There was someone new in the office.
She was sitting ten feet away in her cubicle. Standing from his, Colin could make out just the top of her head - brown hair, a bit frizzy. He mimed sipping his mug of room-temperature coffee. He gained no sustenance from actually drinking it, but he did enjoy the feel of the mug in his hand. He was never quite sure what to do with his hands when they were empty.
A new person in the office meant a new person to learn. Most humans could be drained through similar means, like through quoting long-winded online articles, or dropping the dullest of trivia facts he knew. But each human was unique and had their own specific pet peeves they just couldn't stand. Once Colin learned what those pet peeves were there was no hope for them. Draining someone in a way only they could be drained was far more satisfying than through simple everyday annoyances. Not that he didn't bother everyone in the standard ways, too.
Valerie in accounting couldn't stand sentences that ended in prepositions. Or saying something like "he could care less" when he actually couldn't. Or using the word "literally" in a figurative sense. A total grammar nazi, Valerie was. So Colin intentionally riddled his speech with errors when he spoke to her, hoping she would try to correct him, so he could ignore the correction and piss her off further. Once while on his morning rounds, Valerie had tried correcting him again.
He'd told her, "Val, I literally could care less what you're talking about."
He was pretty sure he saw a small blood vessel pop in her right eye at that one. Her rage that day was burning, moving through increasingly rapid arcs through the air directed straight at him. The energy tasted spicy and hot. He'd had to close his eyes when it happened, as he couldn't help the blue glow emanating from them.
George in HR had been a tough cookie to crack, until Colin discovered his aversion to sound. Chewing, burping, sniffing, coughing. Even uneven breathing disturbed him. Colin always tapped his fingers against his mug when he spoke to him. George would try to pretend it didn't bother him and smile through the frustration, but Colin could feel his discomfort wrap around him like a cold blanket made of burrs. Itchy and spiked.
Colin thought George might have misophonia, an intense dislike of sound, which he meticulously researched one day so he would have something to drone on about the next time they talked. That conversation exhausted George, leaving him slumped over tiredly on his desk before Colin had even gotten halfway through his explanation. But George had also bought noise-canceling headphones after that day, so he must have retained at least a little.
Colin had no knowledge of this new girl except that she was in payroll, had brown frizzy hair, and was Biff's replacement. Biff, the guy he and Evie had drained into a coma. He was still asleep as far as Colin knew, but it had been eight weeks and the payroll department had waited long enough for him to wake up. Colin hadn't noticed his absence and had easily forgotten him. But now he was replaced, and Colin could suddenly remember how Biff preciously guarded his personal space, was bored to tears specifically by history trivia, and that his greatest joy in life was looking after his cat, Chestnut. Colin idly wondered who the cat would go to now and if they could possibly love it as much as Biff had. He doubted it. He'd felt how strong that love was, that soft and warm and nebulous energy. It tasted gross.
Colin decided to do some reconnaissance and get to the bottom of what might bother the new girl. And find out what she looked like. And find out her name. That should probably be number one on the list, actually.
The beige-sweater-clad energy vampire began his trek around the office, his faithful mug in hand as he slowly visited each cubicle. First he spoke with Dana, then Joe, then Fran - who he always referred to as "Flan" much to her annoyance, then Paige, then Rob, and so on. He greeted each with something equally banal like "how's it hanging" or "catch the game last night?" He never knew to which game he was referring, but somehow they always did, and they never wanted to talk about it. He asked each of them about the new girl, but none of them seemed to know anything more about her than her name. It was Joan.
Eventually he reached the water cooler, which happened to be the perfect spot to observe the new hire. It was directly behind Kim and Lyle's cubicles, so he could stand behind the short, gray wall they shared and look over it at Joan's desk. He imagined he must look similar to his roommates like this - peeking over a wall to eye his prey, hiding in a dark corner of the office.
Joan, the frizzy-haired woman in payroll, was familiaring herself with her cubicle. She opened each drawer, looked through each folder, and meticulously explored everything Biff left behind. She looked over his sticky notes, slowly taking them down and stacking them on top of one another on the desk. She began consolidating their information onto a separate sheet of paper, which she pinned to the soft fabric of her cubicle wall, over the coffee stain left on it. Colin had gotten too close to Biff once, causing him to panic and throw the mug, spilling coffee all over the floor, desk, and walls. His embarrassment that day was potent.
