Revisions and Decisions

[marzipan]

My boss Elisa’s voice is piercing at the best of times, so I could hear her well down the hall. “You shouldn’t have - oh, and there you go again. Bless you. You know what dander does to you!” Her words immediately caught my attention, not just because of the somewhat delicious content, but because of what I wasn’t hearing - any sneezing whatsoever. Whoever was in there with her must be a pro at stifling. 

I reminded myself that I did, in fact, have a reason to be in the hall, now directly outside her office after hustling closer in my curiosity. She was my boss, and I was holding a folder full to the brim of old grant reports that she had requested. I had every right to knock on her door. My inquisitive desire to see who else was in the office just so happened to be in line with my professional obligations - so hurray for doing my job. 

As I pushed open the door after she called me to come in, I heard a man’s soft, congested voice exasperatedly say “Mother, don’t” - which immediately let me guess at the person’s identity. Elisa had three kids - a daughter, Hazel, and twin sons, Leo and Medan. Which twin was it? I had my suspicions, but also a distinct preference.

Elisa was standing behind her desk, lips pursed in apparent worry combined with considerable annoyance. Her son was facing her, so had his back to me - and, given that he couldn’t escape Elisa’s tiny office without mowing me over, I guessed he was planning to remain so positioned. 

“Ah, thank you, Viola! Take a seat - I’d like to go over the agenda for this afternoon’s meeting, if we could, please. You remember my son, Medan?” 

Suspicion confirmed. I happened to know that Leo was engaged to a vet tech, a potentially unfortunate choice of partner should pets be a problem. Leo was also not the kind of person who would call Elisa “Mother.” Leo was a very low-key, Type-B kind of person. I always had gotten along well with Leo. 

 Our parents had a joint business and were close friends. Medan and I definitely weren’t, and had never been. While we were growing up, I’d mostly considered him as my primary academic competitor for the best grades and the most prestigious awards. High school, in particular, had been a sequence of trading honors back and forth with a cool detachment that belied what I at least assumed was a mutually burning desire to outdo each other’s accomplishments. Our paths had diverged as we went off to college - I’d gone to a SLAC, which was not the kind of vibe I got from Medan - and I hadn’t seen him since. Now two years after graduating with my Master’s degree, it had certainly been a long time.

“Yes, of course! Hi!” Despite my cheery tone, I was 90% sure that Medan did not appreciate his mother’s reintroduction or her asking me to stay, given that he stayed stock still for a couple seconds before apparently giving up and turning around to face me. He was better looking than I’d remembered, although my rosier view might have been largely due to the fact that he was flushed with what might have been allergic exertion, or what might have been embarrassment. I imagined he blushed easily, since he was fairly pale, a trait emphasized by his dark blonde hair and black-rimmed glasses. He was quite tall - the top of my head was a little lower than his shoulder line - with perfect posture that made him seem even taller and more intimidating. 

 He greeted me with a quiet “good morning,” a smile just slightly suggesting itself at the corners of his lips but not going further. 

“Dan, you’ll need to stay for this meeting, please.” Elisa’s pointed stare at Medan confused me, as did his facial expression in response. The sudden glare of cutting, lofty annoyance wasn’t tempered in the slightest by the fact that his eyes were watering.  I pulled up a chair, both for the meeting and to better view whatever tempest might be developing, and watched with keen interest. 

The staring match lasted until Medan exhaled an audible sigh and reached up to adjust his glasses, which had slipped slightly down his nose in what I could only assume was an allergic fit before I’d entered the premises. “Yes, of course. May I see those papers, please?” Trying to alleviate whatever tension was still rippling through the room, I passed him the folder with a reassuring, bright smile. “Yeah, absolutely!” 

He accepted the papers with a nod and immediately started to page through them. “Mother has been telling me about the applications you’ll be handling now. They sound quite time-consuming.” Between his dark blue suit and his extremely crisp diction, he reminded me of an old-timey movie star. He’d had a persistent stammer when we were growing up, and he now spoke with the deliberate grace of someone who had absorbed years of speech therapy and was dedicated body and spirit to each and every technique for clear articulation. 

“It is pretty slow-going. The budget revisions are -” I paused when he suddenly tensed, his jaw tightening hard, but continued when he relaxed. “-slowing down the process a lot. Reimbursements from our granting agency are being held up, so we’re having to adjust for the irregular cash flow. You’ll see that the -” Trying not to pause and make him self-conscious was virtually impossible, and keeping my gaze casual was totally so, especially when he reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose with one hand while scanning the appended spreadsheets. “I’m sorry - are you okay?”

Medan replied instantly with “yes, thank you,” which Elisa instantly followed up with “Don’t be daft, Dan. You look terrible.” 

His swift responding eye roll was an impressive display of disdain. “Thank you so very much for your input, Mother. I don’t know how I missed your attainment of a medical degree.” Multitasking a dryly sarcastic tone, allergy management, and budget review was a surprisingly attractive vibe. 

Flipping through the spreadsheets, he gave a quick “hmm…” that I couldn’t interpret before looking back at me. “You weren’t the original compiler of these spreadsheets, I assume?” 

I wasn’t sure how to interpret his assumption, either. “No, I didn’t. I think Grace did before she left, if I remember correctly.”

