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“Well, my kid let me sleep through the night. I feel like I’m on top of the world. Dad life. What about you? Are you here to see Kat?”
My life sucks, thanks for asking.
“I’m grand, thanks. We have a meeting, yeah.” I tried not to grimace at my words, as my insides writhed with nerves.
“How is it goingso far? From what I’ve heard, you’ve made great progress?”
“It’s going great. Kat is amazing, I love working with her.”
“That’s wonderful to hear, thank you for your feedback.”
“My pleasure. And I mean it. I don’t know what APEX would do without her.”
What I would do without her.
He clapped his hands together.
“If there is anything I can do, anything you need, just give me a call. My door is always open. Unless I’m sleeping.” The Gargoyle laughed at his own joke and I couldn’t help but grin. He was definitely weird, but I liked the man.
“Wouldn’t want to wake the baby. Nah, I’m good. Kat’s taking good care of me.”
“Wonderful. Right, I’ve got to go. I’ve got an onboarding meeting with a new employee.”
“Congratulations.”
“Cheers.” Raising his hand at me, he turned and left, almost skipping with excitement.
I understood; finding good staff was hard.
In front of Kat’s door, I straightened up, planting my feet firmly on the ground and rolling my shoulders back in the mountain pose as I took a deep breath. Up until Abbie, I had used yoga to ground myself in my body and had given up when she told me how unmanly she found it. I’d never told her that yoga had no gender.
I knocked.
“Come in!”
Taking a deep breath, I awkwardly opened the door with my elbow.
“Roy. Oh, sorry.” Kat came hurrying around her desk, holding the door open for me.
I set down the mugs on her desk, put my bag on the visitor’s chair, and shrugged out of my hoodie jacket. She was still standing by the door when I was done and with a deep breath, I finally met her eyes.
There was no pity on her face and I was fucking grateful for it. I wasn’t sure I could have survived her patronising me.
“Hey.”
A smile softened her expression, and without meaning to, I held open my arms, flooded with relief when Kat stepped into my embrace. It was a beautiful hug. The kind you need after a hard day, or years—warm, and safe, a hug that made you choke with emotion. And even though I dwarfed her, it was she who was holding me together, her strength that kept me upright.
“It’s good to see you,” I said, inhaling her scent stealthily before we let go.
Getting up on tiptoes, Kat kissed my cheek. “And you.”
“Why don’t you have a seat? I’d like to show you the changes Carine and I made to the shop website.”
“Okay.” Settling into one of the chairs at the table in a corner of her office, I waited for her to fill me in.
“We restructured the menu. Carine thought this made more sense and—” She broke off and sat up straighter, taking a deep breath as if she was steeling herself.
“Roy, listen. There’s something I need to say and I am so sorry for bringing this up. I was going to ignore it but I don’t think I can. You know, if you like that sort of thing, if it’s a kink or something, I’m not judging. I just have to put it out there, and I need you to hear me. You can ignore me, of course. But I hope you won’t. I saw the look on your face, and it fucking broke me, Roy,” she rambled as she fiddled with the edge of a red nail.
