lars

—🦢, summary. (post bianca)

Lars doesn’t enjoy having your boyfriend visit you during office hours, and after numerous flirty gestures between you and your boyfriend, Lars becomes a jealous guy.

YOUR BOYFRIEND STOOD IN FRONT OF YOU IN THE BREAKROOM, one of his hands resting on the bench top beside him and the other hand holding onto your side.

“I hate how I can’t stay here with you.” He states with a smirk on his face, which was even more prominent in the lit up room. “This place is so boring.”

“It’s not boring.” You defended softly, the words dripping from your mouth before you could stop them. “I have a lot of friends here.”

The room took a sudden uneasy tilt, feeling a lot smaller than it had when you both walked in. His words made a sour, heavy impression on your heart.

You loved working here and being around your friends all day, and for someone—especially your boyfriend—to make a negative remark about it, held a heavy feeling on your chest.

“You’re right, I’m sorry baby.” His body leaned towards yours, his arms wrapping around your waist as he pulled you in for a hug. “You’re right.”

Your head touched the jacket that covered his shoulder, feeling the material to be rough and cold against your cheek.

The sound of the door opening broke the two of you away from your hug, but your boyfriends hands lingered against the side of your body.

Lars walked into the breakroom, making sure the door closed gently behind him as he looked at you with a polite and apologetic smile, his lips shaping into a thin line.

Before walking to the vending machine, Lars nervously directed his eyes to beside you, noticing your boyfriend. He looked away almost immediately, failing to catch the way you widely smiled back at him, immediately feeling comforted by his presence.

Your boyfriend nodded his head at Lars in acknowledgment, yet his voice lacked any interest. “Hey, man.”

You felt disappointed that your boyfriend refused to give any attention to your work friends, resulting in you attending all of Cindy’s parties alone—and leaving you to make excuses for him, telling your friends; ‘He had to work late,’ or ‘he’s been sick recently’.

Your boyfriends grip became more noticeable as his hand adjusted around your waist. His eyes darted to yours as he motioned his head in directed of the breakroom door, silently telling you he wanted to leave.

You shook your head softly before facing your shy friend again, a caring smile on your face. “That’s a nice sweater, Lars.” You told him, your comment genuine.

Upon hearing your voice, he turned away from the glass of the vending machine to look at you. Unbeknownst to you, seeing your smile caused his heart to warm with sincerity. He looked down at his brown sweater, grinning proudly. “Thank you.”

Lars noticed the hand wrapped around your waist. He found your boyfriend undeserving of you, but never said anything about it. Instead, he shared smiles and packet food to you whenever your boyfriend said something that hurt your feelings.

“You’re wel—” But before you could finish your words, your boyfriend decided use the arm he had wrapped around your waist to pull you towards the door, forcing you to abandon your conversation with Lars.

He opened the breakroom door and guided the both of you back to your cubicle, choosing to ignore the annoyed look you gave him.

Once you sat back down in your chair, your boyfriend crossed his brows at you and shrugged impatiently. “What the hell was that?”

“Why are you saying that to me?” you scoffed out of disbelief, using your hand to motion towards yourself. “You realise you just interrupted our conversation? That was rude.”

“Whatever.” He rolled his eyes, annoyed at you. “I’m going back to work, my breaks over anyway.”

You head turned around, facing the framed picture on your desk that consisted of the two of you from last year, hugging each other with real smiles on your faces.

“Okay,” You replied, refusing to face him and let him start another argument that could attract the attention of your co-workers. “I’ll see you tonight then.”

He straightened his posture, ready to leave. “Don’t wait up,” He told you, causing you to finally face him with confusion written all over your face. “I’m working late tonight.”

“Again?”

“Yes, again.” You frowned at his response, deciding to pay no more attention to his rudeness as you turned your head back to the picture once more.

Then, he walked away.

His steps were quiet on the soft office carpet, but loud enough for you to feel the heaviness of his last words.

