A/N: This may get annoying but it's just a friendly reminder. Bold is for when Bes is using her phone to speak for her and italics is for when she directly addresses the reader/has internal monologue. Also, check out the A/N at the end if you'd like :-) Thanks and enjoy!
Hello, friend. Can you keep a secret? I hope you said yes. Today is when I am going to begin the count down for when I am supposed to finish my degree. T-minus ten months, thirteen days, nine hours and forty two seconds. Are you as excited as I am?
I immediately shoot up out of my bed. I need a new fucking alarm clock.
Today is the day I begin my job at Allsafe. Well, it's technically an introduction into what I'll be doing when I actually begin the job. I'm hoping to God that it isn't extremely awkward that I got the job because of Joe when some people have worked hard to get their jobs there. I can confidently say I know almost nothing about cyber security and the extent of my computer knowledge is some simple coding and how to navigate social media.
Maybe I can just get people coffee.
After showering, I throw on a pair of black dress pants, a long sleeve baby blue button up shirt and a decent pair of flats that don't look like I crossed the desert in them.
Talk about bad first impressions, amiright?
Although I never do much with my hair on a daily basis, apparently this place is sort of strict on the dress code so I just put it into a simple bun.
A persistent knock on the door breaks me out of my trance. Must be Penelope. I pull my phone out of my back pocket and walk to the door to let her in.
"Oh, baby!" Penelope awes over me.
I have exactly fifteen minutes and thirty two seconds until I have to be in the Allsafe building for my introduction. Please get out of my face.
"You look so professional! I'm so proud of you. Are you excited?"
"As excited as I can be." I type with a smile. This earns a look of approval from my mother, which puts me at ease.
Even if I have to lie.
"Okay, Bessie. Let's get this show on the road. I love what you've done with the place though..." This is when I tune her out, smile, nod and check my phone.
7:50. She's been standing here for five minutes.
I begin to push my mother out of the door while she continues to ramble about my shitty apartment some more.
Maybe I'll start taking the train to work. Or walk. Anything but this.
Although the Allsafe building is large, it's not nearly as large as E Corp. As I stare up at the towering structure, I feel slightly intimidated. A gentle hand is rested on my back, and although my mother can be overbearing sometimes, this puts me at ease.
"You'll do great, honey." I nod as she reassures me.
Here goes nothing.
After meeting Gideon, dealing with introduction after introduction and also hearing about how he's willing to work with my 'condition,' I pretty much want to eat lead.
As I sit at my new desk, I become more and more unsure about what I'm doing here. I mean, obviously, cyber security. But I'm just sitting at this desk. Nothing exciting is happening.
Maybe this place isn't what I want to do for the rest of my life. All these people look like they're miserable.
The best thing I have been able to accomplish today is listening to other people's conversations. Such as the one that's currently going on between two, in their mid-ish twenties, men. One man with short, but styled dark hair and the other guy.. annoying
Hard to explain but his face definitely looked annoying.
I think Gideon introduced me to him. What's his name again? Olive? Ollie? Yes, that's right. Ollie.
"Yo, man. Do you wanna-" Ollie starts. The busy short haired guy sitting in his cubicle minding his own damn business takes his headphones off. Unfortunately the other guy continues talking.
"Uh, do you wanna do lunch today?" He asks.
Other Guy replies, "Uh, yeah. I got other plans." Ollie looks disappointed and Other Guy totally does not look like he has other plans.
This Ollie guy seems.. Clingy. I'd probably ditch him too.
Ollie basically interrupts him with, "Other plans. Right. That's what you said the last three times I asked you."
Maybe he has a busy life, douche.
"Look, bud," Poor Other Guy looks like he's going to implode. "You and Angela have been close for a long time, and that's even more reason why I want us to be on good terms. I-I just... I feel like this are awkward between us. Don't you?"
Who's Angela? Oh! That's the blonde girl Gideon introduced me to earlier. She's pretty, seems nice. Can't believe she's with this sucker, though.
"I'm okay with it being awkward between us." I literally laughed out loud. Other Guy and Ollie turn to look at me and I just turn back to my screen.
Wow, Other Guy is actually kind of cute. Maybe not the standard kind of cute but definitely my type.. I think?
My face burns with embarrassment and then they begin talking again.
Ollie laughs awkwardly. "Um, yeah. I-I'm not okay with that." He states simply. There's a slight uncomfortable pause before he begins shitting out of his mouth again. "Um, look, man. I love Angela, and I want us to get along for her sake. I mean, that's what I'm here for. I just, I don't normally do stuff-"
Maybe I'm being too hard on the guy. He sounds.. genuine. I guess.
My thoughts begin to trail off as I'm not exactly concerned with what he has to say at this point, and I totally have no reason to be eavesdropping on their conversation anyways. The sound of typing makes me zone out for a while until I hear my cellphone ding.
From Mommy Dearest: Hey baby!! How's ur day going?? :-) Awesome i hope.
To Mommy Dearest: Id say good. Not too much hustle and bustle. It's pretty chill. Plus i get to hear some gossip so it's not too bad.
