious in my ambition to stop your plans, dead. If you are interested then I can refute everything that the CFO, Mark Billingham has whispered into your ear?”

Casey didn’t react.

“I guess that you are not interested in knowing the truth. In that case, what are your plans for the shutdown? I mean dates and costs and post-closure actions?”

This time she managed to react.
“I can see that you are prepared for this then?”

“Ha… Prepared? Only for the last three years. Ever since the last round of redundancies, the writing was on the wall. COVID came along and clearly delayed the plans for your CEO to buy that mountain in New Mexico that he has been talking about on Facebook for years.”

Casey began to understand that I knew more than I was supposed to about the US Operations. I took my chance to add a little more.

“Has he floated the idea of moving the HQ to Santa Fe again? You do know that is within commuting distance of his bit of the desert? Bit as in fifty square miles?”

Her reaction told me that he hadn’t.

I drank some more of the tea.
“What are your plans then? You must have some. Even those idiots in Austin would not try to close down a subsidiary without formulating at least some sort of plan?”

Once again, my directness had deflected her intent.

“Ok, why don’t you tell me when your return flight is booked?”

Before she could think she said,
“December twenty-four.”

I smiled and shook my head.

“What’s wrong?”

“I guess that you have not read the employment contracts of the staff?”

“What contracts?”

“Ms Burbank, I don’t mean to insult you but from where I stand, you have been ‘sold a pig in a poke’.”

“Eh?”

I sighed.
“A ‘pig in a poke’ means something that is bought without first being inspected, and thus of unknown authenticity or quality. Someone in Austin said ‘Go close down the UK plant and there is a nice bonus and a corner office on the top floor waiting for you. Am I correct or at least in the right ballpark?”

Casey began to see that this was not the job that she had signed up for.

She looked more than a little uncomfortable. That pleased me. Ever since the last set of redundancies, I had planned for this day many, many times always with the hope that it would never come but… it had and I was ready for it. We… I had a good lot of people working for me, depending on me. They had all gone above and beyond the call of duty since the end of 2019 and deserved to be looked after whatever transpired.

I finished my tea and said,
“Now… Ms Burbank, are you willing to look at the books and make up your own mind about this place or?”

“Or what? Mr Beatty, or what?”

“The ‘or what’ is that I give you copies of the contracts and associated documentation and you can work out for yourself how much it will cost Austin to close us down. Remember Ms Burbank, this is not the USA where in many states, people can be fired at will. Your Harvard MBA won’t help you here you know. We have laws and rules about firing people in this Country. Your knowledge of US employment law will not help you here. One more thing, we… as in all the staff are not paid weekly or bi-weekly. We are paid monthly at the end of the third week of the month by bank transfer.”

“What? How?”

“You are wearing a Harvard MBA ring. You are not the first one of them that Austin has sent here. The last one was named Charles McFarland. He was sent in 2019 to remove 30% of our staff. He was just like you sold a load of cock and bull. He found out when he returned with his mission completed that the ‘C’ level execs had moved the goalposts and had neglected to tell him. He was fired and to his credit, he fell into a job that suits his personality a lot better. He’s now the CFO of the largest company of Bounty Hunters in the USA. I would expect your bosses to be hoping the same will happen to you. Remember, they are all old white guys. How many women are VPs? The answer is none. All the VPs and above do their business on the Golf Course or on their Yachts. Are you going to be admitted to their club? Don’t think about answering that, but you could think about what you were told before you were sent over here.”

My words as I’d hoped were finally starting to get through to her.
“Please stop and think about your predecessor, Mr McFarland. He was fired before he got to spend any of that bonus for something trivial like getting the exchange rate wrong on his expenses. At least that was what his lawsuit said. It was settled out of court so we’ll probably never know what really went down and how much Head Office had to pay to keep it quiet. If I were in their shoes, they could send you because you are a woman and in their male preserve of the ‘C-Level’ women are made to fail. It won’t be any skin off their noses. They will all have their own exit plans ready to go, golden parachutes included.”

Casey tried hard and almost managed to stifle a yawn.

“Ms Beatty, did you arrive this morning?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Even if you flew all the way here in first class, you will soon get jet lagged and if I were you, I’d head for my hotel, get a good night’s sleep and return here in the morning with an open mind. Then we might be able to work on making your mission a profitable one for both of us. I’d also tell my boss that the flight was very bumpy with lots of turbulence and two screaming babies and that I went straight to my hotel to get some sleep.”

“Why should I do that?”

“Ms Beatty, get some sleep and some non-airline food into you and tomorrow we can start again and have a meaningful discussion about the future of this place. I am confident that I can convince you that Head Office were wrong to send you here and I am sure that your MBA training will then help you see the futility of your mission. Furthermore, and again if I were you, I’d then work on a way that you could come out of this smelling of roses rather than the sacrificial lamb that you clearly are at the moment. What about it eh? That is… if you are prepared to open your mind to the possibility that Austin might be wrong?”

Her eyes flicked towards the door.
“Come on Ms Beatty, I’ll see you to your car.”

She looked disappointed.

“I don’t have one. I took a Taxi from the airport. It was farther than it looked on the map.”

