(On HOLD) Emotion Virus》Elliot A.

"Elliot, is this you?"

song recommendation: Windows '95 by Amir Miles

Valentine's Day was officially over. The next day wasn't as foggy anymore and work was calling for Marlon. She had already woken up and was dressed up, had eaten cereal and visited her bath for about 20 minutes. Today she was somehow happy to got work. No surprise, she was excited to see Elliot again after last night. He had been really kind and easy to talk to. That was something she would from now on always associate him with.

The walk to Allsafe wasn't very long and she thought about how Elliot would be like to her this day. Yesterday they had the chance to be together alone and with no one from work crossing their path. Still Marlon would try and talk to him a bit, at least before work started. That's why she had been leaving her flat earlier than usual.

She came in to work about half an hour too early. About three people were in the office already. A blonde named Angela, she had inducted Marlon to her work and had a little chat with her sometimes. The other two people were men. Angela stood by one of them.
Marlon put down her bag onto the desk inside her cubicle and made her way to Angela and the guy. She greeted her co-workers with a 'good morning' . As Marlon was standing next to the nice blonde, the guy turned out to be Elliot who gave her a joyful smile that she returned within milliseconds. Angela turned to Elliot, who looked at her smiling kind of forced now and then she left. What was that? Did that have to do something with Marlon? Had she interrupted them talking about something important?

"How are you doing, Marlon?", he asked the brunette, snapping her out of thoughts with his sudden question. He looked at her from bottom to top, not moving his head, just his eyes. She was dressed very formal and had her wavy hair falling down her shoulders. Meanwhile Marlon was busy looking at Elliot's clothing. She liked that office-look on him, though she preferred the zip hoodie and black jeans.

Just as he was about to snap Marlon out of her thoughts again, she responded.
"I'm good, I'm good. Just a bit tired."

"Can't disagree."

Marlon smiled down at Elliot who sat in his chair. She thought about yesterday again. He had really affected her in a good way. Since she had met him, her mood wasn't on a constant low. She was being cringey now, but he really had done her good with taking her out. At the thought of the day being a Valentine she could just laugh. This was kind of cliché, wasn't it?

"Can we meet up again for maybe dinner sometime?", repeating that evening with Elliot would be a dream come true. Kind of.

"Sure.", he grabbed his phone and tapped on it, then gave it to Marlon who took it and looked at it. There was his contact list opened, so she typed in her phone number and name. Of course she didn't name herself Marlon, but 'silly'. At least that's what Elliot liked to call her.

As she gave back his phone he was a bit tense. When he saw the name the contact was saved as he had to grin. "Thanks. I'll text you later.", he assured her.

There was something strange about him today. He wasn't at ease and he definitely hid something under his smiles. Even though she'd want to know what was up with him, she was sure that he wouldn't tell her anything about it. They barely knew each other. It's obvious that he wouldn't trust her that much. Angela and him seemed to have a better relationship, as if they've known each other for years.

With a small smile she left Elliot and went to her cubicle to start her computer. Well, that was the long and satisfying chat she had hoped for all morning. She logged in and checked the time. It wouldn't take long until work was going to start and most of the other workers had come in already too.

Gideon, the CEO of Allsafe, was in his - by a glass wall - separated office and had Angela come in. Marlon couldn't do anything but watch them over her computer screen. Gideon was acting up and kind of angry. They seemed to have an important discussion, with Gideon waving around with reports in his hands and Angela standing straight and trying to look confident. I really should stop spying on them. , just as Marlon was about to start to work on her tasks, Elliot was called into the office too and now she was really curious about what they were talking in there.

At first Elliot was smiling. After Gideon shouting at him, he looked slightly terrified and left behind Angela and Gideon to fastly walk back to his cubicle. Marlon had followed his every step with her eyes fixated on him. As his eyes stared back to hers, she looked away quickly and felt her heartbeat increase. She felt as if she was a small child that had eaten candy without being allowed to. After that she didn't dare to look anywhere else but her computer screen. Trying to get distracted from what she had seen and not heard. Though a part of her brain wanted so badly to know what had happened in there and before she had walked in to Angela and Elliot talking.

---

Work was over. The shift has been lengthened and Marlon was more than done. Ready to fall into her cozy bed and sleep away the night.

She had gone home, cleaned her face from makeup and changed into her pajamas. It wasn't that late. About 7 PM. The work that was listed for her to do and the conversations she had caught had stressed her and made her even more tired than she could've imagined.

Laying in bed, drinking tea in the light of her bed lamp and reading some things on her phone. That was Marlons way of relaxing now, before she'd finally go to sleep. The book she read was boring. It wasn't interesting at the moment and she had no will to read more after 10 minutes into the new chapter. Good. Then sleeping earlier was the option.

Her teacup was empty, so she placed it on the nightstand. That's when something intensely vibrated in her lap. The phone screen revealed an unknown number calling her. She answered the phone being cut off by another person talking on the other end of the phone.

"H-hello?", sounded a shaking voice.

"Who is th-"

"Marlon."

"Elliot, is this you?"

Marlon heard the other phone drop somewhere, Elliot fuzzily mumbling in the background. Her stomach was getting  a bad feeling. What was happening and why had Elliot called her all of a sudden? Why?