Subordinates

"Why did she get you to sign those documents? Couldn't you just throw down the pen and walk out?" Ligo asked, puzzled.

Hesta folded her arms and did not answer right away.

"Jane."

"Huh?"

"Are you listening?" Ligo continued. "What if she got you to sign something you shouldn't have? You'd be finished."

"Not likely... We're equals now, but she has seniority and an obligation to familiarize me with the position. Even if she wanted to set me up, she wouldn't pick now." Hesta said. "There's something else I can't quite figure out..."

"What?"

"I feel like..." Hesta paused for a moment. "She seems to... look down on me."

"You sensed hostility from her?"

"Not hostility," Hesta said. "Contempt."

"...That's even stranger." Ligo was even more confused. She found it hard to imagine anyone looking at Hesta's résumé and responding to those credentials with contempt. "Had you met before? Or did you offend her somehow?"

Hesta shook her head.

Ligo began to feel that this was tricky as well. With a soft sigh, she reached up and grabbed the large iron hook overhead, swinging from one end of the living room to the other. After landing, she pushed the hook toward Hesta, who caught it precisely.

Hesta gave it a tug, and the chain fixed to the ceiling rattled loudly.

"I meant to ask earlier," Hesta said, looking up. "Why is there something like this in our apartment living room?"

"This place used to be a butcher shop. It was later torn down and converted into apartments. The designer preserved a lot of its original 'flavor' in the ground-floor rooms. Those big iron hooks, for example, used to hang meat. The designer added chains and turned them into decorations," Ligo explained. She patted an old solid-wood display cabinet beside her.