Never Ending

~8~

"Can I get the key to the archive?" I ask in the sweetest voice I can muster. Betty looks at me with her mind set to refuse as it should be. "Donald sent me to retrieve a record from-'' The Donald-sent-me-card always works around here.

She cuts me off. "No need to explain." She rummages through her desk and produces a key card for the most guarded room in the entire building.

I thank her and make my way to the elevator. I change into a hooded black jumper that will surely hide my face from the cameras down there. The doors open in the basement. I make my way through the empty halls making sure my head is perfectly downcast. I should not be here. Donald knows nothing of my expedition down here either. I hear footsteps approaching ahead. I am dead! I hurriedly hide behind a corridor branching off to the security room.

The two guards pass by me without noticing a thing. I come out of my hiding place and proceed. The door gives with one swipe of the card. I spot a camera looking directly at the doorway to the archives room. I avert my eyes quickly and duck into the room.

"Ahh." I scream when I bump into a guy in the doorway. He steps back too, flustered. He looks at me with a confused expression. Meanwhile my brain is trying to manufacture the lie to use to explain my presence.

"What are you doing here?" He looks at me expectantly, his eyebrow raising probably with suspicion.

I am fucked, I have nothing to say. I pull the Donald card on him too. He doesn't look one bit convinced. Still, he steps out my way, a clear sign that he is leaving it at that. I make my way to the interior of the room like I know where I am going. Which I don't. I never expected to reach thus far, and now that I am here I don't know where records for 2011 are.

I turn around and find the guy standing there looking at me in amusement with an open file in his hand.

"Do you perhaps know where 2019 is?" I ask stupidly. Now he knows that I don't know what the heck I am doing.

He pushes off the shelf he was leaning on and walks towards me. He passes by leaving a whiff of cologne behind. I follow suit. Maybe it's his powerful strides or the way he carries his shoulders with grace and airs, I start to notice how well built his body is. He turns around to see if I am following and I see his face more clearly this time. I'll have to admit he is handsome. I would have swooned over him if I wasn't so jittery about being caught.

"Here you are." He says and motions to a long shelf with many files from ceiling to floor. I start looking through immediately. I start noticing a pattern in the filing system. The first months are located on the upper shelves: the ones I can't reach. I crane my head and sift through the files labeled April. Finally, I find the right file but even on my tiptoes I can't reach it.

Jumping up produces no better results either. I stare at it hopelessly, wishing I had telekinesis to move that annoying file to my hands.

A hand reaches past my ears and plucks the said file out with ease. I turn in time to have the file shoved into my chest. He leaves promptly after.

Why would he help me if he is going to be an ass about it afterwards? I huff as I make my way out.

"Thank you." I mutter as I pass him. He doesn't even stop me. Outside the door, I shove the file into my hooded sweater and make my way upstairs without encountering anyone on the way.

They say all's well that ends well. Wrong! I find Donald sitting comfortably in my cubicle.

I am a deer caught in headlights. My heart beats like it wants to escape my chest. He looks me up and down, his attention focusing on the hoodie.

"What are you wearing?" He asks with disgust.

"I felt cold." I blurt out. It's not the first time he makes my fashion choices his business, and it gets messy sometimes.

"Cold in this weather? It's almost summer for chrissake." He muses and looks at me with suspicion.

"Yes. I must be coming down with something." I lie.

"With that skimpy thing you wore the other day it's a given." He laughs like he just said the smartest thing ever. His reference to my pretend makeout session with Carter does not sit well with me but I keep my mouth shut. After knocking himself out he gets up. Finally, "Take care of yourself." He says and gets out. "Wear longer dresses." He adds and disappears around a corner. People around me turn to me.

I can't even find it in myself to be angry. I sit in the chair he just left and remove the file from the hoodie choosing to ignore what happened and focus on the more important things.

The file contains articles written about my mother's death. Most of them reiterate the report given by the police, except one that seems to have fallen through the cracks. It was written on the 19th, two days after my mom's death by a woman named Fiona.

I google her and only find articles dated 2019. She left the industry right around that time. But as a fellow journalist, I know you don't just leave, you're too invested in the scoop, the articles, the thrill of it to just up and leave. She must have been coerced or paid to stop writing.

In the article, she showcases how not so accidental my mother's fatal accident was. She hints on confidential evidence she obtained from Maria before she died which shows how she was domestically abused by her husband.

What? How could that be? I don't know of any violence in our home. Indifference sure but violence? I am shaken completely. I feel faint.