An email from the home office states that someone on my team accepted a blank check as payment for a car. I stare at the scanned image, which is indeed a blank check from Navy Federal Credit Union. It should have the loan amount written on it. It should have the approval code we received from their representative when we called.

It is blank.

I will need to call Navy Federal now, all my fingers and toes crossed that they approve this loan and we do not have to beg the customer to return a car we never should have sold them.

I will need to have a conversation with my team member, an outside hire who is supposed to be a supervisor just like me.

I will need to remember to email the home office with an update once I have fixed Lily’s mistake.

A laugh draws my attention to the corner of the office. We don’t have cubicles in here, just a bunch of connected desks with computers on top of them and filing cabinets below them. A big rectangular window connects us to the rest of the building, to the customers and sales consultants we serve. We are a fishbowl, on display for everyone to claim we never do any work because we just sit on computers all day. Our every word echoes out to the people in the waiting area, a fact my team often forgets when they choose to say inappropriate things.

There Lily sits, showing Tiffany a video of her cat. She always looks so put-together, with her straightened hair and makeup. She told me once she never leaves the house without it. I wish she would put the same effort into her job.

I could have the conversation now. Make her fix this herself. But a customer is approaching, and I would rather let her answer whatever question they may have. I reach for the phone.

“Katie, can you help me with this?”

I look up, phone against my ear, Navy Federal’s number half-dialed. Lily is approaching me with several papers in hand.

I squash the burn of resentment in my chest and try to put on a neutral expression and sit up straighter. Look more helpful. Be more approachable. My manager says I will never be able to train for this promotion if I can’t stop intimidating people.

“She needs to know if these are all the documents she needs to sell her husband’s car while he is deployed. They’re moving to Colorado, and he won’t have time to come home and—”

I don’t care why she’s selling her husband’s car. It isn’t my job to decide if her reasons are good enough, it’s my job to ensure she has the proper legal documentation that will protect our company from being sued if we buy the car from her. Lily is wasting my time, as usual. I need to call Navy Federal. I might need to call a customer. I need to email the home office. My feet ache. I have a meeting with my manager in twenty minutes to discuss my progress.

I let Lily finish, because a good manager listens attentively. A good manager is nice. A good manager is approachable and friendly.

Lily should not need my help to determine if these documents are acceptable. We have the same job. She makes more money than me.

I look over the documents. They are fine. I hand them back and tell her so. I reach again for the phone.

The representative at Navy Federal has just answered when Lily appears at my side again. She stands there and waits the entire time I am on the phone. They will not approve it; the loan-to-value ratio is too high. No, it will not help if the customer removes the extended warranty they purchased.

I thank her for her time and try to breathe lightly as I turn to Lily.

“This lady lost her license plate and needs us to get a new one for her.”

Lily has worked here for a year. She makes more money than I do.

I tell her, “Print an affidavit of loss and help her fill it out so she can take it to the registration office. Make sure she knows it will cost $27.50 for replacement plates. The office down the road will only accept payment in cash.”

I gather up my clipboard and a pen. My meeting started three minutes ago. My manager hasn’t returned to the office, but I should be ready when she does. I skim over my notes. She asked me to document recognition I’ve given for the last month, and I have. She asked me to host daily huddles with the team all month, and I did. She asked me to keep a record of any constructive feedback I’ve given, and I have. She asked me to read How to Win Friends and Influence People, and I did. She told me to read People Skills, and I did that too. I took notes on the lessons and created fictional scenarios in which I detailed how the subsequent conversations should be held.

I have done everything she asked, and then some, in addition to all my normal work duties.

Tiffany walks by and places some paper on my desk. “I don’t know what to do with these.” She doesn’t wait for an answer, she just walks away. I don’t look up at her because I fear my own expression. Yesterday I learned Tiffany also gets paid more than I do, and she is not a supervisor. I haven’t been able to look at her since. I am enraged.

Donna is twenty minutes late. The manager meeting ran long, you see. Some really exciting stuff is rolling out over the next couple months, but they will be big adjustments. “Katie, I’m really going to need your help rolling out this change to the team and keeping the conversation around it positive. I know you’ll do a great job.”

