Some days, Leigh wished she had an assistant of her own.

Brock had actually offered to hire one. Several times, in fact. “You’re not my secretary, you’re my E. A. You don’t have to do everything yourself, you know?”

But Leigh had always assured him that she was more than up to all her duties and responsibilities. And she was right, too.

Most days, at least.

Today wasn’t one of those days.

It started well enough. Brock approved the meeting schedule she had set up for next week, and the first calls she made to set those meetings fell into place pretty quickly. Then the architect she had scheduled for Tuesday called back and asked to meet on Wednesday instead.

If the meeting was just with him, that would be one thing. But the company handled all the steps involved with house building. The design, the construction itself, the interior design, even furniture carpentry. And for some high-end clients, they had started offering package deals. They’d pick what they wanted right at the top, make as many decisions beforehand as possible, and the whole thing would go through as one continuous process, effectively saving everyone time and money.

Tuesday’s meeting concerned precisely one of those packages, and the people in charge of every step of the creation of the house had to be there. Which meant that rescheduling one meant rescheduling all others. Tuesday turned out to be the one day everyone could meet, and Leigh was forced to spend the entire morning calling everyone multiple times to see which specific hours of each individual day they were available, and then sometimes having to call back because of incorrect information.

It felt like grunt work, and it was hell. As Brock’s Executive Assistant, she had a large amount of freedom, but this kind of thing always made her feel almost helpless.

On top of that, another package was falling through because the budget for construction was rising, the client didn’t have more funds available, so Leigh was forced to negotiate with the people in charge of the other steps of house creation to get them to lower their prices correspondingly, yet still maintaining as much of the quality of service and client specifications as feasible.

This was the type of job Brock had called back to himself more than once, but when he ended up paying for a client’s bathroom out of his own pocket just so he could spend 30 minutes less on the phone with the contractor, Leigh persuaded him to leave it to her permanently from then on.

But today, it was just too much. Normally, Leigh would just send for lunch and spend half an hour eating while watching or reading something online. But today she needed to get out of the office and go relax for an hour somewhere.

She was about to do just that when the phone rang.

The number was way too familiar to her already. It was Terry, some girl whom Brock had slept with and who couldn’t seem to convince herself that Brock didn’t want anything else to do with her.

Women didn’t cling to Brock that often. As much of a player as he was, he was always kind, courteous, and pretty clear of what he wanted and what he was all about, so no one ever came away from a night with Brock with bad feelings or wrong ideas. No one, that is, except Terry, who had been trying to get Brock on the phone the whole week, after a Friday night that according to him didn’t go so well, and a Sunday afternoon he spent telling her he wanted nothing more to do with her.

Leigh took two steps towards the door, almost letting the phone ring.

Then she sighed and picked up the phone from the front of her desk.

“Hello, Terry.”

“Oh, hi,” she said, like Leigh was a dear friend she hadn’t heard from in ages. “How are you, dear? Look, is Brock in? I really need his help with something. It’s for real this time, I promise.”

“Look,” Leigh said, looking through the door into Brock’s desk, where he repeatedly pretended to slash his throat with his index finger. “Brock’s left for lunch. If it’s really important this time, I’ll gladly take a message.”

“Noooooo, it’s really important, but you know, totally private, I can’t tell it to you.”

Leigh had never met Terry, but wished she had a really amazing body and/or face, just so her opinion of Brock wouldn’t drop precipitously.

“Then I guess you’ll have to keep it to yourself, because he’s not here right now. In fact, he’s not coming back today. In fact, I’m pretty sure he’s taking an extended vacation, and I don’t know until when.”

“Well. I don’t know who you think you are, but I don’t appreciate you being rude. I’ll make sure to tell that to Brock, you hear?”

“Tell that to— Listen to me, you vacuous piece of hollow shit. You’re never going to speak to Brock again, you hear me? He doesn’t want anything to do with you, and if you weren’t such a clingy, dumb, empty moron you’ve figured that out the first twenty times he told you personally, and the hundred times he refused to pick up the phone!”

The phone suddenly flew out of Leigh’s hand, and Brock was speaking into it.

"Hello,” he said, leaning against Leigh’s desk. “You’ve just reached Brock Anderson’s office. I’m not here right now, because I'm dead. I died two days ago in a horrible, horrible accident. There's no need for you to try reaching me again, really. Ever. But be sure to check your local entertainment listings for details on my wake, funeral, and anointment into sainthood. Bye."

He hung up without waiting for an answer and just stared at Leigh, his brotherly smile belying his piercing look.

“Could you sit down for a minute, please?”

“I was going to have lunch, Brock.”

“I know, but lunch can wait. Please. Just for a minute.”

She complied, begrudgingly.

“Okay,” he said. “What is this? What’s happening here?”

“What do you mean, what’s happening? I’m doing my job, Brock.”

“Yeah, yeah. You’ve been doing it for a long time, but somehow you never seem as angry as you did just now. And you’ve been off your game all week. What’s wrong, Leigh?”

“I’m just tired, Brock. Okay? I’m just overworked and exhausted and in no mood to handle your one-night-only bimbos.”

She regretted it as soon as she said it. The last thing she wanted to do was to get Brock mad at her. He was a good friend, yes, but he was also her boss, and she should’ve known better than to confuse the two.

To his credit, he didn’t flinch.

