A/N: Hopefully people are still reading, but silly ol' FFnet has that whole borked hit counter thing going on, so I can't be sure. In any case, I'm still having fun with this. Hope you are, too. :)


Sookie POV

Over the course of the next two weeks, running into Eric became a regular part of my day. Almost every time I ran into him, it was in or around the elevators. We both got to work at the same time, but our lunches varied; one of us was usually getting back just as the other was leaving. We didn't see each other at the end of the day, but the way he talked about his job led me to believe that he had longer hours than I did.

In those brief meetings, I'd learned that he did some kind of phone work as well, but it was more on the technical side of things. At first he assumed that we did the same type of "phone stuff," but I was quick to clear that up after he started tossing tech terms at me. I had no idea what a Cisco was, what VoIP stood for, or any of that other nonsense. He'd been disappointed, but recovered well.

As far as he knew, I was a customer service representative. It was true, in a very loose sense. I was good at my job, and I wouldn't say I was embarrassed about it, but it didn't seem like the kind of thing to bring up to someone I barely knew.

One day, for the first time, he and I left for lunch at the same time. I'd heard Tara, one of the newer girls, talking about a really good noodle place that was only a block away. Since I had an hour for lunch, I figured I had plenty of time to go for something a little less like fast food than my usual fare.

Eric was already on the lift; he worked on the seventh floor.

"Fancy meeting you here," I said, grinning as I stepped inside the doors. Since this was the only place we ever ran into each other, it was one of our little running jokes to act surprised whenever we shared a lift. "Are you just now going to lunch?"

"Yep. Niall was telling me about a noodle shop not far from here. I decided to take a later lunch, so I could avoid the crowds."

I blinked, surprised. "Wow, that's where I was heading. Heard about it from one of the new girls. Mind if I join you?"

The easily flustered air he'd had when I met him the second time came roaring back. Apparently he was fine with elevators, but lunch was way outside of his comfort zone.

"Um, I..."

My stomach clenched, and suddenly I didn't feel hungry anymore. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to impose or anything."

"No, uh, it's not a problem. I just, um..." He gulped. "I'd really like it if you came to lunch with me."

The strange feeling in my belly changed, but didn't entirely go away. I wondered if I was getting some kind of stomach flu, or if I was just really hungry. Whatever the case, I figured I shouldn't order anything too spicy at lunch.

We walked out of the building together. Eric had started out at a fairly brisk pace, but slowed down when he realized I was having a bit of trouble keeping up.

"Sorry. Sometimes I forget how long my legs are."

I laughed. "It's okay. Not everyone is as short as I am." I was only five foot four; only a few inches shorter than average, but those few inches really seemed to matter next to him. He was easily a full foot taller than me.

Over the past year, I'd become quite good at coming up with things to say, but none of those things were appropriate for strolling down the street with Eric. I cleared my throat awkwardly.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets and watched the pavement pass under our feet. "We seem to do our best talking in elevators."

I bit my lip, trying to not think about all of the men who would disagree with that statement. "Oh, you know how it is: when you talk for a living, it gets hard," I paused, cringing at the pun he didn't realize I was making, "Uh, gets difficult to talk in your off-time."

"Yeah, I've done more than my fair share of tech support. I know how that goes. But we don't have to talk about any of the stuff you discuss in your customer service job. It's not like I'm one of your customers or anything."

Since there was no coffee for me to choke on, I somehow managed to inhale some of my own saliva. We stopped walking; his eyebrows furrowed as he watched me turn all sorts of interesting shades of purple.

"You okay?" he asked, once I'd managed to get myself back under control.

"Yeah," I said, hoping I didn't look as embarrassed as I felt. "I always feel like an evolutionary failure when that happens."

He chuckled as we started walking again. "Nah. Happens to the best of people. Something I've been curious about: what kind of company is Ravenscroft Industries?"

I wrinkled my nose. "Let's not talk about work. We're on our lunch breaks, after all."


Eric POV

I wondered if Sookie was trying to be mysterious, or if I was simply being too nosy. I wanted to know everything about her. Every time I saw her in the elevators, I tried to find out something new. Even if it was just what sort of food she liked, or how she took her coffee (blonde and sweet, just like her).

I was a naturally curious person; it was one of the things that made me so smart. I'd scared away a number of people by coming on too strong, by wanting to know too much, too soon. It was a hard lesson for me to learn, but I found I had to keep myself at arm's length from most folks, just to keep them around at all.

Sookie was more of a talker than she let on. She wasn't averse to it at all: once she got going, she could talk a blue streak. I didn't mind that, not at all. If anything, I had to concentrate on her words so I didn't get lost in the sound of her voice.

I learned that she was originally from the south, but not from Atlanta. She'd grown up in a small town outside of Shreveport, in Louisiana. She and her best friend, Amelia, had moved here after high school. Amelia could afford to go to college, but didn't want to; Sookie wanted to, but couldn't afford it. The two of them had been best friends for most of their lives. I was still a little vague on the details of how or why they'd chosen Atlanta, but I didn't want to pry. I didn't want to scare her off, too.

At the restaurant, she ordered some pad thai noodles; that just happened to be one of my favorite dishes, but I decided to order something else. When the food arrived, she closed her eyes and took a deep sniff of the steam coming from her plate. The quiet hum she let out was still audible over the noise of the crowd around us, and it sent shivers down my spine.

I prayed that she didn't wasn't one of those women who moaned when she ate. That was always dangerous, and with that voice of hers? Walking back to work would have been incredibly difficult. Worth it, but painful.