It took him a couple beats to reply, as he was distracted by both the orderly procession of figures marching down the spreadsheet and a sudden, sharp inhale that apparently required significant willpower to keep from materializing into anything further. “Yes, well, I assumed you hadn’t done these because they aren’t good.” 

Now, that was the Medan I remembered - bluntly to the point. I half-laughed before realizing there was actually a compliment buried in his statement. He knew the work wasn’t mine because it didn’t meet his standards for being “good”? That was an unanticipated affirmation. I’ve never been good at receiving compliments, so I just stood up to look over his shoulder. “What’s wrong with them?”

He flipped to the next page and raised his eyebrows in silent condemnation. “Well, first, it underestimates your operating budget, and draws funds that should rightly be applied to your overhead to compensate, which is probably why your -” He was so absorbed that, apparently, a flaring allergic reaction could sneak up on him. He seemed to realize when it was slightly too late to fully repress, and pushed the papers towards me to free both his hands. 

He pivoted to turn fully away from both me and Elisa, a gasped inhalation quickly turning to a silent stifle into his elbow. I tend to think of sneezes as being somewhat explosive, but Medan defied that typical characteristic in that it was somehow more implosive - an abrupt withdrawal from conversation, in which he was completely silent, almost totally still, and entirely divorced from anything going on in his surroundings. 

I backed away to give him space, wondering if maybe I should just duck out. Blessing him now if he was about to experience a full-on allergy fit seemed tactless. However, waiting without acknowledgment of his… predicament… seemed rude. I turned to Elisa for guidance, and she beckoned me over to her desk. “I actually need to take a phone call right now - would you mind running Medan through the application and bringing him up to date?” 

Well, that was unhelpful. I 100% did mind her abandoning me to explain statistics to her son, but because I am horrendously hardwired to be agreeable, the words “Yeah, of course, sure” were out of my mouth before I could ask any questions or make any pleas. 

“Great, thanks!” She leaned closer, quickly whispering “He’ll be done soon” before sweeping out, leaving me fiddling with papers and staring at Medan’s tense, unmoving back, waiting for him to turn around.

[Imgonnasneeze]

Ooh nice

[ID2006]

Interesting 

[starpollen]

Ohhhh stubborn arrogant helplessly allergic man??  YES. PLEASE! 🤩🥳😇 

Eagerly awaiting more of this deliciousness!

[brownsasha11]

This is mouth watering good. Awaiting the next part with much anticipation. 

[Kolen]

Yes, please!!

[Serendipity]

Very good so far, excited for more!!

[flowerbearfalls]

On 2/28/2022 at 12:03 PM, marzipan said:

Between his dark blue suit and his extremely crisp diction, he reminded me of an old-timey movie star.

My kryptonite 😍

I’m so excited for more of this story!

[marzipan]

Thank you all for the nice replies. You make a person feel very welcome here!  😄  Brief content note - there's a tiny bit of profanity in this bit.

Medan's shoulders tightened and relaxed in a staccato pattern before rising in a careful, smooth inhalation, preparing himself for turning back to me. We started speaking at the same time, me with a tentative “bless you” and him with a firmly back-to-business “The estimate is imperfect.” We both stopped abruptly when we realized we were interrupting each other, amplifying the awkward. He spoke first, not acknowledging the blessing in any way whatsoever.

“I see my mother has abandoned you to explain things to me. That’s probably for the best. The woman has many virtues, and brevity is not one of them.” He sat down at the chair in front of his mother’s desk, looking at me expectantly. I felt like I was blushing, but couldn’t tell if I was just paranoid or actually turning red as a lobster. 

“Oh, um, yes. Well… how much has Elisa already told you? I don’t want to bore you with repetition, because I imagine you already know most of it.” He shook his head, waving a hand to dismiss my concerns. 

“Pretend I know nothing, please.” I cocked my head at him questioningly, but he didn’t elaborate, so I launched in. “Okay… well, let’s start with these budget figures. Elisa asked me to write up the budget narrative, which is what kind of alerted us to the problems you’ve already seen. We’re looking to hire new staff, one of whom will be a digital accessibility specialist working on bringing our website up to par. We’ve started with basic quality assurance testing, and are planning out the next phases of usability… uh…” 

I paused when he stiffened again, bringing a hand up to rub the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes in concentration. I replayed my internal ignore-or-acknowledge debate on high speed and concluded that acknowledgment was probably the polite way to go. “Uh, you know, none of this is urgent. We can wait until you’re not…” I hit a verbal roadblock. Uncomfortable? Feeling unwell? On the brink of an allergic abyss? In my awkwardness, I settled on an apologetic gesture in his general direction, trying to look anywhere but at his face. When he didn’t reply, I tentatively glanced back. 

He was staring at me, eyebrows raised. “Thanks, but -” he waved his hand dismissively toward himself, reusing my gestural shorthand  “- I think I’ll multitask.” His dry response suggested to me that my internal debate had led me in the wrong direction. Yet, I blurted “Are you sure?”

He nodded with a slight smile. “I daresay if you try waiting on me, you’ll be waiting rather a long wait.” 

The delicious implications of his statement hit me first, and my stomach dropped like I was on a rapidly lowering elevator. He hadn’t broken eye contact with me, and one lone thought managed to pierce my hazy consciousness: “Wow, he has such long eyelashes.” Then, after I’d stared back at him for a second, I managed to reply, “Was that a The King’s Speech reference?”

