Hello! I hope you all are doing well. On time this time around and it is another long chapter, so I hope you all enjoy! Once again big thanks to my lovely editor who did another fantastic job. Thank you all again for your reviews. I believe I managed to respond to everyone this time around. I hope you all enjoy. It's going to be a busy weekend so expect another update on Monday. Thank you again!
Sundays are like the eye of a storm. They are peaceful and quiet with no sign of what is about to come. Monday mornings are when things storm to life all over again. The threat of a storm begins to loom as soon as the sun sets on this Sunday night, like thunder off in the distance, as Tobias and Tris watch some old black and white film. He realises that this is the end of their weekend, safely ensconced in their little bubble of comfortable companionship and doing whatever they wanted to do. Whether that was breakfast in a fancy dining room or pizza off of paper plates in front of the TV. The thought sits in the back of his mind and won't fade away no matter how hard he tries. Just like a pesky mosquito, it keeps coming back and biting a hole right through his current serene reality.
Not only does Monday mean the end of the Tobias and Tris wonder weekend, it also heralds the beginning of what is sure to be his father breathing down his neck every second of the day. Since the morning phone call that woke him up, Tobias has avoided all of the things he should have been doing in terms of work. Procrastination at its finest. But that doesn't mean he can stop thinking about them, the anxiety churning through him relentlessly. Tris must feel it radiating off of him as she keeps suggesting he do some more of his work. Clearly she caught snippets of this morning's conversation. He keeps shushing her and pretending to watch the movie.
It's nearly midnight when he runs his hands over his face and stretches his arms out. He glances over at Tris, thinking she should be asleep by now, but she still sits on the other end of the couch with her knees pulled against her chest and her arms wrapped around them. Her head rests on top as she watches the film with rapt attention. Due to the darkness of the room it takes him a second to recognise that she is crying.
He really wants to do the right thing in this situation. Say just the perfect thing to comfort her, or perhaps give her the space she needs and not say anything at all. In all honesty, though, Tobias is actually quite clueless as to which is the correct action to take.
His arms drop mid-stretch and he turns his face back to the TV, trying to pretend he hasn't noticed her tears. But then he can't help himself, peeking over at her every few seconds, and even though she doesn't look back at him he feels relatively certain that she is well aware of his stare. Now, instead of the impending Monday morning demanding all of his attention, Tobias can't think of anything else but, what do I do?
The panic that ensues over a girl crying is actually somewhat comical. Perhaps even he would find it humorous if he wasn't the one panicking and she wasn't the one still crying. Finally, he clears his throat and, while still looking at the TV, dares to say, "Are you okay?"
Tris doesn't answer at first and he fights the urge to look over again to check and see whether she has somehow dozed off or if she's simply ignoring him. The silence continues to grow between them before Tris finally squeaks out, "Fine."
Her voice sounds so frail and small that it hardly convinces him of anything. Still, he doesn't dare to look over and contemplates just leaving it at that and going off to bed. After all, what else is he supposed to do? Pat her shoulder and try to reassure her half-heartedly? "Are you sure? Because if it's not that's…alright. We can, like, talk about it or something." He tries very hard to sound comforting and helpful, but really he feels pretty useless.
Tris actually lets out a small laugh at him. It throws him off just a bit. "Thank you. I think I'm just tired, though."
"Oh," he responds quietly, but doesn't yet make a move to leave and let her sleep. He rubs the back of his neck and dares to look at her again. She has wiped her face and offers him a small smile, her eyes no longer on the TV screen. "It's okay, you know? To cry if you need to." He shrugs nonchalantly. Partly because the thought of her crying even more is a bit alarming and partly because he doesn't want to make a big deal of it and cause her to be uncomfortable. "I mean, I don't really cry, 'cause I'm a guy. But you…you can." "You're a man. Stop your goddamned crying." The voice still echoes in his head to this day. He will never forget when he was a child, hiding under the desk or his bed or the table trying to cry as quietly as possible. The pain that followed is also far too well remembered.
