Page 51 of Maxim

Hell no.

The end justifies the means.

Chapter thirty-six

Nat

The sounds of clacking keyboards and conversations ripple over me like gentle waves. I’m locked inside my head and have been for a couple of hours now. Outside, the sky is gradually darkening. Pink ribbons of cloud reflect the light from a dying sun.

Far below, people scurry around like busy ants. From up here on the 9th floor of our building, they look tiny.

“Fancy a drink this evening?” I look up to see Dylan staring at me, his eyes bright with hope. Inside, I die a little.

Dylan is a sweet guy but I feel nothing for him. He writes obituaries and lives with his mother and her 11 cats. Everything he wears is threaded with fifty shades of cat fluff.

I do like cats but I’m allergic, so spending more than fifteen minutes with Dylan makes my eyes and nose run like fountains. How do I know this? Because he always tries to sit next to me at the weekly staff meeting.

“Erm, I think I’m meeting the girls,” I say, too distracted to make my pathetic excuse convincing. He latches on to the vague suggestion that I might not be meeting my friends, and could possibly be free to spend the evening with him.

“I don’t mind tagging along!”

Dear sweet baby Jesus, how do I get out of this? Please send me a sign.

The photocopier nearby spews out a pile of paper seemingly on a whim. Is that my sign from above? I look over at it hopefully. Then Dana appears and scowls in my direction because she’s jealous the editor likes my work more than hers. With a toss of her hair, she grabs the documents from the printer bed and flounces off.

I don’t miss the way Dylan eyes her with blatant interest. Hmm. Maybe I can work with this.

“Dana likes cats, did she tell you?”

“Oh?” Dylan perks up as I quickly pack my shit up, hoping to make a swift exit. Despite being here all afternoon, other than filing my article just ahead of the deadline, I haven’t been productive at all.

Fucking Max.

I still haven’t listened to his voicemail. I’m sure he has a great excuse for why an attractive woman jumped on him in public, acting like they were lovers or something. Men like him usually do have an excuse. Only I’m not interested in hearing it.

Seeing him with another woman is a good thing. Or so I tell myself. It reminds me he’s way out of my league and I’m much better off walking away now before I fall for him any more than I already have done.

Dylan’s patiently waiting for a Dana update. I lower my voice so she doesn’t hear me. If she did, she’d hate me even more.

“She adopted a rescue cat last week.” No clue if that’s true but if it saves me from having to come up with a legitimate reason why I don’t want to go for a drink with him, I’m willing to lie for the sake of my mental health.

White lies aren’t so bad.

“Aww that’s amazing!” Dylan looks like he might cry genuine tears of joy, but he’s still trailing after me like a little lost puppy, so perhaps Dana’s charms aren’t as alluring as mine, even with a fictional cat thrown into the mix.

We step into the elevator together.

I look at Dylan for a moment, against my better judgment because looking can often be construed as wanting. And I don’t want. At all.

“Don’t you need your coat or laptop case?”

He looks confused then breaks out into a smile. “Oh, it’s fine, I can do without them tonight. Mom’s at home so I don’t need my key, and I have my phone!”

“Great.” My teeth hurt from clenching my jaw. There’s no way out of this unless I say something brutally honest and hurt his feelings. And I can’t do it. No matter how much I want to.

Jane always tells me my boundaries have more holes in them than a fishing net. Fuck, she’s so right. I must call that therapist I bookmarked a few months back.

“Do you like cats?” Dylan smiles hopefully as the elevator hums its way down to the ground-floor lobby.

---