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chapter twenty-five: dense paperwork

"Hey, Petunia," she hears yelled across the entire floor (making some of the newer employees jump – one poor nervous young man somehow knocking over both a container of pens and a folder full of documents that he scrambles after - and the others just shake their heads) long before he reaches her. She doesn't even flinch at the volume, hasn't since the third day after she was moved up to this floor, and by the time the messy haired, middle aged man actually gets to her desk, Petunia has set her papers neatly down. She is waiting calmly, hands interlaced in front of her, perfectly poised.

Looking at how she is seated and her droll expression, his grin grows to almost manic levels.

"You yelled, Mr. Peterson?" she asks, not a hint of amusement escaping her.

He rocks back on his heels at the question. "Did I?" he seems to ask himself, frowning - and she actually wonders for a moment if in the space of time it took to walk over to her he forgot why he made the journey. Petunia almost starts to suggest he call from his office next time (she knows he won't – he enjoys startling the new people. She's pretty sure he just enjoys yelling sometimes just for no real reason at all.)

Before she can though, he continues. "Oh, I did!" he brightens again. "Petunia," he leans against her desk, whispering in an absurdly conspiratorial tone, "I think I have a meeting today. Something about marketing." He snaps his fingers repetitively as he tries to think - out of the corner of her eye she can see a woman glare at him over the edge of her cubicle.

"Yes, Mr. Mantlo is coming at 2:30 PM to speak with you about the print ads," she answers the prompt without having to look anything up - Petunia doesn't bother to ask what happened to his calendar, the one she is sure he was given (she gave it to him, after all) since she knows his schedule inside and out anyway.

"Mr. Mantlo. 2:30," he repeats to himself, very seriously, as if trying to commit it to memory. (It never works – that's why she had given him the now missing calendar.) The seriousness doesn't last long though and he switches to the grin again. "Lunch?" he asks, tilting his head like a puppy (purposefully pushing her with the over-juvenile, cuteness unfitting a man his age and position).

In direct response to his absurdity she loses even more expression and the words, "Turkey club on rye, from the deli across the street. I already ordered it," seem almost robotic from the amount of inflection she uses.

"Thanks, you're the best," he says jovially, his smile becoming almost insanely wide, and hitting her desk before pointing at her (complete with ridiculous finger guns). She only raises her eyebrow in response and he cackles like she has told a great joke and wanders in the direction of his office again.

He is, of course, almost all the way there (in the door frame in fact), when he yells, "What time, again?"

(The pens and papers go flying again and inwardly she sighs – perhaps Davidson should be transferred, his nerves might not be able to take this. She'd have to make the suggestion quietly to Jon from HR, who'd become a bit of a friend, he'd be sure to make it seem like a good thing to the jumpy man.)

"Mr. Mantlo. 2:30 PM, Mr. Peterson," she responds in an utter monotone, barely raising her voice – it wasn't really necessary.

"Thanks, Petunia," he responds, still yelling and she bites the inside of her cheek not to let her lips twitch.

Another, much quieter, person makes her way over soon after - leaning against her desk with a mug of tea. (Well, much quieter compared to Mr. Peterson. She was well aware of her approach from the clunk of the ubiquitous boots.)

"You should say something if he keeps bothering you like that," the curvy woman said, matter of factly, pushing her loose wavy brown hair out of her face.

Petunia glances up at Meghan, frown spreading across her face. "Who said I was bothered?"

"It's one of the reasons we've had such a hard time keeping secretaries in the past," Meghan confided, in a low tone. "He means well and he's brilliant – but Peterson is an absolute hyperactive child and it can be a bit much for some to take."

Petunia's eye glanced briefly to the door their boss had left through before she shrugged dismissively. "Then I'll just continue to treat him like a child. I seem to be the one keeping track of his schedule and eating habits anyway."

Meghan let out a bark of a laugh. "You're a riot, Petunia,"

She just looked up at her uncomprehendingly – the statement had been meant in all seriousness - which, if anything, set the woman off in earnest.

"Oh, Petunia," she asked, when she had her giggles under control. "I've been meaning to ask you – thought I might as well before I went and dug through the contract, you always seem to know – what's company policy on freelance work? I've gotten some offers lately and don't know whether I should just turn them down."

She easily rattled off the line from memory, smiling a bit inside that this no longer made her feel uneasy - that so many found this odd quirk of hers useful, had almost come to depend upon it here. After she had gotten the job, Petunia had made sure to work her way through all of the dense paperwork, that no one else ever really read, common to all office jobs. In this electronics field, that was her employment now, there were seemingly mountains of it. And it wasn't hard to find time to read through it all in the very beginning, when, unsure of her capabilities, they gave her so very little to do outside of answering phones.

She never claimed to understand all the contract legalese, patent information, and electronics information she could spout off – but she could recite it verbatim. And that had proved to be valuable time and time again.

Which, in turn, had made her useful – and that felt good. She might just be a secretary but she felt confident in her position, in herself even.

Petunia had never really felt that before.

Now, at this point in her life, within her twin roles of single parent and office worker – she was actually more comfortable in her skin than she ever had been before.

There was plenty she did not know (plenty that she feared – especially when it came to Harry's future) but she was capable and had accomplished so much more through determination than she had ever thought herself able.

Things had changed, and they would continue to do so – but so had she.

And that was a good thing.