"Ms. Floyd, this company treats you like family! After the IPO, you'll be a founding elder. You'll achieve financial freedom! We're just in the darkness before the dawn right now. We have to break through it together!"
Now he drove a Porsche and lived in a luxury flat.
I was still making 4,500.
If I got sick, a single month of medical bills would wipe out my earnings.
Haohhao attended the kindergarten near the residential complex. Ten-minute walk—not far. The round trip took half an hour at most.
After picking him up, I took him to the commercial street to buy the meat Joanna demanded. While waiting for the elevator, I ran into an older neighbor from the 7th floor bringing her granddaughter home.
She chatted me up. "You're the nanny hired by the family on the 11th floor, right? I see you all the time." She leaned in conspiratorially. "To be honest, you're a smart girl. You know there's money in nannying. The one my family hired doesn't even do overnights, and she costs me 6,500. I see you leaving at ten every night. You must be making eight or nine thousand, easy."
The polite smile on my face froze.
I gave a vague, noncommittal response.
Only after she exited with her granddaughter did I let out a heavy sigh. Working overtime until ten was the norm. I also had to help Joanna watch the kid and mix formula. Now I had to come in half an hour early for school drop-offs and pick-ups.
And yet, I didn't even make half of what a standard nanny earned.
As soon as I walked through the company doors, Joanna stood there, hands on her hips.
"Rose Floyd, did you use picking up the kid as an excuse to slack off? You're a full fifteen minutes later than yesterday! I didn't send you out to play! It's freezing outside—what if Haohhao gets sick?"
A deep breath. I forced down the rising bile of irritation. "Joanna, it's five hundred meters from the kindergarten to the shops. A fifteen-minute round trip is reasonable, isn't it?"
She rolled her eyes. "Don't think that just because you've been here two years, you can be disrespectful. This is a professional relationship. You need to respect your superiors when you speak."
My fingers dug into the plastic handles of the grocery bag until my knuckles turned white.
When I wanted a raise, we were "family" and I needed to be understanding.
Now that I was defending myself, it was a "professional relationship" and I had to respect my leader.