black & white

nervous

"please don't be mad at me." we'd been arguing for hours; the sun was starting to come up.

"for the love of god, jane, I'm not mad at you."
"then why are you yelling at me?" I'd started crying. "I'm sorry. I just don't want people to know about us. I'm afraid."

"I'm sorry I yelled," he said, kissing me on the forehead. I continued to cry, and he sat down and rested his head in his hands.

"I don't want this to be a problem anymore. let's just leave our relationship like it is, okay? but if that's not what you want, you can leave. I'll pretend like none of this ever happened. I'm just not comfortable with putting it out there," I sobbed, unable to pull myself together.

"I'm definitely not leaving," he said, taking me into his arms and holding me while I cried.
"I'm sorry."
"don't be. we don't need to put our relationship out there. let's just focus on us."
I slowly pulled myself together and looked up at him. "focus on us?"
"let's just love each other. let's not worry about anyone else."
"I like that idea."

♤

I stayed in the studio with jack until two o'clock in the morning the next day.

"bend over your desk."
"jack, I don't want to-"
"just do it."

he shoved me down so my cheek was against the cold wood, pressing his pelvis into my back end and grabbing my hips. he bent over me and pushed my hair away from my neck, kissed me, and whispered, "sike," in my ear.

"you're terrible," I said, standing up straight.
"but you love it."
"only sometimes."

I sat down and finished some filing, and jack watched me.
"on a scale of one to ten, how boring is it doing that and answering the phone all day?"
"it pays the bills," I shrugged.
"you know you don't really have to work as long as you're with me."
"if I quit suddenly then the others would get suspicious."

he rolled his eyes. "why do you care so much about what other people think?"
"I don't know."
"don't worry about it. let's just focus on us, remember?"
he'd bent over my desk and pressed his lips to my neck, when someone suddenly came through the door; my heart leapt up into my throat and I suddenly forgot how to breathe.

"jane, I have some more-"
it was ben blackwell, director of operations at third man; he also happened to be jack's nephew.

jack quickly jumped off of me and tried to act nonchalant; but it was too little, too late.

"oh, I'm uh, sorry to interrupt. jack, I didn't know you were still here," ben continued, obviously uncomfortable.
"just getting some last minute work in. I was discussing it with jane here," he said; he was nervous too. his voice was shaking a bit.
"okay, well, anyway. jane, I have some more documents for you to file. feel free to do it in the morning, it's kind of late," ben said, handing me a stack of papers.
"oh, goody," I shrugged. "I'll get those done first thing tomorrow, ben."
"take your time. you two have a nice night." he definitely seemed suspicious, but he didn't ask any questions. I listened for his footsteps to reach the end of the hallway before I spoke.

"oh, god," I whimpered.