"Trust me, Chris. You just need to bone"
"Hey, language, Magnus!"
"Uhhh, fine. You are sexually frustrated and need to release your non-born offspring one way or another. You are all edged up, it's written on your forehead like a teenage boy."
"That was even worse, just fucking stop." I closed the folder in my hand, putting it down on my desk while shooting my co-worker and best friend, Magnus, a look. Who now pretended to be deeply investigating the topic in the folder he was hovering over. The sleek black is the only visible evidence of mischief.
Professional investigators are able to work under any distracting environments lingering around. Any amount of pressure is what we are chosen and trained for.
Professional investigators are also not loudly discussing the sex life of their co-workers and their best friends in the shared office for anyone else to hear. And worse: judge.
"Come ooon, Chris. Your hand might give up on you one day." A sneaky gesture of his head towards the hand resting on top of the folder while his eyes were glued onto the same spot in the folder. The growing sly grin on his face was not to miss but I ignored it. It was a challenge. Me glancing at my lap. knew Magnus and his dirty jokes.
"It's still functioning perfectly and I feel perfectly fine too. But I appreciate your concern. Respectfully, you can look after yourself. Can you go back to your research, please?"
"My hand and I go back a long way, but I'm being taken care of."
He smirked as he replied so simply, giving me a wave with his left hand before removing his gaze from the folder back to the screen of the laptop resting on his desk.
I only muttered: "Please spare me the details" before returning my attention fully to the security tape rolling for the 13th time on the screen.
Magnus' right eyebrow cocked up as he shot me his infamous, teasing grin. I didn't need to look over to him, I was able to see it from the corner of my eyes. He was just too predictable and ran by habits that never grew old even in the 6 years we have known each other.
Hand is still up in the air. Palm stretched out. Waiting for a reaction.
"Wipe that grin off your face and focus on the report, Magnus. The meeting is on Friday, and we can't fuck it up this time." I sighed as I looked at the open folder on the desk. Which was barely filled with any useful content. We were walking on thin ice, a thin thread being pulled off the case.
A case that meant a lot to me. And not only because it would be a significant step in my career. Because it could save many lives and serve justice for a string of crimes that had unravelled for the past decade.
"Just tattoo the schedule onto my brain at this point. Each Friday is an important day, an important meeting. Each day is an important day in our job, if I have to remind you of the reality. Seriously, you keep repeating yourself, Chris. Did you start to sleep talking too? If you do, don't spend the night after your one-night stand. It is a clear turn-off. Just record yourself on tape and let it play", Magnus stated with a bored tone that was barely registered as an insult as he took another bite of his sandwich, eating his lunch by his desk.
My appetite left me after reading the new evidence in the folder that we had received this morning. Magnus however... He was indeed one of a kind; he did not even budge—no twitched eye.
"I mean it. They expect us to deliver. Especially Greenaway", I emphasised the last word. The reason behind my determination and fear. Determination to solve this case. Fear of not being able to complete the tasks and solve the case.
"And we always deliver", he replied simply.
"The bad news? Oh yeah, we're pretty good at that.", I added, sorting the papers on my desk to be put away in the assigned folders. It was not working, there was no progress that we could grasp. Anything that we could dig further into, we hit one wall after the other. Not even our IT genius Seonghwa was able to tear them down.
