On my first day at work, I learned that our CEO, Lu, had one rule: no office romances.
On my second day, I became Mrs. Lu.
Most people keep their marriages secret because they’re afraid of being found out.
We kept ours secret because we were afraid he’d be found out.
After all, the whole company knew that the thing CEO Lu hated most was having to eat his own words.
So…
In the conference room, he would sternly criticize my terrible PowerPoint while secretly rubbing his foot against my high heel under the table.
At team-building events, everyone would tease me and ask if I had a boyfriend. He’d walk past with a cup of coffee, pretending not to care as he strained to listen.
When we worked late into the night, his office light was always the last to go out. Then he’d “happen” to give me, the “poor employee who couldn’t get a taxi,” a ride home.
Until the company’s annual gala, when he got drunk and grabbed my hand in front of more than three hundred people, his eyes red as he complained:
“I’ve been married for a whole year, and I still can’t even hold my wife’s hand at work.”
“Who came up with this stupid rule?”
The whole room fell silent.
I expressionlessly covered his mouth.
CEO Lu, you came up with it yourself.
