Playmate (2)

'How to handle gossip in the workplace' '

How to shut down rumors' '

gossip policy example' '

no gossip policy template' '

Warning letter to employee for gossiping' '

gossip in the workplace policy'

Nida has been typing random searches on his desktop.

She was exhausted by the treatment she had been receiving over the last few days.

After the cafeteria incident, she became known as a "flirt" – "using her beauty to lure men" in the company.

"At least they know I am beautiful." She consoles herself.

She doesn't know how the rumor spread, but it ends up that the story of her flirting with the sales manager and neglecting her work made the trucking manager furious, making her the main topic of gossip within the company.

She keeps frowning while typing on her keyboard because the web searches don't help her at all.

"They have nothing better to do. That is why they love talking about you."

Nida was startled by the sudden appearance of her coworker, who shoved her face in front of her monitor to see what she had been searching for.

"Ms. Sue! Long time no see!" She awkwardly greeted her while she closed her screen.

Ms. Sue was her seatmate for the first time at a conference meeting last week. She is in the legal and insurance departments.

"Long time no see, Ms. Mildea; as always, you're a gossip topic." She smiled kindly at her and handed her an envelope which she took a while to read.

"I hope Ms. Sue won't believe those rumors." She said it softly while avoiding her gaze.

Ms. Sue complimented her beauty from their first meeting. She hoped that she wouldn't be disappointed by the rumor saying she was luring men.

"Don't worry much, Miss."

As usual, Ms. Sue is as friendly as before.

Nida felt relieved. Then she put the papers back in the brown envelope and asked, "Are we going to the accident site right now?"

Fortunately, she has a task to do, so she can forget about her gossip issues.

"Yep, who will drive?" Ms. Sue raised her hand, which was holding the car key, then Nida grabbed it and said, "I will ma'am"

Both of them smiled at each other.

She is thankful that the legal assistant in charge of her case was Ms. Sue.

Sue is kind and doesn't have any prejudices, which makes her easier to talk with.

She grabbed all her things needed for their inspection and they both went out of the building and drove to the accident site.

Nida is a logistics assistant and her work involves making sure that their delivery load will be smoothly transported from the pick-up location until it is successfully delivered to the customers.

In today's case, their trailer truck was in an accident on the way to their customer's warehouse, then the loads were stolen.

She needs to inspect and document the incident for insurance purposes and account for the damage, while Ms. Sue needs to meet their truck driver and the family of the driver who crashed their car into their truck.

It took an hour to travel from the office to the accident site due to its distance.

Strangely, the site is well guarded and no unauthorized person has entered.

"What are they guarding this heavily when our load has already been stolen?" she commented while looking around. The site seems like a crime scene, not a traffic accident site.

"Maybe this place has too many thefts that they may steal almost everything."

She just shrugged her shoulder and stopped thinking about the unusual police activity.

They walked closer to the tractor head of their forty-footer trailer-tractor as their eyes opened wider due to surprise at how crumpled the four wheel car was due to crashing head on into the huge vehicle.

"No wonder no one survives." she said, speaking out her thoughts.

"May they rest in peace." Ms. Sue prayed while making a sign of a cross twice.

"Haaa- we need to re-orient our drivers for safe driving." She stated as she expressed her sympathy to the people left behind by the one who died in the accident.

"Ah, you are still new." Ms. Sue commented while taking out her camera to take pictures.

"still new at?" she looked at her, puzzled.

"Our drivers are well trained; we have high standards. They won't be driving that large vehicle halfheartedly killing other motorists."

Nida bit her lips because she thought she offended her, thinking that her side comments might be unprofessional.

[I forgot that Ms. Sue has been at the company for ten years already.]

Ms. Sue smiled at her and gently tapped her shoulder, gesturing her to look at the lines on the road.

"Our trailer is in the right lane. Look at the skid marks. It's pretty obvious that this white car is the one that crashed into our truck."

Ms. Sue pointed out.

Nida was amazed at how Ms. Sue saw a situation from a different perspective. She assesses and visualizes all the possibilities that could have happened. She can also understand the different ways that a person can think and see various perspectives in all the versions of the event.

As a person, she wishes she could grow up like her too.

"Though our vehicle is much larger than the car, though the car was the one who became crumpled, though on our side we don't have causality, it's not right to conclude that is our fault. Anyway, it's our job to protect our driver when it comes to this, so be prepared once we visit the police station."

"What's in the police station?" She also took out her camera and captured the scene.

"Furious family of the dead? probably asking for our driver to die instead." Ms. Sue shrugged her shoulders as she casually responded to her question as if she had dealt with this kind of situation before.

