Things come to head between Francois and Eleanor.
Eleanor
I wait in my office for Francois to arrive. Usually he is first into the office in the morning. But after the sleepless night I’ve had, it wasn’t difficult for me to be first in today. I want to get this over with as soon as possible this morning. I’ll lose my nerve if I don’t.
I wait with a pit of dread in my stomach, feeling nauseous.
It’s over in five minutes. He tells me there is no blackmail. That he is getting counseling about it. Conversation over. I am dismissed.
I leave the office and go home. I can’t spend another minute in the office with him. I am seething with anger, a sense of betrayal. What shred of professional respect I had left for him, what concern I had for him as a person, is shattered. I am stupefied by his monumental lapse in judgment. And then he doesn’t even have the minimal courtesy to apologize to me, to any of us?
I never want to work with him again.
But I don’t get that choice.
Francois
Francois feels a surge of rage.
That judgemental little missy. “Are you getting help?”
As if there’s something wrong with him.
“Yes,” he’d responded, not trusting himself to say anything more. The fact that her idea of “help” and his idea of “help” are worlds apart is none of her damn business.
She wants him to get back to “normal.” Her “normal” is a straightjacket that he is done with forever. He has been helped, is being helped, to embrace and accept himself as he truly is: a gay man, not yet loud—that needs to wait until he is back in South Africa—but proud.
So no, he does not need to explain himself to Eleanor. He is not going to put her small-minded prissiness on his back once again. He has worked too hard to get rid of that shit.
He is free. Free at last. And he’s celebrating.
2nd Last Book Club
Second Last Book Club will be Saturday, May 31, 2025 at 10am ET (3pm London/ 4pm South Africa).
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It seems Eleanor is left with little alternative, given Francois is still her boss, correct? Either go over his head and complain herself or resign... Either could have tragic consequences professionally and personally, but doing nothing certainly and absolutely will become catastrophic. Francois seems intoxicated on exercising his own personal rights, overriding any collateral impacts to all around him!