Néon Raider ♉

Bumped

The autumn air whipped through Ivory's kinky wefted hair. She flashed wide smiles at stunned and seemingly snobbish passersby. Why did they flinch and give her dirty stares when she said hi, hello and waved? Ivory had put so much hard work into learning their language. Sure, she still had a heavy accent, but she conjugated her tenses properly and was 100% percent fluent in written French. She sighed. Perhaps, people weren't the same everywhere after all. Maybe she was trying too hard.
Slow down. She thought to herself.

Back at her home country in Mauritius and her village, Souillé, in particular, it was customary to greet everyone on the way. France had a different culture altogether. She had to shed her small town girl mentality in order to not be seen and branded as the newly arrived creep.

Ivory was lucky to win the lottery. Many had fought for that chance to no avail. Many illegal migrants wallowed in misery at the slumps of Calais.
She was amongst the lucky ones to get a one in a lifetime chance to come to France without breaking a sweat.

She chose the city of Cannes, a resort town on the French Riviera.
She took a left turn from the, Boulevard Victor Tuby, where she rented her small modestly decorated apartment and passed through to Rue Louis Blanc to a multi-tiered office building.

The glass entrance door sprang sideways and Ivory emerged into a vast lobby filled with security guards and buzzing staff.
The interior was neat and the room set alight with hues of assorted fresh flowers. She gawked at the stone decorated ceiling and the three dimensional walls as she wafted towards the elevator. She was headed for second floor. Six months ago she he was granted employment permit to work as a receptionist at a reputable law firm, Laurent & Rheff.co

Ivory was indeed lucky. The salary was swell and she had the opportunity to be a resident of a country she always dreamt of visiting. She reached the elevator doors, it sprang sideways and she made it inside. She studied her French terry pants, loafer pumps and a sky blue Biz shirt, for the 100th time. Pursing her lips, exhaled a long puff of breath. She hoped she wasn't too modestly dressed for her first day at work.
She smoothed her pants as she stepped out of the elevator. With a sudden jolt, she hit a hard wall of muscled flesh.

"Pardon me." A deep, husky voice expressed in French. She looked up at the man, who twitched his soft thin pink lips in a subtle smile, pocketing his hands inside his ripped dark jeans, worn with a simple V-neck immaculate t-shirt, Yves Saint Laurent dark sunglasses on his hand and flat grey espadrilles. His silver eyes, a sharp contrast to his copper coloured hair, fashioned into a samurai bun and matching full beard.

Ivory's heart stopped. Her heartbeat drummed into her ears. She opened her mouth to speak, but it seemed she was suddenly ailing from language disorientation and cognitive dissonance. However, she managed a nod.
"For nothing." Her voice, barely a whisper. She wobbled into the firm's lobby as the beautiful man gazed at his blue brown chrono watch without giving her a second look. He disappeared as the elevator door closed.

A female employee with a blonde side sweft shoulder length styled hair, skipped childishly from the reception desk, blushing and pinching herself. Surely, she was gushing over the guy who had just walked out.

"Who was that?" Ivory found herself asking as she closed in on the lady with bold red lips.
"Ah, Léon Parsifal. He is a client of monsieur Louis Laurent. I lose it every time I see him. Such a beautiful man, isn't he?" The lady shrieked, adjusting her black pant suit.

Ivory couldn't agree more. She never knew a man could be this beautiful. It made her wonder if he was human at all. She had almost fainted at the sight of him. It seemed he did not have that effect on her alone, but on multitudes of women and men, possibly. She pursed her lips. Must be a gigolo anyway. No way she will ever want to feel like that again. Almost traumatised over his looks. No. She couldn't ever come into contact with him ever again. He made her feel a flood of emotions as though he walked with a spell, binding every person he met and enrapturing them with his charm. Perhaps slaved them even. Who knew? She shrugged.

"How can I help you, by the way?" The receptionist clasped her metallic manicured fingers and asked, fluttering her false lashes repeatedly.

"Well," Ivory reached into her black leather shoulder bag, retrieved an employment letter in a brown envelope and handed over to the receptionist who gave her a suspicious look, while she retrieved the printed letter from the brown envelope and skimmed over it, moving her lips slightly as she read.

Her arched brows on fleek shot up at Ivory, who waited for her long awaited response.

"Oh, you must be my new assistant receptionist. I have been expecting you. I'm Gladys. Nice to meet you, miss..." Gladys arched a brow in question.

"Ivory Amsu. Nice to meet you." Ivory extended her hand to Gladys in greetings. Gladys seemed like a genuinely nice person, though Ivory suspected she was a flippant chit-chatter as well.

"Come on inside." Gladys ushered Ivory behind the modern circular mahogany wrapped receptionist desk with an acrylic bottom.

"I should probably call monsieur Martin, the human resource manager and inform him of your arrival. This is your space." Gladys articulated, shoving Ivory into her work space which was already equipped with a desk embedded computer screen, phone and stationeries.

Ivory sat on her mid back office chair and studied her futuristic environment. The lobby was vast with a mellow tinge of blue, lightening the room. Canapés and chaises rêveuse were set around 3D printed optical illusion tables, festooned with vibrant flowers, set at the far end of the room. On the yellow painted wall adjacent to Ivory's desk was a clear message which read, "Teamwork makes great work"
Ivory pursed her lips and studied the employee manifesto on her work space and smiled. This was her first real job and she wouldn't disappoint her employers.