The picture on the TV flashed blue hazy light across the walls of his lonely flat. It illuminated the half empty drinks cabinet, the magazines that littered the small glass coffee table and his shoes lying on opposite sides of the room from where he'd kicked them off earlier. He stretched out, one of his toes protruding through his sock as he realised not for the first time that week he'd put on a pair that were past their best. The remote grew heavy in his hand as he stared blankly at the screen, slowly working his thumb across to the off button so the room was engulfed in darkness, only the little winking red standby light for company.
Nate groaned. He couldn't go on like this.
There was no point to his life outside of work…well there was but the point didn't really seem to want him. That point was Becky James and his feeling for her were multiplying by the minute. Earlier that day he'd been standing looking over her shoulder at one of Jimmy's paintings and he couldn't help but drink in the smell of her apple shampoo, notice the thin silver chain with a small B charm hanging around her neck. These were things that he shouldn't be doing. He knew that, hell that was probably what made it feel so good. It was unprofessional, highly unprofessional.
Becky was a colleague and relationships with colleagues never ended well. Look at Sam and Phil, Sally and Ben, Kezia and Smithy, Emma and Will, Millie and…well nothing really happened with Arun but other people seemed to think that an insignificant detail. Still there was something about the way Millie always clammed up when his name was brought into the conversation, shut down, refused to speak. There was always that niggling feeling in the back of Nate's mind that maybe it was something Millie needed to talk about no matter how much she tried to avoid it. It had been a few weeks since he'd last seen Arun after running into him at the off-licence. To say the meeting was awkward was a bit of an understatement.
But back to his relationship with Becky…well his non-existent relationship there was not much he could do about it. He didn't really know how to deal with a woman who wasn't interested in him, to be perfectly honest there hadn't really been a time for unrequited love with Nate. It just wasn't something that had occurred yet. Well until now that was.
Scratching his head Nate picked himself up off the sofa and trudged through into his bedroom, pulling his shirt off over his head and unbuckling his belt as he went so he could slip between the cold sheets without a second thought, asleep before his head even hit the pillow. His dreams however were plagued horribly by Becky's angry face as she screamed at him and for some reason Millie with tears trickling down her cheeks as she looked at him through the glass. Waking up drenched in a cold sweat Nate took in great deep breaths of air as he calmed his racing pulse.
The illuminated face of his alarm clock told him that it was 4am and there was little point in going back to bed now. Padding through into his kitchen Nate turned on the kettle and stood at the sink as he waited for the water to boil. He couldn't get Becky's face out of his mind, the indignation and hurt in her eyes as she shouted at him to leave her well alone. He couldn't work out what he could have done to hurt her that bad…and as he pondered that thought he laughed to himself. What did it matter…it was a dream after all!
Millie sat with her back up against the headboard. Her phone lay cradled in her lap, the backlight casting a spooky green glow over her skin. Flopping sideways she groaned to herself. Why wasn't anything easy any more? When she's been younger, new and fresh faced straight out of Uni she hadn't had a care in the world. She'd found a fairly nice flat to rent, had a string of pleasant boyfriends and enjoyed her work and social life. But recently…her flat had made her feel claustrophobic and tied down, she hadn't even had a guy make a pass at her recently and as for work well the less said about that the better.
Max had been Millie's eye candy for weeks, the regular butt of all jokes with Mel and Sally but his abrupt manner with her and instant dismissal had done more than just shaken her confidence. It seemed like it had crushed her enthusiasm for playing the dating game full stop. Sally was seeing this new guy Marco who owned one of the local bars and Mel had her squeeze Jake to contend with so she'd been spending more evenings in alone with a microwave meal for one and only Friends and Scrubs for company on those long nights.
It wasn't that her friends had intentionally abandoned her but as their lives grew more busy hers seemed to empty of everything that was important to her and had once provided her with so much happiness. On a rare night out with the girls recently they'd run into Ben, Nate and Will who were also out on what was felt to be a well deserved night on the tiles. Nate had made her feel so special and she'd gone home glowing, with a sparkle back in her eyes as she recalled how he sat with his arm casually around her shoulder and while they danced his hands hugged her waist tightly, his smiling face showing what a good time he was having with her. It was next day at work that was the problem…the shine was gone and she was just his ordinary beat partner again. He didn't even acknowledge the closeness between them the night before…the closest they got to touching was when he handed her a Styrofoam cup of coffee!
Oh well, there was more to life than men Millie thought to herself as she scooped up her cat Freddie and snuggled down under the covers, her finger already hitting the play button on her Sky + so a repeat of Friends flickered across the television screen. Freddie curled up in the crook of her arm, purring loudly as she tickled his ears. At least somebody loved her.