With the first bite of her meal, she frowned slightly. "Is it okay?" I asked.

"It's not bad or anything, but it smells better than it tastes. How's yours?"

I hadn't even tried it yet. I took a small bite of my teriyaki udon. It wasn't the best I'd ever had, but it wasn't bad. I shrugged as I chewed.

"It's passable."

"Gran would have my hide for all the talking I've been doing. Tell me about yourself?"

"Gran?" Was that a proper name, or was she referring to one of her grandparents?

"My dad's mom," she explained. "She raised me and my brother Jason after our parents died. When Amelia and I were halfway through our senior year in high school, her mom died; Gran took her in so she wouldn't have to move to Atlanta until after she graduated. When Gran died, two years after that, Jason kept her house, and Amelia and I moved out here, where her dad lives. Where did you grow up?"

Ah, there were some of the missing puzzle pieces. "I was born in Sweden, but my parents moved here a few years after I was born."

"Ooh, do you speak Swedish?" There was a slight gleam in her eyes, one that made me glad for my answer.

I winked. "Ja."

She beamed at me. "That's neat. I've always wanted to learn another language, but I've heard it's so much easier to learn when you're younger. How'd you get into tech work?"

"I've loved computers since I was a kid. How did you get into phone work?"

To my confusion, she blushed. "Oh, my previous job was a phone thing. With the phone company, actually."

"Did you get laid off?" It wouldn't have surprised me. A lot of companies were sending their customer service jobs overseas.

"Ah, no. Their phone system made my voice sound... weird. I got tired of the customers teasing me about it. I quit after about a month."

That confused me even more. I knew the local telco's phone system; it was on a larger scale, but ultimately the same one we used at DeCastro. If anything, it should have made her voice sound crystal clear: like they were in the same room. I couldn't imagine ever teasing her about that voice of hers, and had no idea why anyone else would.

Something didn't seem right about all of this, but I knew I was missing a fair bit of information. She already looked like a startled rabbit, ready to run. While I wanted to know more, I hated seeing that look on her face.

"Hey, I wonder if they have thai iced tea here," I said, hoping to ease the tension. "Have you ever had it before? It's really good stuff."

"I've heard it's really sweet, but I've never tried it," she said, looking relieved.

The next time a waitress walked by, I stopped her and asked her to bring us two thai iced teas. She returned a few minutes later, drinks in hand.

Sookie stared at them. "Are they supposed to be bright orange like that? And what's that white stuff? It looks like someone melted a Creamsicle."

I grinned. "The tea is supposed to be that color, and I think the white stuff is condensed milk. I'm not sure if you're supposed to stir it, but I always do."

I grabbed the straw in my tea and swirled the liquid until it had blended, making it look almost like carrot juice. Sookie did the same with hers, then picked up her glass and tried a sip. Watching her lips wrap around the straw had a much stronger effect on me than it probably should have. Bad idea, Eric. Very bad idea.

Her eyes snapped shut and she moaned after she swallowed. "Mmmm. Oh my god, Eric! This stuff is delicious!"

As dry as I suddenly found the inside of my mouth, I thanked every star in the sky that I hadn't been drinking at that precise moment. What cruel or benevolent god could make a woman's voice sound so much like raw sex? That couldn't be natural, but there was nothing coy or shifty about her. It didn't seem like she was doing any of it intentionally.

I must have been gaping; when she opened her eyes, she looked at me like I'd grown another head. I closed my mouth and almost knocked over the glass in my rush to take a gulp of tea.

However much I wanted to get to know Sookie, I had no idea how I was going to do it without making a complete jackass of myself.

The rest of our lunch was friendly, but slightly awkward. We talked about completely inconsequential things: local attractions, music, movies – that sort of thing. The more I worried about frightening her away, the more I picked up on her nervous body language. She seemed so relieved when we left the restaurant, it made my stomach twist up in knots.

I didn't know what it was about her. Well, okay, that wasn't exactly true. She was gorgeous. She had a voice like a sex goddess. She was sweet, she wasn't full of herself, and while she wasn't big into computers, she wasn't a complete idiot.

I wasn't totally inexperienced when it came to women, but she did something to me. I'd never felt anything like it before.

If she had never said a single word to me, the first time we'd met, I probably wouldn't have remembered her. It was like she'd put me under her spell, with those thirteen magical words.

The fact that I had even counted them... Yeah. That just wasn't right.

It was so strange: I'd seen her once, and then not at all for an entire month. Just when I thought I'd never see her again, there she was. From then on, I saw her almost every day. It was always in passing, but it was better than nothing. On any day where we didn't see each other, I went home feeling nervous. Wondered if she was going to disappear again.

Wondered if I was losing my mind.

We were halfway back to the office building when Sookie spoke up. "Thanks for letting me come with you. I wouldn't mind doing that again, sometime."

I tried to rein in my disbelief. Was she serious?

And had she intentionally emphasized the word "come?"

Was she trying to kill me?

I gulped, hoped my smile seemed casual enough, and responded, "It would be my pleasure."

I might have given a slight accent to that last word. But did I imagine it when she appeared to shiver, oh so slightly?

The revolving door at the front of the building was jammed up again. Sookie smiled up at me as I held the front door open for her.

As we walked through the lobby, I noticed the sign for the gym on the second floor. I was giving serious thought to getting a membership with them. I was naturally lean and strong, so it wouldn't necessarily be for working out. I was starting to think it might be a good idea for me to have easy access to a cold shower at work.


Disclaimer: All of the characters contained in this story are property of Charlaine Harris. I don't own them; I just like to play with them a bit.