Mac Vs PC: Infected

Command + Left Arrow

""My job is not to be easy on people. My jobs is to take these great people we have and to push them and make them even better." —Steve Jobs (Macintosh & Apple)

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"Mac." She cried out for him when she swore she wouldn't. She didn't need him. She didn't need anyone. "Mac." Yet her voice stretched along the shattered edges of her control, torn and limp. To outsiders it resembled an intimate moment, but Piper knew just as well as him that his strength was the only thing holding her upright. His fingers were relentless against the back of her ribs reminding her to breathe; to get her control back; to focus on the here and now, not the past.

"It's alright. Everything is gonna be alright." She knew her fear had control when she didn't chastise him for speaking to her as if she were a child but instead took comfort in him. As kids she always told his mother how annoying Mac was, but Pam always said, "He's a good kid, he just don't hide it."

Don't let me fall, she sent to Mac with a tight squeeze on his bicep. How could a 5 foot 7, brunette from the suburbs strike more fear in her than Pam's diagnosis? How could a 21 year old mentor bring more anxiety than her father's deployment? Was she this weak? Shaking her head, Piper refused to let go of Mac. If he wanted to help, he damn well better help.

Mac called something over to his teammates and stepped away from Piper, wiggling out of her grip and replacing it with a flat volleyball. So much for her pillar of strength. Asshole.

"C'mon." Grabbing the loose net he bundled it up around his arm. "Let's go put this stuff away."

A second later, it clicked. He was giving her a way out. A moment to hide. Leaving her mentor was not one of the lessons of respect Gloria had taught her. Hiding wasn't a trait Gloria would accept. Torn between loyalty and safety, Piper stared at Mac's outreached hand.

"That's wasn't an request, let's clean up." Taking the choice from her, her guilt subsided as she numbly grabbed the balls placing them in the cart following a determined Mac into the storage closet.

Crossing over the threshold of the closet, she could have sworn that she heard her name being called. Without a moment to analyze it, Mac grabbed her arm before shoving her and her cart inside the small cramped space.

Mac shut the door behind her, leaning against it as if he hadn't just witness Piper's anxiety attack. He didn't coddle her as he did on the court just simply leaned against the door. Waiting.

Piper glanced for a place to sit, a place to gain her bearing but the dingy closet held enough space for the equipment, herself, Mac and the foot of empty space between them. Picking up a flat volleyball, she molded the leather around her fingers manipulating the depleted ball under her control.

"Whenever she's around, I don't know how to feel." Her words came out tumbling against her will. She didn't want to have this conversation. She especially didn't want to have this conversation with Mac. When they first came up with the childish point system in middle school, talking about stupid shit gained a point on the opposing enemy's court. The twelve-year-old Piper would have considered uncontrollable emotions stupid shit. When he didn't respond, she felt the need to justify her melodramatic emotion to a boy who knew she was better than a bag of female emotions.

"She is the best and worst thing that has ever happened to me. She taught me to be proud of who I am when my mother was drinking herself into tears when my dad was deployed. She helped me get up in the morning when your Mom was diagnosed and you refused to talk to me. She brought me flowers on Valentines Day when I got my wisdom teeth out and looked like I'd eaten every Asian child in China.