After office hours
Ryland Grace x Camgirl! Reader
When the days become repetitive and the nights become suffocating, Ryland Grace decides to hop online to let out some steam. What starts as a fleeting late night distraction, becomes far more complicated when the person behind the screen feels strangely familiar
Wc: 6.4k || part one | next part |
Tags: Age gap (Grace is in his mid thirties, reader is in their mid twenties) sex work, reader likes it, sad pathetic Grace, masturbation, fuck machine, Grace and reader met as adults, brief mention of Coltland twins, eventual angst.
a/n: University name is completely made up btw, it does exist actually but disregard that. This started as a thought, I may or may not have lost control while writing, as always English is not my first language so please excuse any mistakes! Not proofread
Requests open!
“Hey” Grace followed the small footsteps of an ant crawling across the concrete railings. He doesn't know why his feet decided to bring him here out of all places, but since he's here anyways, might as well enjoy the view and relax for a moment.
He needs it really, especially after a terrible breakup with his girlfriend just moments prior, he can't blame her for saying what she said and deciding to end things.
“You're selfish! You care about no one but yourself!”
With no heads up though? That's just cruel, well- since when did people ever give a heads up before breaking up. “Hey I'm breaking up with you tomorrow night, 7 pm sharp, see you!”
Nevertheless he's also at fault here, at least that's what he thinks. With his head all up in clouds just as she said, he might’ve not given her enough attention. He knows the feeling of being abandoned all too well, he never expected himself to do it to other people though, his girlfriend much less. Even if it was unintentional, it doesn't remove the guilt that's currently pulling him down.
she must've felt unloved and not seen. But what's done is done, he can't really bring back time and magically make things better can he? At least she's with Mark, it hurts but it's better knowing she has someone she can go to after all this.
Unlike him, maybe that's why he ended up here by the bridge, looking out at the sunset with his newly found friend crawling ever so slowly on the concrete.
“Make sure to find the right girl and treat her right, you know you'll fall and die after sex right?” nothing came back.
The tiny insect stood motionless on the pavement while he waited as if a thoughtful reply was still making its way through a committee.
Seconds drifted by.
He blinked.
The ant did not.
Grace blinked again staring at the ant with the growing realization that the conversation might be a little one sided.
“Well!” Grace huffed while his hands collided with the railings pushing himself upright. “That was a nice conversation Mister, really eye opening unfortunately though! I really need to go home since it's dark and I'm hungry.”
Grace tilted his head and lowered it in the process towards the ant mimicking a bow “Goodbye sir” he turned around and worked his feet towards his apartment, making sure to stop by a grocery store on the way if he did not want to die of starvation.
.✦ ݁˖
Nobody really prepares you for the real world, more so when your parents are absolute good-for-nothings that never bothered to teach how to cook, clean, or basic hygiene.
Grace had to find out the hard way when his mouth started hurting one day during 4th grade. When he looked in the mirror, his teeth were decaying and his gums had these bumps that hurt like crap, he thought people avoided him because he was weird, turns out it was probably because of his bad breath– key word probably, he'd never know for sure, but he chose to believe that the reason is solely because he's weird. It's better to hear that you got ignored for being different than by having a bad breath, Grace stands by that, he does not want to be known as a stinky bad breath kid.
That also means that Grace, someone with a doctorate in molecular biology, teaches middle schoolers and undergraduates, is very much wack at cooking.
Which is why he's standing by the stove, contemplating what can only generously be described as chicken, poor thing died for nothing.
“....takeout it is then!”
Grace decided that the only way to give the burnt chicken justice is by buying an actual edible chicken cooked by someone else so it does not have to go through the tragedy that the poor things go through when he touches a pan.
After placing the order, Grace carefully put the unmistakably burnt chicken into the trash, what a waste, that could've been a tasty orange chicken.
“Didn't even get a chance the second time.” he let out a quiet chuckle, it was small– forced. He couldn't tell if he was trying to make light of it for his own sake, maybe this is just how he coped, with jokes that aren't funny just to fill the silence.
Just as the laugh came, it disappeared just as quickly, the reality of his situation weighing heavily on his back once again after a day of trying to forget everything.
The silence covered the apartment, to the point that he swore his ears started ringing by how quiet it was.
