#stuffartsy

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'Blast it all!' I huffed as I dropped the stack of boxes on the floor. Pretty sizable ones, by the noticeable thump as they hit the ground.

'Mr Linton.' I heard a curt voice. Looking up, I stared into a pair of cold, familiar eyes.

'Yes, sir?' I grimaced at him. It was much easier than smiling when your ribs were aching and lungs wheezing for air.

'You are two minutes and twenty-three seconds slower than you were yesterday.' Snapping his pocket watch closed, he tucked it back into his waistcoat pocket. His gaze flickered back to me. 'I do not pay you for your tardiness.'

'No, sir.' I beamed. Well, I tried to anyway. 'Just for my delightful company.'

His eyes narrowed ever so slightly. His mouth parted slightly as if to retort but then closed.

I made the mistake of looking into that glacial, intense stare of his and felt trapped. But I didn't want to escape. Not when I felt like I could forget my worries and problems from the rest of the world when it was just him and me. His gaze held mine and I had to suppress the urge to shiver. Not out of fear, though.

A flash of images came to mind. Soft lips melded to mine. Ripped clothing on a hotel bed. Cold desert nights spent in strong, comforting arms.

Snapping out of my daze, I shook my head.

'I...' I cleared my throat and glanced away. 'I better get a move on. Wouldn't want to waste time.'

Without waiting for a reply, I hurried back into my office and closed the door without looking back.

I met my reflection in the glass windows overlooking the tall buildings of London on a typical gloomy morning. If I squinted hard enough, I could see a blush forming on her cheeks.

Get a hold of yourself, Lilly!

This past month I had been polishing my acting skills. By that, I meant pretending that certain things in Egypt had never happened. In general, both my employer and I had smoothly settled into a routine that, well, made it seem that Egypt had never happened once we both returned back to London two months ago. A bit too smoothly, actually.

Although there were times when our gazes would linger on each other for one moment too long just like earlier...

Enough, Lilly! Back to work.

Marching back to my desk, I sat down and stretched. What was wrong with me today? I slept mostly decently last night, save for waking up late with some soreness in my lower back—

Plink.

Opening the metal tube on my desk, I unfolded the paper.

Mr Linton,

It is already thirty-two minutes past nine and I fail to see my daily correspondence on my desk.

Rikkard Ambrose

So we were back to communicating through notes now, were we? Flipping it over, I picked up the fountain pen on my desk and began to write.

Dear Mr Ambrose,

On it immediately, sir.

Yours, Lilly Linton

I folded the note and placed it back into the tube, pulling the lever. I opened one of the desk drawers and found the pile of letters Mr Stone had left for me to sort through. Pulling them out, I began to go through them when I heard a gurgling noise. I looked around, confused. Then I heard it again.

What was that noise? It sounded like it was coming from someone's— oh.

As if in protest, my stomach growled even louder.

Right. Another thing I forgot to do this morning after waking up late.

Well, times like these called for extra measures. Opening another desk drawer, I found out my treasured stash of chocolate and grabbed a bar.

Not exactly the healthiest option for breakfast but so what? It was chocolate!

Unwrapping the bar, I began to sort through the stack of letters for Mr Ambrose's correspondence for the day. I managed to finish going through it in under five minutes too— both the stack of letters and the bar of chocolate.

No sooner after sitting back down at my desk once I passed the letters through the letter slot at Mr Ambrose's door, I heard another plink.

I removed the letter from the tube and picked it up, beginning to read.

Mr Linton,

Why are there brown fingerprints on my correspondence?

Rikkard Ambrose

I frowned. What brown fingerprints was he referring to? Setting the note down on the table, I was about to reach for the charity letters in the waste paper basket when I noticed something odd about the note.

Upon further inspection, there were brown fingerprints on there too! But how did it get there? Where was it coming from?

Wait...

Slowly, I looked at my fingers and then at the wrapper of the finished chocolate bar. Then my fingers. Then the wrapper again.

Oops.

Wiping my fingers and the pen on my trousers, I thought about how to explain my slight predicament.

Dear Mr Ambrose,

There was a small accident while sorting your correspondence. I fixed it immediately so it shall not happen again.

Yours, Lilly Linton

That should suffice. I sent the letter through the tube and took out the small appointment book with all of Mr Ambrose's scheduled meetings. I had barely opened it to the current week when I heard another plink.

Mr Linton,

What do you mean by 'small accident'?

Rikkard Ambrose

Darn! I thought I had gotten away with it. I picked up the pen to write again.

Dear Mr Ambrose,

Just a small, teensy-weensy, tiny incident that is barely of any consequence. Really, no need to worry yourself. I've taken care of it.

Yours, Lilly Linton

Not even ten seconds had passed until the next plink.