Lars watched as your boyfriend walked through the office doors, heading in the direction of the exit. He glared daggers at the back of your boyfriends jacket, having heard the harsh tone of words he spoke to you.

It went quiet for a while, everyone in their own cubicle was focusing on their work. Except you, who had your head resting in the palms of your hands, feeling defeated from a simple afternoon with your boyfriend.

Suddenly, the crinkling sound of a chip packet claimed your attention. You quickly moved your hands away from your face curiously, only to see Lars slide a packet of vending machine chips on your desk.

After seeing your head move to look at him, he took a small step away, straightening his posture as hands swiftly returned by his side.

You rotated your body, moving your wheelie chair around so you were fully facing him, wincing as your chair creaked from the sudden movement.

Lars didn’t notice it. He just stared at you with an expression of anticipation mixed with admiration.

He seemed curious at what you would say, but he also admired the way you were careful with everything you did around him. You didn’t think he noticed, but he did.

“Thank you, Lars.” Your lips lifted upwards at his gift, feeling grateful that he was able to take your mind away from the recent events, even just for a little bit. “This is really sweet.”

“I, um,” He started, looking upwards at the office ceiling. You could tell he was trying his best to find the right words. He licked his top lip nervously before speaking again. “I saw him walk away.”

You nodded slowly in response. “Yeah, we had a tiny argument.” You told him, pinching your pointer finger and thumb close together to emphasise the word ‘tiny’. “It doesn’t matter.”

“If it hurt your feelings, it matters.”

You smiled at his words, finding them a lot easier to believe since they came from a wholesome person.

Lars glanced down at his shoes, then to the clock on the wall, before he looked back at you. “Do you like Scrabble?” He blurted, his eyes shyly darted away from you for a second before they returned.

“Scrabble?” You were surprised by the random question, but there was no judgement. “Yeah, I do.”

He gave you a smile of relief. “Do you—Do you want to hang out tonight?” His palms suddenly felt sweaty as he continued to talk to you, afraid you’d eventually say no. “We could play scrabble, or we can chop wood?”

“Chop wood?” You repeated his words with raised eyebrows, unsure if you had heard him correctly.

He nodded politely, another proud smile washed over his features. “I’m really good at it.” His proud expression then drifted into worry.

He would respect your decision to say no, but he was worried he’d lose you for saying something you might think is weird—but what Lars didn’t understand, was that you’ve never thought he was weird, and you never will.

When Lars was with Bianca, you supported him. Unlike some others in town who had thought it was extremely unusual, even those people had still kept their opinions to themselves.

What Lars also didn’t know, was that you had defended him and his relationship with Bianca to your boyfriend, who told you he thought their dynamic was ‘wrong’, and ‘disgusting’.

You had spent hours that night educating your boyfriend on mental health and mental delusions, telling him that there was nothing ‘wrong’ with your friend and that he had to either try and support Lars, or not say anything at all around him and Bianca.

A few seconds passed after Lars’ frown appeared, his worry still present. You looked at him with a reassuring smile, ready to tell him your decision, even though you had already made it minutes ago.

—💼, summary. (post bianca)

After you agree to take Cindy’s shift at reception, you’re stuck listening to countless boring phone calls and drawing on sticky notes—which unbeknownst to you, is exactly what Lars needs for his desk.

LARS COULDN’T REMEMBER WHAT HE LIKED ABOUT YOU FIRST; whether it was how you never showed up late to work—even on days where your car would fail and stutter before you had left your driveway, or if it was the way you never let yourself get distracted when talking to him, no matter how much he grew embarrassed and tried to avoid eye contact.

Maybe it was because you chose to spend your boring reception phone calls mindlessly drawing on the yellow office sticky notes.

Whatever it was that Lars liked about you, he was scared to admit it. Because then it would be real, and Lars hadn’t had anything real since Bianca.

