What Little Worlds

Twenty-One

Amelie glanced up at the clock, almost furtively, so that the room itself could not divine that she was anxious for noon to arrive. After yesterday, she felt like she was cursed not to get to practice magic again. Eleven fifty-six. So so close.

She caught her leg bouncing anxiously and froze it. Calm down, she thought to herself. It was no big deal. It was just a lunch break.

There was a creak outside her door and she steeled herself for someone to enter and assign her a task that would take up her whole lunch break. She held her breath and after thirty seconds, when no one entered, slowly let it out.

Eleven fifty-seven. One minute and she could excuse getting up. She went about closing all her windows on her computer and aligning everything on her desk at right angles before looking up at the clock once again.

Eleven fifty-eight. Time to go!

Amelie ran out of the building and to the T stop on the corner. She had reached the warehouse within twelve minutes of leaving her desk.

She ran through the crowded entry-way, almost tripping several times, and only stopped running once she had made it inside the large gym space. Running for ten minutes straight just days after having a 102 fever turned her into a panting mess and she leaned over to catch her breath.

When she looked up, she was face to face with the most startling pair of green eyes.

"Oh my gosh!" she exclaimed, and took a shocked step backwards. The man with the green eyes was standing three feet away from her, cocking his head. "Um...hi," she said.

"Hi?" he replied. Amelie took in his auburn hair and tanned skin and found herself scanning his toned body. She jerked her head back up to make eye contact with the green eyes. Green like a shimmering forest after a rain storm.

They stared at each other for another minute and Amelie realized maybe he was waiting for her to respond. "Oh, I'm Amelie. I'm friends with Adrien."

The man nodded.

"Are you from Prost?" she asked, cautiously. A thought occurred to her that if he was not from Prost and was from one of the less friendly Realms Adrien had spoken of, she had no idea how to proceed. Did this man know about her?

"I'm not," he said. Shit. She started backing up towards the door, cursing herself for not telling Adrien that she was going to come during her lunch break.

"I'm from Sawth but am in Prost on a diplomatic mission." He took a step forward. "Are you from Moore then?"

Amelie bit her lip. "No. Not exactly." She continued backing up until she felt her back hit the door. "It was nice to meet you but I have to...go," she said and rushed out of the gym, without looking back.

She moved through the rest of her day in a state of disconnect and was startled when Jesse came by to say he was leaving for the night.

"Already?" she replied, looking up from her distillation, goggles and lab coat still on.

"Yeah, already. It's five. I have an hour to meet my friends before happy hour ends!"

"Oh," she said, vaguely and took off her goggles. "Have fun!"

"Thanks," he said. "Go home soon. You look out of it. Are you feeling better by the way?"

"Yes, much better," she said, mustering a smile. "Just been a weird day, that's all."

"Okay, well see you tomorrow," he said and walked out of the door.

Amelie quickly finished up what she was doing and packed up her stuff. She had texted Adrien to ask if it was okay for her to come to the gym tonight about an hour ago, not mentioning her run-in with the man with green eyes from earlier today.