Chapter Twenty-One
Emily
“How the hellare you guys already finished? Didn’t you just start dating?” Jack asks.
I stared into my glass, the amber liquid swirling in a lazy dance as I downed my shot. The burn was sharp, a fleeting distraction from the turmoil churning inside. The bar was dimly lit, a refuge of shadows and muted conversations, with a hum from the old-fashioned jukebox playing classic rock. The bar provided the anonymity that I craved at this exact moment.
Jack sits beside me, nursing a beer, his presence a silent anchor in the storm of my emotions.
“I thought we were becoming solid. We had one damn lunch outside of the office, where moments that we thought were our own could have been seen by our peers.” I mutter, my voice thick with a mix of alcohol and despair, “I thought we had something real.”
It’s been two weeks. Two very long weeks, and I’ve hated every second of it.
As much as I love my job, I’ve hated being here day after day. I would avoid him as much as I could, but that didn’t matter. Knowing he was around, seeing him in the office across the floor, and hearing his laughter has been pure torture.
I know that there was a very slim chance of Regina seeing us together at the bistro, doing anything other than eating a meal and possibly working. We weren’t too overly affectionate, aside from a few times when we were flirty, yet still cautious. She couldn’t have seen us, and nothing has been said within the past few weeks by HR to show otherwise.
I tried to talk to him this morning in the breakroom. But he wouldn’t look at me. I wanted to say so much more than I was sorry, but that’s the only words that I could muster. He didn’t respond, didn’t turn around, and he just walked out of the room.
It broke my heart even more.
I sit inside my office with the blinds drawn, and the door closed. The light is off and the only brightness is the glow of my computer screen. I don’t know what time it is, but I know that most of the office is gone for the day. A bottle of wine sits on top of my desk and my legs are up on the desk.
My phone vibrates from sitting atop the desk and I lean over to see who is bothering me as I sit in darkness.
Valerie.
Okay, I can manage to talk to her. I swipe my finger across the screen.
“Where are you?” she asks immediately.
“Well, hi, hello to you too,” I say to her.
“Where are you?” she repeats.
“I’m sitting in my office.”
“The light was off when I went up there ten minutes ago, but your car is still here in the garage.”
“Yeah. I haven’t left yet.”
“I’ll be right there.” The line goes dead.
Ten minutes later, the door to my office opens and Valerie stands in the doorway.
“There’s something cathartic from sitting in the dark, drinking wine. It’s relaxing, without being in a bubble bath.” I say as she closes the door and takes a seat in the chair in front of my desk.
“What has brought you to this? You never drink while at work? Have you always had this bottle in here?”
“A client gifted it to me.”
“What’s going on? Bad day at the office?” she jokingly asks.
“Bad few weeks is more like it.” I grab the bottle by the neck and take a swig.
“Ouch. I mean, I haven’t seen much of you, but I know some intensive projects were happening. Are the projects completed?”
“For the most part, yeah.”
“Oh, so then this is a celebration! Sweet! Can I have some?” she leans over, and I give her a death stare and she slowly sits back down, with her hands up in surrender.
“I think I messed up. Like really messed up.”
“Continue,” she says.
“Remember the guy that I met on vacation?” I begin.
“Oh, you mean the new hot guy?”
“Yeah, him.”
“Okay, so what about him?”
“I broke up with him.”
“Well, yeah. You told me that when you first got back.”
“Oh, well, we kind of decided to rekindle things from our vacation. And well, it couldn’t last, and we broke up and well, now here we are.”
“Okay, a few things. What the hell! I thought I was your friend. Why is this the first that I’m hearing about this? And another, why on earth did you break up with him, again?”
“It’s complicated.”
“Considering you were very secretive; I assume that this relationship was kept quiet?”
“It was.” I nod.
“But you could have told me, you know.”
“I should have, yes. But we were enjoying one another, and I was going to get around to it, I swear. But then, I ended things.”
“And why?”
“Regina.”
“Um, what does Regina have to do with you and the hot guy from vacation?”
“Gavin.”
“Who?”
“Gavin, the hot guy from vacation.”
“Okay, yes, him. What does Regina have to do with you and the hot guy from vacation?”
“Gavin.”
“Yes. Gavin. Ugh, are you not hearing me?”
“We came very close to getting caught by Regina.”
“You should know better than to do anything at work.”
“We weren’t at work. We were at lunch, not here. But still. We were canoodling, and she was picking up her lunch and she could have seen us.”
“Canoodling?”
“She said nothing, but she saw me, and then mentioned that she saw him.”
“That means nothing. Also, canoodling?”
“Yes. We canoodled. Openly.”
Valerie laughs.
“Has Regina said anything?”
“No, she hasn’t. But that doesn’t mean anything. What if she’s saving it for later?”
“Saving it for later? Em. This isn’t a cookie crumb in a mustache. You say it’s been two weeks?” she looks to me for confirmation. “well there would be some sort of mention of something if it was deemed as a big deal in one of our meetings. And I haven’t heard a peep. Besides, I don’t think there’s anything about dating co-workers as long as they’re not someone you’re supervising.”
“It’s never a good idea to date anyone that we’re working with. That’s a huge no-no.” I take a swig from the bottle.
“You sound like a wounded child.”
“My emotions are wounded. Does that count?”
“Hold on, let me find you a pacifier.” Valerie teases. “Pull up the employee handbook.”
“Why?”
“Let’s make sure that you’re doing everything by the book. Just in case.”
“There’s no bother, we’re over.”
“Do you want to be over? Because it looks like to me, and from what I’m hearing you say is that you’re pretty bummed out that you called it quits, but if you could, you would get back together.”
“That’s beside the point. We’re not getting back together. Like ever.”
“Do not quote Taylor Swift in this moment. Pull up the document. Let’s check this out.”
We sit side by side while we look over the latest version of the handbook provided by human resources. There is no mention of any co-workers’ dating rules within the pages of the company handbook, but I’m still wary of the situation, which I relay to Valerie.
“You should just have a one-on-one with Regina. You can do it hypothetical or something, but that way, you have confirmation that it’s okay to maybe go back to dating him.”
“We can’t. He hates me.”
“What makes you say that?”
“He won’t even look at me. He hasn’t said a word to me, and he avoids me at all costs.”
“He’s doing that because you broke up with him. He’s probably hurting just as much as you are. What you need to do is to talk to Regina. Get the facts. Then make your grand gesture to vacation guy.”
“Gavin.”
“Yes, to Gavin.”
I look at her and open up the email on my computer. I start a new message and ask to see Regina first thing in the morning.