Page 6 of Unbossly Manners

Jackson halted and turned back to me. He raised one eyebrow, the corner of his mouth twitching. Blood trickled down my arm and I put my palm over the cut to stop the bleeding.

“Do you want help or not?” he asked.

I scowled, making it clear I was not happy about it but nodded.

“Follow me,” he said.

I trailed after him, seething. Why did it have to be him? Everyone else in the office was courteous and kind to me. I’d barely had one conversation with Jackson. He walked straight to his office in the mornings, no hellos or chit-chat with me or anyone else. All business. He wasn’t offensive, but he wasn’t warm or inviting.

The only personal thing I knew about him was that he was married with a kid. He’d never said it, but he wore a wedding ring, and he had a picture of his daughter on his desk, which I’d seen when dropping off a document in his office.

“What exactly are you wearing?” I asked.

His lean muscles danced under the skin-tight fabric as we walked, not an ounce of fat to be seen.

“Cycling kit.”

“Huh?”

“I was training on my bike tonight.”

“Oh, right. Like Lance whatever. The guy they caught doping?”

“Yeah. Like that.” He frowned.

I had a vague recollection of packs of cyclists riding along the river in the mornings, but I’d never seen one in the wild.

Jackson’s office was bright—white walls, white desk, white leather office chair—with a bank of windows along one side of the room. A royal blue velvet sofa sat against the far wall across from two cream cushioned chairs and a low coffee table. The wall behind the sofa was a long built-in bookshelf filled to the brim with law books, files, and knick-knacks.

“Sit,” he said.

His office door swung shut and he shoved a doorstop under it to keep it open. He pulled out Neosporin, cotton pads, Band-Aids, and something that looked like… lubricant from a drawer in his desk.

“I have a kid,” he said in way of explanation for his first-aid supplies. His eyes caught my concerned gaze at the fourth item. “And a cycling obsession.”

“So your butt and balls don’t chaff.” The statement popped out of my mouth, and Jackson barked out a laugh.

“Do you ride?” he asked, assessing my injury, but not touching me.

“I tried a Citibike once and ended up on Canal Street, which doesn’t have a bike lane, during Friday rush hour. That was the end of me biking in the city.”

Jackson handed me the first-aid items. “You’ll want to clean that up.”

He went back to his desk as I dabbed at the injury, sliding the ointment over the shallow cut. When it was clean, I placed two bandages over it.

“Band-Aids are racist.” My hand ran over the beige-colored fabric, which was close to the shade of my light skin.

“Huh?” Jackson’s eyebrows raised.

I’m not sure why I made this observation now, but the realization popped into my head and suddenly it seemed egregious.

“They’re meant to be flesh colored, right? But who’s flesh? Only Caucasian.”

Jackson, whose skin was tan, but everything about his features pointed to him being Caucasian, folded his arms over his chest. “That’s an excellent observation. It’s amazing how even those small things reflect the ugly parts of our culture.”

Huh. I wondered if he thought about that stuff too?

“Thanks for all this.” I gathered the scraps and put them in the trash can. When I turned around, a dizzy spell overtook me and I grasped the corner of the desk.

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