Mr Linton,

Do not test my patience. Tell me what happened.

Rikkard Ambrose

Blast! He wasn't going to let this go, was he? Chewing my lip, I picked up the pen with sweaty palms. What to write this time?

Dear Mr Ambrose,

The aforementioned incident was minor, completely inconsequential. Not even a small accident, really. Just a small inconvenience involving chocolate.

Yours, Lilly Linton

With bated breath and my heart ready to jump out of my chest, I pulled the lever.

Perhaps he would move on from it?

Ha, as if! This was Mr Ambrose I was talking about here. Getting the Queen to dance on the rooftops of Buckingham Palace in her undergarments would have been more likely to happen.

As if on cue, icy silence radiated from behind the door to his office. The kind of silence that preceded judgment from kings before they gave the order for executions.

Now to any person, silence was just silence. But not with Mr Ambrose. As his secretary, I knew that there were at least ten types of silences after a few months of being in his employ.

Seconds stretched into minutes until finally...

Plink!

Holding my breath, I unfolded the letter.

Mr Linton,

I do not pay you to eat on the job as my secretary. There is a designated 30 minute break appointed in the afternoon for that. See to it that there are no more 'small inconveniences' to distract you. Knowledge is power is time is money.

Rikkard Ambrose

I suppose that could have gone worse than expected. Considering the incident at his factory two weeks ago. Also the other business deal from the other day. And...

Well, you get the picture.

Sighing, I set the note aside and decided to start on the day's tasks. Hopefully today would just be another day at work that would pass by quickly.

It wasn't until later that I realized just how wrong I was.

— — —

A few hours later, I was in the process of organising new files to be added to Mr Ambrose's already endless file collection when it happened.

I felt a building pressure in my lower abdomen, on the verge of becoming an entirely uncomfortable pressure in my lower regions.

Wonderful. Another thing that I had forgotten to do before leaving the house this morning.

Getting up slowly and carefully, I headed towards Mr Ambrose's door and knocked.

'Enter.' Came the composed, cool voice that I knew by heart at this point.

Shuffling into the room, I saw that Mr Ambrose surrounded by a pile of papers on his desk as usual, reading an opened file in front of him.

'Ehem.' I cleared my throat.

'What is it?' He didn't look up from the file.

I contemplated how to tell him that I needed to pee in the most delicate manner that I could currently manage. I decided to settle with:

'I need to use the powder room.'

He glanced up at me, then quickly back to his papers.

'Go in.' He jerked his head towards the direction of the small door that led to his personal bathroom.

Without expelling the contents of my bladder, I walked as fast I could to the door and shut it behind me. Dropping my trousers, I sat on the toilet to relieve myself.

This was one of those times when wearing trousers was more convenient than wearing a dress and hoop skirt. Once I finished my business, I was ready to pull up my trousers and get back to work.

That's when it happened.

That's when I saw it.

A small, reddish stain on the nether region of my brown trousers.

Oh no.

No.

No, no, no, nononono !

No! No! No!

Why now?

Well, that nasty inner voice in the back of my mind retorted, that explains everything so far today.

My sore back, waking up late, feeling sluggish and extra emotional, craving for chocolate. It all made sense now but...

I frantically tried to think back to when was the last time this happened. Let's see...sometime shortly after I had returned back to London after the Egypt trip. But why wasn't this an issue then?

Because, my inner voice piped up again, you were home on a Sunday afternoon when it started.

Blast! What was I going to do now?

I went over my options.

Option 1: Try to endure the rest of the day and hope that no one would notice. I could even tie my tailcoat around my waist. It would definitely look odd and probably rouse suspicion but maybe it could work?

Yeah, right. If you bleed through your tailcoat too, then you're done for. Say goodbye to your job.

Couldn't that inner voice of mine shut up already! Why did it have to be so rational?

Option 2: Resign my job before I would be found out.

Definitely not happening. Not when I had been through so much for this job including leaving the country twice and risking my life multiple times. There was no way that I, Lilly Linton, ifrit extraordinaire, would let something like this get in the way of my independence.

Which left option 3: Ask Mr Ambrose if I could take my lunch break early to go home and change.

Just the idea made me want to disappear on the spot. It was embarrassing enough that this had to happen but having to involve my boss too? This made the situation more dreadful a hundred times over. But...

What other choice did I have? Unfortunately, this was the best option compared to the other two.

Closing my eyes, I couldn't help but to let out a loud sigh.

Remember what I said earlier about trousers being convenient? I take it all back. This was definitely one of those times when wearing trousers was definitely not convenient! If I was wearing a dress, then there may have been a chance that I could have held on a bit until lunch break. But there was no choice, I needed to go home immediately to change my trousers and retrieve that.

However, the bigger issue was how to convince Mr Ambrose to let me take my lunch break earlier. What to tell him?

