"Great news, everyone!"
'Oh, God… What crazy idea will have crossed Mr. Blue's mind this time…'
"I've been talking to Hans and our HR team, and it's settled: starting tomorrow, we all be camping in the office for a whole week!"
What?! He must be joking, but his enthusiasm and his wide grin seemed to say the contrary.
"Excuse me, sir… I think I'm not understanding…" I said hoping I did hear wrong. "We're supposed to live in here for a whole week? Like… seven days without going home?"
"Yess! You got it, Anna!"
Everyone started looking at each other, but no one seemed up to say a word.
"But, sir… some of us have a family that is waiting for us in our home, and we need to meet with the owners of the products whose campaigns have been assigned to us."
"Of course you will! Do not worry at all, dear: your families will be attended, I'll make sure of that, and our contractors are aware of the situation and will come here for the meetings. You'll continue to do your eight normal work hours, and the rest of the day will be for resting, relaxing, and strengthening bonds."
Damn it, he was being serious! What else could I say?
"Is this mandatory, Mr. Blue?" Kristoff asked with a tired face.
"Of course it's not. That wouldn't be legal! Haha! But I strongly recommend both of you to participate in this. You know you need it."
Shit. Mr. Blue was looking at me. So that was our fault too… Kristoff was looking at me too, frowning… Sven was looking at Kristoff with a wide smile, and Hans… he was looking at me too; but he wasn't frowning or smiling, he was just nodding satisfied.
It was settled…
I glanced at Kristoff once again. I didn't thank Kristoff for the advice. I didn't even know if I should… But it's not like it was easy for me to talk to him. It had never been; not once.
I remember the day he arrived there as a new employee. I was bewildered by his appearance. I should have been blind to not seeing how hunky he was, how soft and wild his hair fell, and how sweet his look seemed… But the sweetness didn't last too much.
"I present to you our new team member: Kristoff Bjorgman. I know we're not used to big men like this, but let's not get crazy, this huge man comes ready for action! He has an excellent resume and extensive experience, so please make sure you guide him properly to get him up to speed and treat him with the respect he deserves."
He was our second man, but, although Sven seemed happy with all the attentions the girls gave him, Kristoff seemed rather uncomfortable.
The poor boy, large as he was, had the look of a frightened child. I'm sure that, at that moment, he just wanted the ground to swallow him up. Mr. Blue has never been able to shut up his thoughts and he was embarrassing him terribly.
The girls didn't make it easy for him either. Soon they surrounded him and began to ask him questions of all kinds. I remember the mischievous look of Megara, who is no longer part of the staff because she left everything to go to Greece to live life with her last contractor. I also remember Belle giving him tour after tour through the office and piling books and more books on his desk. She also recently left the company to become a bookseller. I remember even better, how Esmeralda ran her lascivious finger along his shoulder and his jaw… However, she soon grew bored of sharing him with the rest and found herself another target: Sven. Fortunately, Sven only seemed to have eyes for Kristoff. They soon became good friends, and Sven became Kristoff's friendly anti-woman shield. He attracted them all and didn't pay too much attention to any of them. I guessed Jasmine hadn't gotten into that plan yet… Sven was busy working with me this time.
The thing is, no matter how overwhelmed he seemed, Kristoff always managed to bring out a kind smile and a few polite words for every woman who approached him. For everyone except me.
I wasn't looking for anything, I just thought that amidst all that pestering, maybe he could use another friend, but I guess I didn't come at a good time because what I got was the contrary of kindness
"A rough start? Fame has a price, huh? Now you know what it feels like to be a rockstar."
I found him sitting on the fire escape, probably trying to hide.
"Oh… It's just you."
"Excuse me?"
Just me?
"Couldn't you just leave me alone?"
"Oh, being so rude there, aren't you?!"
"I am rude?! I'm not the one not leaving the new guy five minutes to breathe!"
"Okay… I can see you are a little stressed, so I'm leaving."
"That would be nice."
"Hey! I was just trying to actually be nice to you and to offer you my friendship!"
"Sure…"
"What? Do you think you are so irresistible that no woman can approach you without wanting to fuck you?!"
"No, I'm pretty sure you don't want to fuck me. You're just approaching me because you want to get closer to Sven. He's the one you want to fuck."
Okay. Maybe he had a point, but that wasn't the reason I was approaching him.
"You are such a jerk, you know that?!"
He didn't answer. He just turned his face toward the gray cloudy street and sighed.
"Okay. I guess you don't need my friendship at all. You don't deserve it, in fact! But you're gonna regret your words, Bjorgman!"
Next thing I did was telling Belle where she could find him for the next tour.
From that day on, we started a silent war. We put salt inside the other's coffee, quit the toilet paper just before the other entered… He blocked my view of Sven always he had a chance, I told Belle I saw him lost looking for some papers in the archive… He always sent me insinuations about my crush on Sven… And, since all the girls settled with looking at him instead of trying to talk or something more, I just didn't really know how to tease him anymore. He was brilliant in his job, so I couldn't do anything there, and I didn't know anything about his private life, so that was a dead point too. But he kept teasing me with that haughty smirk, that strong crossed arms, and… that look…
Anyway, our weird hate relationship was somehow fun. But, of course, silent or not, our war arrived at Mr. Blue's ears and he would not let something like that happen in his team, so there we ended, about to be secluded in the office for a week, with a guy that I didn't really know if liked me, a guy I liked but he didn't like me back, and a guy that hated me and that will spend the whole week laughing at me while Miss sexy nose/cat eyes was hanging from his neck and whispering things to his ear. Simply great.