“But of course.” His breath caught and he froze again, eyes closed, lips pressed together tightly. The switch in attention seemed total, like he had just stepped all the way out of the office mentally and fully switched gears into keeping himself in check. The apparent need for total concentration passed in about ten seconds, and he opened his eyes with a harsh blink that left allergic tears clinging to his aforementioned gorgeous eyelashes. “Carry on.” I’m not sure how he interpreted my facial expression (one that I imagine was a confusing mish-mash of desire, concern, embarrassment, and uncertainty), but it prompted him to append “...if you don’t mind.” 

I stared at him a second, mind blank and face probably even blanker, before my brain re-engaged with my mouth. “No, I don’t mind.” Minding was definitely not the problem. Keeping myself on the task of rattling on about budget narratives while trying not to be hyper-attuned to his every move was more of the problem. “Uh, anyway. Right. Initially, we didn’t apply for funding for usability testing, because I guess we just thought we’d do it all in-house. Turns out that was a mistake.” 

Another sharp inhalation signaled Medan’s sudden distraction. He pinched his nose shut before swiveling his chair so he was no longer fully facing me. I could only get a glimpse of his partial profile, chin quivering as he took a careful, steadying breath through his mouth. He gestured at me to keep going, but all critical deliberations about budgets had dropped right out of my mind. 

  My pause seemed to irk him. “Go ahead. I am still listening.” His tone was decidedly testy, which he seemed to realize as soon as he swiveled back to look back at me. “I…” What may or may not have been the start of an apology was unceremoniously terminated by his face crumpling. He gasped an inhalation and jerked his head down to tuck his face in his elbow. 

The following four stifles weren’t quite as successfully silent as they had been before, but his concentrated intention to remain quiet appeared wholly intact. Working up my nerve, I murmured a shy “Bless you” as he pulled off his glasses to rub his eyes. This time, perhaps because he hadn’t been able to turn away from me in time to more successfully disguise what was happening, he muttered a thanks in return. Encouraged by his responsiveness, I tentatively pulled a single kleenex from a box setting on Elisa’s bookcase and extended it to him. When he didn’t accept it right away, I wondered if I’d been too familiar too soon. But, after a beat, he dropped his glasses on the desk and grabbed it from me - just in time to pivot away from me and bury his face in the outstretched tissue. 

“Httxthh! Httk! Httchhhh! Hehhtsh! Htshk!” His sneezes were becoming fuller, seemingly less readily quenchable, although he was pinching his nose so hard I suspected if I tried to pull his hand away from his face, there’d be fingernail marks cutting into the bridge of his nose. After the fifth sneeze, he didn’t blow his nose or set down the Kleenex, instead remaining frozen and perfectly still, eyes closed and back stiff.

Prodding myself with a reminder to just act normal, I set the box of tissues in front of him “Are you okay? Allergies, huh?” The first question was totally normal and acceptable - and the second one just slipped out.

His answer took a moment. It was clearly a strain to speak, and a slight stammer slipped into his speech for the first time in our conversation, making his forehead furrow in frustration as he replied with a terse “I’m f-f…fine. And yes.” He stood up abruptly and decisively, grabbing his glasses. He had the look of someone about to make a speedy exit. 

I stepped back so he could quickly brush by me and drop the tissue in his mother’s garbage can. He paused in the doorway to his mother’s tiny office and spoke quickly and declaratively. “How about I meet you in your office to review the grant in –” he turned to glance at the clock ticking away on the wall - “a half-hour?” I was still tracking slowly, and the brief pause for me to respond was slightly overlong for his sinuses. As I said “Of course,” he stumbled back against the door frame, tucking his elbow over his mouth and nose as his eyes fell shut. “Htcht! Tch! Heeeh… hchttt! Tchh! Oh, for fuck's sake." His outburst so out of character that I couldn’t even quite believe what I’d heard him say. Profanity? In a place of business? Never - at least, not in the version of him I knew.

In another unexpected move, he stepped back into the office and shut the door with a sharp bang, locking it with one hand while keeping the other hand over his nose and mouth. “Viola, hand me…” Perhaps afraid that he’d keep sneezing if he had to breathe to speak, he cut himself off and just pointed at the kleenex box on his mom’s desk. 

I pulled out a wad of tissues and handed them to him. I felt like asking him if he was okay again would be annoying, so I mixed it up and opted for a “...what’s wrong?” this time. Ah, Vi. A queen of social graces. To be fair, Emily Post certainly never wrote about this situation. Medan started to reply before he cut himself off, gasping a deep breath and launching into a quick, convulsive fit. “Ksh! Tsh! Ekksheew! Hrrrshoo! Hsheee! Hshhooo! Ehh, eehh, Tsh! Tsh! Tsh! Tsh! Tsh! Tsh! Tsh!” After getting the first few sneezes out, it appeared his body had just locked him into a wholly unsatisfying rhythm - just enough to make him sneeze, but not enough to do him any good, and barely enough hang time between them to allow him a slight inhale. He sat down in the chair opposite the desk, leaning forward and propping one hand against his head in a way that made me wonder whether he was getting dizzy.