Mr Ambrose, I'm feeling a bit ill and would like to take a break.

Great. That would give him the grounds to dismiss me for the day, possibly even sack me, especially after what happened earlier with the chocolate.

My younger sister, Ella, has food poisoning and I need to check on her.

Nope. Mr Ambrose would be moved to sympathy as much as a mountain could budge.

My aunt has arranged a meeting with a prospective suitor for me this afternoon.

Not convincing in the slightest considering that Mr Ambrose knew that I would do anything to avoid the topic of marriage. Especially when it involved me.

Drat! What could I say?

Unbidden, another thought popped into my head.

Why not just tell him the truth?

What? As if that would ever work!

Not to mention, a woman's....time was a taboo topic. Despite my mother's early death and limited knowledge provided by my aunt, even I knew that was something proper ladies did not discuss with gentlemen in society. It was highly inappropriate.

But then again, since when were you a proper lady?

Good point. It's not like Mr Ambrose was a gentleman either by any means.

Still, the main issue was that would Mr Ambrose be understanding even if I told him the truth?

I doubted that someone like him even knew something like that about females anyway, given that he most likely came out of a giant boulder. It was impossible to imagine him with a mother, let alone two human parents.

Enough stalling, Lilly! It's now or never.

Five minutes later, I stepped out of the bathroom after working up enough courage. Mr Ambrose was still flipping through the same file, not having moved from his position.

Standing in front of his desk, I cleared my throat. No response.

I tried to get his attention again. 'Mr Ambrose?'

'What is it, Mr Linton?' His eyes never left the file.

'Er, I was wondering if...I could take my lunch break now?'

Damn! Why did my voice sound so weak?

His hand paused, right in the middle of flipping a page. Slowly, ever so slowly, he raised his eyes to meet mine.

I swallowed.

'What did you say?' His voice was deceptively calm.

'Could I take my lunch break now?'

If his stare was cold before, it was frosty now.

'Mr Linton, did I or did I not mention earlier that there is a designated thirty minute break for all employees?'

'Um, you did, sir.' I looked down at the stone floor. For some reason, it was particularly interesting.

'So why are you asking me this?' He reached to grab another file from one of the piles on his table.

'Well,' I bit my lip. 'I had another accident.'

Silence.

I risked a glance upwards. He seemed frozen, his hand still holding onto the file, save for the narrowing of his eyes by 0.000013 of a millimetre.

'By any chance,' he finally ground out, 'is this "accident" of yours similar to what happened earlier?'

'No.'

'No?'

'No.' I repeated, my throat dry. Why was this so hard? 'A worse accident. Much, much worse.'

He cocked his head. 'How so?'

'It involves my identity.'

Based on his expression, he knew what I was referring to. While I was his personal secretary during working hours, it was as Mr Victor Linton, not as my true self, Miss Lillian Linton.

A female.

'Mr Linton.' His voice was soft. Too soft. Like the momentary stillness before a hurricane. 'What. Did. You. Do?'

'I- I didn't do anything!' Why the heck was I stuttering? 'Well, not yet anyway.'

'Yet?'

It was both impressive and a bit unnerving how ominous he made just one word sound. I felt like a mouse that had been cornered by a tiger.

'What is going on?' He demanded, eyes flashing. 'Tell me!'

I bit my lip and his eyes zeroed in on the action, following my every movement.

'I'm not sure how to bring this up since you haven't been out in society much but have you heard about a woman's time?'

'A woman's time for what?'

Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath. This really wasn't going to be easy, was it? 'There comes a time when a girl matures into a woman. Her body undergoes some physical changes and afterwards, every once in a while, she...'

Plop.

My voice trailed off when his hand let go of the file he was holding onto and it dropped back onto the table.

His mouth was now slightly ajar and his eyes were cast downwards, scanning the contents of his desk.

'Oh.' His voice didn't sound as collected as before.

'Yes.'

So he did know about it after all. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised as I was, given what he repeated about time and knowledge and all that. But still, considering this was Mr Ambrose...

'What do you expect me to do about that?'

'Huh?'

'Don't you females usually do something to deal with it?'

'Well...yes, but—'

'So do what you need to do. Stop wasting my time already.'

'That's the issue, sir.' I snapped at him, too annoyed to focus on the fact that he had acknowledged my gender. 'I need to go home and change. That's why I asked if I could take my lunch break now.'

'Why do you need to go home? Can't you do it here?'

I nearly choked. That hardheaded, miserly head of his was really made of stone!

'I don't have any extra clothes here and what I use to take care of it is also at home too.'

He just stared at me.

I shrugged. 'I mean, I suppose I can wait until later to take my break. You'll have to risk my true identity being exposed once your workers see me bleeding all over the—'

'Mr Linton!'

