Chapter 6
Allison
I pulled my headphones tighter against my ears as I stared at my computer in a daze. I watched the spinning pinwheel on the screen as the reports ran in the background. Work. I thought about the walk to work. It was so much different. I felt like I had walked on clouds. I took a sip of my coffee and a bite of my bagel as I thought about my dream date. The date I couldn’t tell anyone about at work.
Every vibration of my phone sent me floundering to look at it, hoping it was a message from him, but there was nothing. A text from Jess, a notification from the bank that my balance was running low, but nothing from him. I buried myself in work, waiting for him to come talk to me.
I peeked over my cube but his door was still shut. He had gotten in earlier than normal and I missed his grand entrance. The entrance I had thought about the entire weekend where he slid into my cube and smiled at me, thanking me for a wonderful date. Any minute now, that was going to happen. Or perhaps I’d run into him in the hallway or maybe the break room.
Or maybe he wouldn’t come to my cubicle at all, maybe he’d call me into his office.
My dream. Holy crap, if he called me in there, would he close the blinds? Would drum music be pounding through his computer speakers?
Every door that opened nearby sent me into a scramble as my heart pounded. False alarm.
I couldn’t take it anymore. I sidled up to his assistant’s desk. “So, Craig, what’s Joshua’s schedule like today?”
Craig shot me a look, like it wasn’t my damn business. I caught the reflection of his Spider solitaire game in the glass window behind him.
“Look, I just want to know if he’s going to be out and about a lot. I had some things I needed to show him.”
Craig nodded. “You can leave them with me.” He leaned back in his chair and smiled.
“No thanks, I really want to give them to him myself.”
“He said not to bother him. His calendar is blocked off for the day so you’ll have to wait until tomorrow.” Craig leaned back as if he had just delivered some great news. It was heartbreak for me. My chances of running into Joshua in the hall were nil.
I wondered whether Joshua was avoiding me, whether he had changed his mind about wanting to see me again. I wondered whether I’d end up getting fired because he didn’t want any sort of conflict at work.
Maybe I was just being an idiot and he really did have a ton of work to do. Running a business couldn’t be easy.
“Okay,” I managed to squeak out. “Thanks, Craig.”
The clouds at my feet had evaporated. Actually, they were now hanging over my head, raining on me. I moped back to my cube and plopped down in my chair, wrapping my headphones around my head and covering my ears.
Jamie craned his neck over my cubicle at about noon. “Want to grab some lunch?”
He reminded me of a jack-in-the-box when he popped his head over the divider like that. I managed a weak smile. “No thanks. I should stay in and get some work done.”
Or rather, sit here like a loser in the hope that Joshua would come by and invite me out to lunch. I wasn’t hungry, Joshua, but since you’re begging, why, yes, I’d love to try that little place near Penn’s Landing, the one with amazing minestrone.
At the very least, he could send a quick message through Scintilla’s dating site explaining what the hell was up with ignoring me at work.
“Come on,” Jamie said. “I saw the hot dog vendor. The one with the sauerkraut that you like…”
I could sit here pathetically, ready to be taken out at Joshua’s convenience, or I could take charge of my own damn life and feed myself. I caved in and decided to head out with Jamie. “Sure. Why not.”
I gave one last look at my computer screen, willing a Scintilla message to pop up. Maybe Joshua was trying to keep a low profile. A secret office affair.
“Let’s go,” Jamie said, and my swoon-worthy fantasies involving clandestine meetings in the empty boardrooms and company retreats in the Alps came crashing down around me.
I let out a heavy breath and grabbed my purse from around my chair. We didn’t talk much as we walked to the elevators, although I slowed down as we went past Joshua’s office.
Jamie gave me a curious look, as if he saw something different in me today. “I saw you talking to Craig earlier. Do you need to talk to my brother about something? You could always talk to me, you know. This is my company, too.”