The apartment felt larger too, now that its frequent visitors most likely will not be coming back anytime soon. There was no voice of the girl in his life asking what he had burnt this time, no voice from his twin brother joking about his dreadful cooking, nothing.
The faint hum of the refrigerator is starting to get on his nerves, his smile faded.
It was deafening.
Sadness is a weird thing, when you think you finally got over something, suddenly it comes crashing down tenfold than it was earlier.
Grace did not cry when he got fired.
Grace did not cry when his parents died.
Grace did not cry when his twin brother cut contact with him and chose to leave him all alone with no one to go to.
Grace did not cry when his only girlfriend broke up with him and left him for another guy.
So he will not cry.
Still it doesn't remove the tightness in his chest, the heavy feeling at the back of his throat, that churning and turning of his stomach that he can't control, the wetness of his eyes increasing at every lousy attempt of swallowing, (and failing.)
It's not easy, but he will go through it because what choice does he have? Nothing. He can't do anything but to accept it and move on.
The silence stretched on, Grace sat with it for another minute before releasing a tired breath while his eyes were squeezed shut. He had so many what ifs, and questions that he desperately needed an answer to, the breakup was his last straw, now he's not just thinking about things he possibly had done wrong during his relationship but also his mistakes from way back, all the things he wanted to fix that he wasn't able to.
It came crawling back, Grace doesn't know just how much more he can take for the night.
His shoulders slumped as the tension bled out of him, whatever answers he was hoping to find aren't going to appear no matter how long he tears himself down.
Grace stood up straight, lifted his chin and left the kitchen to walk towards his room, the knot in his chest still refusing to leave. Busying himself in his work or just doing anything will be better than him being all alone with his thoughts that will for sure make him spiral once again.
His fingers glided through the keyboard flawlessly as he typed in his password, out of habit he opened Microsoft Word, the half finished report flashed his screen.
Grace read the same sentence three times and retained none of it.
With a sigh, he rubbed his eyes and leaned back on his chair.
The apartment was still too quiet.
Every attempt at getting any work done seems to lead to Grace doing something completely unrelated, being easily influenced by his own mind, the report on his screen didn't seem to be getting finished any time soon.
"Enough." Grace muttered under his breath.
He pushed the report aside and directed his mouse to open a new tab, at first it was the usual stuff, random videos on YouTube, news articles and checked his social media, despite all of that he wouldn't be able to tell you the contents of all the things he'd watched and seen in the past hour because his mind wasn't even paying attention, just doing something to fill the space in his thoughts.
But the distraction never lasted, The moment one page loaded, his mind started wandering somewhere who knows what again.
Grace drummed his fingers against the desk.
He didn't want to think anymore, he didn't want to sit alone with his pretentiously loud thoughts for another hour.
So when the thought crossed his mind, he didn't spend much time arguing with it.
Anything to feel something else for a while.
The cursor hovered over the search bar.
‘pornhub’
He doesn't feel shame because why would he? Everybody does it, additionally it's been a long time since he had a release. Because of his hectic schedule of teaching middle schoolers then going to college to teach undergraduates, then the gradings, and lesson plans if he hadn't prepared one already, it was a lot. His girlfriend– well ex girlfriend was usually the one who initiates sex and because of the misunderstandings that led her to break up with him eventually, she stopped asking, and Grace feels like such a dick why he never once asked why, or even check up on her if she's okay or if she wants something or–
Stop, it's done, more thinking won't bring back the past.
Grace navigated the videos that popped up, it all looks so fake that he can't even get his dick to harden, is it bad that he's actually a bit disgusted by all those fake cum coming out of that girl's pussy? But hey he's not yucking someone else's yum.
Eventually he settled on a random video that he found after his endless clicking, it has a more natural vibe, (he prefers it that way.)
Grace unzipped his pants and pushed it down just a bit, enough to let his dick spring out.
A soft groan rumbled his throat as his hand warmed up his dick, tension from his muscles melted away, his eyes closed shut.
He didn't even bother looking at the random woman masturbating on his screen, he focused on the sounds that's coming out of her mouth, his hand pumping his dick at her every moan.
His thumb circled around his tip and pressed hard, Grace played around at the slit that's leaking with pre cum and smeared it all over. The dry friction of him jerking off got on his nerves quickly, at times where he's in a hurry and just needs a quick release, he just goes straight at it, no lube just jerking off raw.