From Mommy Dearest: Well darn!! Ok, i'm gonna pick u up from work. U have to tell me everything.
To Mommy Dearest: Sure thing, Ma. C u later.
I finished up my text and sent it. Apparently Ollie is still going on, so I turned on my listening ears just so I had more stuff to tell my mother later.
"...I've never done anything like this before."
I can tell. I hope Other Guy can too.
"...I like music. You like music. Maroon 5."
Really? Maroon 5?
"And that's all I mean. I just want you to know that. I like you, bro, I just want you to like me too."
Come on. Are we in grade school? BRO?
"I understand. I'll try harder."
Ugh. Poor thing. He's totes pushing this guy out of his comfort zone and doesn't feel bad for doing so. Maybe he doesn't notice but you'd have to be a blind person to not pick up on this body language right now.
Ollie begins talking again. "That's cool, man. Hey, whenever you're ready. I'd love to just chill-" He places his arm on ShortHair's shoulder, but he looks extremely weirded out as he shifts his shoulder away.
Huh.. Maybe the guy doesn't like physical contact? Or maybe just not from Ollie?
"Oh, forgot about your no touching thing."
Gideon begins walking down our aisle as Ollie is finishing up, with a group of suits trailing behind him.They begin to slow down when they reach my neighbor's cubicle. They stop.
"There are six on-site engineers on your account. Plus a few off-site." Gideon states. Other Guy's eyes shift back and forth between different members of the Men in Black-esque squad. His eyebrows furrow for a second, probably thinking hard. Looks like it, anyway.
Other Guy looks away, obviously losing interest. But before he can look back at his terminal, he looks directly at me. I gulp. Awkward. I feel embarrassed once again so I look away quickly. This is the second time he caught me staring. He's totally gonna think I'm a creep.
Just as I went back to my work, a member of the MIB squad walks up to the Other Guy. I silently pray that this guy doesn't touch him, just because he clearly hates it. As soon as dude reaches the terminal, he sticks his hand out for my neighbor to take. Other Guy reluctantly and painfully shakes this mans hand.
"Oh, hi. Tyrell Wellick. I'm Senior Vice President, Technology." The man says. Why did that name sound oddly familiar? I believe Joe has said it before. Maybe...E Corp? Has to be.
"I'm.. Elliot. Just a tech." Other Guy..er, Elliot says. Wow, that is a nice name. It suits him.
"Don't be so humble. You know, I started out exactly where you are, and to be honest, you know, my heart is still there." Tyrell peers at Elliot's screen. "So I see you're running Gnome. You know, I'm actually on KDE myself. I know this desktop environment is supposed to be better but you know what they say. Old habits die hard." There's a slight pause because Tyrell is taking the time to study Elliot's facial expressions.
"Yeah, I know what you're thinking. I'm an executive I mean, why am I even running Linux? Again, old habits. It's gonna be fun working with you. I should join the rest of the group. Bonsior, Elliot."
What the hell did he just say? Wow, this guy is so much creepier than when Ollie was harassing Elliot earlier. I mean that guy was just a dork. This Tyrell guy.. the way he carried himself.. He was intimidating to say the least. No bueno.
"And that is how my first day went." I end my story as my mother since on my expensive chair drinking red wine.
Probably a horrible idea. Is she going to be able to drive home?
My mother smiles. "Wow, that was really.. interesting. So, this Elliot guy, is he cute? Is that why he caught you staring twice?" I gasp and she shoots me a knowing smirk.
"He has a very interesting way of communicating. Clearly people are drawn to him because.. I don't know, because he's awkward? Maybe all these people think they're going to change him by forcing him out of his comfort zone. You know as well as I how much that does not work. He flinched when that dumbass, Ollie, touched him earlier. He should have known not to do that if he apparently knew Elliot so well.. but yeah, I guess he's okay looking." I lie. He's totally gorgeous.
"So you do think he's cute?" I roll my eyes and lay back on my couch.
"Okay, fine. He's cute. Whatever. Doesn't matter. We work together, wouldn't that be conflict of interest or something? He clearly doesn't like people either. Whatever. I'm not talking about this with you." That sounded a lot better in my head. I regret the words immediately as I typed them out. Penelope's face shows she's disappointed. I know she wants me to tell her everything, talk to her about guys, etc but she always finds a way to make things awkward.
"Who do you talk to then? David? He's a guy! He's the worst person to ask advice about boys from. Call that a conflict of interest. Extremely biased opinion. No, no, no. Can't do that."
If only she knew.. David has had way more experience with guys than she has ever had. And.. she's definitely drunk.
"It's just weird. You're my mom. You know that I have more people to talk to than just David, too. Mary still exists. She actually doesn't live too far from here. Maybe I could ask her if she wanted to hang out soon." Penelope smiles and nods.
"Good idea sweet cheeks. You mind if I crash here? If you make coffee in the morning and give me some Tylenol I will totally drive you to work. Maybe I could ask Joe to get you a car." I shake my head.
"Let me go get some blankets."
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