I glanced up at the clock. 11.24 am. Yes, now should work fine. I walked from the offices and up the stairs to the highest floor.
It was a slightly surreal set-up in the building. There were four floors in total, with two large rooms on each. The landlord had decided that they were going to split up the building and rent the rooms out as office space to different companies, all except for one room. One of the top-floor rooms had been converted into a communal dining space.
There were tables and chairs dotted about, but most of the people who worked in the building usually took their drinks and food back to their respective offices, unless they'd prepared a big midday meal. I walked into the dining space and gave out a sigh of relief, nobody else was in there.
I poured enough water into the kettle for my drink and switched the kettle on. Not only did coming up here now allow me to use it straight away without waiting, but it also gave me a few minutes of peaceful solitude away from the humdrum of the busy offices. Then the door opened.
"Oh, somebody else having the same idea as me?" said a cutesy-sounding female voice.
She looked as cute as she sounded. Wearing a long floral dress with ankle boots, royal blue eyes stared at me as she smiled in my direction. Her hair was shoulder length, tousled like she'd run her fingers through it while wet and left it to dry. Its jet-black colour contrasted against her pale skin. She was around 5' 5" tall, and slim built.
"Yes, I waited for the masses to leave so I didn't have to wait any longer than I needed," I answered.
"Great minds think alike," she laughed, "first floor."
"No, I'm on the third," I told her.
"No! Me, silly," she giggled, resting her hand on my arm.
I asked her what she did, and she explained it was a call centre for an ad campaign, it was only a couple of months' work but it would be a stopgap while she was between jobs and the pay was quite good.
"What do you do nice?" she asked.
I told her it was quite boring, mainly answering emails about customer complaints or queries that my company sold. There was a little bit of cold-calling but the salary was very good. I told her that there were a few offices that had been used short-term like hers previously, with different people coming and going.
The kettle boiled, I told her she could do her drink first and I'd do mine later. She smiled, thanked me, and prepared her drink. Tea, milk, one sugar. I laughed and told her that was how I took mine too.
"See, I told you great minds think alike," she laughed, "see you same time tomorrow? Put enough water in for two people," she laughed as she walked out of the door.
She met and spoke over the next couple of days, talking about just random things, things we could think of to pass the ten minutes or so we were in there. Each day we were the only two people. On Thursday she came in with a huge grin on her face.
"Right, if we're going to be friends rather than just tea buddies we need to get to know each other," she announced.
I smiled and said okay, whatever the lady wanted.
"I'm Hannah, I'm twenty years old, and I've been married for almost two years. Long story about that," she said.
"Hi Hannah, pretty name for a pretty lady," I told her, "I'm Dave, I'm thirty-nine, and I'm also married. I have two twin teenagers, both living away at University."
"I don't have children, not yet anyway. Dean and I want kids eventually, but not just yet," she answered, "how long have you been married?"
"Twenty years soon. How about you, you're a little young to have been married for nearly two years already aren't you?" I asked.
She laughed and repeated about it being a long story, but she saw the quizzical look in my eyes.
"We've known each other since we were toddlers, Dean's parents moved in next door to mine. We went to school together, the same classes mainly, all the way through until we'd left. We started dating at eighteen, but both of our parents are quite religious so wanted us not to have sex before marriage. We agreed reluctantly, but only if we could get married young then. They arranged it all, and we got married on my nineteenth birthday," she gushed.
"You didn't cheat and have sex without them knowing before getting wed?" I asked.
"No, we were both virgins so it made sense, even though we knew we both wanted to. If anything good has come of it making us wait has probably helped our sex lives," she giggled.
She paused while she put the water into our mugs, took a quick sip then looked up at me.
"What about you, have you been faithful to your wife?" she blurted out, before putting her hand over her mouth when she realised what she'd said. I laughed before answering.
"Yes, I've never cheated on her. Well, not cheating exactly, but..." I cut myself off.
"But what?" she exclaimed.
"It's a long story, it will save for another time," I told her.
I walked towards the door leaving her protesting about me leaving it there. The following day she burst into the dining room.
"Come on you, spill, and I don't mean the tea. You can't leave a conversation like that, I was on tenterhooks all last night trying to work out what you meant, have you slept with someone else or not?" she asked.
"I think I can trust you enough to tell you if you can keep a secret?" I told her. She nodded vigorously.
"I didn't sleep with her, but a young girl that worked here a while ago kept sending me photos, pictures of herself," I answered.
"Photos of what?" she asked, a bewildered look on her face.
"Well, she wanted to tempt me to sleep with her. I'll let your imagination work out what the pictures were," I said.
I could see the cogs whirring in her innocent pretty head before she gasped. She pointed towards her tits and crotch area.
"You mean...?" she gasped.
"Yes, exactly that, and probably a lot more than you're thinking too."
"Did you ever send her any?"
