The alarm started it's screaming at 6am. I groaned as I turned it off and Cupid licked my face. I didn't want to get up and deal with doing the presentation. Even knowing I had it backed up so Abigail wouldn't be able to do anything wasn't reassuring. I was still going to have to talk in front of a group of people and that was not my strong suit.
I forced myself to get out of bed and Cupid followed me to the bathroom. I got the shower running.
"You are not showering with me." I told Cupid.
She snorted at me and laid down in the doorway of the bathroom as I turned on the CD player to listen to music while I showered to help wake me up. The CD it played now was a mix I had thrown together a few days ago of new songs I Had downloaded.
Cupid wasn't by the door anymore when I got out, she had moved herself back to the bed. I dried off and put my pajamas back on until I was ready to get dressed for work.
"You ready to go outside?" I asked Cupid.
She jumped off the bed and waited for me by the back door to get up and let her out. While she was out, I got the bed made and went to make a bagel for myself to eat and filled up her food bowl and water bowl.
I was mentally going over my presentation as I let Cupid back in and followed her back out to the living room where she ate her breakfast and I nibbled on my bagel. I finished before Cupid did and went to get ready for work while she munched away. I didn't want to look too dressed up for the presentation, but I wasn't going to wear my normal everyday clothes either. I settled on a dark blue short sleeved fitted top, and dark grey skinny jeans with tie dye wedges.
Cupid came and joined me while I was putting on a little mascara and eyeliner. My hair was mostly dry, I would need to just run a brush through it when I got to work, but I was as ready as I was going to be.
"Okay Cupid, I have to head in and get this done with. You be a good girl." I told her as I grabbed my purse, laptop, and keys.
She grabbed a bone and laid down on her spot on the couch to chew on it as I walked out the door locking it and the security door behind me.
"Hey Jacelynn." A man called to me.
I looked up to see Rowan by his door, apparently leaving right now too.
"Hi, Rowan, right?" I said as he walked over to me.
"Yeah, how's it going? Heading to work?"
"Yeah I have a presentation to do today and just hoping the day goes fast."
"At least it's Friday." He said, I noticed his eyes were blue as he took my laptop from my hands so I could open the door on my grey 4runner.
"True and thank you." I said as I took back the laptop and slid it to the passenger seat.
"What time are you off?"
"Supposed to be off earlier today, just depends how long the presentation takes."
"Well I'll be home around three today, if you and Cupid want to hang out just come on over." Rowan said, "Good luck on your presentation."
"Thank you." I told him and got into my 4runner.
I waved to him as I backed out of my parking spot and left. The drive to work wasn't a very long one but it was time I could blare my radio. I was singing along to a Halestorm song as I pulled into the parking lot of work. I parked my 4runner and noticed that Abigail had to just pulled in to a spot as well.
"Great, I was hoping to not have to deal with her as soon as I got here." I said to myself.
I forced a smile on my face as I got out of my 4runner to find Abigail waiting for me.
"You ready for this?" She asked as she eyed what I was wearing.
"As I'll ever be." I answered, "What are you looking for?"
"Trying to tell if the rumors are true."
"What rumors?"
"That you've been sleeping with Riley, and that you're pregnant." She said, "It does look like you've put on weight so I guess they're true, won't everyone love to hear that."
"They're not true." I said wondering if Riley had heard this yet, "Why do you feel the need to make crap up? Are you really that board with your own life? Or is it the damn lockers in the hallway making you feel like you're in high school?"
"I'm not making crap up deary. Everyone here knows you're a whore. You hung out with Kyle before he left, then you are always around Andrew and he's thirty years older than you and married, or do they both like sleeping with you?" She said as she walked ahead of me.
I didn't respond, nothing I would say was going to help right now and I didn't need to be more upset before having to talk in front of people. Andrew and his wife Sarah were sitting in the cafeteria, they waved me over as soon as they saw me.
"you ready to present?" Sarah asked.
"I guess so." I answered.
"You guess so? What did Abigail say to you now? We saw her walk in right before you." Andrew said.
"Normal crap, I guess there's a rumor that I'm pregnant with Riley's kid, and she's trying to start one that we have threesomes." I answered.
"Wow, someone is really getting desperate." Sarah responded.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Abigail, she needs to throw you off your game because she knows you are better at this then she is. The bosses like you and go to you for ideas because of how quick you are at problem solving. She knows that if she can make you look bad then she looks better." Sarah said.
"Plus, she's been chasing Riley since she started working here and hates that you two are always exchanging books and movies." Andrew added.
"Peachy. Now I get to go and sit in this meeting and wonder how many people think I am pregnant and think that I have something sexual going on with multiple people." I said. I was wondering if the bosses had heard these rumors, and if they had what was that going to mean for how I looked giving this presentation.
"Get out of your head." Sarah said to me, "Just focus on presenting and we'll talk later and figure out what to do. I'll keep an ear out and see if there really are any rumors going around and if there are we'll figure out how to put a stop to them."
All I could do was nod. I made my way to the meeting room we were using. Abigail had already claimed a seat next to one of the bosses. She didn't have her laptop or anything yet, and I wasn't dumb enough to let her try and use mine again. I wanted to avoid having to use the back up on the flash drive attached to my keychain.
"Oh, good you have your laptop, I forgot mine." Abigail said as soon as I picked a seat and sat down.
