Alex and Annie: A Bad Jokes Spinoff

Chapter 4 (Annie): To The Club

The texts from Alex wouldn't stop.

How was lunch?

I don't think you should rush into anything with him.

You were just with me the other night. Are you sure you want to start something with him now? I think I should vet him for you.

Wait until you hear about Shelby. You'll laugh.

Want to have dinner tonight?

And so on until I had to turn off my phone just so I could focus on work. I should have known that no response from me would get a response from him. Not even an hour after I got back from lunch, Alex walked up to my desk.

"Hey, Annie, could I talk to you for a minute?"

"Sure." I leaned back in my chair.

"It's classified," he said.

"Oh, well, we all have the same security clearance so your secrets are safe with us."

His jaw worked. "It's a special clearance."

"We haven't gotten the email yet, so we don't know about any special clearances. Sorry."

"Annie, we need to talk."

"I have work to do."

"Oh, go ahead Annie," my supervisor jumped up.

Was it bad form to actually throw something at a supervisor?

I got up and followed Alex to his office, which was just down the hall from finance. Once he shut the door behind me, I turned on him. 

"What the hell, Alex? Don't ever do that to me again! We're at work and people are going to start talking and then they'll talk about things when there isn't anything to talk about."

"If you hadn't made such a big deal about it, no one would think twice about it."

"So sorry I almost revealed your dirty little secret."

He looked like I'd just told him sex was bad for you. "You're not my dirty little secret, Annie."

"So you've told people we're friends with benefits?"

"No but not because you're a secret. Because I hate people knowing my business. And ever since my cousin pretended she was an escort I'd gotten pregnant in front of almost all of my colleagues, I keep my shit close."

"That still doesn't excuse what you just did, Alex."

"I'm sorry, Annie, but you wouldn't return any of my texts."

"That should have been a clue that I was busy with work, Alex."

"You always respond to my messages right away."

And that was the problem. I had. But no more.

"I'm going back to work."

"Wait!" He stopped me. "You didn't answer me about dinner."

"No."

"Why?"

"Why would I let my bestie waste a dinner on me when he could be using that time to find a woman like me who he wants to marry?"

For a minute, I thought I'd gone too far and he figured it out. I mean, come on, the man was sent in to carry out some extremely delicate operations that involved skill and serious brain power. But the look of confusion left and his face cleared.

"You're never a waste of time, Annie. Ever."

"Alex, I think our friends with benefits situation has come to an end."

"No."

"Yes. You want a wife now and you need to be free to look for one."

"No, Annie, we're not done." His tone was even more forceful than it had been for his initial No. "We can still be friends and keep our current arrangement."

"So you want to look for a wife and fuck me?"

"No, Annie."

"Then what do you want?"

"I want to feel like you aren't mad at me."

I gave him a long, long look. "Why would I be mad at you?"

"I feel like you are and I'm not sure why."

"I need to get back to work."

"You haven't even told me how your date with Clayton went."

"It's Creighton," I said, "and I know you know that."

"Well?"

"It went great. He's taking me to a new club that just opened up and seems to be the place to be."

"You don't even like clubs! You'll hate it."

I shrugged. "Creighton makes me want to try new things."

"You don't even know him! And what kinds of things?"

"All sorts of wild new things. So, I'm going to the club with him."

"It has a three month waiting list. You'll probably need me to get in."

"Doubt that," I said. "His brother owns it. Now, I really need to get back to work."

I opened the door to his office and there stood Shelby. Funny but she didn't look happy to see me coming out of Alex's office.