I never got to finish my coffee

Part 1

Orange light hazed through the room, bouncing off the walls and furniture. The slow sighs of various employees was a regular ambiance at this point, accompanied by the quick, subtle glances at the clock. Thirty long minutes more until the sweet release of getting to go home for the day.

20 minutes.

Then 15.

Then 10, dozing down towards 7.

5...4...3...2...and...1

Footsteps blended together into a nearly unison scurrying, until everyone disbanded into separate directions, off to their homes.

No matter how much time passed, however, she couldn't get rid of the feeling that someone's following her. From home to work, during break hours, and even now. It wasn't even recent; it's been precisely 4 days since the hair on her neck would stand on end every time she left the house.

...Perhaps it would be better to take the long route to the apartment. That's right, underfunded public transport. Before the rational part of her mind could protest, she turned around, using the movement as an excuse to discreetly scan the evening crowd surrounding her. Everyone was minding their own business, of course. Why would anyone follow her, anyway? With the sun in her eyes, it's not like she could see shit anyway, she thought, while making her way to the metro station.

Wincing as she saw the price for a train ticket, she made a judgement call, and listed everything going on in her head.

This feeling had no basis on anything she saw today (or this week).

Every time she looked behind her, she saw nothing abnormal.

Contrarily, every time she continued what she was doing, she could practically see someone's gaze piercing into her head-

She got pulled out of her thoughts by a nearby seagull squeaking at a pedestrian, determined to get someone's leftover food. Shaking her head at the sight, she continued;

She lives and works in a pretty large city. She doesn't know anyone here, and nobody here knows her. Whether that's evidence of her claim or assurance of normality is...definitely up for debate.

If she wanted to get onto the train, she'd have to do it now, she thought, watching the train pull into the station.

With no further thought, hoping to lose whoever might be following her, she stepped aboard the train, into the crowd.

The evening rush made the train car rather congested (and she thought the foot traffic was bad!?). People were squashed together, like compressed pixels on a small screen. The doors closed, and the train suddenly jolted (or, it started moving to the next stop, as she immediately realized), momentarily bumping her into the wall she was next to. It was a bit embarrassing, upon noticing a coworker nearby, who might've noticed that moment of clumsiness. She straightened herself once more, and took to staring out the window until reaching her stop. It was a good distraction.

At last, she made it (without falling over again, thankfully). Taking extra care to weave around as many people as possible (just a precaution, surely), she exited the station, and took a slightly longer route home than normal. Not that it was needed, of course. The feeling in her stomach slowly would've died down on the train...right?

(It hadn't, but she convinced herself anyway.)

Stepping into the blissfully air conditioned apartment building, she took the elevator up to the seventh floor, hurriedly went into her apartment, and locked the door (not to mention triple checking the lock, but nobody needs to know that, right?). The windows couldn't be opened from outside, but she checked to make sure those were all shut too.

Enough of this. Nobody was coming after her. Nobody had any reason to come after her. Let's be rational here, the weird feeling could probably be chalked up to her less-than-ideal appetite. It was late summer, and chilly drifts weren't unusual at this time of the year, which would explain her hairs standing on end. She spent the next half an hour washing her face, fix herself a cup of coffee, and tying her (rather short) hair up out of her face, and sat down.

A buzzing caught her attention.

Her phone was ringing. Unknown number.

She scowled. How many godforsaken times had she told HR to not contact her outside of work hours?

She picked up the phone anyway. "Hello?"

"Celeste?" A familiar voice questioned.

"Mhm?"

"I know you're off right now," the speaker paused, and their wince could be pretty much felt through the phone. "But some client called in saying they wanted to talk to you urgently? Something about consulting for some project..."

"Sure, I'll bite. Details?"

"They should show up in your inbox in a moment,"

"Thanks, Mindy,"

Sure enough, a moment after cutting the call, a notification on her phone sprung up, which she opened. The details seem legitimate, she thought, and began typing out the receival email.