One Month Later...

I sat on the couch, flipping between one bad reality TV show and the next. Glancing at my ever-silent phone, I saw that it was barely 9 p.m. With Ash gone for two weeks on vacation with her fam, (#Eurotrip), the lull between Christmas and NYE was painfully lonely. The bursting Christmas cheer that practically spilled out of every edge of NYC for the past month was slowly tapering off, and the city had never felt lonelier.

I reached for my phone again and scrolled mindlessly through Instagram, reaching for the glass of wine that had sat half-drank next to me for the past hour. I was bored. Since Dylan and I had broken up I’d felt restless, and that combined with the chaos at work had left me feeling unsettled for weeks.

Being home for Christmas hadn’t been the welcome distraction that I’d been hoping for. The whole four days I was in Philly I was painfully aware of how easily I could hop in my car and see Dylan. Even though the breakup had been mostly mutual, I knew that seeing him would be a bad idea.

I pulled up our string of texts in my phone to re-read them, something that I had done all too frequently these days. Our last exchange was Christmas morning, a simple “Merry Christmas” that he had instigated. Before I'd boarded my train down to Philly on the 24th, he'd asked to see me while I was home. I had made up excuses about a schedule jammed with family dinners and reunions with old friends, trying to keep my distance. I had felt it in my bones after Thanksgiving that as much as I liked Dylan, we just weren't meant to be. The relationship had become defined by more troubles than triumphs. So after a long afternoon, we'd ended it and I hadn't seen him since. Which hadn't stopped him from trying to win me back, albeit fairly pathetically, but his attempts had tapered off as the weeks wore on. So now here I was, single again, temporarily roommate-less, possibly soon-to-be jobless and currently, a little bit drunk. #winning.

Luckily since the holidays were upon us, things had settled down a bit at work. We hadn't heard much talk about the possible layoffs, but everyone had been working their asses off to prove that they were worth keeping. A few people even cancelled long-awaited vacations, not wanting anything to happen while their backs were turned.

As for Gathr, they had thanked me for the interview but hadn't asked me back in. When I asked Jeff about it, he informed me that they had stopped the interviewing process all together, apparently wanting a firm job description in place to properly assess candidates. He told me to sit tight until the new year, but with everything else going on I wasn't as consumed by the rejection as I would have normally been.

As I got up from the couch to fetch a vino refill, my phone pinged with a text. Glancing over, I saw that it was Nick. Ever since Dylan and I had broken up, Nick and I had been texting more frequently. Although I hadn't actually told him I was single, I had a feeling he knew. And even though he hadn't mentioned it, I had seen plenty of photos online of him and one of his "costars", Hadley, all alluding to the fact that they were a bonafide couple.

Hey you - any plans for NYE?

I pondered how to respond. A while back, Dylan and I had purchased tickets to a NYE party in Philly. Since that clearly wasn't happening, I hadn't made any efforts to plan something else. And without Ash to force me out of the house, I had fully planned on staying in and wallowing in my loneliness. I know, I'm becoming more like Bridget Jones, pre-Mark Darcy, every minute.

Actually was planning a low-key night, you?

I replied, keeping an eye on his text bubbles as I refilled my wine.

Low key huh? Well we're having a party at my place, and I'd love it if you could come.

I chewed on my lip, tempted. It would be better than sitting here alone watching sadly as the ball dropped on TV, envisioning my inevitable cat-lady life that laid before me. However then he would definitely know that Dylan and I had broken up.

As I was still debating the pros and cons, another text popped up.

Please?

I sighed.

Okay, I guess I could swing by. I may bring Elena, if that is okay?

I remembered Elena saying that she had no plans for New Years either, and had planned to hang in with her roommate who had recently been dumped. I figured it couldn't be too hard to wrangle her into my plans.

Awesome, starts at 8.

I padded back over to the couch, sending a screen-grab of the conversation to Ash's email. Stupid texting wasn't working while she was traipsing over Europe. I knew she'd want me to be on Trevor duty on NYE, to make sure he wasn't kissing anyone else at midnight.

I sighed, sinking back into the couch. It seemed like I was starting 2015 off the same way I had began 2014... single, unsure, and still in a gray area with Nick. I really needed to branch out.

