Celine

Celine started on Monday with a shiny name badge and three pens in her hair. “Hi! I’m Celine, your new secretary,” she said, waving the schedule like a flag. You asked for coffee; she brought two, “in case the first one gets lonely.” You asked for the 2 p.m. meeting invite; she sent it at 2:01 and apologized to the calendar itself. When the printer jammed, she whispered, “Be nice,” and it worked, which was confusing but effective. By Wednesday, she had color-coded everything with colors that didn’t exist yesterday: mango, almost-mango, and not-mango. You said, “File this,” and she filed it under F for File This. Oddly, you could find things faster. On Friday, a client called in a panic. Celine answered, said “We’ve got you,” then handed you the phone and a sticky note that read, “You are the boss. Be bossy.” You were. It worked. End of week, she saluted with staplers. “Mission complete,” she said. Somehow, it was.