This is the fifth chapter of an eight chapter story. I recommend starting with chapter one.
My thanks go to Joffa for providing his spelling and grammar expertise. His help is highly appreciated. If any errors remain, I'm sure they happened after his editing.
Please vote and/or leave comments. It is your feedback which fuels my motivation.
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Ch. 05: Digging deeper
"What are you doing here?" we wondered simultaneously and started laughing.
"You know each other?" Helen inquired surprised.
Again we started talking simultaneously. We both stopped, restarted simultaneously and stopped again. After another short burst of laughter, I signalled that I would not start speaking again by drawing an imagined zipper over my lips.
"Kind of. Knowing each other might be a bit over the top but yes, we have met before."
"You haven't told me," Helen complained, looking at me.
"Well, first of all, I didn't realise I had to tell you about every person I meet and second there is nothing to tell. We met twice at a club. Once when I took Pat out for his eighteenth birthday and the other time again at a club when I went with Paul and his wife. We haven't spoken more than a few words."
"You forgot the one time when you came for a coffee to the restaurant where I earn the money for my studies."
"You're studying? You were such a good waitress during the lunch that I thought you did it full-time."
"Thanks, but no. I'm studying veterinary medicine."
"Interesting. So you want to be a vet? Farm animals or pets?"
"Pets. But first I have to finish university. It's a five-year course and I have only completed four years so far."
"But with eighty percent finished you see the light at the end of the tunnel, don't you?"
We had been talking for a while when Sandra came out with the side dishes. After she had set the salads down, she came over to us.
"I've neglected my duties as a host. I haven't introduced you to each other, yet."
"Don't worry, Sandra," Helen jumped in, "they have met before and have been babbling like a waterfall for the last ten minutes."
Sandra looked from Melissa to me in the search of an explanation. "You've met?" she enquired when none was offered.
"You remember that mystery man I mentioned a few months ago? It's him."
"I'm no mystery."
"Well, not many men have rejected an approach from me, let alone two of them."
"So the mystery is that I rejected you?"
"No, the mystery is that I still couldn't stop thinking about you. Do you have an idea how often I've been to that club just to see you again?"
Helen took the opportunity that I had to assimilate that piece of information and interrupted, "See? They have been going on like that since they met right here on this very spot. They haven't even sat down. But if I see it correctly, food has been served."
To say we hit off great at that barbeque would be an understatement. We spent the entire evening chatting and I could tell that her eyes were not the only thing to get lost in. She also turned out to be very smart, bordering on brilliant, and uncovered the holes in my cover story with ease without making them public. She did have the advantage of having met me on the way to a customer which is something coders rarely do but still realised quickly that this couldn't be the truth.
When the barbeque was over we went on separate ways. I avoided being tasked to take her home as I could all too well imagine where this would end and I didn't want to go down that road right now. The conversation with Melissa during the afternoon and evening showed me clearly that she would leave me in shambles when the inevitable break-up happened.
***
The next morning I sat at home in the garden, drinking coffee in the slightly chilly late summer morning temperatures. I had my smart phone in my hand and Melissa's contact information open. When it had been time to leave, she had insisted on exchanging numbers. All it would take was to tap the number she had entered. But I held back.
I had had so many bad experiences in the past. What were the chances that this would end in a disaster like the previous attempts? Why try? It would only hurt in the end. How often had I thought that this maybe was the one? How often had I thought that I finally would be able to build up a relationship? How often had it ended after a few days or weeks? Every. Single. Time. So if I called her, we would meet, have some great weeks when we would be seemingly happy but sooner or later her hidden agenda would come through. What would it be this time? Which would be more important to her? Money or status? How would I feel then? Better or worse than if I just didn't call her?
