Page 38 of Sincerely Yours, Anna Sherwood

I let out a sigh of relief, my heart calming down considerably – which is ironic, since discussing the new Arrowmile coolant leads to a heated debate around the table, getting someone to take responsibility because it was meant to be allocated to a different project. I don’t really know why that’s so important, only that everyone’s so difficult about it, itmustbe. When I talked to Elaine about it over breakfast, she suggested it was maybe a tax thing, or linked to investors somehow.

As a couple of the managers bicker between themselves about who takes the blame and who needs to fix it, I get finally get a chance to ground myself and breathe. It’s enough to remember my script, figure out what’s next.

I catch Lloyd’s eye and mouth,Thank you, wondering if he’s aware of how much he just saved me from total humiliation.

He grins back, bright and friendly, an anchor.

My heart gives a little skip, and damn him, it takes more effort than it should to pull my attention back to the ongoing debate in the middle of the table.

Still. I’m glad he’s here. Especially when I falter a couple more times and he pipes up with a leading question to pull me back on track, since he knows my presentation as well as – or, I guess, better than – I do. And especially when he smiles at me with an encouraging nod; it’s a little easier to make eye contact with him in the room. I find I keep glancing his way for reassurance rather than to Michaela, or anybody else.

This boy with his unfaltering smile, who carries the sunshine with him wherever he goes, with summer in his eyes.

Damn him. And damn me, for being so drawn in by it –again.

It’s approaching five o’clock on Friday and I have big plans tonight. Huge. They involve switching off for a couple of hours with whatever thriller Netflix recommends to me, a frozen pizza I’ll buy on the way home, and maybe a pint of Ben & Jerry’s. I feel like indulging. It’s been a long week, especially after all the stress of that presentation on Monday – which mercifully, I salvaged so I didn’t make a total fool of myself. Mostly thanks to Lloyd.

Speak of the devil … My computer pings, a little purple box appearing in the bottom corner.

Lloyd Fletcher

Working hard or hardly working? TGIF, Annalise Sherwood.

Anna Sherwood

Fletcher. Hi. How are you?

I always have to re-orient the conversation. Well, I suppose I don’thaveto, but he never says hello or anything that amounts to a remotelynormalgreeting, and this has become our pattern. So, predictably enough, his next message is –

Hi, Annalise. I’m very well thank you.

How are you?

What are you doing tonight?

Why?

Trying to figure out if I’ll run into you at midnight again and you’ll scare the shit out of me, popping up out of the darkness all ‘LET THERE BE LIGHT!’ while you steal someone’s birthday cake out of the fridge

That’s not how that happened. And no, I’m about to log off actually. You just caught me.

… You’re not staying here all night again, you? Don’t you have better things to be doing?

I am so glad you asked.

And then the chat goes dead. His status switches abruptly to offline, leaving me staring, bewildered, at the screen. What the hell was that all about?

I wait to see if he’ll come back online, and half expect him to suddenly pop up behind me. When he doesn’t, I huff, muttering under my breath, determined to forget that whole conversation – if that’s even what you can call it. He’s so bloody infuriating.

When I pack up a couple of minutes later, I glance over to see if Tasha’s ready to go – it seems rude to justleave, since we’re going the same way. But she’s preoccupied at her desk chatting with Verity and two women I only vaguely recognize (I swear I only ever seem to look over when she’s stopped to chat to someone or check her phone), so I leave them to it, secretly relieved I don’t have to endure a journey home with Tasha.

I join the steady trickle of people leaving the building. The weather’s a little cooler this week, which makes this whole commute thing less painful.

I don’t know how people do this every day,all the time. It must get so exhausting. I know I used to get the bus back and forth for school, but after a year of uni, that feels like a distant memory. And so much for days that didn’t start until an eleven a.m. lecture, or where Icould trundle home at two in the afternoon. After just five weeks away, uni feels like a distant memory, too.

Is this what it means, being a grown-up? Will this be my whole life after I graduate – steeling myself for the trip home and daydreaming of eating pizza on the sofa?

There’s a pang somewhere deep in the pit of my chest, something tight and fierce and hot. A life like that – it’s what I want, isn’t it? What I’ve been working towards, wishing for. But thinking of it likethis, realizing that it’ll be just an extended version of how I’m treating this summer, it feels …

---