Next thing he knows, Tris's hand is on his forearm and he shifts his gaze away from staring at the TV to look over at her. "Thank you, Tobias," she says again, her words heavy with sincerity. She reaches over and kisses his cheek softly, for just a second, before returning to where she had been sitting before.
Instantly, Tobias feels the blood draining from the rest of his body and rushing furiously to his face. He feels like multi-organ failure is about to come next. "Y-you're welcome," he says jumping off of the couch to go excuse himself off to bed. He hopes it's dark enough in the room that she can't see how red he is turning, but feels as though a large, neon flashing sign is pointing at his face, exposing his telltale blush. He might as well just scream his attraction to her. Instead, he sputters, "I'm going to head to bed now, you know, work in the morning and all, but, uh, you…you help yourself to whatever and I'll see you later. Well I don't mean later today since I'm going to bed, although it is after midnight, so I guess it will be later today, just not tonight…but, well, you know, the morning."
He walks to his room with his head hanging in shame, too embarrassed to turn back and wave goodnight to her one more time. Or to allow her an opportunity to respond to that humiliating projectile word vomit he had just hurled at her. He shuts his door and falls onto his bed, still dressed in his clothes from their foray to the bar, and just one thought cycles through his mind endlessly. At least the blood hadn't all rushed someplace else.
Somehow, it isn't quite as comforting as he'd hoped.
The alarm is just as annoying as it is every other morning. The room is just as cold and miserable as always whenever he's forced to get out of bed. And the shower is once again his only saving grace. It is still dark outside when he wakes up, which he is convinced is part of the problem, but he turns on all the lights in the bathroom and shuts the door hoping to trick himself into thinking otherwise.
At first, all he cares about is how cold and tired and overall miserable he is, but as the shower water slowly begins to wake him up he forgets to care about his deep-seated exhaustion, and instead focuses on the anxiety of what he'll be facing this morning.
Much like his first day on the job, he knows in theory what he'll need to do in order to placate Marcus, but he can't help but worry that there is no way for him to do it. He had only been eighteen when he started, and he had spent thirty minutes that morning ironing his clothes over and over, trying to get the creases in his pants right just like Ms. Rosa always used to do for his dad. After that, he made a point to use the dry cleaners instead. Walking through those huge doors at work had seemed to hold the promise of a new life coupled with all of the burdens of the old one.
Even now, he sometimes hoped that one day the giant office building really could hold his future. He hated his father, even from a young age. He resented him and lacked any loving memories to make up for all of the awful ones. But that didn't change the fact that Tobias had looked up to him. He remembered sitting on the bathroom counter while his father combed his hair perfectly and tied his tie just so. He remembered the smell of his after shave in the mornings. In the evenings the office left a different scent on him, something akin to mustiness combined with paper and old coffee. It seemed so glamorous, even if Tobias hated every other aspect of the man; he aspired to be a successful businessman just like him. The conversations around the dinner table about his father's investments and advances up the proverbial work ladder lingered as some of the only positive memories he had of his childhood.
Tobias's face in the mirror on that very first day at work was some scary reflection of how his father had looked back when he was still young enough to sit on the counter and stare in wonder at him. And at first it was as wonderful as he'd thought it to be when he was a boy. But in truth, as he got older and realised just how little option he truly had in joining the family business, he disliked it more and more. Nothing could have prepared him for just how greatly he'd end up resenting this dumb job.
Three years later and he still hates it. In fact, he despises it more every day. But today will be stored away as a special sort of anxiety-filled day for him. He can't just show up and hate it and walk around with his head down and simply get through the day. No, now he has to be competent, even better than competent. And all of his years prior have been a waste because he feels like today is his first day ever with all of the knowledge he has.
Green is the best colour to describe how he is feeling when he emerges from his room in pursuit of coffee despite the fact it will probably just fuel his nervous jitters even more. His towel still hangs around his shoulders and he readjusts the waistband of his boxers, too tired to fully dress himself just yet. He takes his towel and runs it over his face again as his hair drips onto it. When he pulls it away he opens his eyes and finds Tris staring at him, her jaw hanging slightly open.