After finishing her notes, her head suddenly spiked up, and he sensed a moment of remembrance from her. A sharp, short, and bright kind of feeling. She pulled her bag into her lap and dug inside until she pulled out a small plastic orchid with pink flowers. She set it on the side of her desk, tilting its leaves toward the sunlight as if it could actually benefit from the light. She smiled a little, then looked at the small picture frame she had placed the orchid next to. It was a photo of Chestnut. Joan lifted the photo closer to her face, pursed her pale lips into a sad frown, considered it, and nodded once to herself. She placed the photo back where it was next to her orchid.
For a few moments she sat idly in her chair, spinning it slightly on the balls of her heels. She looked over her desk, her computer, her orchid, and Chestnut. Then she sighed a deep sigh, leaned back in her chair, and closed her eyes. Colin sensed her attempts to right herself - center herself in the space, adjust to the environment she would now be spending forty hours a week at. He snorted, and pretended to sip his mug again. If humans were actually any good at controlling their own emotions, he'd have starved in a week.
He could sense boredom from her, a thick, rich energy that oozed into the air. She'd been here, what, two hours? She was already bored? Usually there was a little excitement, at least, that came with starting a new job. Or nervousness, too. But there was neither. Just a deep boredom, and, strangely, a deep appreciation for something he couldn't identify. He was seven feet away. If he was closer, he might be able to find out.
He may not have understood why she was feeling so bored, but that wouldn't stop him from draining it anyway. He pulled a bit of that bored feeling away from her, like spooning a dollop of molasses. It tasted soft and familiar. He saw her relax a little more into her chair, fatigue from the mild draining.
Then, with a sudden sharp spike of lucid awareness, she opened her eyes and stared straight at him.
"Shit!"
He quickly ducked, spilling a bit of his now-cold coffee on the gray carpet. Unfortunately, Valerie from accounting had been passing by and saw everything. She cocked a brow at him in question. He could sense pity from her - a hollow, pointed kind of energy. It was bitter. He didn't know how emotional vampires could acquire such a taste for it.
He was still ducking. "Heyyyy, Valerie. What are you up to?"
She rolled her eyes and walked away. Her annoyance tasted much better than her pity.
After waiting a few minutes, staring at the bubbles that occasionally floated up in the cooler, Colin slowly began straightening out to peek over the wall again. In the time he'd been hiding, she'd apparently set herself to whatever task she was meant to be doing once she'd settled in. She'd spread countless papers along the desk and was referring back to them as she worked on her computer. Seeing that she was clearly deep in the middle of her work, Colin decided this was the perfect time to introduce himself. It'd probably be more awkward, now that she'd seen him spying on her. Awkwardness had a tangy, uneven quality to it that he never grew tired of.
He walked over and tapped "shave and a haircut" on her desk until she looked up. Derek, who worked in the cubicle next to hers, gave him an annoyed side eye. Derek couldn't stand any kind of distraction from his work, especially if Colin was the one attempting to be distracting.
Colin held out his clammy hand to Joan. "Hey, newbie. I'm Colin Robinson, I work in … well, I work."
She stared at his hand for a moment and shook it, cringing a bit at how limp his handshake was. He was the master of the weak handshake.
"I'm Joan. Joan Jordan."
He shook her hand three seconds longer than was customary, then nodded his acknowledgement. After waiting an awkward beat, he said, "Mondays, huh?"
For a moment she only stared at him with wide gray eyes. He sensed two puzzle pieces click together in her mind as she looked him up and down. She smirked, just the tiniest bit.
"It's Wednesday."
He sipped his mug, actually drinking a bit this time. Coffee tasted remarkably similar to pride. "Kind of weird to start work on a Wednesday."
Her smirk widened. "Kind of weird to forget what day it is."
He shrugged his shoulders. It didn't surprise him that he forgot the day. They all ran together, mostly. He woke up, went to work, drained his colleagues, went home, drained his roommates, then went to bed. And so it went on for years. Hell, most of the time his roommates couldn't even keep track of the year, so he was doing pretty good, in his opinion.
