Writ-aholic

“What happened Y/n?”

You shake your head, brushing it off. “Nothing, I uh just tripped while going down the stairs-”

“Tripped? Look at that,” She tries to reach for it again, this time making you smack her hand away. “More like shoved.” 

“Tripped.” You insist. “It um.. it was dark, because you know, it was in the middle of the night and I… had to get water….to drink obviously. I was thirsty. Very thirsty.”

“But don’t you keep a huge bottle of water on your nightstand every night? Before you sleep?” She stares suspiciously.

You scoff, “What? I can’t forget to take water one night?”

“You can,” She points out. “But Ana won’t-”

“Ok, if you’re not going to believe what I say, why even ask me?”

Isabelle just looks at you lips parted, blinking fast, confused, making you regret your words as soon as they leave your mouth.

“I’m sorry,” You let the tension escape from your posture, “I just have a really long day ahead of me - I need to take my father for his appointment then rush to Ana’s event and the house, oh heavens, the house is like the North Pole. I’ve been trying for the last 5 days to find a guy who isn’t trying to empty my wallet to just fix the thermostat and I….everything is just a mess, I can’t…I don’t…-”

“Okay okay.” She waves it away., “Its fine, like always, you have a lot going on.  But why are you here then? Didn’t you take the day off?”

“Oh yeah,” You reach inside your bag and start scrounging. “I was supposed to mail some really important documents by 8 o’clock today but surprise surprise, something was wrong with my laptop as well and so I just put them all in this flash drive,” You finally find it and fish it out. “And I just need to make sure they reach our boss and-”

“Our boss?” She blink as you stupidly. “Not ‘that dingus’ or ‘the man who’s teeth I wanna boil’?” 

“Very graphic.” You observe, quite disturbed. “But as I was saying, I just need them to reach him, then I’ll go.”

“And you want me to help you give it to him so you made me climb down six floors?”

“You came down by the lift.”

“And you can go up by it.” She sneers, walking back. “Maybe then you’ll discover that it is still a journey that involves six floors!” 

As you laugh you ignore the pain that radiates from your cheekbones until you notice she’s seriously walking back into the lift. 

“Come on Izzy.” You put your hand in way of the doors, preventing them from shutting. “You just have to take it from me and give it to him.”

“And have him discover my fingerprints on his USB of ‘very important documents’? I think not. Whatever this is, only his assistant, you, should be dealing with.” 

You sigh, knowing it will be much easier to do this yourself than convince her so you proceed to do just that and step into the lift. 

“You know, if you waited another 5 minutes” She points at your watch. “He would be here and you could have handed him the drive downstairs.”

“Uh,” You play with your fingers not meeting her eye. “I was kinda hoping to avoid interacting with him today.” 

“And why is that?”

“Because last night uh we argued?”

“When do the two of you not argue?”

“Okay, then maybe this time it was more of a…fight?”

She squints at you curiously. “What kind of…fight?” 

“The kind where I screamed and threw stuff at him and accused him and called him a lot of unpleasant names and….I was the one at fault.”

“You…what?” She laughs in utter disbelief. “You did all that to the man who pays you? The man who hired you and who can fire you?”

“Yes, yes, and yes.” You look at her, ashamed. “I’m not proud of it, alright, but I just lost control. And I’m terribly sorry about it too, which is why I don’t want my face to be the first thing he sees in his office today morning.”

“Then you have less than five minutes to do whatever you have to and then get out of this building.” 

You tap your foot impatiently. “Thanks to you, yes.” 

“Hey, you can’t blame me for not having a death wish like you. The man looks at me like he wants to harvest my toes, every time I do something out of line.” 

You frown very confused, “What is it with you and the descriptions today?”

“I was watching a documentary about witches last night.”

“Figures.”

“Did you know the witch trials were really a political game? They sacrificed so many people just for-”

“Yes that’s very interesting I’m sure.” You look up from your watch as the doors ding open. “I will listen to every word you have to say when I see you the next time okay? I’m sorry, I just don’t have time right now.” 

You can’t hear what she says in response as you hurry to the cabin opposite and open the door to be greeted by the usual darkness. As always, you carefully yet quickly walk behind the table, roll the blinds open letting the sunlight stream in, turn on the coffee machine in the corner, switch on his desktop, mentally chide yourself for forgetting to collect his mail yet again, then remind yourself that today is your day off and you didn’t have to do anything except leave the flashdrive on his table and go. So you place it, right in the middle of his workspace where he can see it and begin to hurry out only to stop by the door, hand on the handle. You should leave a note right? To let him know what it is?

You turn back and quickly grab a pen and paper from his desk, bend over his table and begin scribbling a note, Confidential papers for the Legal-

And the door clicks open behind you followed by the clock on his table chiming as it turns 8, followed by the sigh the man lets out softly. You recall what happened in this very place less than 24 hours ago, and shut your eyes, lips pursing in regret. This was exactly what you were trying to avoid. Why couldn’t you have been a minute faster? 

“I know you’re not particularly gifted in following what I say, but today I learnt you don’t even follow what you say. I thought you were not going to come to work today?” 

As you turn, you see his eyes complete their infamous eye roll and land on you before narrowing, as his lips part wordlessly. You hold your breath and swallow when he takes takes a step ahead and then two and then suddenly he’s right before you, leaving just enough space between his desk, you and himself, looking with an intensity which gave you no choice but to look away.

“Uh…” You grip the edge of his table behind you tight and stare at his shoes. That seemed like a reasonable thing to do somehow. “I came to-”

And then his hand is under your chin, lifting your face, his eyes fixated on his thumb which softly brushed against your lower lip. You’re suddenly hyperaware of how chapped your lips are and and how calloused his thumb feels and how dry your skin is and how cold his hand is as it finds its way past your cheek to behind your ear, thumb hesitating to execute its intention. 

And the silence is so deafening, all you can hear is heartbeat. Yours…And his. And that’s the only sound till his thumb finally finds the courage to touch the bruise on your cheekbone, only to elicit a hiss of pain out of you. It makes his eyes meet yours and you realize. You realize all these days, not once had you paid attention to his eyes. Maybe because he always sat against the light, or he never looked you in the eye for long enough but today the sun shone into them, into that dark dark brown piercing you and they looked so…..ordinary. So ordinary yet you couldn’t stop looking. 

For a man who had incredible restrain, he didn’t make the slightest attempt to hide the rage in his voice.

“Who did this to you?”   

You stutter, “Why, why would anyone do this to me?”

“What happened?”