But he's not in a hurry is he? He has all the time in the world so might as well make the most of it. He reached for his drawer and pulled out a bottle of lube and poured a generous amount on his palm, rubbing it together for a few seconds before reaching down and giving his dick its well deserved attention.
Small moans managed to escape from his throat as his hand was pumping his own cock, Grace knew he was close when he felt his dick twitch. His hand squeezed tightly before speeding up chasing his release.
“fuck…yeah..just like that..” Grace muttered under his own breath, deep and gentle, the same tone he used when complimenting his girlfriend for taking his dick to her mouth– which to his dismay only happened once in their years of relationship, why? Because she labeled herself as a pillow princess that expected all her needs to be taken care of and no consideration for Grace's own pleasure. Back then he didn't have any issues with it since he'd much rather pleasure her instead but now that he thinks about it. Yeah..having someones mouth on your dick– kneeling before you is incredibly hot and turns him on more than he expected.
“I'm coming!.. I'm comminggg!” the voice from his laptop echoed through the room, the obnoxious fake moan was heard loud and clear– still at the same time he grunted while a thick white fluid squirted out of his dick.
His hand didn't stop.
It kept pumping up and down while his breath started to shake, sweat was trickling down his forehead, his chest rising and going down quicker than normal.
The overstimulation kicked in no doubt but that didn't stop Grace, the feeling was addictive, every single fiber in his body was telling him to remove his hand or to simply stop but he didn't, his dick was already starting to limp and yet he didn't shred it any mercy.
“fuck..” his voice cracked when a moan slipped out of his mouth, his body was twitching and getting that sudden pops when your body is overstimulated.
His hand went faster, and faster, harder, quicker and–
Ding Dong!
Grace jumped in his seat, his hand pulled away from his dick out of habit as he tried and collect himself together after that intense session.
“uhh..” yeah that was the doorbell, Grace's body immediately entered what could only be described as processing mode.
He blinked once.
Twice.
Then he continued staring at his laptop screen like it had personally offended his family, God forbid a guy watch porn and masturbate.
The person outside must be getting impatient when a ring of a doorbell comes one after another, the sound overlapping, this guy is abusing the hell out of his doorbell.
It's 11 pm.
Who the hell needs him at this hour?
With great reluctance and a huge amount of annoyance, Grace pulled his pants back up, tucking away his cock for a while, he made sure to wash his hands because whoever the person outside of his house, does not deserve (probably) to get touched by cum covered hands.
Ding ding ding ding ding
The person growing more impatient than ever, Grace finally made his way to the front door, his hand twisted the doorknob to see the glorious face of the person begging for his companionship at this hour.
“Delivery for Ryland, chicken wings, it's not paid.” the teenage guy blurted out with a monotone voice, seemingly done with the whole situation. It is late, must be annoying in his end especially since they're probably closing soon– if they aren't already. Grace knows all too well since he himself had worked in fast food during his teenage years.
“oh! Uh..right sorry– give me a minute, I completely forgot.” Grace said frantically, his hand was raised signaling the guy to wait for a moment while he hurried inside to fetch money from his wallet.
He made sure to tip the guy generously for the inconvenience, (even though it's his job, and he's simply doing what he needs to do but it's the thought that counts.)
Grace huffed while the table let out a loud ‘thunk’ when he basically threw it on there.
He dragged his hands slowly down his face, fingers pressing into his eyes, before tracing down to his jaw, as though he could rub away his frustration.
Just great, not that it's the guys fault, but now he's dealing with his cum stained underwear, hopefully the guy didn't notice the wet patch on his pants– he might as well kill himself at this point.
Grace turned his head to stare at the takeout bag that he's no longer interested in eating. The app had literally given him a countdown, updates, there were notifications as well, a map, and an estimated time of arrival, somehow, he'd ignored all of it.
He headed back to his room after putting the takeout in the fridge. He intends to eat it in the morning, since his appetite currently is basically non existent.
After closing the door behind him, the chair squeaked as Grace sat down, he checked the time earlier, it was 11:07 pm. His body is tired and aching, yelling at him to rest, enough masturbation from the night.
He turned his attention to his laptop to close it but the contents on his screen stopped him briefly.
He was sure he was on pornhub, watching some girl masturbating with that awful acting, now he's on a website. He must've clicked on an ad somewhere accidentally when he got up earlier.
