Page 9 of Sweeter than Honey
“Please?”
I stand up, carrying Eli in my arms. It’s past two a.m., and I have no fight left in me anymore.
“All right, just for tonight, ok?”
We creep into my bedroom quietly, so as not to wake up my sleeping mother. Not that there’s much risk of that. She’s snoring loudly, wearing her pink earplugs and frilly eye mask.
I tuck Eli into bed, his precious pony doll still clutched in one hand. Immediately, he drifts off to sleep. I pull on some pajamas and join him.
It’s been a long night.
Chapter 4: Married to work
Renata
“Silence! I call this meeting to order,” I declare.
The boardroom, which only a moment ago was filled with the din of workplace chatter, immediately quiets. We’ve added a row of chairs to the side and back of the room to accommodate all of the staff who need to be present at our biweekly manager’s meeting.
I take my usual spot at the head of the table, naturally. Every other chair is full, except…
“Where’s Celine?” I turn to my assistant, Lily. She looks up at me with her soft green eyes, her pale face flushing slightly pink. Before she can answer, Xia Chan, the head of our Day Guard, leans forward across the table. Her straight black hair is streaked through with silver and her hazel eyes are bright and expressive. She’s a witch, not a vampire, which is why she leads the Day Guard that protects the hotel during the daylight hours.
“Celine is meeting with the good witches,” she reports. “She said she would try to make it to the meeting, but it’s a long journey back, so they might be late.”
I purse my lips, unable to hide my annoyance. Ever since the imprisonment of our Creator, my sister has been showing up less and less often for her business-related commitments, shouldering me with more of the burden. We used to commiserate about how much Tudor over-invested in his alliances with the other magical groups in our region, like the good witches, and how little he was around for theday-to-day operations of the hotel. But now it seems that she’s following in his footsteps.
“Make a note on the minutes,” I tell Lily. “No Celine.”
“I’m here!” says my other sister proudly, raising her hand high in the air.
I do my best to suppress an eye roll. My second-youngest sister, Lexi, sits cross-legged in her chair, her bright yellow pumps discarded on the ground in front of her. She holds her enormous iPhone in her other hand, probably updating her instagram feed as we speak. Her pale skin is completely devoid of colour, and her platinum blond hair is tied high on her head in a tight ponytail. She wears a yellow crocheted top and, inexplicably, a see-through rain jacket, even though there’s a clear sky outside and it’s the beginning of June. And she’s avampire. By definition, we can’t feel cold or be affected by the elements.
Still, I acknowledge Lexi with as much patience as I can muster. “Noted.”
Lily senses my frustration and clears her throat softly. “Ms. Espina, the first item on the agenda is the discussion of vacation time and summer workload.”
“Thank you, Lily.” I press my clicker and the slideshow on the mounted TV behind me moves forward, to a bar chart demonstrating how much vacation time is dispensed throughout the year. “As you can all see from this data, summer is our busiest time of year, and yet it is also when staff are most likely to request vacation. Of course, it’s imperative that we treat our staff well, and approve as many vacation requests as we can reasonably accommodate.ButI want you all to be aware that we’re going into our most understaffed months of the year. To compensate, we have to ensure that we’re running an extremely tight ship…”
Xia interrupts. “Why don’t we just hire more staff?”
“Impossible,” I respond immediately. “If we hire in the summer, we have to let go of staff when the season slows down again in fall.”
“Couldn’t we hire contract employees?” Lexi asks, without taking her eyes off of her phone screen.
“We’renothiring contract employees,” I reply. “The training that’s required is…”
“Yes, exactly,” a lilting voice interjects. It’s Mel, the head of ourHuman Resources department. She sits at the very back of the boardroom, in a chair by the window. She runs her fingers absentmindedly through her long, lime green hair. Her skin has a faint undertone of purple, and her eyes seem to constantly be changing colour. “That sounds likewaytoo much work.”
“It’s not because it’s too much work,” I correct with a sigh. It’s a concern that our Human Resources manager considers training staff to be ‘too much work,’ but I don’t have time to address that right now. “We don’t hire contract employees because our services require a high degree of training, and it’s not feasible to train someone and then employ them for such a short period of time. The Respite hotel’s workplace culture and values are an essential part of our customer service, and it takes time to distill that in new employees. Any more questions?”
Everyone stares back at me with vague expressions of boredom, so I click to the next slide in my presentation.
“Excellent. As I was saying, since we know we’re going to be understaffed, it’s imperative that we maintain a high level of efficiency. Luckily, even though our staff tend to take vacations around this time of year, since it’s the summer, I expect that no one will be teaching.”
I give Xia and Damien a pointed look. They both teach at Elmwood Academy, which is the magical university located a few hours out of the city. Both of them teach there regularly, and their schedules often conflict with their guard rotations.
Damien tilts his head in an expression that I know means he’s going to tell me something I don’t want to hear. He’s the most professional out of the bunch, wearing a crisp white button-up shirt and fitted slacks, a crimson handkerchief in one pocket. His long locs fall elegantly over his shoulders, each one tipped with gold. He has thoughtful brown eyes and there’s a cool tone to his copper skin.