A Business Love

chapter 30

YOU ARE READING
A   B U S I N E S S   L O V E

Jessie was fighting the snowy wind that was blowing her hair all over the place. She blew at them, trying to remove the few strands of hair that had stuck to her mouth. She wished she had put gloves on as she carried two containers of homemade cookies in her bare freezing hands.

When she finally got to the company's glass front door, she tucked the two containers under her armpit, trying not to drop anything. She nervously rummaged in her coat pocket for her employee card that would allow her to unlock the door.

Inside, it was dead calm. Ginetta hadn't arrived yet. Jessie knew that most of the employees would arrive late, probably disappointed to have to go back to work after the holidays. But not her. She couldn't wait to get back to the office.

She had missed the smell of paper, the sound of printers, fingers tapping on computer keyboards, and the shoes clanging in the hallways. She knew that wasn't a popular opinion, but she didn't mind. Her workplace was for her a social palace where she was able to create connections with others. In fact, these were her only social interactions since outside the office, she had none, except with her parents and Julian.

She went behind Ginetta's desk and picked up a post-it and a pencil. She wrote: 'Torcetti! Help yourself! From Jessie :)'.

She put the post-it on one of the containers of torcetti which was a twisted Italian cookie. She and her mother had cooked a ridiculous number of them. And she knew for a fact that other Italian mums had done the same and that the company would be full of pastries in the next few days. She wanted to beat everyone to it. She placed one of the containers on the front desk and kept the other for her department.

She met no one on her way to her office. It wasn't even 8 o'clock yet. She loved being the first to arrive. The calm before the storm gave her a sense of peace and well-being that made her very productive. After placing the second container of cookies in plain view, she picked one up and settled into her office. She opened her laptop and immediately plunged into her work.

Gradually, the office came back to life as employees began to arrive. They warmly greeted Jessie one after another, wished each other good wishes for the New Year and thanked her for the delicious cookies. 

But Jessie was anxiously awaiting Mariana's arrival. She had missed her so much. Apart from a few text messages during the holiday season, the two women had not seen each other.

She knew that Mariana had a busy life outside of the office with friends of her own, while Jessie considered her her best friend, which she found embarrassing. She didn't want to be clingy, so she refrained from bombarding her with messages and even proposing a get together outside of the office.

When Mariana finally appeared fashionably late as always, Jessie immediately frolicked out of her office to greet her. The two friends gave each other a warm hug, not far from Natalia who looked at them rolling her eyes.

Mariana had also missed her very much, but she knew that Jessie was always busy working and with her fairy tale life with Julian, she didn't want to bother her during the holidays.

They couldn't help but catch up on the latest happenings in their lives, Mariana telling her all about the horrible dates she'd been on over the holidays and Jessie telling her about her five-day trip to Whistler.

Mariana had immediately noticed the diamond earrings dangling from Jessie's ears. She knew that Jessie usually wore the same earrings; two small diamonds given to her by her late grandmother. She pointed to her ears. "Julian?" she asked.