Page 76 of Out on a Limb

Walker didn’t hear most of the conversation, just the “two weeks” part. Then Cameron looked at him through the mirror like a vision of death.

He knew this day was coming. Cameron always had LA on his mind. That was the place he was headed. But he thought they had more time than two weeks. Cameron said he couldn’t push this Arthur guy, that he had to start immediately. Walker called bullshit. If they really wanted him, they would’ve worked with him. They would’ve let him attend his own damn graduation.

“I have to take this job. You know that.”

“You don’t have to take the first job you’re offered. That’s what I did with Berkwell.”

“But this is an amazing opportunity.”

“Is it? You’re just going to be fetching coffee and answering someone’s phone.”

“It’s starting at the bottom, learning the business from the ground up.”

Walker remained by the door. A part of him saw relief in Cameron. Things were getting too serious between them, and this was the perfect chance to run.

“So do you still want dinner?” Walker asked, like an idiot.

“Can we talk about this?” Cameron got up and walked toward him. A smile quirked on his face. “I’m sorry. I’m excited. I’m…confused about this,” he pointed at both of them. “But I’m excited. Can you please be just a little happy for me? This shouldn’t be some big surprise to you. You knew from the start what my plans were.”

“Your plans were to move in September, not April.”

“I wasn’t expecting this.”

“Are you talking about the job or us?” Walker asked. He felt his insides turning to rocks. It was all about staying strong. He wished they could go back a half-hour when things were perfect.

“Let’s just have dinner, okay?”

“Lucy, on this category slide, can you find a better way to phrase our market share situation? I don’t want us to say that we’ve lost market share. We need to reframe it in a more positive way. ‘The market has continued to expand as new competitors enter the field, diluting market share for all established players.’ Something like that.”

“Will do!” Lucy said. She gave Walker a supportive smile. He hadn’t told her the news yet, but she knew how to read him.

“Oh, wait just one minute.” Patricia ran her finger across the screen. “Our main competitors haven’t lost share. How come they’ve kept share or even gained it, and we’ve lost it?” Patricia sighed for all to hear. “This is a major issue. The client is going to notice this the second we get to this slide. Walker, why wasn’t this raised to my attention?”

“You knew that we’d been losing market share,” he said. “Hence being put up for review.”

“It looks so drastic on this chart.”

“We can take out the chart.”

“We need better reasoning for this disparity.” She kept reading the slide over and over.

Lucy handed over a copy of our latest media plan. “We went dark last fall when the client cut our budget. Not running advertising for three months surely helped our competitors.”

“I guess that’s a start.”

“I guess this is the end,” Cameron had said. He hadn’t touched his pot roast. Neither had Walker. This was the first thing either of them had said during dinner, and the words sliced through the silence.

“The end?” Walker shot back reflexively. “We still have two weeks.”

“It’s just going to be harder stretching it out. We need a clean break.”

“What does that mean?” Walker took a healthy drink from his wine glass.

“I’m going to get my things together and go. And that will be that.”

“Just like that? You’re going to throw away these last few weeks.”

“I’m not throwing them away. You don’t think this is hard for me? It’s hard, Walker. I think we should rip the Band-Aid off now, like you said.”