“What? No, no.” Sometimes I almost forgot that Jamie and Joshua were brothers. Joshua outshone Jamie in so many respects. It was easy to see why Joshua was considered the leader.
“Well, how is your day going, then?” he asked.
I wanted to blurt that I had had the most incredible date of my life with his brother who I was just dying to talk to again, and would Jamie please give me some intel on why Joshua would take me out on a date and look at me and kiss me like that, but then ignore me all morning…but it would have been way too awkward. “So far my day is the same as every other day…unfortunately.”
* * * * *
I sat down on the edge of the brick wall, Jamie flanking my side. The warm sun was a welcome distraction from the waiting game I had been playing all morning. Every creak of a door or vibration of my phone caused me to jump. Everyone’s voice sounded like his. I just wanted him to contact me, somehow. Today had been like every other day at the office. I was again invisible.
“Yeah. So I was thinking a lot over the weekend. You know, my brother and I are co-owners of Scintilla. But it always seems like he gets the credit for everything. I’m not bitching, but I think I’ve got some pretty good ideas that this company could implement.” Jamie took a bite of his hot dog.
“So why don’t you tell him about them?” It seemed like a pretty simple solution to me.
I bit into my hotdog, enjoying the mustard and sauerkraut flavors exploding over my tongue. If there was one good thing about working in Philly, it was the food carts that we could count on to deliver delicious lunches.
“I’ve told him plenty of things.” Jamie wiped his mouth. “He just snubs me. He acts like I’m not good enough for this place.”
“Well, what are your great ideas? I’ll listen.” I took a sip of my water. A part of me actually felt a little sorry for him. It must be frustrating to be the younger brother who is always in the shadow of his older, smarter, more creative and much more handsome brother.
“Well, my idea is really simple. Basically, I’d like to add some features to the website to engage a wider audience.”
I nodded, taking a swig of my drink. “Wider audience. Sounds good so far.”
“Yeah. Think about it. Maybe people would want to pay for a sneak peek of their date or something else. That could put an extra million on the bottom line.” Jamie’s eyes glimmered. A million didn’t sound like much in the scope of Tolbert & Tolbert’s earnings, but he felt passionately about the idea, at least. I thought about the idea. I would have loved to know what I was walking into, but then again, Joshua would have too. Maybe our date would have never happened.
“And you think that’s where the company’s energies should go?”
He shrugged. “Why not?”
“Well,” I said, trying to be diplomatic, “I think it’s an okay idea, but it almost defeats the purpose of the site.” I tossed my hot dog wrapper in the trash.
“Well, I also thought about doing a simple redesign of the site, make it more appealing.”
“But what makes you think the site needs this kind of make-over?” It reminded me of my own make-over, how surprised Joshua had been to see me with my hair down, wearing a fantastic dress.
“I think that as it stands right now, the site is a little uppity. I think that the design would look awesome with some better graphics and zip. I mean, the color scheme right now is kind of dull and reminds me of, say, an over thirty crowd. But it could look really cool if the design were just a little more exciting. Don’t you think?”
I was in my thirties, and I hadn’t had a problem with the design when I signed up. My only issue was that it was hard to check my messages on my phone. “I guess it’s worth a try. So why don’t you approach Joshua again?”
Jamie snorted. “He completely ignores me.”
Ha, I used to know how that felt. “Maybe he just comes off as being uninterested because he’s really busy, or because he thinks making changes might take up too much time. Speaking of the time,” I said, “we should probably head back.”
We started walking past the tall buildings. If I closed my eyes, I could imagine I was with Joshua again, walking around downtown, kissing under the streetlights.
Jamie cleared his throat, and I looked over at him. His expression was determined and serious. “I guess I could try again, but he can come off as a real prick sometimes.”
“Maybe you just need to time it better. Joshua can be a really good listener when he wants to be.”
“Really?” Jamie raised his eyebrow as he turned to look at me. “So, you and Joshua talk a lot, do you?” Jamie joked.
“Not lately.” I joked back, but it was the truth.