His Nineteenth Secretary [✔]

Two

The tense atmosphere emitting from her was enough to get me all giddy and to have numerous thoughts running in my head as I picked up the envelope, desperately hoping within myself it was something else.

Only, it wasn't something else.

I lifted my head slowly once I was done with going through the content of the letter to look at her.

My hands were visibly trembling by now before helplessly dropping to my sides and for some time, I couldn't get myself to say anything, still clearly in shock.

"Liz?" I managed to say eventually hoping for her to tell me it was a joke, but, she wouldn't even look at me. "Liz, can you please give me a second chance and I promise you- I promise you, I will do my best to work harder." I begged, trying my possible best to not cry, at least not when she was yet to say anything.

"I will advise you to get your things before my new Secretary arrives." She brushed me off, her eyes not leaving the files before her.

With everything still like a dream to me, I felt rooted to the ground. Speechless as well. Seeing she wasn't ready to say anything to me after that, I left her office to get my things.

Now outside her office, at my desk, my vision instantly blurred from the pool of tears gathering in them and threatening to fall.

That was not fair and I wanted to be able to scream on top of my lungs to tell her just that.

Casting another painful glance towards the termination letter that was now lying on my desk, my eyes welled up even the more and I couldn't stop the tears from falling anymore.

I wiped the tears off my cheeks just as quickly as they came with the back of my hand and was halfway done with packing my things when the new secretary, I guess, from her formal outfit, a pretty lady probably in her twenties arrived, her rose scented perfume instantly filling the air.

"Hi!" She waved cheerfully at me on seeing me.

I wasn't about to return her greeting, instead, I cast her a cold look before turning back to what I was doing.

That moment, I saw Lizzy come out of her office, now with a smile on her perfectly made up face and before turning back to what I was doing, again, I saw her hugging the lady affectionately.

They must know each other before.

I carried the box containing my things once I was done with packing and headed to the sixth floor where my best friend, Alicia's office was.

Noticing my teary eyes and the box containing my things, I didn't have to explain things to her before she knew what was going on. She pulled me into a comforting hug on reaching me without as much as asking me a single question, which I found surprising.

At the same time I felt relieved she didn't because if she did I knew myself to have burst into tears before I could get a single word out and despite the fact that she didn't, I had burst into tears in her embrace. I would feel her arms wrap more tightly around me whenever my crying intensifies.

She released me from the hug once she saw that I had stopped crying, pulling a little away at the same time so she could look at me. There was concern written all over her face and it looked like she would start crying herself.

"Are you okay now?" She asked.

"Yeah," I nodded. "I think so." I sniffled. She went ahead to pick up the box I had dropped on the floor while I was crying and I thought she was going to hand it over back to me because I stretched out my hands to take it from her but she didn't.

"I will bring this for you later. Umm... This is what you are going to do for me. Go home, if necessary take a nice shower and try to get some sleep..."

"Alicia, I can't believe she could fire me." My lips quivered. She held her hand to my face and wiped the tears streaking my cheeks with the pad of her thumb.

"I don't want you to cry anymore about what happened, trust me it won't be hard to find a new job at a new company." She assured and then, sighed. "I will be coming over to your place after I get off work today, I might probably sleep over too. The past few days had been really hard on you, I can't let you be alone all by yourself throughout today. Only if I could, I want to leave this very moment to spend the whole of today with you but I can't," She said with a pout. "Anyway, I don't want you to think too much about it, so go home and get some rest, okay?"

I nodded.

"Let's go. Let me see you out." She offered after setting the box under her desk. "Did you bring your car?"

"No, I took a cab this morning but wait, what about your boss?" I asked knowing very well it wasn't going to be a good idea, two friends getting fired in a day.

"Don't worry about him, he already assigned to me all that I needed to do this morning and he will be in his office for now, he won't notice I am gone for five minutes!" She winked at me in a funny way.

I laughed and even if not close to a minute able to forget the mess that I was in. Just what I loved about her, she would always manage to lighten my mood somehow whenever I was down. And, she was right, I really didn't need to worry too much about her boss. Alex was a very nice guy and if anything, he could never fire her for something like that.

I flopped down onto the couch in my living room with a sigh immediately I entered my small, but, cozy apartment. I couldn't stop thinking about what happened no matter how much I wanted to and that was because I couldn't bring myself to believe she could fire me. She knew about the whole thing with Mike, but, at the same time, I knew I couldn't blame her, I was falling behind at work. I should have seen it coming. Before rising up, I slipped off my brown heels.

With slow steps, I walked to my room while holding them in one hand alongside my bag and dumping them onto the floor once I was inside without the consideration of putting them in the right place.

Changing into comfortable clothes didn't take long and in a matter of seconds I was in bed casting off the thought of what happened and trying to get some sleep.

I must have slept for over three hours because when I woke up and checked for the time on my phone it was already eleven, still in the morning.

After checking for the time, I busied myself with deleting all the pictures of Mike, including the one we took together that I had on my phone and all the text messages. That way I will think less about him. Done with that, but, not finding anything interesting to do anymore and not in the mood to check up new job vacancies, I angrily shoved my phone at a distance away from me, although, I was careful not to let it fall off the bed.

I made a slow journey to the living room afterwards while combing and smoothening my disheveled hair with my fingers. Closing my eyes, I took in the cold air from the fridge before taking out an orange juice, shutting the fridge after scanning it for something else I could eat but not finding any.

I dropped the orange juice and the pack of cookies which I later took from the kitchen island, on the table in the living room before turning on the TV to binge-watch movies.

Over the pack of cookies and orange juice, I continued to stare at the TV screen watching Netflix, not failing to crack up occasionally, a little too much at times, whenever there was a funny scene.

After the first movie ended, I proceeded to watch another one. At the end of the second movie my butt was seriously aching. I rose up to tidy up the house a little and to do some laundering. By the time I was done with everything and was going to slump unto the couch in my living room in exhaustion, I heard a soft knock at the door. I could tell it must be no one else, but, Alicia.

I pulled the door widely open on reaching it to let her in.

"Hey!" I greeted heartily on seeing her.

I was met with a smile. She had on a different dress from the one she had on at work and I could spot the soft green duffel bag containing the things she would need for the night and definitely the ones for work the following morning, also the box containing my things which I took from her and then she had pulled me into a one-sided hug before stooping to take off her sandals.

"How was work?" I asked, walking ahead of her to drop the box on the small table in the living room for the meantime.

"Not fine. Couldn't stop thinking about what happened with you at work." She confessed. "I hope you're good now though?"