Archive of Our Own ^beta

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Showed up first day, met all the staff one by one, and then wasn't seen for another three weeks. Off to a good start as a business owner. Previous business owner is still overshadowing everything like a bad smell though.

“Okay who's up first?” She asked, finally getting her breath back after climbing those stairs for the first time.

“Senior accountant, 9 years,” the previous owner introduced. 

“Interesting, she can obviously do it all,” she said, eyes lit up, especially seeing the salary figure on the page in front of her. 

“What can you do?” The senior accountant of 9 years asked, almost challengingly.

She decided to rise to the challenge. She had more accounting experience in her little finger. “I'm a Jack of all trades,” she boasted. 

The next staff member came in. Accountant of 5 years, Irish, the CPA equivalent in Ireland. Slightly round in the middle— 

“Oh I'm also putting on weight,” she blurted, “I think I ate too much at Christmas.”

“I'm pregnant,” the senior accountant of 5 years drawled. 

Next staff members were boring, two admin ladies who acted like they knew too much but were only paid a fraction more than the minimum wage and did more post office and lunch pick ups than actual work. What was the point in them? Type up the returns? The accountants can do that. 

A bookkeeper who was in admin for 8 years. Did half a course in bookkeeping. Seems nice. 

Junior clerk who showed me all her artwork and doodling when I asked what she did. How is this girl relevant to accounting? Will replace with an Italian as soon as possible. They get shit done, those Italians. 

Small accounting firm in the south eastern suburbs secured. Next stop, world domination. 

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Needing to take more control, send off emails around 3am insisting I am the boss, I need to review all jobs, and I need to see all mail going in and out. But the emails come at a price because I'm so stressed by this added workload and will smoke an entire pack of cigarettes. 

It was time to take action. 

The new Italian junior clerk walked past my office holding the tray with the correspondence and tax returns to go out to clients. Walked right past to get it signed off by the previous owner.

Humiliating.

Plus I heard he’s still looking through the mail in the mornings. No no no no. I should be looking through the mail when I come in at midday. Read through it downstairs— no, read it at my desk upstairs— get the junior clerk to carry it up.

I need both hands free when climbing the stairs. Grip the railing on one side and hold the wall on the other. Pull myself up step by step.

This Italian junior clerk has a bit of an attitude though. Not sure how long I’ll last with her. She said no to doing an individual tax return and then she’s off to Hawaii for two weeks. 

Anyway, I’ve had this accounting firm for 4 months. It’s time to start acting like it.

Plus, speaking of attitude, that one conversation with the accountant of 9 years haunts my nightmares and my insomnia is at an all time high. 

“I’ve worked 12 hours every day!”

“Doing what?”

Doing what. Doing what. I honestly don’t know.

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Starting to come into the office every day. Interesting. Office life is very different from being at home. Still prefer the work from home life and often took files home in a suitcase to review.

“Doing what?” The accountant of 9 years screamed at me when I arrived at the office one day around lunch time.

I needed to come into the office more. Every day. No more making excuses like needing to wash my hair or not having enough clean clothes. Just wear the skirt with a stain on it, no one will notice.

Office life is a different experience. 

There's cheese biscuits in the kitchen. Sometimes there's Tim Tams and choc chip cookies and shortbreads with cream and—

But I don't want any of the digestives or arrowroot or anything boring like that. 

Have to be careful how many biscuits I get the junior clerk to bring up for me, the other admin ladies can be judgemental. 

Oh and the files, everything's all printed and hard copies and files stacked on my desk to review. So much easier coming into the office to review it all. Wow, maybe this business will work out well after all. 

If I get up around 9am, eat a piece of toast for breakfast, get dressed, get a taxi around 11, I'll be in the office like 11:30, then go to the toilet, head upstairs, it'll be like 12 so I'll have an optimum chocolate protein bar for lunch with a coffee, and then review some jobs. Full day of work. Especially going up and down the stairs every time I need a toilet break.

I have to leave at 5pm unless someone stays here with me because I can't lock up, I did it once and there were sirens blaring oh my god never again.

It's going to be hard to keep this up 5 days a week though.

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Fully working at home. No idea what the employees are doing every day. Junior clerk has taken up bookkeeping, she's quite good. Sometimes junior clerk writes on her timesheet “swapped files at Bunnings with accountant - 2 hours” what on earth is she doing for two hours at Bunnings??? Catching up with him for coffee? Isn't he married? Found the employees emergency contact list and fighting the urge to call the wife that he's having an affair. Don't get involved, don't get involved—

Being at home all the time means I should be taking up a hobby. Well, a hobby besides smoking and yelling at my employees to do more work.

