Miss Pen

Chapter Nine

My cup rattled in my hand, the dark liquid spilling over the rim. I hissed when it burned the tops of my fingers, quickly setting the Styrofoam down on the counter. Black drops slowly fell onto the white surface.

"Crap, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for that to happen."

I looked up into concerned, dark green gems, silently cursing them out in my head. I guessed that I was wrong about how Rhode would act during work the next day. I had been waiting for him to walk past me - without making eye contact - and continue on his merry way, not someone who would find me getting coffee in the break room and do a little hip bump to get my attention. It certainly worked, though.

"It's fine." I sighed. "Please just get me some paper towels."

By then, the burning of my fingers wasn't as intense. Rhode still rushed around the tiny kitchen, frantically ripping off a few sheets of napkins and running them under cold water.

"Give me your hand." He said, reaching for me.

After a quick glance down at our touching skin, I lifted my eyes to focus them on the cabinets behind his head. Rhode used his thumb and middle finger to hold a soft lock around my wrist while his other hand enclosed around my fingers, the wet paper toweling being the only thing that separated them. The burning from the coffee was still there, but Rhode made me easily forget about that.

"Good morning, you two!"

Carlita skipped into the break room, squeezing in between me and Rhode to get to the coffee pot. Rhode dropped my hand and stepped back, giving the unnecessarily excited woman some space. She was the next person I mentally had a few choice words about. I had a feeling that that would be going on a lot during the day. But then again, when didn't it happen?

"Good morning." Rhode politely smiled. "Are you always so... enthusiastic this early in the day?"

"If I wasn't, we would have to rely on Aubrey to brighten our day, and we all know how that would go." She laughed, giving me a glance over from head-to-toe.

No, actually. We don't know how that would go.

"I wouldn't mind that." Rhode said, looking straight into her eyes. "Some people don't need to be phony for others to like them."

Carlita's eyebrows rose and lips parted, clearly from the shock of Rhode's bluntness. When her face returned back to normal after a few seconds, she shrugged.

"Well, it's a good thing none of us are like that."

"Yeah," He rocked on his feet. "it is a good thing."

I bit my lip, hiding my amusement of Rhode's sarcasm to Carlita. When he made eye contact with me, his lips twitched like he knew exactly what I had been thinking.

"So, how are you liking the first day of your internship?" Carlita changed the subject.

"I don't know. I've only been here for about an hour and it's been spent talking to Ms. Snow. Lovely woman, by the way."

"You actually like her?" She gaped at his calm face. "You might be the first person that actually does."

"In complete honesty, she's not all that bad. She's just under a lot of stress, so give her a break."

It was my turn to look at Rhode in shock. If he could talk to that woman for an hour straight, there definitely had to be a reason behind it. She never kept anyone in her office for more than a few minutes.

"What did she want from you? I mean, that's a little unusual for her."

Rhode looked down at me with a blank face, giving nothing away. He really was a hard one to read. One minute you could tell exactly what he was feeling, the next it was like you weren't even there in front of him.