Oh my. Was it just me or were his ears now tinged a bit red?

Pressing my palms into the table, I leaned forward. 'Or you could let me go home now and get this taken care of so I can get back to work sooner.'

He leaned forward as well, sea-coloured eyes clashing with hazel ones.

'Indeed, Mr Linton?' I felt his breath on my lips.

I arched an eyebrow. 'Indeed, Mr Ambrose.'

'Very well then.' He straightened back into his chair and picked up the file he dropped.

'W-What?' I blinked.

'You may take your lunch break now.'

'Really?' I stared at him in shock.

I couldn't believe it had actually worked! This was Mr Ambrose we were talking about here. I had half expected him to tell me something ridiculous along the lines of controlling my body's functions and to stop bleeding. It wouldn't have been the first time he had said something like that anyway.

'I don't like to repeat myself. Go now.'

My face broke out into a broad smile. 'Yes, sir!'

'Also, see to it that this doesn't happen again.' His stare was disapproving.

'You mean taking an early lunch break? Or are you referring to my other problem? Because I don't know how to break this to you but—'

'The clock is ticking, Mr Linton.'

'Yes, sir!' I gave a salute and left his office.

— — —

It's surprising really, what one can accomplish during a time of emergency. If you were to ask me how I was able to go back home, change my clothes and even eat an early lunch on my way back to Empire house all within the span of thirty minutes, I would tell you that I had no idea it was at all possible until today.

Maybe it was possibly due to luck? That certainly seemed to play a factor as the only people home were my uncle, locked up in his study as usual, and Leadfield, cleaning out the attic. It was a good thing too, since I hadn't bothered to change back into a dress in the garden shed before climbing through my bedroom window.

I was able to obtain some linen rags designated for times like these (part of the wonderful experience of being a female) and changed into another pair of my uncle's old trousers. I even packed extra rags in my briefcase, something I probably should have done in the first place. But eh, better late than never, I suppose.

Since I had five minutes to spare on my return back to Empire House, I was able to buy a sandwich and eat it on the way. I was starting to understand the concept of efficiency, especially after working for Mr Ambrose. Huh, it might not actually be all that bad.

Thankfully, the rest of work passed by uneventfully. Once I returned to my office, I saw that Mr Ambrose had shut the door to his own once again. He still could tell that I had returned though, for I had just sat down at my desk when I was pelted with more tasks to complete for the rest of the day, including retrieving more files. But I was determined to work even harder to make up for this morning.

By the time I took a look at my pocket watch, it was already dark outside. Eight o'clock on the dot.

Packing up my things, I was ready to leave when the door to Mr Ambrose's office opened, revealing his tall, dark figure in the doorway.

'Would you step into my office for a moment, Mr Linton?'

'Why?'

'I have something I wish to discuss with you.'

'You can discuss it here.'

'I can, But I would prefer not to.'

'I would prefer to.'

'You do not get to decide, Mr Linton. My office, now. Close the door behind you.'

I reluctantly followed him, shutting the door behind me. He sat back down in his chair, his posture ramrod straight with crossed arms.

'In regards to the matter earlier today...' He began in a low voice.

'Yes?' Did I take more than thirty minutes to return? Were there more mistakes I had made after my break?

'Are you sure that you're fit to work?'

'What?'

'Are you fit to work with your current state?'

Was he being serious right now? Judging by the expression on his face (or lack thereof), I had to say that he was.

'Why wouldn't I be?'

'Given what has transpired earlier today, I have reason to believe so, Mr Linton.'

A spark of anger flared within me. 'Mr Ambrose, besides the two incidents that happened before my break, did I give you any other reason to believe otherwise?'

'Well, no.' He had the nerve to sound reluctant!

'Then yes, I am plenty fit to work.' I glared at him. 'Mr Ambrose, just because of I'm losing a bit of blood does not mean that I am incapacitated.'

He opened his mouth to speak, but I cut him off.

'Furthermore, I am not weak. Women are not weak. We have been dealing with this since the beginning of time and haven't let it get in the way of doing what needs to be done.'

'I never said that you were weak, Mr Linton.'

'Then what are you trying to say?'

'I...' Something flashed in his eyes so quickly before I completely identify it. Concern?

'Nothing, Mr Linton.' That granite mask of his was back in place. 'You are dismissed for the day.'

I turned to leave but then paused.

'Thank you.'

He looked up from the papers in front of him.

'For what?'

'For letting me take my break early today.'

For being more understanding than I expected you to be.

Our eyes met for a fathomless moment. He nodded once.

You're welcome.

I gave him a small smile. Spinning on my heel, I left his office, feeling his eyes trail behind my retreating figure the entire time.

I guess that today may not have been a completely bad day after all.

— — —