‘NotaCamsite.com’ pulled a few chuckles out of him, it's a bad name, terrible even, but he can't deny– it is a bit funny.
Abandoning the plan of getting some sleep early– at least for Grace 11 pm can still be considered as early, his messed up schedule fucked his perception on time.
Scrolling for a bit, he concluded that it's basically your usual cam site, he never actually visited one before but he doesn't live under a rock to not know what and how cam sites work.
Cam models promoting their streams, and the site asking him to buy tokens and quote on quote. ‘Running low on tokens? Recharge now! So you can show your favorite models some love.’
His eyes trailed down towards the small text under the big ‘PURCHASE NOW!’
‘Sign up and get a free 500 tokens to make a model happy!’
Fuck it right? Grace thought.
It's free and it doesn't ask for any banking information when he tries to sign up, the tokens will hypothetically just appear on his account if he did hypothetically sign up and hypothetically watch a few streams and hypothetically give it to a cam model.
Yes yes right hypothetically.
No way he'll actually do it.
No….
Grace clicked his tongue while staring at his laptop screen.
…..
Ah his hand slipped.
Well he can't let that 500 tokens go to waste now can he.
Sleep now saying it's goodbye after Grace began scrolling through the streams available.
Apparently 500 tokens costs $50 so basically 10 tokens for a dollar, not too shabby, he swears he'll finally have his sweet date with his bed once he gives away his precious free 500 tokens.
Upon endless scrolling, Grace often lingers from certain streams that caught his attention, all of it was enough to get his dick to rise up again.
Months of no sexual activity really does affect a person.
He palmed his erection and squeezed it tightly, not enough to hurt. Pre cum was already leaking from his tip, the clear fluid glistening.
He smeared the pre cum all over his tip, a ritual at this point every time he masturbates, he let go for a moment to grab the lube sitting on his table. Grace poured a generous amount all over his hand once again.
After putting it back, he gently ran his hand into his dick, the cold base making him hiss. He looked back at the screen, his free hand scrolling once again, looking at all the cam models presenting their pussy for the camera and doing wonders with it.
His eyebrows raised for a moment when he saw a woman taking a foot tall tentacle deep into her vagina- impressive really but it isn't what he's looking for.
His hand kept pumping his dick while woman after woman came on screen– quite literally.
He kept scrolling and–
Grace didn't mean to stop, his fingers just froze, his body moving before his mind could even think.
Mid scroll, as if the moment had snagged him by the wrist, a quiet hitch broke his breathing.
He wouldn't call it love at first sight, no he doesn't believe in those kind of things, what he can say though is the woman looks absolutely breathtaking.
He never means to judge somebody just by their appearance–
The woman he's looking at through his laptop screen is simply just that beautiful. Your legs were spread open with a fuck machine pounding your pussy, you were screaming– in a good way, at least Grace hopes so, you look like you're enjoying it so that's good.
Just as the silicone dick was thrusting into you at a monstrous speed, the hand on his dick sped up just the same.
“ah..fuck..so pretty....”
His eyes never once looked at anywhere else other than you, unfortunately for him, the silicone dick seems to be slowing down, real slow.
His hand never stopped pumping his dick but the lack of movement on your end was a bit disappointing, when he realized that you're not gonna start moving anytime soon, he threw his head back and worked on his dick, his thumb playing with his tip, gliding it around and eventually pressing down hard on his slit.
Just as he was about to be lost in the pleasure a voice snapped him out of it.
“everyone..” a tired voice was heard “is that all you wanted to see, are you sure? Keep the donations coming and the fuck machine will continue destroying my pussy, won't you like that?” he watched as you turned to the camera, a mask adorned your face with intricate designs only covering your eyes.
Grace's eyes flickered open when he heard your voice, it sounded nice too…in the back of his mind, that voice sounds vaguely familiar but he chose to ignore it for now.
More importantly, you're threatening to end the stream if no more donations came in, he's not even close to cumming yet, this won't do.
A quiet hum vibrated on his throat when he remembered the free 500 tokens sitting in his account right now– Grace hadn't noticed earlier but there were texts on the top left of the screen.