Nida walked around the trailer to check if their stocks are fine. She left Ms. Sue talking to an enforcer and the mechanic.

"Shit." She frowned as she cursed.

"S-sorry ma'am, we could not stop them. Only three of us are here to guard." A man wearing a safety vest and a hard hat approached her.

"There's nothing we could do about that. Sorry for cursing. I'll look around for a bit." She waved her hand at the helper and continued assessing their truck load.

"Double the work." she commented as she sighed, looking at the empty boxes of items meant for delivery.

She was expecting to retrieve some items but the trailer van was totally emptied.

She thought she would only be doing a report about a traffic accident. She will also be doing a theft report.

"The wing van of the trailer broke from the crash, resulting in some of the load being thrown away."

She tilted her head as she repeated the statement she read on the initial report.

"The collision happened at the front. How did the wing van break?"

She thought it was weird that the wing van snapped open from the collision with the tractor head.

"Did they force the wing van to open?" She walked around the trailer to investigate more.

"I need to report this to the police," she sighed deeply, realizing she'd have to do more work.

"The bystanders were more focused on stealing the items than helping the one inside the car." she touches the side of the steel door that seems to be scratched by a sharp object.

Even the flooring of the trailer has scratches that she doesn't know how or why it has such large scratches over there.

Huh?

She immediately took a step back as soon as she saw a large paw print underneath the trailer.

"No way." she mumbled and a sign of fear could be seen on her face.

Now that she saw the large paw print, it makes her think that the scratches at the side of the van and its flooring are not from the accident.

She immediately walked back to where Ms. Sue was.

"Are you done documenting?" Ms. Sue asked when she noticed that her face had turned pale. "What's wrong?"

"Ms. Sue, do you know how the accident happened?"

"Not yet. We will know after we read the blotter. If you're done, let's go to the station."

The two leave the accident site.

Ms. Sue drove the car because of Nida shaky hands.

"Are you okay? Are you sick?" Sue asked Nida as she glanced at her while driving.

"I am fine, I guess I drink too much coffee." She states a lie as an excuse, then works hard to calm herself.

Soon after they reached the station, a swarm of people approached them with their voice recorder and microphone.

"Please tell me what your company will do…"

"Are you going to pay the damages?"

"What are you going to do with the family left behind?"

"Can you tell us…"

Reporters throw lots of questions at them without giving them a chance to respond.

"Assholes."

Nida flinched after hearing Ms. Sue curse for the first time. It was only her who heard her curse, because they were moving too close to each other due to the reporters squeezing them with their mics and recorders.

With the help of the police officers, they managed to safely enter the station.

"May I see the blotter, sir? Why do they think it's our fault?" she frustratedly asked the police officer. "Did you make a press release already?"

"No ma'am, we didn't, but the child of the driver who died posted on the SNS claiming that it was the truck driver's fault." The police officer handed the documents and talked respectfully to Ms. Sue. Her kind and nice demeanor suddenly changed into an intimidating legal officer.

"Atty. Abogado is on his way. He will deal with the traffic incident case. I'll be dealing with the media and Ms. Mildea," She gestured her hand toward Nida, then moved forward.

"She will take care of the stolen goods."

The police officer just nicely greeted them and introduced Nida to a police officer who would help her.

"Nida!" someone shouted her name, then she looked at the group of police officers who were doing something at their counter.

"Sir," the police officer saluted the man who called her, then approached them happily.

"Nida, it's been a long time."The man looked at him like he really knew her, but for her, she really didn't recall who the man was, especially since she doesn't have any friends or acquaintances.

"Did you already start?" The man asked the police officer.

"Not yet, sir,"

"Can I take this?" He smiled brightly in front of them, then snatched the documents from the police officer's hand.

The police officer just awkwardly walked away, then the man was left smiling brightly in front of her.

Just by looking at him made her recall a cartoon character named Johnny Bravo because of the way he smiled and his body was built.

[Thank goodness he didn't style his hair like Johnny Bravo.] she thought as her neck hurt from looking up at the tall, big man.

The man has spiky indigo short hair and dark blue eyes. He may look pure and innocent if you only focus your gaze on his face, but his big built that highlights his police uniform seems out of place.

'SPO 1 Lord Suarez'

She read his name plate.

[What a weird name?] she commented internally.

"Sir, Suarez." The huge man's face beamed with happiness after Nida mentioned his name. "I appreciate that you could recognize me but would you mind introducing yourself?" She respectfully asked since she really couldn't remember the man even his name.

"Ah!" he snapped and acted as if he had suddenly realized. "It's me toto, I was adopted and they gave me a new name." He happily shared it with Nida.