"Shit!" he exclaims. Somehow, and he really isn't sure just how the hell he'd managed it, he succeeded in momentarily forgetting that she was out here, in all of her freshly-woken glory. Her hair is rumpled, and an imprint is still pressed into the side of her cheek from how she slept. Her coffee cup was halfway to her mouth but was now paused, hanging shakily in the air. "Sorry, I…wasn't thinking." He turns around, struggling to identify a reason that might help him save face in this awkward situation. "It's been a long morning," he sighs, surrendering his dignity with a slump of his shoulders.
Tris giggles behind him. God, does he enjoy it when she does that. "It's okay, Tobias. I've seen men in their underwear before."
"Right, yes, good." He clears his throat and just stands still another moment longer, staring back at his open bedroom door. "Well I'm just going to go…get dressed." And then he hurries down the hall, closing the door firmly to his bedroom and leaning heavily against it.
It seems this day is going to kill him, one way or another.
Tobias exits his room, this time fully clothed and much more put together. He makes himself some breakfast while Tris sits at the island and watches him with a smirk on her face. He does his best to ignore her entirely. But try as he might, he can only pretend to ignore her. In reality, he is hyperaware of her untamed bedhead and the fact that she is still wearing his T-shirt. Apparently, his conscious and subconscious mind are both so focused on these details that he becomes incapable of managing other basic tasks at the same time, resulting in him blithely pouring a cup of hot coffee onto his suit and successfully scalding a portion of his chest.
At first, Tris is nothing but concerned as she hops up and grabs a dish towel, pressing it against his chest in a slight panic. Needless to say, the burning from the coffee is the last thing on his mind in that exact moment. But once she sees he is just fine she dissolves into hysterical laughter which he turns and walks away from in order to go change into clean work attire. When he walks back out Tris has put his coffee in a to-go cup with a lid and smiles cheekily at him. "Didn't want you to hurt yourself."
Tobias frowns at her teasing, but takes the cup regardless and then grabs his briefcase and leaves. Imagine his surprise when he takes a sip of his prepared coffee only to find it's exactly as he likes it. Apparently, he's not the only one paying attention to these things.
This small detail is enough to put a bit more of a spring in his step, at least until he actually arrives at the office, fifteen minutes early despite the coffee mishap. Once he's there he feels like shoving his hands in his pockets and staring at the floor, trying to pretend he isn't there both for his sake and everyone else's. But today is the day to start proving himself, apparently, so he attempts confidence at least long enough to walk through the door.
Perhaps his mood can't be classified as chipper, but he does hope that maybe friendly and professional would be applicable words as he smiles and nods at his colleagues. Honestly, he is relatively impressed with how many names of people in the office he actually knows. Most everyone there is enough of a kiss-up that they all respond in earnest with overly enthusiastic greetings of their own. Tobias is also surprised to see that there are quite a few people who don't even care enough to bother kissing up. Lazy, Tobias thinks. Everyone knows being a brown-nosed suck-up is the only way to get anywhere with an office job. Probably explains why teacher's pets always succeed in life.
He sets himself up at his desk, pulling out the ten pounds of paperwork he stuffed into his briefcase this morning and laying it all out. It doesn't take much to tell that he feels unprepared and is completely disorganised. Even though technically nothing is happening today, Tobias knows something will be happening. His father had been serious on the phone last night. Now that Tobias lives on his own his father only gets like that on rare occasions. Generally, either when Tobias already has screwed up, or when he is just about to. Although he doesn't fear a beating in his office on a Monday morning, he doesn't doubt a scolding will most likely be in order. That is, unless he is somehow able to know all of these stats well enough before Marcus manages to show up.
It's all rather daunting, just staring at all of the work he has cut out for him. How is anyone supposed to master this much information in their lifetime, let alone a mere week and a half! Not to mention this is Tobias of all people. He's not exactly known for cramming and studying, or even for having the slightest gift for reading stocks or overly complex graphs with standard deviations and outliers. Not for the first time, he wishes he would have at least considered higher education or at the very least to have paid attention in Ms. Combs 10th grade algebra class.
