Chapter 18 Molly #2
Elijah doesn’t respond, and I fear he’s found his way back to Google to find the other few stories that have been published online, but while I’m staring at my screen waiting for him to start typing, he appears at my cubicle, slight smile on his lips.
‘Have a minute to help me with something?’ he asks, nodding towards his office casually.
‘Can you google it?’ I ask, on reflex, and Kenneth snickers from his desk.
‘You’re evil, Moll,’ Kenneth calls out to me.
‘I have tried the Google, but this one needs a master’s touch.’
I roll my eyes but take my headphones off all the way and follow Elijah back to his office. He closes the door behind me while I stretch my arms up over my head.
When I drop my arms back at my sides, Elijah’s eyes are directed to my stomach, and I follow the line of sight to see that my sweater has ridden up to reveal a patch of skin above my slacks. He’s looking at it like he might be scandalised, or maybe like he might be starving.
Elijah’s office door has a small window, but Devi covered it with orange crepe paper for Halloween festivities and has yet to take it down.
I right my sweater and shift on my feet before nodding to his computer. ‘What’s the issue?’
‘I…’ Elijah closes his mouth and tilts his head side to side. ‘I lied.’
‘You didn’t try to google it first?’
‘I don’t need your assistance,’ he says. ‘Well, I do actually, I need you to help me set up a printer driver on the fourth-floor secretary’s computer when you get a chance–I might have broken it beyond repair when I tried earlier.’
‘Oh, so you want to do that now?’ I look meaningfully around the office, where the fourth-floor printer is most certainly not.
‘No, I was distracted because I was reading your short story, your very good short story, by the way.’
I feel my cheeks warm, but I mutter a genuine, albeit little, thank you.
‘And all day I’ve been thinking about what you said. All week actually. I’m pitiful.’
It’s my turn to tilt my head. ‘I say a lot of things.’
‘The friends with benefits thing.’
‘Oh.’ The smile falls from my face. Have I caught entirely the wrong vibe here? Did he go home and think long and hard about it and realise that hooking up with his grumpy, human coworker was actually a very bad idea, strings attached or not?
Maybe it was the short story that sent him over the edge. He realised I’m obviously too much of a romantic for something like a casual hookup arrangement to ever really work out, and he had to call me in here to sort that out quickly?
‘Why do you look scared?’ he asks.
‘I don’t look scared,’ I say immediately, though I may very well look scared. I hate rejection as much as anyone. I’m human.
‘I meant that I wanted to… circle back on the friends with benefits notion,’ he says.
I would be more amused at him using ‘circle back’ after we wrote it in his corporate lingo log Tuesday, but I’m too busy being stressed that the circle back at hand will be to cut off all future talk of hooking up.
‘We’re off to a good start on the friends portion.
Thought we might–what was it? Double touch? ’
‘Double click,’ I correct, another of Ryan’s favourite corporate lingos.
‘Right. Thought we might double click on the benefits. Though, of course, being your friend is benefit enough–really, I think the term is oxymoronic, but that’s neither here nor there.’
I squeeze my lips together, waiting for him to tire himself out from the rambling. He sighs, shoulders slumping, and leans on the front of his desk. I do the same, mirroring him and tilting my head to keep our eyes together.
‘So if I’m hearing this right, you are wondering when we get to start kissing again?’ I ask, bolder than I feel.
Elijah looks embarrassed, but he’s smirking too. ‘Obviously I don’t know what I’m doing,’ he says, sheepish.
‘I’m out of practice.’
‘Out of practice in no-strings-attached relationships with colleagues?’
‘Out of practice at having friends. Talking to anyone, really. I think I lost most of my social skills around the time of the Second World War.’
‘I think you do okay,’ I say. ‘Except for the lack of lexicon and pop culture knowledge. That needs a little work.’
‘Can I kiss you?’ he blurts.
I feel a flush rise on my neck immediately; my skin has never kept my secrets.
‘Now?’
‘You’re right, it was a bad idea, I’m sorry I—’
‘No, that’s not what I meant. I’m surprised,’ I tell him. ‘It’s… generally seen as a very bad idea to kiss at work.’
‘Of course, of course,’ he says, over-effusive. ‘Bad idea.’
‘And if anyone saw us…’ I give a dramatic exhale. ‘The gossip would be the least of our problems.’
While I speak, I slide closer by an inch, and then another, slowly eating up the space between us in the small office. He watches me as I do, my chest rising and falling faster.
‘Right. As you said, bad idea,’ he agrees, but his gaze skates to my mouth. I press my lips together to keep from grinning and exhale a shaky breath.
‘So you see why we really shouldn’t,’ I say, not a question, and step closer, close enough to slide one of my boots between his feet, close enough that my eyes are level with his plump, pink lips.
Gosh, he really is pretty, isn’t he?
‘Won’t ask again,’ he says, and when he speaks, I feel his breath on my face. I nod barely.
‘It’s for the best,’ I whisper, pushing on my toes just enough to bring my lips below his. He closes the remaining distance, his hands going immediately around my waist as he does.
It’s not a long kiss, or a feverish one; it’s languid, like he’s revelling in every movement of my mouth and his, my tongue swiping lightly against the seam of his lips until he lets me in, kissing me with a smile still turning his lips.
One of his cold hands slips beneath my sweater, a startling and delicious sensation against my hot skin there.
I decide that I want him to touch me everywhere, to place these smiling kisses down my throat, my chest, my—
Something drops in the office next to Elijah’s, and the sound startles us away from each other as if someone had walked in. They didn’t–his door remains shut, but my heart still races as if we were found out. I meet his eye and, after a tense moment, we both quietly giggle at the situation.
‘Close call,’ Elijah says.
‘Told you it was a bad idea,’ I breathe. I right my sweater and hope that my cheeks aren’t as crimson as they feel while I reach for his doorknob.
‘I really do need help with the printer on four,’ he says, and I laugh, rolling my eyes with fanfare.
‘Let’s go.’
Card left on Molly’s desk with a paper-wrapped copy of Sweet Summer Minotaur
Molly,
Happy belated birthday.
Didn’t know what you liked, but this one came even more highly recommended by my usual bookseller than The Multi-Millionaire Minotaur.:)
I can’t say enough how grateful I am for the help you’ve given me this month. You are singular in your skill and patience.
Elijah