Page 6 of Behind Frenemy Lines

Kriya

Charles wasn’t at his desk when I got back to what, like it or not, was now my office.

I could hot desk in the open plan area, as Arthur had suggested, but then I wouldn’t have such luxuries as shelves for my client files, or a permanent noticeboard, or a drawer to keep spare pens and Post-it notes in. Even sharing with Kawan Baik was better than that.

I sighed, slung my coat over the back of my chair, put down my bag, and plugged in my new laptop. The computer was booting up when I heard a step behind me.

Charles stalked past and sat down at his desk. He did not say hello, or look at me. I might as well not have been there.

To be fair, I hadn’t said hello to him either, when I’d come by earlier. But he’d been in the middle of a call. If you thought about it, it had been more polite not to interrupt him.

In any case, we were colleagues now, and we were going to be sharing an office.

I had to put this weird whatever you wanted to call it—antipathy, tension, evil fate binding us together—behind me.

Forget the fact that something bad happened every time I bumped into Charles Goh, whether it was me bombing my training contract interview, screwing up my conference talk, or dousing my firm-provided laptop with sparkling water.

(This last had happened at the joint strategy meeting we’d attended as junior lawyers, moments before Kawan Baik had chucked his coffee over my lap, supposedly by accident.)

I had to let it go. I was never going to be good friends with Charles Goh, notwithstanding my nickname for him. But there was no reason why we couldn’t have a civil working relationship.

I was opening my mouth to say something friendly when I caught Charles sneaking a look at me out of the corner of his eye.

What was that about? I’d thought he hadn’t noticed me and that was why he hadn’t said anything on coming into the office. But had he blanked me on purpose? Was that why he was checking for my reaction now? Was this all some kind of mind game?

If that was the case, Charles was about to find out it wasn’t easy to intimidate Kriya Rajasekar.

Growing up in Ipoh had given me a working understanding of spoken Cantonese, a reliable craving for mooncakes at Mid-Autumn and tang yuan at Winter Solstice, and a skin thicker than a rhinoceros hide.

A light spot of workplace bullying was nothing compared to the crap I’d got back at primary school, as a chubby, dark-skinned Indian girl.

I said, “I don’t know if you remember me. My name’s Kriya.” I smiled, bright and steely. “We worked together on the sugar labelling JR?”

That was the case for which we’d had the strategy meeting years ago, where I had ruined my firm laptop and Charles had ruined my dress. I’d been an NQ: newly qualified as a solicitor, overawed by the fact I was being allowed to talk to clients in my first two weeks on the job.

Charles had qualified a couple of years earlier than me, accord ing to his LinkedIn, so the meeting was probably less significant to him. It was entirely possible he had no memory of it, or me.

Charles twitched like he’d been zapped by static. “Yes. I know.”

I let a few seconds pass, but that seemed to be all he had to say.

I said, determinedly normal, “You guys were acting for G&O, right? Do you still do work for them?”

“I believe the Food Law team do,” said Charles. “It was Mackintosh Cereals who were your client.”

I wasn’t sure if that was meant to be a question. “Yes?”

His eyes flicked to me and back to his monitor. I could practically hear his mind whirring.

Was Charles Goh actually a robot? It would explain a lot about his approach to social interactions.

“I’m sorry about the coffee,” he said stiffly. “I spilled some on you at the first meeting. You might not remember.”

“I remember,” I said.

Silence descended.

Charles broke it. “Hopefully that wasn’t the reason why you stopped appearing at the strategy meetings.”

Was that a joke? Who knew Kawan Baik had a sense of humour?

“Oh no,” I said. “The client decided they didn’t want to pay for me to attend the meetings. I was on the case all the way through, though. For all the good it did Mackintosh.”

I could joke about it, because we’d won the case.

The court had struck down the regulations our clients had challenged.

Unfortunately, judicial reviews being what they were, the government had simply turned around, tweaked the regulations to nullify any further challenge, and passed them regardless.

“Bought them time,” said Charles.

For a while, neither of us said anything.

Charles tapped away at his keyboard, his forehead furrowed in concentration.

I set up my Westlaw login, following the instructions from IT.

I was going to need it to re-create the slides for the client training sessions I’d be helping to deliver in Hong Kong in two weeks’ time.

I jumped when Charles spoke.

“It was a good witness statement,” he said.

“What?”

“The one Mackintosh filed in the JR,” said Charles. “It was well drafted.”

“I drafted that! My first ever witness statement.” I grinned. “I’m surprised you remember it. It’s been, what, eight years?”

“The judge quoted it extensively in her judgment,” said Charles, and after that he said nothing more.