100 tokens = 1 minute
500 tokens = 7 minutes
1k tokens = 15 minutes
And so on, there were a lot more options, such as 15k tokens to choose what kind of toy you'll use, 10k to focus on a specific fetish–
Grace shook his head snapping himself back to reality– the point is, he has 500 free ones and he can– no, he will use it for an extra 7 minutes, until he came at least.
He wasted no time and dragged his mouse to click on the donate button, he typed in 500 and quickly pressed send, he's pent up and his dick is standing tall and hard, his tip leaking angrily, hungry for any kind of stimulation, and Grace stopping waiting for the Camgirl to get pounded did not help at all.
Eventually his donation was delivered and shown on the screen.
‘rylace139 has donated 500 tokens’
His user was horrid, very clear that he didn't spend any time thinking about it, before he could even talk shit about his user on his mind, your voice grabbed his attention.
“ah! Looks like one of you guys wanted to see this pussy for longer.”
Yeah, he does.
“500 tokens? That's very generous of you Ry.”
Keep calling him that.
“Ry you're real naughty tonight huh, you don't want me to rest? You want me to get ruined instead?”
Well no– he wants you to rest but fuck, he's had a long day and he wants nothing more than to see what your beautiful face would look like once you cum hard.
“Well since you asked nicely…I'll make sure to put on a good show for you, watch me okay?”
You say with that flirty voice, Grace's strokes sped up matching the frequency of your fuck machine, God he doesn't know why he's so turned on, it feels so wrong but he can't stop.
He's so sure that whatever tone you're using is only for show, but fuck you know how to use the hell out of it, because he just felt himself twitch when you said your last message before getting fucked again.
It puts him on edge, with the way his dick kept twitching and the amount of pre cum leaking, he knew he's close, he hopes you are too.
“please..” he whined before pressing hard on his dick as the cum shoots out, it covered his hand and made a mess on his stomach too.
Just a moment later, you're screaming again as your climax hit you hard– your legs were shaking as the fuck machine showed no mercy and kept pounding in and out of your cunt.
Grace watched while his dick was limping from the aftermath, he could feel himself getting turned on again but after all of his orgasms, he's not sure if his cock down there can take more.
You still had a few minutes left and Grace sat through the entirety of it, the way you pleaded for the machine to go faster and harder, although surely it won't respond– gIves it a nice touch though, makes it feel real.
He was leaning back in his chair as he watched you get unraveled, eventually the timer did reach its end and the machine slowed down to a stop.
You were panting, face down ass up, with your pussy dripping with juices. “I think..”
You look beautiful, Grace thought.
“That's enough for tonight.” you sat up and looked at the camera, the ruined bed sheets in view with all the wet patches in it makes it all the more erotic.
“bye my lovelies, thank you all for your donations, make sure to come back tomorrow and spend more money on me okay? Love you all~”
And then screen froze, Grace stared at it for a good minute or two before dragging his mouse to click on your account, you really are beautiful– well you aren't exactly showing your face, with that mask always present to cover your eyes, still he knows you're beautiful, he just knows.
The gnawing feeling of familiarity is eating Grace away but he just can't put his finger on it, you probably just sound like somebody he had met before, he left it at that before closing his laptop shut and finally thought about cleaning himself up.
The weird feeling of sticky underwear pressed against him is not very ideal, the cum on his stomach that's very much drying quickly doesn't feel too good either.
Shower it is.
.✦ ݁˖
After ending the stream you sat on your bed and simply laid still while staring in the distance, sex work has never been easy, it's tiring, but for the most part atleast you don't hate it too much, it's daunting work but it pays the bills.
Even if you had to put up that kind of act that your viewers liked, desperate slut wants to get ravished or something. You let out a shaky breath before standing to clean yourself up, the sharp pain on your abdomen hits you instantly, it's not too painful thankfully, just very uncomfortable.
Cleaning yourself up and the bed was exhausting, it's a task that normally wouldn't take too much energy out of you but after hours of streaming, you want nothing more than to lay down and melt.
You were actually glad that the donations had slowed down and eventually stopped, you were ready to finally pack things up but you just had to say that– out of habit really. You sighed frustrated while looking back at what you'd done.
You forgot just how much the viewers liked it when you talked like that– you mentally punched yourself when you had heard the notification that someone had donated 500 tokens, seven more minutes, well you had no one to blame but yourself, it felt good though so that was helpful. A soft sigh came out from your lips as you laid there dazed.
