Early Bird (Erkençi Kus)(Part 1)

104. The Fruitarian issue

Can rolls his stones around in his fists, looking at his half of the prints that were still left, trying his best to concentrate.

All he kept thinking about was Sanem hugging him - her hair in his face, her smell so close to his nose he could dive in and drown in it.

Frowning, he takes out the small pink envelope from his pocket that he stole off the Wish Tree and taps it on the desk, looking at it pensively.

What could you have written in here Sanem? What do you want more than anything?

I shouldn't open it right? I should put it back...

But what if it mentions Levent? What if she wrote she that wants him to be her albatross?

No...I can't read it...it's wrong...it's an invasion of privacy...

Right?

He turns the envelope over between his fingers and then goes to open it, only to stop and puts it down flat.

For a second he steps away and then comes back, leaning on his desk and lifting it in between his fingers again.

What if that's not what she wrote? What it's something else? Something innocent? Oh God...Why do I have to have a moral compass?!

He taps it against his head and screwes up his face before he takes a deep breath and puts the envelope back in his pocket.

Leave it where it belongs...out of sight...out of mind...

-

Sanem tilts her head slightly, her eyes going up Polen's long legs from her heels as Polen sat on the edge of her desk looking at the laptop screen. How is it possible to be born like this?

"There you go," Polen says and Sanem snaps out of her staring. "Everything is downloaded. Even all the agency backups," Polen smiles and hands Sanem her laptop. "You can work now."

"Thank you so much." Sanem looks at the screen and indeed she was online successfully. She didn't want to ask Polen for help, but Polen offered when she saw Sanem struggling to set the thing up, saying she knew a thing or two about IT. "It's actually a pity there's no typewriters around," Sanem laments, "I would have liked to use one of those instead, they're very sturdy. And don't crash." 

"You are an unusual girl, Sanem, and your ideas are very...original." Polen chuckles. "I can see why Emre appeciates you. He has nothing but good things to say." Sanem nods with a small smile. "Can too."

"Oh," Sanem lets out a breathless scoff and waves the compliment off. "Thank you, but they're probably exaggerating."

Polen lifts a brow and Sanem looks down, typing in her password. For a few seconds it's quiet as the system logs her in.

"So, uhm, you and Mr Can...did you two get back together...?" Sanem asks, glances at her quickly. "Sorry, I don't want to pry or anything...It just looked to me like you did, but if that's not the case - Sorry," she apologizes again and looks down.

Polen looks away for a moment at the door and then gets up from the desk. "We've been together for a long time, Sanem." Sanem nods behind her back. "The only problem we've ever had was being so far away from each other."

"Hm."

"He usually comes to me to visit, you know," Polen shrugs. "But this time I came to him. I figured it was time."

"Yes, you did," Sanem mutters as Polen goes to get a magazine from the pile she'd chosen earlier.

"Well, I'll go back upstairs then. I'm done down here anyway. But Sanem, I would like to get to know you better and if you agree, we can have lunch some time?"