Hot Enough To Burn

This happened in 2003. I am male and had one male boss who was in his sixties and about 1,50 meters — five feet — tall. We were the IT-guys at a school.

One day we got a trainee, a lovely and beautiful girl about 18 years old who would be helping us for the next ten months. My boss was notorious for his sexist and creepy “compliments” he gave to women. He already had received several warnings but sadly, there was no way to fire him because his behaviour was just annoying but not considered sexual harassment at that time.

My boss began hitting on the trainee with all sorts of cheesy remarks. The first time I heard it, I immediately told him to shut up or I’d tell his wife. Visibly embarrassed, he left the room and I thought that was the end of it.

A few days later I found the trainee in tears behind her desk. You’ve already guessed it: the boss wasn’t planning on stopping his creepy behaviour. I really felt sorry for the girl because as far as I could judge she could become one h*** of a sys-admin.

That evening I spoke about this to my wife. She had some creepy and sexist remarks from my boss when she sometimes came to school to pick me up, so she could imagine how the girl must feel. Suddenly she began to laugh, took some paper, and wrote some lines down.

She gave it to me and said, “Have your trainee learn these lines by heart. The next time he’s bothering her again, she must say them in a very loud voice.”

The next day I gave the paper to the trainee and told her what to do. She read the lines, began to laugh, and said she couldn’t say those things to the boss. I told her that if she wanted to stay here without the crap my boss was giving her, she had no other options. We could report my boss, and he would get another warning, but nothing would change. The trainee wanted to stay at our school so she began to memorize the lines.

It was Friday, and she said she would study the lines over the weekend. The next Monday we started work and my boss phoned that he wouldn’t come in until lunchtime. Fine. Lunchtime came and the trainee and I went for a coffee in the break room. Most of the teachers and the principal were there, too, so we had to wait in line.

The trainee poured herself a coffee, and as if on cue there was the boss, saying, “Oh, such a hot girl shouldn’t drink hot coffee. I can’t handle you if you’re too hot.” The trainee turned around and yelled at him:

“Now, you listen, you oversexed, over-aged, undersized albino smurf! I don’t want to hear your foul mouth ever again. I’ve had enough of you, creep. Leave me alone or I’ll drown you in the first toilet bowl I can find. It would take just one flush to get rid of the body.”

The room went silent for a moment, and next, there was hysterical laughter and clapping.  

The boss made an exit and the principal went after him. When we came back from lunch, there was a note on my desk that the boss had decided to take some time off to evaluate his career.

The last we heard was that he had applied for early retirement without a goodbye party. I asked my wife where she got those lines from.

She said, “You know how sometimes you only come up with good lines long after the fact? I’ve had these lines prepared just in case I ever met your boss again. I never expected them to work so efficiently.”