Once the fit finally hit a lull, Medan reached out for the kleenex and softly blew his nose before answering smoothly, "Nothing's wrong." I blinked at him in a do-you-think-I'm-absolutely-dense kind of way. He stared back in apparent challenge for a second, until he rolled his eyes in extremely expressive annoyance. "Just an unexpected exposure to an allergen. I was... unprepared." He said "unprepared" with the biting derision I usually associate with good old-fashioned swearing. To be fair, given what I deduced of his hyper-professionalism, being caught off guard was probably anathema for him.

"How so? Can I get you anything to help?" The first question was purely a blurted question stemming from my own curiosity. The second question was to assuage my embarrassment about asking the first question. 

He shook his head, blinking sharply. "Not unless you have a change of clothes, a shower, a bottle of Zyrtec, and an ice pack stuffed in that briefcase. And anyway, I was just driving to work and saw a woman chasing after her dog. I told her I’d retrieve it and meet her back at her address, given that she’d been playing keep-away with it for the last couple of hours. She was -” a break in his speech marked another tight stifle, quiet at first but then marked by a half-swallowed cough  - “confused but willing, so I caught it and drove it back to her place, which made me late. And completely riddled with histamines, apparently.” 

I took the opportunity to tentatively interrupt when he went silent, retreating from conversation to crush a series of four sneezes into his tight fist. “I think that was really nice of you.” 

My compliment seemed to make him as uncomfortable as the accumulated fur clinging to his suit had. “Not really, no. I just don’t like seeing people do things wrong.” I raised my eyebrows at his curt reply. “What was she 'doing wrong'?” My slightly sarcastic air quotes didn't seem to faze him whatsoever.

 “In short, she was just chasing it. That’s contraindicated, because the dog then generally either assumes that you’re just playing a game, or that it’ll get in trouble when you catch it. What you should do is tempt it toward you - with food or an open car door or something. You want something that makes noise, that isn’t you calling it. I used a crinkling pretzel bag to tempt it over into my car.”

“Well, I guess that makes sense.” I didn’t say that it was surprising that he’d accumulated any knowledge of dogs whatsoever, given that their presence seemed to make his entire immune system go haywire, but that’s what I was thinking. 

His phone buzzing in his pocket interrupted our conversation. He distractedly murmured an “excuse me” as he squinted near-sightedly at his phone for a moment before making what I can only describe as a slightly more genteel “ugh” sound. “It’s Mother. Looks like she’s extremely salty about her phone call with Sharon. I…” His sentence tapered off and he frustratedly dragged his knuckles against his nostrils. He stood up again, looking just the slightest bit unsteady as he fetched his glasses, and then turned back to me once he’d slipped them on again. “May I tell her that I’m meeting you in your office in a half-hour to discuss the grant?”

“Yeah, sure. That’d work for me.” My hopes were riding on splashing water on my face and munching on a granola bar to restore me to some semblance of non-addled, fully-focused-on-spreadsheets functionality, but I remained (perhaps unrealistically) optimistic.

His quick smile in return was surprisingly collegial, before he had to crush a sudden sneeze, pinching his nose viciously with his thumb and forefinger. 

“Bless you!” My blessing, as expected, went unacknowledged, as he just abruptly nodded at me in parting and walked out the door. 

[lighthousegirl]

Loving this... just my cup of tea. 🤤

[Kolen]

Yum!

[Glimmer]

This is amaaaazing

[BabyGoth]

Agghh!! I cant wait to see where this is going. I LOVE allergic men who prefer to stifle🤤🤤 thank you!

[Alyssa1146]

Omg.  I’m dying with anticipation of what comes next.  

[RavenWatson]

More???

[marzipan]

And some more, here in part 3.  Thanks again for the comments - I'm enjoying writing, and I'm glad you're enjoying reading, too! 

I stared at the closed doorway for a second before coming to my senses and springing into action. Collecting papers, straightening spreadsheets, and readjusting chairs so they were as they were before, I was a whirlwind of efficiency before sprinting out of Elisa’s office at top speed. Anything she wanted to tell me could wait. I wanted to get back to my own office, slam the door, and have a moment of privacy to quell my embarrassingly flushed cheeks and quivering knees before being required to re-enter professional society.

My office was up four flights of stairs from Elisa’s, and my desire to avoid fellow humans led me to take them instead of waiting for the elevator and potentially having to endure awkward chitchat with a coworker. Now was not the moment to make small talk about the leaking sink in our break room or the glitching printer. Now was the moment to focus wholly on my heart thrumming against my ribs and the sweat prickling the palms of my hands. 

Securely back in my office, I closed the door and stood, eyes shut, with my back against the reassuringly firm wooden door. Then, I realized that Medan would be in this space with me in probably less than twenty-five minutes. Jiggling my laptop mouse to see the time, I was horrified to see that seven whole minutes had ticked by. How could that be?! It was time to play my well-rehearsed mind-game: what will [insert whatever person I’m angsting about, whose mind I actually can’t read, despite my best attempts] think when they entered my office? 

I wanted it to feel homey and cozy. Jane Austen and Studio Ghibli posters on the walls, a pale orange armchair and a golden yellow settee, a ceiling-high bookshelf full of both books and potted plants, a little electric tea kettle perched on a tiny round table - my whole office was designed to be a place where I could be myself. I’d seen enough professional offices designed to scare the living hell out of people in grad school. As soon as I got space for an office I didn’t have to share, I’d resolved to make it inviting - to make it my own.

