Sunk-Cost Fallacy

You rap your knuckles on the wood, feeling ten inches tall. Your boss pulls the door open just enough for you to meet his steely gaze. You look away immediately, shame clawing at your throat. The age gap between you and your boss has always felt awkward. You’re too young to relate to most of what he says but too old to feel like his daughter.

He has sons, you remember, one still in middle school. Your boss once asked you to decode some newfangled preteen slang, and you didn’t know how to explain that the sixth grade is almost twenty years in the rearview mirror. Even when you were his son’s age, you barely knew a thing, admitting to the girl with whom you shared a music stand in choir that you had never heard of Taylor Swift.

You step into his office and scan the room. For what, you’re not quite sure.

“I’m sorry,” you say, your voice so soft, you don’t think he hears you.

“Thanks for stopping by,” he says, running his thumb and his index finger along the gray hairs of his mustache. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”

You lick your lips, unnerved by the casual way in which he speaks. He makes it sound as though he’s more your friend than he is your boss. Perhaps, in his mind, he is both equally. He’s your friend. He’s your boss. He’s family. You can’t escape. He may not be your stepdad, but he’s still the dad that stepped up.

Your real dad is convinced your boss is a genius. The next Zuckerberg, he says. You’ve tried pointing out that this isn’t a good thing, but he won’t hear it.

You run through your boss’s words again: Tell me what’s on your mind. It sounds like something a therapist would say.

The other month, an employee at the company was placed on a 5150 hold. In response, all employees received a month of free counseling sessions.

Available, the email notification read, as a handy-dandy app, now powered by the latest and greatest AI therapists!

You wondered if it was possible for therapy to make you more depressed. You considered testing your theory by giving the app a try but ultimately decided not to give those bots a single thing.

“Is this about your PTO?” your boss asks.

You can’t help it; you wince.

At your most recent evaluation, your boss highlighted your ridiculously high amount of unused PTO. You admitted, sheepishly, that you were saving up, just in case. You smiled after you said it, as if you were joking.

You were not joking. Were not smiling. At least, not on the inside.

You kept waiting for him to ask, In case of what?

An emergency, you would have replied. As the product of a lifelong doomsday prepper and a woman with a day planner, you are nothing if not prepared.

Now, of course, you suspect the worst has already happened.

It wasn’t an atomic bomb. Not war, famine, or a tsunami. It wasn’t double-booking your Saturday with two friends of equal importance.

Instead, the worst started with your mother. The scans that revealed too much.

You remember how betrayed you felt. Her body carried you. It had let you down before already, releasing you after just six months and ruining your mother’s meticulous birth plans. Your parents once thought that was the worst thing.

You now know that it’s not.

The sound of your own name startles you out of your thoughts. When you look up, your boss tilts his head and asks, “Spacing out again?”

Resentment sparks in your chest. You do your best to keep your expression neutral.

You do not space out. If you ever seem distracted in meetings, it’s because you’re getting more work done. Unlike those who hold eye contact like they think it’s their job, you alternate between taking down minutes, creating to-do lists, and doing all the real work.

You are an expert multitasker. You learned this from your mother. You learned most things from your mother. Your father loves you for it.

You are your mother’s daughter, he said once.

What is a mother’s daughter without a mother to emulate?

You clear your throat, and for a moment, it’s as if you’re back in middle school, as young as your boss’s son. All those years ago, in the sixth grade, you and your classmates were tasked with writing and reciting persuasive essays.

You hated standing in that auditorium, your notecards in your hands. The microphone had been left too low, barely reaching your chin. You refrained from adjusting it, afraid of triggering that feedback whine you heard in every teen movie, and instead slouched so dramatically, you looked like an inverted L. By the time you staggered off the stage, your body ached and moaned. You felt like a lost stowaway, crammed into a stranger’s suitcase.

Maybe that was your first Alice in Wonderland moment. Unlike Alice, you grew first, stretching high enough to scare away everyone in a ten-mile radius. You were soft but not dainty. Quiet but not small. You worried your soul did not fit your body.

You shrink now, slumping in the chair at your boss’s desk. You’ve reverted to an L shape, though at least you’re now upright.

You clear your throat again. “I know it’s busy season, and it’s been all hands on deck. It’s just . . . my mom.”

