Spitballs

Stubble

The man in the suit ran his hand lightly across his cheek, the short bristles of an almost unshaven face leaving a tingling in his fingers.

It was a natural habit of his, although he had never been sure why. He would absent-mindedly run his hands over his light beard more often than he realized.

Some found it annoying. Some found it slightly disturbing.

But the lady across the room, the one sitting quietly in the greenish chair, did not. She did not find it to be annoying, nor disturbing.

She knew exactly what it meant.

It was a nervous habit.

Almost all the agents had them, although few were aware of it. Being constantly on edge left them bored when they weren't doing something, almost restless.

There was a slight twinge of satisfaction inside the woman. At least he wouldn't be bored anymore. What she was about to do would leave him anything but bored. She tried to think of this as a small consolation, but for some reason it made her feel more guilty.

She was going to kill him. This man, the one who was rubbing his hand over his half beard. She was going to take his life, even though he was a person, a person that lived and breathed and had nervous habits.

She let out a long breath, trying to focus on the fact that he was the enemy. He was the enemy. She scolded herself for thinking of him as a person, as a real human being. It was always harder to kill them when she did that.

She had been doing it a lot lately, which bothered her, but not enough to do anything about it. And what could she do, anyway? Tell her boss that she, a trained assassin, was having moral dilemmas about killing people? The people in her business weren't the most understanding when it came to something like that, something they would perceive as weakness.

She was still staring at the man, which was bad. He, like her, had also been trained, and he would, or at least should, be able to tell when someone was watching him. Maybe he had already noticed and was waiting for her to make a move. She forced her eyes down to the table in front of her. A pile of magazines was scattered across it.

Forcing herself not to look at the man, mostly because she realized the more she looked at him the harder it would be to kill him, she picked up a magazine and pretended to thumb through it.

The receptionist was staring at her computer. Probably checking the schedule.

The woman in the green chair sighed. She would have to wait for the receptionist to leave.