"toto?" She immediately frowned once she heard the name.

Toto noticed the sudden change in her expression, which made him sad that his shoulder fell and the glow in his face faded.

"Ah, sorry, it looks like I am the only one happy to see you."

"Ah!Ah! no! Toto! I'm sorry! I am also happy to see you. Sorry I didn't recognize you at all. You totally looked different! " She said this awkwardly, looking away.

She didn't expect meeting someone from her hometown.

As much as possible, she wants to bury everything related to her hometown.

Toto is the same age as her, they are classmates, and he often hangs with her and Randell, but Randell's name was Jake in his memory.

Nida will be happy to talk to him if they share the same memory, but Toto and everyone else in her hometown have different versions of the past.

"I–I have grown a lot, I am taller now."

Both of them hate it when their conversation turns awkward.

Toto was so excited to see her again after a long time and didn't restrain himself from greeting her openly, forgetting the traumatic incident that his friend experienced.

He wanted to hit himself as he thought about how inconsiderate he was.

"Yes, that's great." Nida shortly responded, and their dull conversation was cut with silence.

Ehem!

He made up a fake cough to get her attention.

"S-shall I call the PO1 again to assist you?" he asked instead, but Nida waved her hand to refuse.

"No, I didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable, I would appreciate it if you could assist me still."

Nida feels guilty about how she treated her childhood friend.

[Toto doesn't know that his memory is altered, I shouldn't be treating him like this!] She scolded herself.

Toto guides her to his table to finally talk about work. "The wing van broke at this part and thrown out 12 to 15 boxes off the road," he explains while showing her the blotter and some pictures. The

helpers said that some bystanders who witnessed the collision picked up the items and took them home. The other people who saw these actions thought that this was okay, so they took some boxes inside the van until lots of people gathered to take them all and empty the van." "Can

you show me at least CCTV footage? It will be easier for the insurance company to pay us if we show them that."

"Unfortunately, the CCTV at that area was under maintenance. We also came into the site too late, and all the loads were all gone." he sounds very apologetic.

Thinking of the lost opportunity to expose the existence of the werewolf, Nida just tapped the pictures.

"Toto, I mean Sir Suarez."

Toto slightly smiled upon hearing his nickname.

"I'm fine with Toto."

Fidgeting for a moment, hesitating if she could say what was on her mind.

"I think the opening of the wing van is kind of weird."

"You noticed it too!?" He leaned forward closer to Nida.

"Yes sir, do you think it's unusual for a wing van to open whereas the collision happened at the tractor head."

"Yes, I also see marks of forcefully opening the wing van locks and some scratches on the flooring. It is too bad I cannot investigate further. "

"Why? Did others get assigned? "

"No." He shakes his side from side to side.

"They won't investigate." Toto leaned closer to her ears to whisper. "They said our higher ups won't allow any more investigation and will settle things as accident."

"What?" she frowned, then she moved her head to look directly into his eyes. "If you know something is strange, why didn't you investigate it? you ca—."

She stopped midway through her sentence because she felt something similar, then she gasped in realization.

"No, if they are involved with this, I am sure they will come at night again!" She unintentionally speaks out her thoughts while thinking about a wolf running wild again and their backer is running around erasing people's memories again.

They left little bits of evidence and she is sure that tonight they will surely clean it up.

"y-you know who's behind this?"

Toto asked confusingly.

"Ah, no. I'm sorry I spoke my mind. I was thinking of other things. Anyway, can I have a copy of this?" She pointed to the blotter and the pictures that Toto had presented to her a while ago.

"You can have this. These are only copies. We have the original copy inside." He handed the papers to her, which she grabbed hurriedly.

"I'll be going now. It was nice meeting you again."

He felt bitter about how they treated each other now, whereas they were closest a long time ago. he

suddenly became a stranger to her.

"Me too. Keep safe, Nida." he softly said. He said goodbye while watching her hurriedly walk away, as if she had just realized something and wanted to rush over.

He was about to walk inside when she saw Nida going back again.

"Did you forget something?" he asked, but Nida held both of her hands up to lighten her heavy feelings.

"It's nice to see you doing well Toto. I always wished for you to be safe, healthy and happy." She said it warmly as she genuinely smiled at him.

She suddenly thought that despite having different memories, he was still her dearest friend. That is why she turned back and wished him well.

After saying the words she wanted to convey, she hurriedly walked away and left Toto, looking at his hands that Nida held.

"Silver dust?"

Her hands left a silver dust mark on his hands, but it soon evaporated into the air.

He wondered for a moment what that was, but he turned and walked inside the station with a happy warm heart, knowing his friend was wishing him happiness and health, which is the most important in his work.