"Well, y'know, I'm on office time. I believe it was in May of 1905 that Albert Einstein said that 'time is relative,' a scientific revelation that…"
He proceeded to give a very long-winded explanation of the Theory of Relativity, diving deep into the science of it all. But she wasn't bored. On the contrary, her boredom seemed to lift the longer he went on. Her eyes twinkled with amusement, like she was in on a joke he didn't understand. His voice tapered off when he realized scientific facts weren't the way to annoy her.
She rested her weight on one side of her chair. "Why'd you stop? I didn't understand much of it, but you looked like you had more to say."
She wanted to laugh at him, he could feel it. Her delight was airy but sour. Like a lemon-scented cloud. He thought he might actually prefer pity to this.
"You … you didn't interrupt me."
The twinkling in her eyes began to fade. Her amusement dwindled until it was replaced by some other feeling. He felt … sympathy, from her. Sympathy! Directed at him. That was new. It felt like - well, he didn't know what it felt like. He didn't have a metaphor on hand for that one. It was foreign.
"Did you want me to?"
"No, no. I mean, yes, but …" His head bobbed with indecision. He needed to switch tactics.
He gestured to the plastic orchid on her desk with his mug, spilling a bit of coffee on her paperwork. "So. Can't handle a real orchid, huh?"
It was rare for him to resort to blatant insults. It was artless, and the feelings evoked weren't usually very layered or tasty, either. Not compared to the slowly built up rage he could inspire in a person. Why eat a McDonald's Big Mac when you could have grass-fed dry-aged beef?
Joan pulled out a tissue from her bag and started dabbing the paper. "No, I can, I just didn't expect to get any decent light in here. At my last job there weren't any windows at all. The cubicle walls were a lot taller, too."
She looked up at him from the corner of her eye, a tiny smile forming. "Even standing up, you couldn't look over them."
He blanked. So she really did catch him spying. He thought that would make things awkward, but here she was, unbothered and teasing him about it. Where was her anger? And why the hell did she feel like laughing? She didn't think he looked funny, did she? He looked perfectly average. He was pretty sure he was designed to.
Clearly he needed to retreat and regroup. Lick his wounds a little, maybe.
He cleared his throat and started to turn to go. "Well, uh, don't let me take up any more of your time. Wouldn't be a good look, on your first day."
Joan gestured vaguely to her desk. "Exactly, it's my first day. I think they'll extend me a little grace."
She looked at him expectantly, like she actually wanted him to continue for his own sake. As if she knew that he was disappointed his attempts to drain her had failed.
"No, no, I've talked enough." He held up a hand, shielding her from him. He had to get out of here. "I'll get out of your hair." Your stupid, frizzy hair.
He started heading toward the water cooler. He gripped his mug a little harder.
"Don't be a stranger, Colin."
He fled.
He quickly passed the water cooler and kept walking until he reached his desk, slumping in his chair when he finally reached it. If he got looks from everyone else as he sped past them he didn't notice.
There was something off about Joan. The last time he'd struggled to drain a new employee, it was Evie, an emotional vampire. Joan clearly wasn't that. The closest she'd gotten to dropping a pathetic anecdote about herself was that comment she made about her old job, but she didn't seem to be fishing for pity like Evie did. And Evie definitely never felt sympathy.
That was what stumped him the most. It wasn't unheard of for some humans to be more resistant to draining. Usually they were insanely positive people with empty heads and, consequently, empty hearts. Or they were already so dead inside they didn't have any energy left to give. But no one, human or not, had ever felt sympathy for him before. Because why would they? Looking at his half-dead reflection in the monitor on his desk, he knew there was nothing about him worth feeling sad over.
He shook his head a little. No, he may not understand Joan now, but someday he would. He had all the time in the world to do it (well, he had until the end of her natural life), so there was no point tying himself in knots over it. Over the years he'd learned every unique quirk of the people in this office - someday she wouldn't be the exception.
Looking over his cubicle wall again, staring at the back of her head, he felt a surge of confidence well within him. He was an energy vampire and he would not be bested by some little human woman in payroll. He would come back tomorrow and make her feel exactly as frustrated and annoyed as he did right now.
His eyes glowed as a plan began to take shape in his mind.