It had been months after Bianca’s death, and Lars had slowly been improving. Alone, he sat a row closer to everybody else during church, but he sat right beside you whenever you were there—even sometimes without speaking a word, because just being near you was enough for him.

The photos on his work desk consisted of a framed picture of himself and Bianca, having a spot of their own on his desk, next to his computer. Their one photo left him staring at the open space of his desk now and then, struggling to think of what could be missing as the thoughts gnawed at his mind every second like a cold-hearted brain freeze.

Lars was your friend, and you were glad to support him through Bianca’s time in his life. When Karin called you one morning, telling you the news about Lars and Bianca, you were dazed but happy that Lars had found someone to make him happy.

This current morning in the office, you sat on the reception wheelie chair, finishing the last few touches of your small sticky-note drawing, barely listening to the words on the other end of the call. The phone rested between your right ear and shoulder, balancing with each glide of your pen.

When Cindy had called you the night before, asking you desperately to fill in for her, you agreed reassuringly, having no idea how many boring calls you’d eventually receive.

“Yeah, sure. Yeah, I can send her the papers.” You told the person on the other line blankly, adding shoes to the poorly-drawn scribble of yourself on the phone. The pen faintly scratched against the thin sticky note, slowly losing its ink. “No, I’ll make sure she gets them.”

Suddenly, the glass door in front of you opened, causing you to look up from your drawing, the pen still in your hand and phone still pressed close to your ear.

Lars walked in, glancing over at you. A brown sweater clung to his button-up office shirt. He held a plastic bag with his lunch inside, and pressed his lips together tightly, sending you an awkward but polite smile.

“Okay, sure.” You spoke quickly into the phone, taking your eyes off Lars for a moment. “Okay, bye.” You picked up the phone with your left hand before placing it down with a click. You faced Lars once again, catching his attention before he pushed his body towards the other set of doors.

“Hey,” You smiled at him once he turned around to face you. In contrast to his, your smile felt more confident, letting your eyes light up as you remembered your drawing. “Here, for you,” You picked it up from the reception desk, reaching it out in front of him, waiting for him to take it from your hands.

Hesitantly, he did. Nervously, he reached out to retrieve it, bringing it closer towards himself to get a better look at the drawing. “This is—” He started to speak, taking a deep breath before continuing. “This is really good.”

“Thank you,” You replied with appreciation, another smile gracing your lips. You shrugged your shoulders, keeping your eyes trained on Lars, watching intriguingly as he never took his eyes off the note. “I guess the last phone call was a little too boring.”

Lars nodded with understanding, having no more words to share. You understood, taking no offence to his chosen silence, or the indirect eye contact that surfaced every stationary item on your desk before it finally landed on you. Sighing contentedly, you asked him a question, still considerate of your boundaries. “I’ll see you at lunch?”

He nodded again, gripping the paper tightly, but not tight enough to crumple it. Lars pushed one of the brown double doors open, walking through them, but not before sending you another indrawn smile.

Your posture slouched into the back of the wheelie chair, finding yourself slightly disappointed that you weren’t able to talk to your friend longer.

Lars, once seated at his own office space, placed your drawing on top of a stack of stapled papers and stared at his desk like it was inscrutable. He hadn’t yet discovered a solution for the emptiness of his desk, now finding it almost impossible to avoid as he visited his workplace nearly every day.

His saddened, engrossed eyes drifted towards your drawing once more, tilting his head in thought. “Hm.” He hummed softly, blinking a few times as he lifted the sticky note from the pile of paper, placing your drawing on the cubicle wall in front of him, pressing it gently against the wall so it could stay there.

Although the sticky note was a small, yellow square that took up barely any space at all on Lars’ side of the office cubicle, it meant a lot to him. To him, the space at his desk was now figuratively filled, and his heart could now relax as he had finally found the solution.

Lars valued his clean desk. He took care of it, along with his personal belongings that were always organised in their own section of his desk. He smiled warmly at the sight of your drawing adding light to his office space perfectly.