**I won't be posting Friday, but I'm definitely going to try to get back to at least once a week as the New Year starts! However it won't be my normal Weds/Fri schedule, but I'll be tweeting out the day before a post goes up so make sure to follow me there! (@Trag20Something). With this new job a lot has changed, so writing time isn't as abundant. But I haven't forgotten you and I still have so much planned for Dani in 2015. Have an INCREDIBLE and safe New Year's everyone! Make sure to lay one on someone special at midnight. xoxo**

NEWS!

First off I want to thank you all for being so sweet and supportive lately. No one has posted, tweeted or emailed a negative thing about my lack of posting.

That said, I started writing again (finally!) and will have a post up tomorrow !

xoxo

Layoffs

**Hello my loves. Finally a long awaited post - and i'm so sorry that it's so short. I can't make any promises for Friday but I'll do my best to post. The family member I mentioned passed away, and my new job starts Monday. For now I'm going to promise to post as often as I can but I need to deviate from my Weds/Fri schedule. After the holidays and everything has settled down again, I hope to return to normal posting. Between now and then I'll post as much as I can, and just follow me on twitter for any updates. **

A few minutes after leaving Noah, I entered Platform's offices a complete bundle of nerves. Elena's texts had left me on edge and I had no idea what I was about to walk into. 

I dumped my bag and coat on my desk, scanning the space for my intern before heading into the meeting. No sign of Alice. Rolling my eyes, I grabbed a notebook and headed into the conference room that Elena had instructed. 

As I grew closer, I saw more than 30 people crowded in the glass-walled room. My heart sped up - this had to have something to do with what I heard Colleen discussing on the phone last week. During the last few strides between myself and the heavy glass door to my fate, all I could hear was Colleen's voice repeating in my head "that's a huge cutback Scott."

I pulled the door open slowly, in an attempt to draw as little attention to myself as possible. I spotted Elena seated in the corner nearest the door and, relieved, I slunk into a chair she had saved next to her. We exchanged a few of those knowing facial expressions that you can only master when you really know someone before I turned my attention to Colleen, who was addressing the group.

"--we expected the third quarter sales to jump, especially with the talent we had on our covers. But that just wasn't the case. We've all known that print sales have been down for years, but it's really starting to hit Platform hard now."

She made a dramatic pause and even though I had been in the meeting all of 30 seconds, I felt my stomach drop. 

Finally, Colleen spoke. "I'm not saying that layoffs are imminent, but I just wanted you all to prepare yourselves."

"Oh my god," Becca, a previous intern, said. "That is what you say when someone is about to die."

I bit my lip, trying to stifle a laugh. 

"Becca," Colleen addressed her, clearly frustrated. "I'm just giving a warning, which anyone who pays any attention to our sales figures wouldn't be surprised by."

I glanced at Elena, who was simultaneously side-eyeing me. I knew, realistically, I was in one of the safer departments. If anything digital would get more of the budget in the long run. But Elena was in Editorial, she did a lot of the copy writing and editing for pieces that went in print.  

Colleen ended the meeting and people began filtering out, gossiping loudly as they did so. Having missed the first half of the meeting, I kept my mouth shut until we reached our desks. 

"Fill me in," I said, following Elena to her desk and perching on the side of it.

She took a deep breath. "Basically, Colleen called an emergency meeting for all senior staff and editorial. She told us a bunch of numbers and said that our parent company wasn't happy, then that is about when you walked in."

I could tell she was worried about her job, and I didn't blame her. 

"Why would she even tell everyone? Now the whole staff is going to start looking for other jobs," Elena continued, and I felt a warmth creep up my neck remembering where I had been just 30 minutes before.

"Yeah," I said, before slinking off to my desk. 

Update

My lovely, amazing readers - 

I know you're wondering where Friday's post was. Truth be told, with the bustle of the holiday and then traveling between Philly-NYC, I completely lost track of the time. On top of that, I'm going through a career change (for an incredible new job! but lots to wrap up at my current one), and I have a family member in the hospital. All that said, I don't want to try and push out below-par posts for you guys. I'm going to take a week off, and will be back at it on December 10th. 

I know this is upsetting and annoying (trust me, I've been super bummed in the past when bloggers either go MIA or take a hiatus), but just keep in mind I do this for free in my spare time, and I also don't want to give you guys a post just to give you one - I want them to be well thought out and written. I know I've missed a few posts the last couple of months, but bear with me! 

See you December 10th! 

xoxo