Week 1 Storytelling: The Wolf and the Shepherd Retelling

Author's Note:
For my retelling, I'm using Aesop's fable about the wolf and the shepherd, which is about trust and how people don't always change. The wolf in the fable seems helpful to the shepherd at first, but as soon as the shepherd lets his guard down, the wolf takes the opportunity to steal sheep. For my retelling, I used a modern scenario of the corporate world.

(Wolf image from Wikimedia Commons)

 Retelling:
 

December 17, 2003
Suspended. Jessica snatched her backpack from the ground, fighting tears. She had worked so hard to do well in her calculus test and was ecstatic when her diligence resulted in a perfect score. It had never happened before in any of Mr. Lamb's 12th grade calculus classes, and at first, Mr. Lamb had told her he was proud of her. However, soon the whole school learned that other sections of the calculus class had several perfect scores, one of which was Crystal Wolfe's exam. Crystal had always disliked Jessica for no reason other than Jessica's academic success, and Jessica knew Crystal wasn't doing well in calculus prior to the test. She was sure that Crystal must have somehow been involved. Rumors of cheating proliferated until one by one, the students were called into the principal's office. When it was Jessica's turn, the principal informed her that all of the students had told him there was one person responsible for sneaking into Mr. Lamb's office and taking pictures of the exam-- her. She had easy access to a camera because she was the the photographer for the school's newspaper., so she was the perfect person to take the blame. Despite Jessica's protests that the students had lied, the professor showed her enough faked "proof" that made Jessica seem guilty. After the principal delivered the verdict of her suspension, Jessica stormed towards Crystal's locker.
"Why?" she cried, "Why did you do this to me?"
Crystal smirked. "There's one thing you need to learn about life. Do what you need to do to survive. That's all I did."
"You've ruined my life," Jessica said, fighting back tears.
"Good luck, Jessica," Crystal said, with no sincerity.
That was the last time Jessica would ever see Crystal, or so she thought.

July 17, 2013
Jessica sat at her desk in the new office of start up firm, Shepherd's Consulting. For years she and her boss, James Shepherd, had tried to make their vision of partnering eco-friendly companies with commercial businesses into reality. Now, she was finally working towards her dream of improving the quality of products that would benefit companies and the environment.
Her assistant's voice filtered through her intercom, "Ms. Wolfe is here to see you, Jess."
"Thanks, Kay! Send her in."
Jessica straightened the miscellaneous items on her desk. Ms. Wolfe was the vice president of a huge corporation that was a potential partner with Shepherd Consulting. Securing a deal with Ms. Wolfe would add a great deal of revenue and reputation to Shepherd Consulting, so Mr. Shepherd was relying on Jessica to negotiate a partnership.
At the knock on her door, Jessica stood and smiled, but her smile soon froze on her face when none other than Crystal Wolfe walked in.

Three Hours Later...
"James, you have to trust me, we can't go through with this deal! Crystal ruined my reputation in high school, and I had to go to community college when I lost all of my scholarships because my teachers refused to support me. She'll throw us under the bus if it suits her!"
James pressed his fingertips together and leaned his elbows on his desk, ever the picture of serenity. "How many years ago was this, Jess?"
Jessica frowned. "Ten, but you're missing my point. People like her don't change!"
"What could you tell from your meeting with her today"
"She seemed friendly and professional. I've changed a lot since high school, so she didn't recognize me, I think."
He nodded. "High school was a long time ago. She's an important person in a corporation that we need a contract with if we're ever going to expand our reach. Go ahead and negotiate a deal."

October 24, 2013
Showtime! The official partnership of a new line of eco-friendly products began today, and in the next six months it would line the shelves of stores in Crystal's corporation. The negotiations had gone surprisingly well, and even Jessica was starting to believe that maybe Crystal changed for the better.
"Are you ready?" James asked, with his keys in hand.
They were traveling to their partner's corporate headquarters to celebrate the new line and discuss other potential projects.
"Yes! Just give me a minute to finish up this e-mail."
As she was typing, her desk phone beeped, and her assistant said, "Ms. Wolfe here to see you, Jess."
Jessica stopped typing and looked at James questioningly. "We were supposed to meet her there, right?"
He nodded, a tiny furrow of worry forming between his eyebrows.
Jessica shrugged. "I hope everything is okay."

Three Hours Later...
"How could I have been so naive?" James paced the room.
Crystal had breezed into Jessica's office and informed them that they had found a better business partner who would work better for their needs. James, in a desperate attempt to save their deal, offered to work with Crystal personally to ensure that their deal would go through, but Crystal said that where her corporation stood, they could not expend the resources for renegotiating the contract.
It was over.
Jessica sighed tiredly. Shepherd Consulting was in a bad place. They would have to work hard to make up for the failed deal and find new investors and companies to sell the eco-friendly products, which would be doubly hard with attempting to build their reputation once more.
"We'll recover," she said, assuring both herself and James.
"You were right, Jessica. Sometimes, people's true nature doesn't change."
"Actually, they do," Jessica said. "Crystal meant for me to fail ten years ago, and she succeeded. I didn't have confidence. Now, she can't bring me down. We're going to fight for Shepherd Consulting, and we're going to succeed."

Bibliography:
"The Wolf and the Shepherd." by Aesop, from The Aesop for Children (2006). Web Source: The Project Gutenberg Ebook