Page 42 of Stoker's Serenity

He winked at me, looked like he wanted to kiss me, hesitated a moment and finally settled for, “See you, Orchid.”

“Later,” I murmured.

I wrapped my black cardigan in front of me and hugged my middle, feeling a little bereft as I watched him leave. Wishing I was going with him. I was worried about fixing this… this thing that I felt hung between us now, while, at the same time trying to wrap my head around the fact that he was still here. I mean, if he were any other guy, I would have to guess he should have hit it and quit it by now – but he hadn’t. As of right now, he was headed to my little studio to make me dinner.

How about that?

The women’s department phone rang probably forty-five minutes later, just as I was returning from my first break. Megan said, “She’s right here, she just got back,” before holding the receiver out to me.

“This is Serenity, how may I help you?”

“Ah, sorry, Orchid, you could tell your landlady and this nice officer of the law that I have your permission to be here and to please not arrest me…”

“Oh, my God! Yes! Um, hand Mrs. Sedgwick the phone…”

I unsnarled the mess I made by not having the forethought to warn Mrs. Sedgwick I had company – which I never did, so I could see why she would be concerned. When I hung up the phone I turned around to our new manager standing nearby.

“What was that?” she demanded.

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I didn’t think I was long –”

“So it was a personal call, then?”

“I’m sorry, yes, it was. It won’t happen again.”

“Right, Serena come to my office to sign your write-up before end of shift.”

Shit, you’ve got to be kidding me!

“Um, close, it’s actually Serenity, and yes, of course.”

She gave me a pointed look and said, “I don’t stand much for being corrected. Don’t forget, before you clock out.”

“Y-y-yes, ma’am.”

Tears threatened, but not for what you might think. I mean, yeah, I was upset I was being written up, but she didn’t stand for being corrected? When she got my goddamn name wrong? I was so angry, that helpless anger at being stuck, forced to endure because what else could I reasonably do? I couldn’t quit. I couldn’t punch her in the throat, or any of the people who harassed, bullied, or abused me for that matter.

I was so goddamn sick of it.

So I did the only thing I could do – I finished my shift, without taking a lunch because there was no one to relieve me when Megan was pulled to cover another department – and then I clocked out and went home. Yep, that’s right. I conveniently forgot to get my further dressing-down and to sign my write-up for earlier. Of course, I was also half hoping that she would need me going to her office to remind her to write me up in the first place. Only time would tell.

If she fired me tomorrow, I was going straight to HR. Then again, I was betting if I tried to go to HR about earlier I would just be brushed off, told that it wasn’t their job to deal with every little personality conflict, because how many times and in how many iterations had I heard that before?

God, I hated people.

Well, not allpeople. As much as it scared me, I really liked Stoker. I liked him a lot, and I needed to figure out what to do. It felt like investing in anyone was a recipe for disaster when it came to my poor, battered and abused, super-fragile heart.

I thought about all of that and more as I made the drive back home, and by the time I pulled into the garage beneath where I lived, I was pretty thoroughly miserable.

I felt doomed, in a way, because I already knew it was too late. I’d let my guard down; if I’d wanted to maintain distance, I never should have slept with him, because I absolutely could not keep emotional attachment out of sex.

I was afraid ? I’d given Stoker a piece of my heart already, and it was a fragile thing - made of glass and there was nothing stopping him from making my heart go smash.

When I got out of the car, I could hear light music, the somewhat bluesy strains coming from the direction of Mrs. Sedgwick’s massive front porch. I hit the fob to lower the garage door and walked up the drive to quite the sight.

Stoker was seated on Mrs. Sedgwick’s top step, playing a guitar, the old woman rocking in her chair under the overhang of her covered porch. A little hibachi grill was set up at Stoker’s feet on the bottom step and a grocery bag and a bunch of fixings for the hot dogs he was cooking was arranged to one side.

I had to laugh as I walked up the path to the porch.

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