It’s maybe a little old-fashioned to have a personal maxim, but mine has always been: "Never stop doing little things for others." Push the thoughtfulness envelope - lean in all the way. So, when trying to envision Medan’s thoughts on entering my office, I tried to conjure what might make him feel most comfortable. The conclusion was obvious: allergy meds. The nearest pharmacy was just a quarter-mile away, so a dash (that I’d strive to make not look like a dash) was in order.

He’d specifically mentioned Zyrtec, so I got him a bottle of that, and, upon a quick browse of the aisles, I found the closest thing I could get to an ice pack, another item he'd mentioned. It was a bag of frozen peas, so not quite what I was going for, and I wasn’t sure I had the chutzpah to offer it to him anyway. But, if the occasion arose, I’d be ready. It never hurts to be over-prepared.

Checking my watch, I had a cozy ten minutes to make it back to my office, necessitating the ungainly walk/run/flapping about like a penguin perfected by those of us who wear high heels for the *aesthetic* without having the skill to move in them with any degree of grace. I slid into my office with a grand total of two minutes to spare, and collapsed into the settee to catch my breath. I’d sort of forgotten that said run would mean that I’d feel sweaty and sticky and gross - not the impression I’d ideally hope to make, but there was no time to do anything other than fix my hair using my phone’s camera, reapply my lipstick, and and dab the more obvious sweat off my forehead and neck before there was a knock at my door. Exactly thirty minutes had elapsed - the timing so precise I wondered if he had arrived early and stared at his watch until the final minute clicked over. 

I opened the door to Medan, who was cautiously balancing a teetering stack of folders and manila envelopes in various stages of crumpledness. He’d taken off his suit jacket since I’d seen him, his hair was damp, and his sleeves were rolled up and slightly damp along the cuffs. My immediate guess was that he’d probably left Elisa’s office and immediately headed to the bathroom to get as close as possible to taking a shower when at work, in a cramped single-room bathroom, and trying not to crease a very nice suit. Based on the force with which he was pressing his lips together, I gathered the effort hadn’t been wholly a success. 

“Hi! Come on in. Let me take those.” He wordlessly passed me the stack of folders, then gingerly stepped back, his eyes focused somewhere vague above my head. “Please, have a seat, if you’d like.” He shook his head, still not looking at me. At first I assumed he was rejecting the offer of a seat, but as I blinked at him in confusion, I realized his firm refusal wasn’t strictly of me, but was instead part of whatever dialogue he was engaging in with himself when he seemed to withdraw and check out of the external world temporarily, when all of his attention was focused internally. The headshake was one of refusal or denial, but it had nothing to do with me.  

Even though the question “are you okay?” was again teetering on the tip of my tongue, I repressed the urge to ask, instead carrying on with conversation as casually and naturally as I could. “I have a kettle - would you like some tea? Also - and I hope this is okay - I went ahead and got you…” I was too embarrassed to say the words aloud, so I just thrust the bottle of Zyrtec at him, now that his hands were free. He accepted it, looking at me directly for the first time since stepping into my office. I couldn't really interpret his expression, except to guess that maybe his slight head tilt was a little quizzical. 

“Y-y...y-...” I sat down on the settee, working to keep my expression completely neutral as his stammer reasserted itself, seemingly much to his annoyance, if the way his hands clenched on the bottle of Zyrtec was any indication. When the sentence finally came, it rushed out so quickly I almost had to ask him to repeat himself so I’d catch it. “You didn’t have to do that.” 

“I know I didn’t have to. I wanted to. I hope it helps.” I fidgeted under his suddenly piercing stare, finding the prolonged silence more awkward than even the extremely awkward  preceding conversation had been. After the quiet stretched on for seemingly an eternity, I decided he must be offended. Oh, God, I'd put my foot in it. He probably thought I was criticizing him for not having an emergency stash of allergy medication with him at all times, or that I was tacitly saying I was annoyed with the delay necessitated by his allergies, or something even worse that I couldn't even think of off the top of my head. I began to blurt out an apology. “I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to be presumptuous -” 

He interrupted so sharply and unexpectedly I flinched, which I tried to cover by sinking into the armchair. “Jesus Christ, Viola, why are you apologizing?” He popped the container open and tipped a pill out. “Thank you.” I was so rattled by his curt but apparently sincere gratitude that I genuinely didn’t know how to respond, making me thankful when he, after swallowing the pill while continuing to stare at me speculatively, continued the conversation himself. “Tell me about the budget shortfall. I’m listening.”

“Oh. Right.” As I started to launch back into my well-worn monologue about how financial allocations that I didn’t even fully understand were a disaster area, he sat down on the settee, crossed his arms tightly against his chest, and leaned back, eyes closed. This time, I knew better than to interrupt myself to inquire if he was feeling okay, instead just adjusting my usual spiel to describe in detail the stats I was recounting instead of having him look at the spreadsheets alongside me. 

 It was novel - and a little unnerving - to have a completely silent audience. Elisa usually demonstrated that she was listening by interrupting me with questions every whipstitch, and board members usually demonstrated that they were listening by having “more of a comment than a question…” whenever I paused to breathe. Medan was perfectly quiet and still - except for pinching the bridge of his nose and occasionally sucking in a deep breath through his mouth, which I told myself in my strictest internal voice to ignore. 