You pause at the absolute worst time.

“She’s not dead,” you rush to say, your cheeks filling with heat. “It’s just—I mean, her birthday is next week. I thought it would be nice to take her out. If I could.”

Your boss’s expression softens. “Right. Your mom. How’s she doing now?”

“She’s fine,” you say stiffly, as if reciting your thesis statement. “She’s fine. She’s good. She’s doing well.”

Restate it, and maybe this time, he’ll believe you.

You have to laugh a little at your own incompetence.

Then, before you can feel the slightest hint of shame at laughing, you instead burst into tears.

“Sorry,” you say. “Sorry. I don’t know why I’m crying.”

Really. Why are you crying? She’s still here, isn’t she? She’s fine.

Except, of course, when she isn’t. When she begins to shrink. You keep telling yourself you’ll someday be big enough to hold her, but you’re just fooling yourself. You never know what to do. You’re as lost as Alice is. As underwater as the oysters. You’re all of two minutes from getting gobbled up by the whiskered walrus.

“I’m sorry,” your boss says. You want to believe he means it. “I know it’s been hard for you. It’s just . . . well, you’re right. It is all hands on deck. If you took off, even for a day, it could throw off the whole schedule.”

For the past six months, as long as your mother’s body held you, the company has been working on an all-important project. The contract was hard-won. It’s the biggest, most expensive project in which you’ve taken part. Your boss said if you do well enough, you might even get promoted.

He didn’t lay it out that way. He merely hinted at it. He said, at your most recent evaluation, you might take on some new responsibilities.

That doesn’t mean a promotion, your mother pointed out. It sounds to me like he’s just trying to give you more work.

Good, your father said. That way, you can show him how capable you are.

What if you’re not capable, though? What if you’re barely staying afloat?

“I hope you understand,” your boss continues. “I’m afraid work this important can’t wait.”

Right. Of course, you want to say. And sickness surely can. Sickness gives you as much time as you need. Sickness waits for all men.

You run your tongue along your lips. You wear lipstick every day. It tastes like fish and grown-up sadness. You’re tired of it all.

“It’s busy season,” he continues, repeatedly shooting you in the head with the same bullet point.

“It’s always busy season now,” you say. “It’s not always my mom’s birthday.”

“I understand that,” he begins, “but—”

“I’m taking the day off.”

He pulls back, his ocean eyes widening. It takes all your self-control not to mirror him. The voice that left your mouth was larger than the both of you. It filled his office space.

“I’m sorry,” you say, though you’re not. “I need the time off.”

He studies you for a moment, faint lines etched between his brows.

“In your interview,” he says slowly, “You called yourself a team player.”

“I am,” you say. “I just . . . need a break.”

For the next few seconds, your boss says nothing, his expression unreadable. You could create a hundred spreadsheets, could run a thousand analyses, and still not know what’s on his mind. Is he thinking of firing you? Determining sunk-cost fallacy?

You decide you don’t care anymore. If he fires you, so be it. You’ll spend your extra days with your mother, holding tea parties like you’re still young. You’ll underbake cookies from a refrigerated roll, clink plastic cups of guava juice. You’ll speak in awful, potentially offensive British accents and call your father over for crumpets and scones.

Is bread okay? he will ask you both.

You’ll reply, That’ll do.

“Okay,” your boss says to you now. “Just know I’m disappointed.”

That’s fine. You’re not. You’re proud of yourself. Your mother will be too.

Your eyes flick to the black-framed pictures on your boss’s mahogany desk. You wonder how much time he spends with his children. If, when he hears them laughing and splashing around in the pool just outside his window, he ever considers logging off and cannonballing his way back into their lives.

You should do that, you think. Take your mother swimming. When did you last go to the beach? You’re not the biggest fan of the sand, but your mother has always loved the way it feels to drift along the water.

“Thank you,” you say, standing. “I’ll see you when I get back.”

He’ll be here. You know it. This whole ship could go down, and he would still be at the wheel, thinking the whole world is going under just because he is.

You lift your head, already imagining the way the sun will feel on your face. The sigh that slips out from between your boss’s lips reminds you of the wash of waves on the sand.

You break into a grin. You can’t wait to tell your mother where you’re taking her for her birthday.

You leave your boss’s office and feel yourself begin to float.