"Nia." Her name softly fell from his lips and she soaked in his sweet breath like a pancake to syrup. Her eyes were low and she was watching his chest rise and fall. She couldn't look at him just yet. She was frozen in place.
With just this brazen...
Nia took a break from typing to try and skillfully scratch her scalp.
She had tied her hair back tightly this morning, slicked it down with eco styler and wound a black satin scrunchie around her bun.
With her life feeling unfamiliar, and out of order in Malcolm's absence, Nia needed to ensure the things that were within her control were as sterile looking and feeling as they possibly could be.
Her severe, plain-jane signature style had become a part of her uniform for the past few weeks with the implosion of her personal life and the explosion of her professional one.
It was the end of the fiscal year and Mint Beauty Co.'s office had been constantly buzzing. Nia was so busy that she needed minimal distractions and couldn't afford to waste her time – even on a washday.
If it wasn't closing periodic and year end financials, it was creating upcoming budgets and forecasts. There was content to be planned, materials to be delivered, annual reports to be completed, deadlines to hit, and oh yes, Nia remembered, an office expansion into an entirely different country.
Nia's wrist pinged with a notification. She was due to meet with some project managers from marketing in meeting room 7 in half an hour. She took a break from customer reposts and replying to comments on Instagram on the company phone and decided to eye over the powerpoint presentation on quarter one's planned Tik Tok content that she was about to give instead.
Even with all that was happening, Nia was yet to miss a step. She had been on the ball with everything that had her name attached to it, but that wasn't new for Nia.
What was new was the circumstance. It felt like she was juggling all these spinning plates and trying to keep them in the air as she stood on one leg in 12 inch pleaser heels.
Unfortunately for Nia, some of the plates had already crashed to the ground. So at this point, she really was doing the most just to not lose her shit; to keep the remaining plates spinning and not get cut on broken remnants in the process.
And of course, as always, Nia really was trying her best. But her best currently felt like it just wasn't enough.
Nia wheeled her chair around to see Val leaning in her door's frame and jumped in her seat in response to the surprise visit.
"Didn't mean to startle you," Val waved her hands up in consolation. "Sorry! I just couldn't look away from seeing you in action."
"No, no, it's okay, come on in Val!" Nia fanned Val in nonchalantly, while also cooling the cold sweat prickling her baby hairs.
"It's amazing to see you work. This is how you do it, huh? This is how you get shit done, the little Mint Beauty engine that could— do-it-all!" Val giggled to herself.
Nia shrugged and laughed nervously, but Val's words had injected confidence back in her veins. They affirmed her and made pride spread across Nia's skin. The nice compliments on what felt like her bare minimum efforts had warmed her insides and motivated her to actually get her to-do list done for the first time in a week. "It's no big deal, Val. I'm just doing my job."
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