The board wants it, too. He says it'll fix everything with the shareholders. She lifted her chin. I told him I'd think about it. And I came down here to tell you that I'm not going to do it.
And that the only reason I even said I'd think about it is that I'm a coward when it comes to that board. And I'm ashamed of that. And I wanted you to hear it from me before you heard it from anybody else. Marcus was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice had changed.
There was something underneath it. Something low and steady she hadn't heard before. This Daniel, he said, he, the one who walked past me on the stairs today. Tall fella, watch worth more than my truck, looked at me like I was a wet spot on the carpet. Olivia winced.
He said you were staring at my office. I was, Marcus said without a flicker of shame. I was standing at the bottom of the stairwell working up the nerve to come up here and stop being a coward myself and I lost it and I went back to work. So, I guess we've both been cowards this week. He wiped his hands slowly on the rag.
But I'll tell you something, Ms. Carter. A man who looks at another man like that like he's furniture, like he's less than that man has never once in his life caught something heavy so it wouldn't hurt somebody he loved. And I don't much care how expensive his watch is. Olivia's breath caught. You said something a second ago.
Marcus went on taking a step toward her. You said you're done taking the easy way about me and I've been standing here for 8 days telling myself the wall was the smart play. Keep the job. Keep the light on. Don't want what you can't fix.
He shook his head slowly. But I've been miserable, Olivia. 8 days. You went quiet up in your glass tower and it turned my whole kingdom down here into a tomb. And I finally figured out why.
And the why is real simple and it scares me to death. He stopped a foot away from her. I missed you. Not the idea of you. You for a woman who stared down billionaires.
Olivia Carter suddenly did not know what to do with her hands. So here's where I've landed. Marcus said, "I'm still scared. That hasn't changed. I've still got a mortgage and a little girl and no net, and the whole world's still going to say, "A maintenance man's got no business standing next to a woman like you." All of that's still true." His voice dropped.
But you standing there telling me you'd rather fight your own board than let a rich man put his brand on you, that changes the math. Because it turns out the only thing scarier than wanting you is watching you walk into that gala on Daniel Reed's arm. I'm not going to. I know you said. He almost smiled.
But I want you to go to the gala. Olivia stared at him. What? I want you to go, Marcus said with me. The words hung in the concrete air, and for a second, neither of them could believe he'd said them.
Then reality crashed back in, and Olivia saw the exact moment his own courage terrified him. Saw his eyes widen. Saw the machine start to come back online. She grabbed his arm before he could take it back. Yes, she said.
Olivia, I don't even own a Yes, Marcus. Before you talk yourself out of it. Yes. She was almost laughing and there were tears in it, too. You want to walk into that room full of Daniel Reeds and Gerald Vosses with the maintenance supervisor on my arm and let them all choke on it?
Yes. God, yes. I have wanted to blow up their whole polite little world for 3 years, and you just offered to hand me the match." Marcus let out a breath that shook. "This is a terrible idea." "The worst?" she agreed, beaming. "They're going to say awful things.
They are about you, not me. I can take it. But they're going to say things about you, and I'm not Marcus." She took both his hands, the bandaged one and the good one, and held them like she had at midnight. Let me be brave about my own life for once. You've been brave for everybody your whole life.
Let me carry this one. And Marcus Johnson, standing in his concrete kingdom, looked at the impossible woman holding both his hands and felt the last of the wall come down quiet as dust. "Okay," he said. "That word again," Olivia whispered. "I really love that word from you." They stood there a moment longer than they needed to.
And then Marcus stepped back because he was still Marcus and there was still a corroded coupling on the water mane that would flood the suble if he didn't finish it. I got to close this up, he said. Or you'll have a lake down here by morning. Can I stay? Olivia asked.
And watch you work. He looked at her. It's boring. It's just a man in a pipe. Marcus, she said, sitting down on the overturned bucket in her thousand blouse like it was a throne.
Watching you work is the most honest thing that happens in this entire building. I've been coming down here for 3 years. You just never asked why. He didn't have an answer for that. So he turned back to the pipe and she watched and for a while the only sound was the wrench and the hum and the occasional low word he said to the machine.
And it was both of them privately understood the happiest either of them had been in a very long time. She left near midnight. He walked her to the freight elevator like it was a front porch. 2 weeks, she said as the doors opened. 2 weeks, he agreed.
Marcus, she stopped the doors with her hand. Whatever they say to us in that room, I need you to remember something. Every awful thing they'll say about you belonging or not belonging. I already thought all of it three years ago and then I watched the badge logs and I stopped thinking it forever. So when they try to make you feel small in there, you look at me and you remember that the woman who built this whole company already ran the numbers on you and you came out worth more than every man in the room.
The doors tried to close. She held them. You hear me? Marcus's throat was tight. I hear you.