I was so lost in thought that I didn't even notice that my coffee had gone cold and that it had started to rain. I sat in the rain for two hours not knowing what to do. In the end, I couldn't avoid coming to the conclusion I had feared from the beginning: I would be better off not calling her. I don't know if I cried over that decision because rain was running down my face and I had been soaking wet for a long time by now. I went inside, lay down on the couch in front of the TV and started to watch a documentary. I awoke an hour later, freezing in my still wet clothes and the draft as I hadn't closed the garden door. I went upstairs to change, came back down, started my lap-top and opened the task-list for the coming week. It wouldn't hurt to try and get a head start because it was unrealistic to assume that there wouldn't be any unexpected emergencies.
***
As it turned out I was right. On Monday afternoon our entire internal network broke down. It took us the whole night to find out what had happened and get it back running. We were fortunate that we did permanent live back-ups. We hadn't lost any work, just a bit of time. On Tuesday the PR campaign went public and R&D had a break-through on one of their ideas. This double event led to me working until well after eleven pm. On Wednesday the quarterly results and KPIs were delivered by Charles. I was so absorbed in analysing the information that I didn't notice I had developed a cough.
Thursday was worse. We had multiple journalists requesting interviews and I decided to hold a press lunch/conference where they would be able to ask their questions. This took much longer than anticipated but if we wanted the PR campaign to take full effect it was unavoidable. But this caused my mailbox to overflow on Friday so again I had to work until late. Because I had fallen so far behind with my other duties, I spent the entire weekend at the office to read various reports from the coding and sales team leads. The coughing had become really disturbing by now, so I suppressed it with cough syrup. Another week later on Sunday, I had finally been able to catch up on most of my tasks but I found it increasingly difficult to concentrate, was permanently freezing and sweating at the same time.
On Monday morning Sandra stormed into my office without knocking.
"Why haven't you called her yet?"
I cleared my throat of the ever present lump, "What? Called whom?"
"Melissa. She has been waiting for your call for two weeks now. You don't even answer when she calls."
In the meantime, Helen had entered my office and tried to pull Sandra back out.
"You are overstepping your boundaries. My private life is none of your business."
"Bull shit. Melissa is my best friend and you have become a good friend in a short time."
I again had to clear my throat, I felt increasingly dizzy, "I do not discuss my private life in the office with my employees."
"At least have the decency to call and tell her that you're not interested. You both were in such a good mood after the barbeque. What happened?"
"One more word on the topic and you will need to look for a new job."
That stunned her and gave Helen the opportunity to pull her out of the office, closing the door behind them.
I felt miserable. Not necessarily because I hadn't called Melissa but because I had a strong fever running which I had been fighting unsuccessfully with meds over the last week. I somehow battled my way through the day and, finally at home, I collapsed. I crawled up to the bedroom, set the alarm to be up in time for the board meeting the next morning, took some more medication and fell into a restless sleep.
*
When I woke up the next morning I soon realised I would not make it to the office. I dragged myself to my home-office and, despite my difficulties to see the keyboard or the text I had written, managed to send Helen an email to set up a video conference so I could attend the board meeting from home.
Everybody was ready when Helen called and the connection built up. I was still trying to focus my eyes on the transmission when I heard Helen speak very quietly. There seemed to be a problem with the connection because I could neither recognise the people on the screen nor was the audio working properly.
"Ok, everybody. The meeting is adjourned, I activate emergency plan Eta one" I heard Helen's muted voice.
Adjourned? Eta one? What was Eta one about again? Was it the one about the heavy earthquake? Or the fire? Before I had the opportunity to ask the connection was turned off. I took my phone and called Helen to tell her that the connection had broken down but she didn't answer. Next, I tried Charles and then Sandra but neither replied. Not even Paula reacted to my calls. After a coughing fit caused by some loud swearing, I buried my head in my hands and closed my eyes to wait for my head to stop hurting.
***
The next thing I remembered was that I was laying on something soft, couldn't see anything and somebody was softly rubbing a warm, wet cloth over my face and neck. I lifted my hands to rub my eyes and find out why I couldn't see anything.
