"Cassandra. You're back and feeling better I presume?"
Cassandra smiles up at Jenkins. "Yes, thank you."
"That is good to hear." Jenkins says as he returns to his work, sorting through a pile of recently refound books that had been in the wrong section earlier.
Cassandra nods as she begins to walk away. She has tried desperately to ignore the feelings of awkwardness she has felt ever since her impromptu move to ask him out had failed. He had told her that he loved her. It wasn't the same way she had dreamt of hearing him say it, but it was enough. It was something afterall. She could live with that.
"Cassandra." Jenkins calls out as she shuffles past his desk.
"Yes Jenkins?" Cassandra asks trying to remain calm. She forces her hands to fill themselves up with a book from by the clippings book. That way they wouldn't go to the hem of her skirt.
"I am very hopeful that our previous conversation along with last nights ordeal changes nothing between us."
Shouldn't that be her line? She was the one to ask him out after all.
"Of course not. That is, as long as you don't want them to."
"I do not." He answers and she smiles briefly.
"Jenkins I am not sorry that I asked you out. If it made you uncomfortable I am sorry for that, but I was resolute that that would be my last night. I wanted to spend it with someone I trust and care for. Someone who would live on after gone and remember me. Not many would, and I didn't want you all to know. I don't want my moment of emotionally instability to harm our friendship. Not in anyway." Cassandra admits trying her face from flushing. Her confession made her sound desperate and she couldn't stand that, but back then she had been desperate. Now, days later she had to face the consequences. They had to have this talk. It was the adult thing to do.
Cassandra watches Jenkins as she awaits his reply. Expecting him to fully comfort her would be too much. So she would let him decide where the lines would be drawn now.
"Cassandra, you are a dear friend to me. As well as an important person to this library. You were in a rather distressing situation. Yet you overcame it and are here with us now. Even if you hadn't planned to." Was it her or did he sound hurt. "I only ask that you don't hide things like that from me in the future." There it was again. A slight hint of pain in his voice. Her hiding it had hurt him. They shared a lot with each other. She confided a lot in him. Told him more than anyone else. Had hiding it really been what had hurt him the most. Not embarrassment or anger, but the fact that she had hidden this from him? Suddenly she felt like an even bigger idiot now.
Eventually Cassandra found her voice. "I promise Jenkins."
"Good. Now if you aren't to preoccupied by that book you are squeezing the life out of I could use some help with the the basement level aquarium. Apparently there is another leak." He offers with a small smile at her.
Cassandra felt giddy again. "Yes! Or, well, of course I would like to help you Jenkins." She avoids using the L word that had been said quite too much already. She didn't want to make this awkward again. She sets the book down and scrambles over to the towering man as he leaves his desk behind. "What do you need me to do?"
"Well that will depend on where the leak is." He answers.
"Of course." She replies trying to sound as if she already knew that.
Neither of them had noticed the colonel holding a thief back behind one of the shelves. So they would remain unseen. He was rolling his eyes as Colonel Eve Baird was trying to figure out what had gone on between the two. As she lets Ezekiel go she decides to get it from Cassandra later.