I resisted sniggering.
“Where is your hotel?”

“At the airport. The company has an account with one of the chains. I just dropped my bags off there before coming here.”

This time, I shook my head.
“Let me guess, the room is little more than a concrete box that is the same as the concrete box in any one of their hotels because you are not far enough up the pecking order to warrant an executive room?”

She didn’t answer. That told me that I was right.

“I don’t want you to go home and complain about our hospitality. I’ll see if the Royal Oak has a room. That is about a mile from here and will be more comfortable than some formulaic hotel. How about it?”

I had given her an awful lot to think about. She just nodded.

“Good. Let me tell my people that I am going to be out for a few hours and we can be off.”

On the way to the Airport, I called the Royal Oak. This place is more of a traditional pub but with a modern hotel wing. The chef is pretty good as well. There was a room available and I got our corporate rate.

“You see, we have our own corporate arrangements so you are in the clear with the people back in Austin. I’ll wager that it is lower than the one at your current hotel. The Royal Oak has an excellent restaurant as well.”

“Thank you but you didn’t have to do that.”

“I do. You are a visitor and we have to look after our visitors. I don’t want you going back home with a bad impression of us, even if you do end up shutting us down.”

"But… I'm supposed to throw you out of a job? Doesn't that count for something?"

“As I said before, we have been expecting something like this for three years. Would it not have been prudent for us to have a ‘plan B’?”

I saw a slight nod of her head.
“Good. That makes my job a lot easier.”

“Easier? How?”

“I have to persuade you that your lords and masters 4000 miles away are making a huge mistake in closing us down. Then you can try to persuade them of that. The question is… are you up to the challenge?”

“You have to persuade me first.”

“How good an accountant, are you?”

I detected a slight groan from the person on my left.

I smiled as I saw her hotel ahead.
“Then I will give you some help. Don’t worry, it will be impartial. We’ll pay for it but you will be in charge of the person who looks at the books.”

I dropped her off at the entrance.
“I’ll wait for you here unless I get moved on, but I won’t be far away.”

“Thank you.”

Ten minutes later she returned hauling a large… no make that an extra-large suitcase. I heaved it into the back of my car and got in the front.

As I went to put the car in gear, she said,

“One thing and please be honest with me.”

“I will try to be. What is it?”

“The people in Austin think that you are… gay. I am sure that given the political donations that the company has made to the recent elections… they are not exactly favouring people in the LGBTQ spectrum at the moment.”

“Was this part of your brief for this trip?”

She shook her head.
“No but there was a lot of… shall we say changes in jobs recently. Two openly gay men were let go. One of them was being lined up for this job. One of the assistants to the CFO speculated that you were gay and as the company was cleaning house before the Chairman ran for the Texas State House on the GOP ticket.”

“So that when they fail… they can be fired?”

“Something like that.”

“Then we will have to make sure that it does not happen to you, won’t we?”

“Eh?”

“Please, think about what I have said today. Get some food into you and a good night’s sleep and I’ll pick you up at nine tomorrow morning. Then we can start work on making things right for everyone.”

“I didn’t expect this… all this. I was briefed and told how I should go about this assignment. They said go in hard and do not accept any excuses.”

“Then that is how you should report back for the next few days. Tell them that you are getting your feet under the situation and reviewing the books because of local legal issues, there might be some unexpected costs to do what they want and by when they want. That will be true, won’t it?”

“You are one smart guy. Aren’t you wasted in this job?” said a slightly defiant Casey.

“Are you implying that I’m in the wrong job?”

“Aren’t you?”

I shook my head as I negotiated my way onto the M60. It was always busy at lunchtime but it seemed more hectic than normal today.

“I don’t think so. I like this job and the people back at the Mill, who make it possible.”

“I got that message loud and clear. The people back home thought that I could have all this done in a week and then get the contents sold all in a month.”

“Sorry to disappoint you. Things are not that simple here. The UK laws on employment will make it almost impossible to close us down by Christmas without a large sum of money… no make that very large sums of money coming from Austin. I’ll explain that tomorrow.”

I looked across at my passenger. The life was draining out of her. Tiredness was a strange beast.

The car fell silent for much of the journey to the Royal Oak.

I stopped outside and showed her into the pub. While she checked in, I retrieved her large and heavy bag from my car.

“All checked in?” I asked as I met her in the entrance lobby to the hotel part of the establishment.

“Yes. My room is just down the corridor,” she said dangling the key in front of me.

I didn’t wait for her to ask but headed through the fire door and down the corridor. I stopped outside room 12.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at nine.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly.

I smiled.
“One more thing, please ditch those heels. There are parts of the mill that you can’t go wearing heels, as it isn’t safe. Health and safety laws get in the way I’m afraid. Trainers would be fine. Besides, I would not want to damage such an expensive pair of shoes. Also, if you want to go into a couple of parts of the plant, then you will need proper protective clothing. Wearing a skirt precludes that.”

I didn’t wait for a reply but headed back to my car. I had a lot of work to do before I picked her up in the morning.

I fell asleep that night wondering if I had been too hard on her. My last thought was ‘nah’.

[to be continued]