“We’re, um, we’re applying for several grants to, um, hire on specialists in web and graphic design. We have six, uh, sorry - six applications under consideration right now, and four more in process…” My ums corresponded to Medan sliding his fingers up to right between his eyebrows, his thumb and forefinger pressing protectively against his sinuses in the classic headache-relief-position. My impulse to check if he was okay was harder to quell this time - he did not look particularly comfortable - but he stayed statue-still and kept his eyes closed, so I carried on with the explanation.

Being jumpily attuned to his movements, I noticed that whenever his breathing seemed slightly shakier, he’d press his lips together and tilt his head down with the slightest of headshakes, like he was reminding himself that this was apparently not the place nor the time even as I was trying to remind myself, for rather different reasons, that this was not the place nor the time. I, however, had the good fortune of knowing that he wasn’t scrutinizing my every expression the way I was scrutinizing his, given that he’d cut off his searingly focused eye contact in favor of keeping his eyes shut.

“And… I guess that’s just about it. We’re hoping to be able to have a surplus and reallocate $25,000 at the end of the next quarter, if that’s helpful at all. Um… do you have any questions?”

Medan blinked sharply, keeping his one hand where it was and reaching into his trouser pocket with the other. When he pulled out a handkerchief and held up a finger to indicate I should wait, it was my turn to blink and then pretend to redirect my attention to my phone, suddenly deeply engrossed by a nonexistent text message. 

A gasped inhalation initiated a flurry of sneezes, half-choked back and fully smothered in his handkerchief. The fit initially seemed a little less wrenching than the one he’d had before - more consciously self-contained and controlled. However, when he tucked his apparently-rendered-useless handkerchief back into his pocket and just leaned forward into his elbow, propped against his knee, I realized his allergies were settling in for the long haul. Less intense? Maybe… but that’s no comfort to the person experiencing exhaustion through allergic attrition. The rhythmic monotony, barely getting enough time to suck in a breath between sneezes, was probably every bit as tiring, and possibly even more potentially embarrassing.

Asking if he was okay seemed patently ludicrous, so I just got up from my chair and sat down next to him on the settee, trying to nonverbally communicate both my sympathy and my complete non-repulsion (indeed, I was anything but repulsed). He didn’t slide away, despite there being room to. He just turned away from me slightly so I couldn’t see his face, his shoulders and neck continuing to tense and relax for just a moment before being forced to tense again with the pressure of another oncoming stifle. Since he wasn’t facing me, I was surprised when he spoke, taking advantage of a brief moment of reprieve. “Well. This is… exasperating. I-hheehh….” 

His thought interrupted, I interjected a hopefully reassuring “It’s fine.” I was struck by the impulse to reach out and put my hand on his shoulder as it shuddered with the effort of keeping himself quiet, but I stuck my hands in my pockets instead. I knew I’d later wonder how painfully transparent I’d been about how very much I appreciated how he looked just now - no need to draw his attention to me, too.

His next sneeze came on agonizingly slowly, leaving him audibly gasping in stuttering inhalations until they struck, three stifled sneezes in approximately the same number of seconds. The perfect silence following was broken by a congested sniffle as he turned back to me. He was flushed and visibly disheveled, yet seemingly preternaturally composed, with no evidence of embarrassment in sight. “I can help you with the grants. The first thing-” His eyes flickered to mine with what might have verged on a smile before his breath caught again. He rolled his eyes, his irritation with both his body and the situation keenly expressed before his face went slack in preparation for another bout. “Httsh! Httcht! Htsht! Hshttt! Ahhtshxt!” 

I stood up from the settee, shuffling nervously toward my desk as I wondered if he’d rather be alone with his misery. But then I wondered how weird it’d be for me to come up with some quasi-compelling excuse for leaving my own office, and instead cloaked my decision to stand by fetching him a wad of kleenex and hesitantly extending it to him like a figurative olive branch. He accepted it silently, stood up himself, and again held up a finger for me to wait on him before stepping out of my office. Despite not being able to see his efforts to clear his sinuses and stem the allergic floods, the damp gurgling from outside my door would likely have been unpleasant to ears other than my own. 

Take this moment alone to compose yourself, woman! I shrieked at myself mentally. I had just enough time to look at myself in my cellphone camera and be aghast at how much I was blushing before Medan reopened the door. As I hadn’t composed myself even in the slightest, I blurted “You okay?” He replied with a nonchalant shrug, crossing my office to sit back down. “Is… this… all still from the dog this morning?”

He looked surprised by my question, which in turn surprised me, given that it seemed the only question to ask in the wake of such a spectacular display. “Um. No.” 

Wait. What? I raised my eyebrows at him in a silent request for clarification that he ignored until I made it explicit. “No?” 

“No.” He leaned back, like his second “no” had actually clarified something, which I found quite annoying.“Then what’s… what’s…” My inquiry was incoherent, but he seemed to understand it, although he dismissed it with a casual “It’s fine.” 

“It’s pretty clearly not 100% fine, given…” Another wave in his general direction completed my inarticulate point. 