Unfortunately, Tobias didn't study when he was a kid. He didn't even apply himself. Anything past junior high and he was lost. Come to find out, business requires an awful lot of math comprehension and application. Perhaps he shouldn't have been as surprised by this, it wasn't like he hadn't been there when his father discussed his work, often this included a rambling of all sorts of numbers. Perhaps he'd just been in denial, seeing as how this whole math thing put him at a pretty big disadvantage. It was a gap he had no idea how to close.
Over the next couple of hours he tries his best to study everything, he really does, but his brain, much like this morning, wants nothing to do with the task in front of him. Instead, Tris floods his every thought and it almost paralyzes him just how much he cannot stop thinking about her. It doesn't seem healthy. After all, Tobias has dated many girls before. He has even told girls that he loved them before. He dated one girl for almost nine months before she broke it off with him. It wasn't as though he was a stranger to crushes and relationships and that very unmanly feeling of butterflies fluttering in his gut.
So, why is…whatever this feeling with Tris is, so consuming? He thinks he can compare it to falling ill. All you want to do is forget how miserable you feel, but instead you can't help but acknowledge every ache and pain and twist of your stomach. Only this feeling isn't miserable, well, not all of the time. This feeling is kind of wonderful and beautiful and magical, but also horrible and painful and confusing all rolled into one. A part of him just wants it to go away. Go away so he can go back to being the man who just wanted to be kind and do something good. A bigger part thinks that maybe altruism isn't his driving motivation, or at least it hasn't been for a very long time.
So considering that the morning was spent in this manner, with his head in one hand whilst his other one flips through papers and pretends to read them, it's a bit alarming when his father announces his presence by flinging the door open and storming into his office. Tobias swears he jumps a foot in his chair and remembers very abruptly just why this studying is so important. Thoughts of Tris finally manage to fly right out of his head.
Tobias sinks back down into his chair, hoping maybe it can just devour him whole and put him out of his misery. He crosses his arm over his chest and tries to swallow. His mouth is too dry for it to be effective. "Hello, Father," he tries to say with as much dignity as he can muster. Just like when his father walked in the door every evening after work, or late at night if he'd visited the bar and had managed to inebriate himself already.
Marcus stares him down for a moment and then glances at his desk. "Tobias," he answers gruffly. As always, Marcus is the picture of perfection. Not a single hair in disarray and his pants perfectly pressed with the creases in exactly the right spots. It didn't even look as though he had sat in his car on the way here with them on. He probably hadn't. Tobias could just imagine him getting to work and switching out of his mildly rumpled work pants in exchange for a completely new pair. The idea is completely ludicrous, yet just plausible enough that he considers it a real possibility.
"Speak, boy," his father demands, pulling Tobias out from his thoughts only to realise his in-depth consideration of what his father does with his pants has caused him to completely miss whatever he was saying.
Tobias clears his throat and picks one arm up to rub his hand along the back of his neck. "Sorry, what did you say?"
The question obviously sets his father off, and even though Tobias is almost positive his father would never lay a hand on him in the office, his confidence in that wavers with the look on Marcus' face. "Maybe if you got your head out your ass every once in a while you would know." He doesn't shout but the low tone is somehow more threatening. "I asked you if you were done studying the goddamned papers I gave you yet."
Now, a normal person wouldn't need to explain they aren't finished yet as anyone can plainly see that he is still working with them. However, Marcus is not a normal man, and he does not want a normal answer. The only reason he is asking the question is because he already has an answer in mind. And Tobias had better damn well answer it right or so help him God.
"I was just finishing up, actually," he lies, crossing his fingers in the hope that his father doesn't turn around and start quizzing him. Now that he thinks about it, he sure wishes Tris had insisted on helping him last night. She is good at helping him study.
Marcus looks Tobias up and down and scans the office. Tobias feels the familiar twinge of fear. Suffice it to say that the butterflies have all been chased away. "Good," is all he says, but his voice remains harsh. "I have more."
It takes everything in Tobias not to look horrified in this moment. "No problem," he says instead, trying to infuse enthusiasm where there is none. "Just send it my way."