All in all tonight had been good, it's not life changing, sure, but you earned enough to cover a few months of rent. Not too bad.
A few regulars came to watch you, nothing significant happened but now with the money you earned you can justify spending hours online looking through different kinds of things that you want to buy– maybe you'd go out as well, you won't have to just window shop because now you have the money.
You grabbed your phone to look at your account, the other things were irrelevant, you just wanted to know the total of all the donations sent to you– you already know it's high, the donations decorated your screen whenever people send you one, and some high numbers popped up today.
Still you were curious though
Scrolling down all the donations that you received, you recognize all the users, they're regulars that often donate enough so they can command you to do stuff, a few users you're familiar with that donated small amounts but no biggie, you remember them giving you thousands, you pin the thought of teasing them next stream.
Your scrolling halted when you saw a user you don't recognize
“Oh, new guy.”
You weren't small but not big enough that new people often came to donate that much for their first time. You had a dedicated fan base that you were thankful for, making it easier to communicate with the viewers.
You clicked on the users account.
Created today, no profile picture, no bio, just a username. ‘rylace139’
You don't remember him commenting during your stream earlier, only the fact that he was the last one that donated to your stream, a quiet viewer.
You seem to have piqued his interest, you smile to yourself, making sure that you'll make that person talk if he comes and watch your stream again– you hope so, you just love playing with your fans, makes the job more interesting.
It was late at night and your eyelids are starting to grow heavy, it's time to sleep you figured.
You plugged in your phone and turned off the lamp, and settled inside your blanket making it into your self owned cocoon.
.✦ ݁˖
Grace woke up a mess, he had forgotten to take off his glasses and now it's sitting on his chin lopsided, he remembered last night, he went to shower but decided to get just a little bit of work done before going to bed.
30 minutes turned into an hour, he got into his bed at 2 in the morning, thankfully his schedule for today is late in the afternoon, he checked the time and it's only 11 am.
Good. If he hurries to make food he can still consider it breakfast.
Probably.
Mostly.
Oh who cares, he's a grown man he's gonna eat whenever and wherever he wants, he can call his breakfast dinner for all he cares, he's the one in charge of this apartment.
With a big yawn, Grace stood up and headed towards the kitchen, didn't bother to fix his glasses, it's still dangling on his face, how it's not falling? He's not sure himself.
He shuffled around the kitchen and was about to make something simple, like a grilled cheese, however, the paper bag sitting nicely inside his fridge that hasn't even been opened caught his eye.
Right, he ordered takeout last night and didn't even eat it. The consequences of his terrible decisions now coming back to bite his ass, his stomach is growling and aching painfully from hunger. From lunch time yesterday to now, he hadn't eaten a single thing.
He grabbed it out of the fridge. Grace had come to a conclusion that transferring the cold, hard, and stale chicken onto a plate and heating it up is too much work. Which is why he opted to eat it straight out of its packaging.
He picked a chicken wing up and ate it cold without a second thought, leaning against the counter top as he scrolled through his phone with his free hand, looking through the things he needed to do for the day.
It wasn't exactly a balanced breakfast, (yes, he insists it's still breakfast despite the time being 11:12 am.) but food is food and he isn't about to waste perfectly edible chicken over arbitrary meal rules.
Upon scrolling through his phone– 5th wing down, he learned that there's a few new faculty members and they're hosting some kind of welcoming party. Now it makes sense why his schedule for today is so late. A lot happened yesterday that Grace hadn't even thought to question why his time for today starts at 1 pm.
After finishing the whole box of wings, he started to get ready, following his routine to a tea. A quick shower, brushed his teeth, fresh shirt, neatly pressed slacks, a tie that took two tries to get right, and finally his glasses, now sitting where it's actually supposed to be.
One final glance at the clock, he thought he might be late. He wasn't, thankfully.
Years of sprinting across university campuses had taught him exactly how long he could procrastinate before it genuinely became a problem.
Summer break had bought everyone a few weeks of silence before the next academic year comes and discombobulate their respective sleep schedules once again. Well, a few weeks is a stretch. It's only the students that's really getting a break here, the teachers still have to prepare everything, pretty evident on Grace's very much tired figure that's currently locking his bicycle on one of the railings.