We sit in the conference room, the first I’ve sat in four hours. Her hair is freshly dyed today, a brighter red than usual. She asks how the last month has been. I take out my notes and show her everything I did. She asks me about the challenges, and I tell her which conversations didn’t go well and which I would do differently if I could go back. She nods along. She tells me good managers often wish they could go back and change their wording, but must decide if the conversation was bad enough to revisit or if it was probably fine.

Then she says, “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to attend any of your team huddles this month, so I can’t write any observations for them. But this month should be less hectic, so if you do them again, I’ll be able to make more of an effort to be there.”

The smile slides from my face.

“You said the same thing last month.”

“I know, and I’m sorry. But I can’t start you on the Management Development Plan until I can show that you’ve successfully completed these Individual Development Plans.”

“But I have successfully completed them. I’ve done everything I was supposed to. You keep making the measure of my success your own observations, and then never doing the observations, effectively setting me up for failure.”

“Katie, the problem is that you want to be promoted immediately, and you really need to be more patient. No one gets promoted that fast at this company.”

Our last manager worked part-time for six months before being promoted. Donna was hired as a manager. Lily was hired as a supervisor.

I’ve been with the company for three years.

There is an obstacle in my sternum. I struggle to breathe through it. I force a smile, because good managers are nice and approachable and not intimidating.

“I would like a raise. Fifty cents per hour, so I make the same as Tiffany.” That is not even the same as Lily, but I know I will not get an extra $2 per hour.

“I understand why you’re upset.” She has the manager face; the one they put on when they want to appear nice and approachable while doing absolutely nothing to help. “Unfortunately, the thing about pay is that it’s based on experience. So because Tiffany worked in sales, she gets paid more.”

“Because she spent six months in sales, her time is more valuable to the company than her supervisor’s?”

“No, it only means that her experience is different.”

I cannot know what my face looks like. I have lost control of it. The world is tilting upward and fading to white in the periphery of my vision, making me grateful to be seated.

This woman will never promote me. The knowledge is ice cold and settles into the pit of my stomach, wedges itself beneath my rib cage. It will hurt for a long time, this realization that I have spent the last 18 months doing extra work for free. That she fully intends to keep using me, dangling in front of me the promise of a promotion that she has no intention of giving me.

“Look,” she says, “we have merit raises coming in May. I know you’ve done a great job all year, and you will certainly get one.”

“So will everyone who already makes more than me.” I know this because I have gotten many glimpses into management in my eighteen months of free additional labor, and I know that if a manager denies a merit raise, they have to explain why, with documented evidence of what the associate has done wrong and problem-solving measures the manager has taken. And Donna never does anything of the sort, unless she is setting someone up to be fired.

“Yes, that is true. We cannot deny other people their merit raises just because you make less money than them. But, hey, listen. The best way to improve your pay is to move up through the company, and we’ll keep working toward your promotion…”

I can’t hear her anymore, the sound of my own heartbeat drowning her out. This woman will never promote me. I will have to switch store locations and work my way up under a different manager. It will be like starting over, after eighteen months of unpaid labor, fixing the mistakes of people who make more money than I do, working harder than everyone else to be told I have to be more “approachable” if I want to be a manager. I have been a rat in a cage, scrabbling at the walls, only succeeding in tearing off my own claws and gnawing off my own tail.

The next day when I arrive to work, Donna wants me to sign a reprimand in my Associate Development File. It says I wrote a note to my coworkers on the white board, but I wrote it in red ink, which can be perceived as aggressive. The note said I was coming in early today to help us catch up on admin work, so I called dibs if someone got to leave early.

I stare at Donna over the blue folder lying open on her desk, cluttered with work she does not do and problems she always passes along to me to solve. I know what she’s doing. She knows that I know what she’s doing.

I sign the file. I sit at my desk. I delete everything I ever created here; every spreadsheet, every customer letter template, every helpful thing. I open Microsoft Word.

“This notice is to inform you of my intent to leave the company.”