He sighed, removing his glasses to rub the heels of his hands against his eyes. “The lavender on your bookshelf. But it’s honestly fine.” 

His reassurances of “fine”-ness were not reassuring. “You knew?! As soon as you came in?” 

He stared at me, head tilted in thought, clearly weighing his options. “Well…” His “well” was as good as an acknowledgment. “Oh. My. God.” My voice was reaching glass-breaking levels of shrill. “Why didn’t you tell me?!” 

His defensive response of “Because I didn’t want to?” was so inadequate that I didn’t dignify it with a reply. He paused, his intent stare disconcertingly discerning as he put his glasses back on and collected his thoughts, still watching me thoughtfully. His dark gray eyes seemed bluer when they were watery, like they were now. “It’s… It’s just… It’s your office. I didn’t…” He trailed off, leaving the thought fragmented. This time, the pause didn’t seem due to his train of thought. He stood up again, picked up his spent handkerchief, and stuck it back into his pocket, all his motions precise and sharp. “I’ll e-mail you about the budget this evening. I’m sort of doing consultant work here until I find, in my mother’s words, ‘a real job.’” 

His desire to be elsewhere was palpable, so I let his unfinished thought slide. “Okay. Sure, that sounds like a plan.” He nodded at me, his hesitant smile acknowledging my puzzled but on-the-whole genuine one, before leaving my office. As he closed the door, a smothered sneeze punctuated the otherwise quiet hallway. 

[Serendipity]

very cute! looking forward to more

[BabyGoth]

Ugh im drooling 🤤Would we by chance ever get to know his perspective of things? 🙃

Thank you!! 

[starpollen]

9 hours ago, BabyGoth said:

Ugh im drooling 🤤Would we by chance ever get to know his perspective of things? 🙃

Thank you!! 

Ooh I love that idea.  But this is perfectly lovely as-is!  Do, please, continue! 

[Kolen]

On 3/23/2022 at 11:26 PM, starpollen said:

Ooh I love that idea.  But this is perfectly lovely as-is!  Do, please, continue! 

I agree with all of the above!!

 

[marzipan]

Yes, it'd be fun to write from Medan's perspective too! What would you prefer - the same events from his perspective? Alternating between his and Vi's perspective between chapters? Sticking with Vi's perspective here and writing his perspective in another thread? Other ideas? I welcome input.  This fourth part is still from Vi's POV:

As soon as Medan left, I realized I was staring after him blankly, probably with my mouth hanging open in an expression of total discombobulation. Collecting myself wasn’t so easy, though, since the sharp left turn from hot-and-bothered to anxious-and-guilty took me on quite the mental short-circuit. Fortunately for me, after just a few minutes of tedious self-recrimination and regret, my coworker Javeah popped into my office to talk shop. Chatting took my mind off the embarrassment factor of my brain becoming mush in front of Medan… until she asked me offhandedly, “Hey, have you met Elisa’s son, Medan? I hadn’t seen him around before, but she just introduced me.” 

“Uh, yeah, I know him.” Usually, I’d provide more background, but I was pretty sure my nervous twitch at the mention of his name had already caught Javeah’s attention, since she raised her eyebrows at me with a curious smile. 

“Well, he seems…” she trailed off, like she was expecting me to fill in her sentence like some kind of workplace mad-lib, but my cautious attempts to not incriminate myself kept me quiet until she filled in her thoughts herself, lowering her voice even though my door was closed. “...kind of intense. I was definitely sensing some tension between him and the boss, so I think we’ve got a real powder keg on our hands. Or maybe he’s just not feeling good. He looked pretty peaky."

 I suddenly entertained a fantasy of changing my name and moving to a deserted island to avoid ever seeing him again. “Oh, god, that’s all my fault.” Javeah’s quizzical look prompted further explanation. “He was just in here, and it turns out he’s allergic to one of my plants. He said he was fine when he left, but… Did he really look bad?” 

Javeah, bless her soul, instantly tried to backtrack to alleviate my anxiety. “No, no. If he said he’s fine, he’s fine. I guess it just seemed like he kind of couldn’t get his breath and was pissed about it, which, you know, fair enough.” She laughed. “I’d be pissed too if my mom was trying to make me #network while I was mid-allergy-attack. But, you know Elisa.” We exchanged knowing looks. “She’s a… force of nature.”

After Javeah left, the difficulty of chucking all unproductive thoughts about Medan out of my mind exponentially multiplied. I’m no stranger to a good old-fashioned anxiety spiral. The vague but looming sense of dread that somehow, despite my total lack of foreknowledge, the lavender trigger was totally my fault and probably meant that I was a bad person had trapped me in its tendrils so tightly I quickly recognized that I wouldn’t be able to use my brain for anything other than worrying until I’d taken some action to assuage my guilt. Writing off taking a lunch hour, I headed straight for the elevator to make a return trip to the pharmacy. 

Picking up a nasal spray, a package of eye drops, and, after racking my brains for anything I could remember Medan enjoying in high school, a bottle of iced coffee, I scanned myself through the self-checkout to avoid the awkwardness of revisiting a cashier so soon after my last visit. Also, buying allergy-related accoutrement felt inherently awkward. I could feel my cheeks heating up as I thought about the itchy, breathless, yet incongruously self-possessed person I was buying this for - which only compounded the embarrassment factor.