He never intended to come here today in the first place. On an ordinary occasion, yes, he would welcome the new faces but he's tired. A different kind of tired, not like the ones where he stayed up all night grading papers or preparing for a particularly eventful day, no. The kind of tired where the only thing he wants to do is lay down and rot.
Unfortunately for him, after the welcoming party there's a faculty meeting. Something he really doesn't want to miss, which is why he's headed towards the administrative building. Begrudgingly so, he can't wait for the day to be over.
The moment Grace stepped into the lobby, he was greeted by colorful streamers, a long table line of food, and a banner stretched across the wall.
‘WELCOME TO OUR NEW FACULTY MEMBERS’
“Huh..”
“Look at you, coming here to greet our new family.”
“Co-workers.”
“Eh, same thing.”
Grace turned towards the familiar voice, finding one of his fellow science teachers already balancing a paper plate filled with meat and carbs. “I was told there'd be a faculty meeting.”
“There is, eventually.” He gestured towards the decorations. “Principal thought it'd be nice to welcome the new hires first.”
“How fun.” Grace let out a breath.
“You don't look like you're having fun.”
“I skipped a perfectly good nap for this.”
He snorted. “You'll survive.”
Grace watched him walk off to get even more ribs onto his plate..that was still very much full of food.
A few people greeted him upon his arrival, someone had even silently handed him a coffee, perhaps sensing his exhaustion– if it's not obvious by the way he moves. The coffee there sucks but he appreciates it nonetheless.
The air was filled with teachers socializing and catching up with everything they've done during the break, a few also approached him and engaged in small talk. Grace isn't that cruel to shrug them off just because he's a bit under the weather, he tried to befriend everybody when he first started teaching here, not really a smart move for him to suddenly act like a snob.
A soft clink against a glass caught everyone's attention. The Principal stepped to the front of the room, smiling warmly.
“Good afternoon everyone, Thank you all for coming before the school year officially begins. As always, I'd like to welcome the newest members of our faculty. I hope everyone makes them feel at home.” A small round of applause echoed across the room. “Why don't we start with introductions?”
One by one, the new teachers stepped forward, giving brief summaries about themselves. Grace paid attention to every single one while sipping his coffee, he didn't want to give off the wrong vibes towards the new hires.
His ears twitched when he heard a familiar voice, there at the front he saw you, adjusting a folder tucked between your arm before offering the room an easy smile.
“Good afternoon everyone, I'll be joining the science department this year.” You say followed by your name. “Before this, I worked as an office assistant at Westbridge University while finishing my degree. I mostly handled graduate student records, thesis paperwork, and scheduling, and whatever administrative emergencies happened to come through the office.”
His brows knitted together.
“I've been looking forward to teaching here, and I hope we all get along.” Polite applause followed as you stepped back into the crowd.
Grace joined and clapped but his mind was elsewhere, it was rummaging through his old memories trying to find where he had seen and heard you.
Westbridge University..
Office assistant..
Then it clicked, it's you.
He knew that face, not intimately but well enough. Back when he was working his ass off for his PhD, there had been one student assistant sitting behind the front desk whenever he dragged himself into the office.
The one who never forgot to remind him to eat lunch.
The one who noticed whenever the dark circles under his eyes became a little deeper.
The one who'd sigh whenever he'd submit his paperwork minutes before the deadline.
“Sir Grace, you arranged this out of order.”
“You can't survive on coffee alone.”
“Did you even sleep today?”
Nothing drastic happened, you were simply someone he befriended back then that he slowly lost contact with, it's a pleasant surprise that he was able to see you again. He hopes you aren't too mad.
As you sat down, Grace was still replaying your introduction in his head when he heard you answer a question.
“I've always wanted to teach.”
Huh.. It's oddly familiar, he just can't seem to put his finger on it.
For the briefest second, his mind wandered back to the previous night– to the anonymous masked Camgirl he jerked his cock off to when he stumbled upon her stream.
The resemblance was eerily close, not that he has evidence, he doesn't know what the Camgirl looks like. It's very common for people to have similar voices as well.
His thoughts screeched to a halt almost as quickly as they'd begun when it started going somewhere inappropriate.
Not to mention it's incredibly rude– and more than a little insane, to look at a Co worker (that you were also acquainted with back in the past) and think,
‘you sound like the Camgirl I watched last night’
He quietly pushed the thought aside as he sipped his coffee.
A coincidence.
Nothing more.