Start writing stories, making up fanfiction, plotting love triangles like Betty switching her homeroom to be with James and—

It was a bright sunny day in the Dan Andrews Dome of Melbourne. Her dad parked the car at Bunnings and dashed in for a quick look at the gardening supplies. And maybe check out the paints. Oh and the—

Meanwhile, she hands over files that she’s done the bookkeeping on, her cheeks flustered, explaining what she’s done on the file.

“I think this one has capital gains so I didn’t know—” she would say.

“Mm,” the senior accountant would reply. “What do you think?”

“Oh, I don’t know much about capital gains—” she’ll say, blushing, not wanting to elaborate on her 0/5 on the capital gains quiz at university.

“No, I mean what do you think about bunnings sausages?” he would say, his eyes straying to the Bunnings entrance.

Her stomach rumbled in response and they made their way over to the famous sausage sizzle, him buying two sausages and handing one to her.

“Chilli sauce?” he asked jokingly, cheeky smile on his face, tipping the tomato sauce bottle toward her sausage.

“That better be tomato sauce,” she growled, annoyed, unaware that he was flirting with her. Little did she know that it just made her more attractive to him.

They chatted away, him mostly listening to her talk about how badly Collingwood were playing football in the hubs and how much of a glow up Josh Daicos had during lockdowns, while finishing their sausages.

“I’ll see you next Monday?” he said, before departing.

“Yeah,” she breathed, “I’ll have more files to give you by then.”

“Cool,” he said and watched her get into her dad’s car, wondering what it would be like to drive her home. Maybe when Dan lifted the 5km travel limit. 

He jumped in his own car and drove away, not knowing that she was still sitting there two hours later while her dad was lost inside Bunnings.

She hits post on her latest story and lies back down on the couch for an afternoon nap. Another good day at work.

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Two months and then that's it, get rid of the previous business owner. About time he retired anyway, he’s in his 80’s. Go play some golf, grandpa.

The shadow of the previous owner is too much, too overbearing. He still does everything. He only works two days a week and rumour has it that he's doing more than me. 

Plus wants to be paid more. 

No, it's too much. He has to go. 

It was a new era. Hairdressers, restaurants and golf courses were in full swing. The economy was back on track. This was now the time to strike out on my own, become the strong independent woman that my daughters clearly were. 

After getting rid of the previous owner, it turns out one senior accountant has been sending jobs out for signature with mistakes on it.

Who's reviewing this??? Which public practitioner reviewed these jobs? 

They're wasting time on revising tax returns when a public practitioner would've picked up the mistakes easily. Sure, I'm not always in the office, but I've got an old friend who's retired down the road, don't they know that? 

No no no no. This senior accountant has to go. We'll be more productive and send out more tax returns without her. I'll finally have time to sit on the couch and watch the news every day without having to fix all her mistakes. 

I can get by with three admin, one bookkeeper, and one senior accountant. Maybe just promote the bookkeeper to accountant, and the Italian admin girl can step up and—

She said no. She refused my generous promotion (more responsibilities, same pay) from admin to bookkeeper. Huh. Well, at least the bookkeeper agreed to start finalising returns—

Resignation letter from the bookkeeper. Betrayal. 

Oh calamity.

Chapter Text

9am.

“Lite milk? Again? Why can't we have fresh milk, what kind of fresh hell are we living in—” sighs the bookkeeper as she makes up her breakfast of milk and packet oats.

After porridge, it was time to get started on work.

11am.

“I think I'll have a kebab for lunch.”

Liase with each staff member around about what they're having for lunch and why a kebab would be so much better.

“A sandwich? Again? Do you really want to spend your whole life eating sandwiches? That's so boring. You have to think about your health, you need more iron, the kebabs have lots of iron!!! Yes, come get kebabs with us! No, don't you dare touch the sticker on my car, I'm aware that it's a plane that drops bombs but I like it, okay—”

Lunch.

Some time after lunch, maybe more work gets done, maybe it's just her talking about how she doesn't really like the senior accountant and then, if someone defends him:

“STOP DEFENDING YOUR BOYFRIEND,” surely knowing full well that it's not true, he's happily married and—

“No, he's your boyfriend!” could be yelled back knowing full well that this definitely can't be true on account of—

4:50pm

Most team members finish what they're doing, getting ready to go home, relax, cook dinner, etc, while one madly runs around trying to do 7 hours of work in 5 minutes.

Everyone rushes out the door at 5pm.

The boss rings at 5:02pm wondering where everyone is.

Repeat every day.