Once back in my office, I immediately decided that there was absolutely no way I would possibly deliver this self-manufactured care package to Medan in person. So, after compiling a list of the likeliest locations for Medan to be, I walked to each - the first one being his mom’s office. At the far end of the hall, I could already hear his voice (slightly raised, and quite hoarse - Javeah’s read had definitely been right when she assumed he was pissed off). I was excruciatingly tempted to eavesdrop, but I sternly told myself to mind my own business and just leave the package outside the door for him. 

**

As promised, a painstakingly detailed e-mail from Medan summarizing everything wrong with our aspirational budget arrived in my inbox later that night, right as I was reheating leftover lasagna for dinner. It figured that he’d be working past the dinner hour - it seemed like him. He didn’t mention anything beyond number crunching and grant writing, which was good for a deep sigh of relief. 

Still, the next morning, I went into work on high alert, every nerve twinging whenever I heard anyone outside my door. I couldn’t figure out if I wanted to see Medan or if I really, really didn’t. Agonizing over what turned out to be a four-sentence reply to his e-mail took me a half hour - a use of time that would make any efficiency expert weep. Settling on a salutation was hard enough (“Dear Medan”? Absolutely not, for obvious reasons. “Hi”? Too informal. “Hello, Medan”? Too stilted. “Good morning”? Too casual - and, given that I felt on the cusp of anxiety meltdown, fairly inaccurate). Once I hit “send,” I deleted the message from my sent folder to just clear the whole thing from my mind. 

Once a couple colleagues dropped in to my office to catch up or run something by me, I started to relax a tiny bit. One new coworker, Min, complimented me on my “green thumb,” which reminded me to get the lavender out of my office. Stuffing it into a double-layered plastic bag and cramming it into my work backpack felt like the exact opposite of a green thumb, but the mental checkmark of consideration also helped me dismiss my lingering anxieties. Or so I thought. A recognizably sharp, hard knock at my door still made me jump like a startled rabbit.

When Medan walked in, I tracked his gaze as it reflexively darted to the empty space on the shelf where the lavender once was, before he blinked and refocused. While he had been deliberately nonchalant about the allergy attack yesterday (at least, nonchalant about it to my face), he clearly wasn’t keen on a repeat.

“Good morning! How’s it going? What’s up?” Instead of responding verbally, he extended two crisp $20 bills to me, like that was an answer in and of itself. “Sorry - what’s that for?” 

“For the meds from yesterday.” The meds clearly hadn’t done as much for him as one would have hoped - the m in “meds” was more adjacent to a “b." I contemplated hedging and claiming ignorance - I’d tried to be an anonymous giver for a reason - but he seemed so completely confident that he was right in his guess that I didn’t think I could fib with any degree of persuasiveness. 

“Oh, no. You don’t have to do that, really.” He continued holding the bills out to me despite me making no move to take them. 

“But I want to.” The combination of his stubborn persistence and his slow, crisply deliberate articulation impressed on me the knowledge that I could argue this point until I was an old, old woman and he’d still not move an inch. 

“No, really. It’s nothing.” 

He scoffed. “It’s very literally not nothing. To be exact, it’s $40.” 

Trying to get my point across to him was like talking to a brick wall - certainly futile - but I’m no slouch in the stubbornness department myself, so I took a stab at it. “No, it’s… it’s my fault that you — it’s literally the least I could do. It’s not even an inconvenience.”

Brooking no dissension, Medan dropped the bills on my desk and slid a paper weight onto them. “If it is indeed your fault that I’m allergic to every goddamn piece of flora and fauna on this earth, then your omnipotence is wasted in this desk job.” 

 “I wasn’t saying that, I was just saying I should’ve known – “

He interrupted, sarcasm dripping from his every word. “Oh, well, congratulations then on your remarkable omniscience. I should have known, based on your admittedly impressive curriculum vitae, that perfect foreknowledge regarding even the tiniest, most insignificant minutiae was only a matter of time.”

My responding, impassioned “ugh” of total exasperation was not a sign of the maturity that I imagined as fitting for a person with remarkable omniscience or an impressive CV. “Just… just take me out for coffee sometime and we’ll call it even.” Ah, the joy of speaking before thinking - the immediate desire to time travel back a couple seconds and keep yourself from stuffing your foot in your mouth so hard your toes dent your neck. 

However, I didn’t have to come up with a subtle and tactical technique for personal disappearance - perhaps like dropping a smoke bomb and vanishing forever in a mysterious plume of purple fog - because Medan just tilted his head at me and said, “Okay. When?”

[starpollen]

Loving this story.  Definitely would enjoy all parts from his POV, if you’re up for it. ☺️

[BabyGoth]

I got so excited to see this was updated!! Omg so many options i think all parts from his pov would be great too, just because im very curious what his inner dialogue is especially as he has his iner battle about the lavender and what its like to see her agian after 2 years and of all things he is fighting an intense allergy fit. ....but do what is good for you! I love everything youve done so far and cant wait for more!

[RipleyToo]

He should catch a cold next 😜

[sprinkles287]

Ohhhhmy.   I’m in love, once again, with a fictional character. Medan is perfection. I can’t wait for their coffee date!!

And however you want to write the rest will be wonderful. I’m all for hearing Medan’s POV for everything.