God, she is pretty.
She is still wearing the same outfit from this morning, but now that she’s not behind a counter—and I’m not ten extra feet away like a coward—I can actually admire her. Her tight black jeans hug her hips and ass perfectly, and she has a loose, gray t-shirt tucked into the front of them. I love how effortlessly casual she looks with her hair pulled back into a low ponytail with her signature little pieces sticking out.
If I had things my way, I would close the door, lower the blinds, and see if she can stay quiet when I make her come. The thought of Ellie bent over my desk with my hand over her mouth to muffle the moans immediately has me moving to readjust myself. Fuck, she doesn’t even have to do anything, and it still turns me on—just her presence does it for me.
My mind continues to drift off to somewhere not appropriate for work, but I snap out of it when she sets the bag on my desk. “I thought an ‘apology’ burger would be something you're interested in?”
Her voice is sweet but timid, and I can tell that she feels bad about everything that happened yesterday. Just like that, everynegative, anxious thought that was pulling me away from Ellie is gone.
“Only if there’s an ‘I’m sorry’ milkshake to accompany it like you promised?” I raise a curious eyebrow, and she places it in front of me.
“Of course, and our meal would not be complete without ‘I’m changing my phone password and never telling Nick again’ fries.” She pulls the fries out of the bag and starts setting up our lunch on my desk.
“Oo, I’ve never had those before. I hope they’re good.”
She laughs, and my chest aches with how much I missed her. It is not healthy how much of an impact Ellie has on me, but I can’t stop it from happening.
It is obvious that she is hungry, but she eats at a slow pace, savoring the deliciously sinful burger. We share the large container of ‘password’ fries, and I don’t even care that my office is going to smell like fryer grease for days.
While I take a couple ketchup packets and squeeze them onto my wrapper to dip my fries, she bites off the tiniest corner of the packet and squeezes it on each individual fry. I find myself staring and wondering how ketchup usage can be so cute. It’s completely irrational to obsess over her tiny motions, but she is something special.
As we sit here enjoying the meal together, Ellie is the one who breaks our silence.
“I shouldn’t have asked you to leave last night.” Her eyes don’t meet mine when she admits it, but I wish they would. If she just looked up, she could see how much her saying that means to me. “I wanted you to stay.”
I don’t know how I’m supposed to respond, but she is putting herself out there by showing her vulnerability. It is not an apology for what happened. It is a statement. I decide to be honest too, but not wanting to say something wrong, I go for the safe option. Taking a deep breath, I keep my gaze on her. “I would’ve stayed if you asked me to.”
She keeps her eyes down, but her mouth turns up in the slightest smile. She goes back to eating her lunch, and the comforting silence is back.
I can’t explain exactly why, but it feels like everything is okay again.
Chapter 30
Ellie
WhenIfinallygeta chance to look at my phone, the screen reads 11:30 a.m.
I swear there's been thirty minutes left of my shift every time I've checked the time, and it’s killing me. Exhaustion has taken over my life from all of the school stress, but I’m relieved that it’s almost over. There are only three classes left of this summer semester, and they cannot come fast enough. Tomorrow’s class is focused on conferencing and peer reviewing for our final essay, and I’m feeling surprisingly okay about it.
I have always been good at putting my thoughts and ideas onto paper and articulating that way. That is one of the reasons why I’ve always loved English. The writing and reading aspects feel like home to me.
It’s the public speaking and group discussions that I am not confident in. I have a tendency to hesitate and second guess myself which is traumatizing in a socratic seminar because nobody waits for you to be ready. You just have to just dive in and commit to what you want to say. I also never know if my notes are actually going to be helpful because the discussion can change based on what ideas are brought up. The discussion itself might be based on an overarching topic, but the specificsare determined by the group and where our conversation takes us.
Luckily for me, the socratic seminar hit on two different ideas that I was able to connect to my notes.
Even though it went well, I was still shaking through the whole thing. My nerves were absolutely shot for the rest of the night which made sleeping nonexistent, so this whole morning, I’ve been kind of a wreck. It feels like being hungover, but without the vomiting. I spent so much energy and time focusing on doing well yesterday that there's nothing left for today. While I was doing a good job at appearing happy and pleasant for the first part of my shift, now I am just over it.
Letting out a deep sigh, I am grateful when I see Lily stroll in because I know that means it’s almost time to go home.
It’s impressive how she manages to be cute and put together for every shift, or at least all the shifts I see her for, but I still don’t understand how she does it. She is wearing a flowy white blouse and pastel pink pants, and if she wasn’t already at work, I would be convinced that she’s going somewhere to have brunch. Her hair is styled into a long braid down her back that is flawless. I try not to compare my appearance to hers because comparison is the thief of joy—andI haphazardly threw myself together at 4 a.m.
She walks up to stand in the line which confirms my assumption that she is definitely a little early, so I still have to suffer through at least ten more minutes of making drinks.
We get two free shift drinks every time we work, and we aresupposedto have someone else ring it in. If I'm being honest, I never remember and always just ring them in at the end of myshift. But, Lily does it the correct way every time, even if it means getting here ten minutes before her shift starts.
Ever since Lily started working here, she has always been a rule follower, which I appreciate. Despite my rebellious shift drink attitude, I’m too anxious to not follow all of the other rules at work. If something is done wrong, someone will find out, and I will get in trouble. Although that is less than likely, it is what my brain tells me every single time I think about skipping something or taking a shortcut.
There are a lot of places where the people who work different shifts become frustrated with each other, but Lily and I are pretty good at setting the other one up for success. She approaches the bar and offers me a smile. “Ellie! How are you? How did your seminar go? Good I hope?”
