Love and Beasts

Chapter 29

On Wednesday, Izabela was still thinking about what happened on Saturday night. When she was managing invoices with one of her coworkers, Ivan came by and decided to surprise the girl. So, he tickled her under her armpits, to which the girl was suddenly surprised and not knowing who was behind her, she swung her elbow to the man's stomach. For a moment Ivan actually stumbled back, shocked by the girl's reaction. When Izabela turned around, she noticed the man holding his stomach a little. "Ivan? What are you doing here?"

Then the man looked at her and was happy to finally reach out to her. "Hello Izabela. I simply wanted to ask how have you been these past days? We hadn't had the chance to meet too often and I've been thinking that you started avoiding me." Izabela felt bad about the man's words. The girl decided to forget about Ivan's strange behavior from last time they spoke, because to her, it wasn't anything big to make a fuzz over nothing. "Oh. Actually, I was quite good. How about you? Do you enjoy your stay here in America?" "Yes, it's really nice here. Say, can we meet up after work today? Because there's something that I wanted to tell you for a very long time but didn't have a chance, since both of us were busy with something and it never turned out the way I wanted." "Oh, sure why not? But when and where to be exact?" "Maybe in that diner we went to last time? Is 6 pm okay for you?" "Yeah, it's perfect! I actually wouldn't be able to attend earlier since I have some other stuff to attend to after work." "So, till 6?" "Yeah. See you at 6." After that, the man said bye to Izabela and waved to everyone in the office. Some of the women in the office were sending daggers from their eyes towards Izabela's direction, but she thought nothing of it.

When Ivan closed the office door behind him, Sheila came to her and slammed on Izabela's desk with her right hand, to gain her attention. "What is the meaning of this, Steinberg?" Iza looked at Sheila from over her documents and was slightly annoyed by her outburst. "What do you mean, Sheila? Is something bothering you?" "No, just a little whore who rather than stay with one man, dates many at the same time, without reconsidering feelings of people around her." She said, having a smug look waiting for the girl before her to react. But Izabela without a care in the world was doing her paperwork, unfazed by the woman's attitude. "Ohh, I'm sorry for ya. Do I know her, by any chance?" "Yes, you do." "Then may you enlighten me who is it?" "I'm standing right in front of her." Said Sheila, with a cocky smile on her face. Izabela could hear how her friends snickered at this silly remark. "I'm sorry darling, but I'm not a mirror. Maybe you should go to the optician, to have your eyesight checked?" "Excuse me?!" Sheila said, while seething from anger.

At this comment, she heard how everyone in the office tried to hold in a laughter, not wanting for the drama to stop. "Ahh, sorry. Your eyesight is perfectly fine. You just lost your way. You know what? Why don't you turn right and go straight ahead? That way, you will get to the lobby and there you can look at yourself in the mirror for however long you want to and say compliments like that one to yourself." "You little-!" "Besides, if you're talking about Ivan, then I'm sorry to disappoint you but I'm not interested in him, nor am I dating him. I know you are like a honeybee that wants to stick to whichever pretty flower you will meet around you. But don't you think that you can label me to the same level you are on." While saying it, Izabela calmly stood up from her desk and came closer towards the blondie who unfortunately, was around 15 centimeters shorter, which made her feel slightly inferior compared to Izabela.

"If you want to date this guy, then go on. You need to know that I'm not interested in him nor am I holding him by the leash. If you can't make yourself do something but rather, bother someone else with your problems, then to me you're a bit of a rude person who thinks that the whole world is supposed to turn only around you. So why don't you get your stupid ass moving and do something productive, rather than bother me with your problems?" After hearing this, Sheila totally embarrassed and angry wanted to jump at Izabela and scratch her eyes out with her super long nails, but the woman's friends had to come in and hold her back, because they didn't want to cause themselves nor her any problems since Izabela was their teamleader and they knew, that she could easily report it to the manager and they would be screwed if he knows about that. While Sheila was telling them to let her go, Izabela simply stood there, with a calm and cool demeanor. Soon, the other woman calmed down and after throwing Izabela a glare, she went to her desk and finally started doing her job. Izabela then satisfied to be free from this attention seeker continued with her job, not wanting to waste anymore of the time.