"Abigail, you have time to go get yours." Our boss Nathan told her, "You forgot it yesterday too, are you the incompetent?"
"I was just trying to save time; I'll go get mine." Abigail said as she got up trying to hide her embarrassed blush as she walked past me.
"I saw her mess with your files yesterday. Were you able to fix them?" Nathan asked me.
"Yes. It wasn't too bad." I answered, surprised that he had seen that and had prevented her from being able to try the same trick again.
Abigail came back. She shot a death glare at me as she placed her laptop down by her seat. She went into the attached kitchen without saying a word. The door slammed behind her and suddenly she was screaming.
Nathan got out of his seat so fast it fell backwards. He was at the door trying to open it but it was locked.
"Abigail, open the door." He said as he pounded on the solid wood, "Why did you lock it?"
The only response we could hear was Abigail continued screams. Then there was the sounds of things breaking.
Finally, the screaming stopped and the door clicked open. Abigail was sitting on the ground by the sink. She was crying and her breathing was coming fast. I pushed past Nathan and dropped to my knees in front of her. I took her hands off her knees.
"Abigail, look at me." I told her keeping my voice level, "You have to tell us what happened. Are you okay?"
She didn't respond, but as she raised her head to look at me, I could see there was blood pouring out of her mouth. It ran down the front of her light pink shirt standing out horrifically. She was clinging to my hands like a drowning person will cling to anything floating. She was making gurgled sounds that didn't make any sense.
"Nathan, call 911." I called over my shoulder.
"On it." He responded and I heard him step away from the door.
"Abigail, you need to calm down, focus on your breathing, try to match mine." I told her.
I was thinking something scared her into a panic attack as I slowed my breathing down. I was deliberately exaggerating my breaths in, holding for a few seconds then slowly breathing out. Trying to get her to copy me.
"There's an ambulance on the way, I didn't know what to tell them about what happened or what the injury was." Nathan said, he wouldn't come into the room just hung out in the doorway.
"I'm not sure what her injury is yet. Are you okay?" I responded looking at him over my shoulder.
"I have a thing with blood." He said.
I noticed he looked pale almost green.
"Well don't faint or anything, I can really only help one of you and she's more important right now." I told him.
He managed a slight smile as his eyes stayed glued to the blood coming out of Abigail's mouth.
Abigail tried to say something and it drew my attention back to her. She wasn't able to form words and she was starting to cry harder again. Something was clearly wrong with her mouth. I took my phone out of my back pocket and turned the flashlight on.
"Abigail, I need you to open your mouth for me as wide as you can so I can see what's wrong so we can tell the paramedics when they get here." I said to her.
Her blue eyes were wide as they were looking at something behind me. She nodded and slowly opened her mouth. I shined the phone's flashlight into her mouth and tried to make sense of what I was seeing.
Her tongue was split.
It wasn't just split like I had seen people I know get done at a piercing parlor, it was split all the way down from as far into her mouth as I could see. I heard Nathan take a step towards us.
"Shit." I heard him say before I could warn him not to look.
I heard him hit the ground hard, surprised he hadn't landed on us.
"Jace? There's paramedics here, what happened?" I heard Andrew's voice.
"I don't know, Abigail is hurt, her tongue is split and Nathan fainted." I said.
I moved to try and look at Nathan but Abigail suddenly gripped my hands hard. I looked back at her and the desperate pleading in her eyes not to leave her was painfully obvious.
"I'm not going anywhere." I told her, "I was just looking to make sure Nathan didn't hit his head or anything when he fell."
She nodded but she didn't let go. She was starting to shake, her skin was pale, and even where I was holding her hands was ice cold.
"Abigail, I need you to keep focusing on your breathing. I promise I am not going to leave you until the paramedics are in here with us." I told her.
I knew it would take a few minutes for the paramedics to get to us in this meeting room, they needed to unload their tools and then get lead here.
"Sarah is waiting to lead them here." Andrew said, he was closer than I thought he was.
I looked over my shoulder and realized he had crouched down and was checking on Nathan.
"He okay?" I asked.
"As far as I can tell, it doesn't look like he hit his head on anything." Andrew told me, "What the hell happened?"
"Him, he has a thing about blood." I answered, "Her, I have no idea. She came in here and slammed the door closed and then there was screaming and when the door opened, she was here bleeding and her tongue is like all the way split."
"Jesus. Is she going to have to live with that?" Andrew asked just as Sarah came in with the paramedics.
There were two of them, one sat down with Nathan to check him. The other came over to Abigail and I.
"What happened?" The paramedic asked me.
"We were getting ready for a meeting; she came in here and the door slammed. She was screaming and when we were able to get in, she was here and her tongue is split." I answered.
The paramedic had Abigail open her mouth and was shining a light in to see the damage.
"Is she going to have to live with that?" Andrew asked again as he looked over the paramedic's shoulder into Abigail's mouth.
"Luckily for her no, it is fixable. Healing time may take a while with how far it was split but she should be okay." The paramedic answered.
Nathan was awake now and out in the meeting room with Sarah, I didn't even hear him get up. Now both paramedics lifted Abigail on to the gurney and rolled her back out the way they had come.
"I think we will put off the presentation until next week." Nathan said, "How about the three of you all take the rest of the day off. I don't want this going around the building until we know how Abigail is doing."