“See, I don’t buy that. You’ve handled plenty of my bimbos before, and you never lost your cool. I mean yeah, this is the first stalker bimbo as far as I can recall, but still. I don’t think that’s it.”

Leigh almost got up and told him to shove it, but this time she remembered her place.

“Look, if it’s work, we can get someone to help you—”

“I don’t want help.”

“I know you don’t. Just saying we can. But I don’t think we need to either.”

He finally pulled up a chair and sat in front of her.

“Come on, Leigh. This is me here. Not your boss, your friend. Your close friend, and proud of it. You know you can talk to me.”

“I know.”

“Then why don’t you?”

“I know I can talk to you, Brock. Doesn’t mean I should. Or that I want to.”

His smile faded for just a second.

“Fine. Fine, I’m not the boss of you.” He looked around the office. “Present location notwithstanding. If you don’t want to tell me what’s wrong, I can’t make you, and I wouldn’t want to anyway.”

“Good. Thank you.” Leigh inhaled deeply, then forced all the air out, hoping her frustration would go with it. “Look, I know I haven’t been myself lately, but… I’m just working through some stuff, that’s all. I’ll be okay.”

“Okay.” He raised his hands in mock surrender. “That’s all I want here. For you to be okay.”

“Thanks.” Leigh almost got up and left, but he wasn’t done.

“One thing, though. Have you talked to Jonas lately?”

Leigh bit her lip, then hoped he hadn’t noticed.

“No. No, I haven’t, not for a while.” She hesitated. “Have you?”

“Only once, right after you guys came back from that little escapade. And wouldn’t you know it, he didn’t seem like himself either. Come on, Leigh. I’m friends with both. I want the best for both of you, and I know how to be objective. I’m not here to judge either of you. What really happened between you two?”

Leigh sighed, holding her own hands on her lap. She hadn’t told anyone about anything that happened. Not that she could. There weren’t that many people with whom she could confide that sort of thing. There was Jonas, and he was out of the question. And aside from Jonas… There was Brock. And for the life of her, Leigh couldn’t find a single good reason why she shouldn’t get it all off her chest.

So she relented, and opened up to her friend. She avoided specifics, particularly the ones involving the details of her fantasies, but gradually she found herself telling her friend everything else.

Surprisingly, it felt good.

Perhaps not as surprisingly, Brock was smiling when she finished.

“What?” she asked. “What is it?”

“It’s just the irony, you know. I mean, you know Jonas. He’s always treated his ladies right, like equals. He’s not the greatest gentleman around, but he’s not full on alpha either.”

“So?”

“So, as far as I know you’re the first woman he’s actually put up on a pedestal and treated like a queen, taking every load off you that he could. And trust me, from what I’ve seen of his previous companions, every single one of them would give everything to be treated like that. And yet here you are. The only one he does treat like that, and not only don’t you want it, it actually ruined everything.”

“Yeah. Irony. I’m splitting my sides.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be mean.”

Leigh gave him a smile, only half forced.

“You weren’t.” She paused. “You think that if I did enjoy that kind of treatment, things would’ve been fine?”

Brock thought about it for a second.

“Probably not, actually. I’d think he wouldn’t have fallen for your.”

“There you go, then. Catch 22.”

“I guess. But look, here’s the way I see it. All that stuff, all that serving and doing things, all that need for control… That’s all bullshit, you know? Deep down where it counts, that doesn’t matter at all.”

“What do you mean, it doesn’t matter? Brock, I’ve spent all my life—”

He raised his hand. “No, no, I know that. What I meant was, if you’re in a relationship, it’s not about feeling in control. Or even being in control. A true relationship is about sharing everything, right? That includes control and making decisions. Sometimes there’ll be times where one takes the lead, sure, but other times it’ll be the other way round. And if there are boundaries in there, well, that’s where talking comes in. You set the boundaries loud and clear, and you stick to them, and everything should be fine. What you have to know is, do you really want to be in that relationship.”

Leigh considered his reply. He kept staring at her like he expected her to say something.

“What?”

“Do you?”

“Do I what?”

Brock actually sighed. He seemed as close to losing his patience as Leigh had ever seen him.

“Leigh, I get that this isn’t easy for you, but please, don’t play dumb with me. You have to choose. You have to decide. Do you want a relationship with Jonas? And it can’t be a passing thing, it can’t be a ‘let’s just try it out and see what happens’ fling. You two are too close for that bullshit, and he loves you too much. So do you love him? Really?”

“God.” Leigh’s elbow rested on the desk next to her, and she laid her head on her hand. “I can’t even tell anymore. Back in the boat, when everything was going great, I thought I did. I really did. Then things got… complicated. And I just don’t know anymore.”

“Well. In my book, things are truer when they’re simple. Complications add unnecessary layers, makes things harder to see clearly. Maybe that time on the boat is what you should be looking to.”

“Maybe…”

He slapped his hands on his legs and moved forward, finally moving off the desk. “Then again, maybe not. What do I know?”

Leigh laughed. He knew exactly what he knew, and it was a lot.

“I guess after all that, the least I can do is buy you lunch,” he told her. “There’s this great restaurant around the corner I’ve been dying to take you to.”

She held his arm as they left the office.

“What if I don’t want to go to that restaurant?”

“Then next time you won’t. This time, though, you gotta roll with it. I mean, I am buying.”