Marcus takes two steps toward him until he's standing right in front of his desk and then he lowers himself until he is eye level with Tobias. "You'd best not be fucking with me," he says in a low voice. The stance, the growl, the manner in which he talks - Tobias is reminded of a menacing dog trying to protect its territory.
"Never," he answers promptly, offering a fake smile.
Marcus smacks him once across the face. A sissy hit, he used to call it. The first time his father ever hit Tobias it had been just like that. At only four years old, Tobias had immediately burst into tears. "You don't cry about a goddamned sissy hit, son," his father had bellowed at him. So now he remains stone-faced, not really caring about one little smack anyway. Now that he is older it doesn't even faze him. "There's a meeting at three on the material you claim you're so well versed in." It's clearly a threat. "Show me."
When the office door slams shut behind him Tobias finally breathes again, his hand flying up to touch his red cheek before he can even think twice.
Exhaustion is an interesting concept. You always think you've met it before, hung out with it, probably shared some coffee with it, but the truth about exhaustion is that you never really know when you've truly experienced it, because there's always comes another time when you'll be even more tired.
At least, that's how Tobias feels by the time the day is finally over. His body is worn out simply from how utterly exhausted his mind is. All of the stress and anxiety and the fact that he hasn't eaten yet today is getting to him. His mind just wants to shut off and not boot back up for about ten years.
As he goes home he feels like an extra from The Walking Dead. He grunts in response to the doorman and leans heavily on the elevator wall. When he opens his apartment door he takes just enough time to take off his shoes and toe them carefully into place, then say "Hey," to Tris who stands in the kitchen once again surrounded by amazing scents. He walks on by and then collapses face first onto his bed.
He decides that he's not going to move, not anytime soon, at least. Now the day is through and he doesn't have to worry about pant creases or if his tie is straight or whether or not he is contributing enough in some dull statistical meeting. Now all he worries about is how deeply he can bury his face into the pillows in hopes of suffocating himself. Well, not really, but yeah, a little bit.
Tobias doesn't feel the least bit awake, but he also knows that he isn't really asleep. So he just lays there, breathing in stale pillow air and hoping that soon he won't be conscious anymore.
At some point the bed dips down, significantly enough that he figures it must be another person. Which means it must be the only person who would be worth seeing right now. So, he finally emerges from the pillows and takes his first breath of fresh air in God knows how long. He sits up and looks over at her. She is radiant, even in the early darkness of winter she is still glowing.
"So, I was thinking," she starts and it's only now that Tobias sees the tray full of food. "We've eaten just about everywhere else in this house so I was just like, what the hell!"
It's so perfect, and she's so perfect, and suddenly the stress seems to untangle itself from every knot in his body and finally sets him free. "Breakfast in the dining room and dinner in bed?" he asks with a light chuckle, because it seems just weird enough.
"Tomorrow I'm thinking lunch in the bathtub." She laughs at her own joke which is even more endearing and Tobias can't help himself as he smiles widely at her.
This is it, he thinks to himself. This is the most I have ever wanted to kiss someone else in my life. There's a million and one reasons as to why he can't though, so many that even he can't ignore them. So instead, he sits up just enough to reach her cheek and presses his lips to it. Unlike hers, this kiss is not quite so chaste, his lips lingering a bit longer than absolutely necessary. When he pulls away he hovers not an inch from her face as she turns to look at him. So close now that he can feel her breath and see the freckles that sit across her nose. He sees a tiny scar, right on her lip.
If he moves just half an inch more he'll be kissing her. And if he moves just a bit more than that she will be underneath of him, on his bed. He quickly slams the door shut on that thought and instead just inwardly gloats when he sees her blush bright red. She still handles it in far better stride than he had. "Thank you, Tris," he whispers over to her before finally pulling back and examining the tray properly.
Unlike him, she doesn't dart from the room and stammer and gasp, making him look even more like an idiot. But she does smile, a lot. And then she licks her lips and looks away and they both pretend nothing ever happened.
"You're welcome," she adds a moment later, her eyes meeting his once more as she attempts to hide the giddy smile continuing to spread across her face.