Page 41 of Stoker's Serenity

“You want to come back?” I whispered.

“Well, yeah.” He smiled at me and I tried not to tear up.

“You mean it?” I asked.

“Yeah, Orchid… I mean it. I like you and I don’t like to give up on the things I like just because of one outside sour taste, you feel me?”

“What did you just call me?” I asked, bewildered, wanting to pinch myself to make sure it was real.

“My pet name for you.” He smacked a kiss on the end of my nose. “Deal with it.”

“I-I don’t know what to say, what to think…” I stammered.

“You don’t have to say anything. What time are you off work?”

“Um, six, I think…”

“So way after me. I’ll come by where you work to get your keys, and have dinner ready when you get home, if you’ll let me stay.”

He stood up and looked down at me, waiting expectantly for me to reject him but I couldn’t. Not when I so desperately wanted him to be here, to stay with me… I was just shocked and amazed that he wanted to after…

“I’d like that,” I answered him and he smiled faintly and nodded.

“Good deal, I’ll see you at the mall. Just let me know what store.”

I told him the name of the department store I worked at and what department. He gave a nod and picked up a tool belt that was slung over the back of one of my dining table chairs. I blinked stupidly and he picked up his travel mug. He came over to me and leaned down giving me another quick kiss.

“Sleep some more if you can,” he said. “I’ll see you this afternoon.”

“Okay.”

He slipped out and I watched him go, absolutely dumbfounded that I could have lucked out so completely. That he wasn’t just going to ghost on me when he had every right to run screaming as far away from me as he could get.

I sat and wondered, my lips still tingling from his kiss.

* * *

The day didn’t getany better from there, but it did get considerably worse. At least, after I got to work. My department store had a new manager and it was already off to a rocky start. She lined us up and nitpicked our hair and dress, and then proceeded to move us all over hell and gone, proclaiming we’d gotten too comfortable in our given departments and that we needed to learn every one of the departments to a ‘T’.

My first thought wasn’t really so much a thought as it was a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. I prayed she wouldn’t move me to a horror show of a department, but I had no such luck in that regard – she moved me from the familiar territory of the children’s toy department to women’s clothing.

I was crestfallen, but put on a smile despite it and followed my marching orders.

It was bad. The dressing rooms were a post-apocalyptic wasteland of discarded clothing and broken hangers. I sighed and set to work putting everything to rights while my co-worker Megan rang up customers at the cashier’s stand for the department.

It felt like it took forever, but finally I swapped Megan out so that she could go to lunch. A little while later, Stoker came through.

“Hey, there you are. I’ve been looking all over the place.”

“I’m so sorry, the new manager switched us all around to different departments the minute I got here and I haven’t gotten a break yet to even give you the heads-up.”

I felt stressed, waited for him to say something hurtful, about letting him down or annoying him, but all he said was, “It’s cool, Orchid. You got the key for me?”

“Yeah, oh yeah!” I pulled my house key, which I had already taken off my ring, out of my pocket and handed it to him.

He held it up and gave it a shake and said, “I’ll get out of your hair. See you when you get home.”

“Okay,” I murmured.

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