1 | Almost Happy ▷ Sam Wilson | ✓

23 - KNOW NOTHING

"I LOOK LIKE AN EYESORE, DON'T I?"

Sam looked up from where he was playing Solitaire to see Jen wearing a green dress underneath a black blazer, her hair pulled into a respectable bun and glasses perched on her nose. She hadn't worn those clothes coming into work, so he assumed she had gotten changed in her office.

"You look nice," he replied, carefully moving back to his computer, pretending like he hadn't been shirking his duties, "Big day today. Gonna win the case?"

She sighed, looking down at herself. "Not looking like this I'm not."

He shifted around in his seat, folding his hands together and smiling at the younger woman. "You're gonna be fine. Look, they're not gonna care about the dress you wear, they're gonna care about how you do in court, what you say, how you say it. You're gonna do great. Now go on, keep your head up, you got this."

She sighed, smoothing down the folds of the dress. "I had worn this to be confident. I tend to feel a lot more powerful when I'm green."

Sam didn't know quite what to make of that, so he just smiled encouragingly and watched as she nodded towards him and made her way to the door, opening it before pausing, taking a deep breath, and heading out, her head held high.

Nodding to himself, Sam glanced over at the paperwork he had to do, then over to his game of Solitaire.

No one ever said he had the greatest work ethic.

As he went back to his game, happy to just be sitting in the quiet, playing a game that is solely meant for one person, his phone buzzed, interrupting the flow he had been getting himself into.

He sighed and slid over towards it, raising an eyebrow when he saw that he was getting a call from Rhett. Strange as Steve had made it very clear he didn't want his boyfriend anywhere near the alluring presence of his much more superior best friend. Steve's words, not Sam's, obviously.

"Hey, man," Sam greeted, because he was a true friend, and true friends don't try to steal their friend's partners, no matter how much he wanted to.

"Hey," Rhett greeted, much too happy to be genuine, "Listen, Steve punched a Nazi and I'm gonna need to take him to his apartment to calm down, but Nicky's going through a really rough time right now and he can't be alone, I'm really sorry to ask, but you can just stay with him, remind him that he isn't alone?"

Sam was already grabbing his jacket and his keys, rushing out of the building and locking the door behind him, reminding himself to text Jen to explain why he ran out with the computer still on and cards on his desk.

"Yeah, I'll be there," he promised, listening to the sounds of Steve cursing in the background, yelling in the way he gets when he's truly upset, words failing and starts of sentences coming out but with no endings, "Good luck with him. I wanna say take him to a gym, let him punch out his feelings."

"Good plan, I'll find a place. Good luck with Nicky, he won't really be a handful since I'm sure you've dealt with worse," Rhett said, and it was in such a casual tone that Sam had to wonder just how much he'd dealt with.

"Talk to you later," Sam finished, hanging up and shoving his phone into his jacket pocket.

Looks like he was headed to Brooklyn.

º º º

"Knock-knock, princess, you awake?"

It could never be said that Sam always knew what to say, he tended to default into lightly poking fun before fully immersing himself into being the nurturing soul that he had become over time, something he was proud of, though refused to be exploited by.