Jayne Hall: then I apldjfasdfx

The full map of the third floor is in this info chapter

Tuesday, May the 26

It is just before 8 AM and you're standing in line at the Starbucks on the way to work. There is actually a Starbucks very close to your apartment on Vermont Ave but it's the opposite direction from the Bathurst Health Centre so you just walk a short block down Bloor St closer to your work.

The wait is only a few minutes, and the barista smiles widely at you. "Hi Zach! The usual?"

"You bet, grande Iced Caramel Macchiato." She has already entered your order but you like to say it out loud anyway.

As she gives you your total and you tap your card to pay, she says "I'm not trying to drive you away, but if you ordered ahead for pickup it would be a lot faster for you. I can tell when you're running late and I feel bad when the line is long or the person in front of you is ordering something crazy."

Chuckling and trying not to blush, you mumble, "I'm never in a hurry it's fine. Thank you," and shuffle over to wait for your drink. You know that the truth, that you prefer to talk to whoever takes your order because you don't get to talk to many people outside of work and standing in line at least makes you feel like you're out with people, would just be sad. Even if anyone who works at a coffee shop probably wouldn't be shocked to hear that.

With your drink in hand, you hustle across Bloor to get to the BHC because, well, you are a little late and you do need to hurry. By the time you get to your desk (a quick peek shows you Jayne in her desk on the phone as you walk by) you are halfway done your drink. You'd get a venti but you're going to be going to grab another coffee in a couple of hours with Jayne anyway, and that break is your favourite part of the day.

The old LCD monitor you have plugged into the SGI server is still in standby, as you'd expect. You fight the urge to go check to make sure the power cable is still unplugged, because that would be silly.

Docking your laptop, you open up your ticket queue and start to go through your emails, getting some actual work done for a while. A little after 9 AM, an alert pops up on your second screen. The health org uses Microsoft Teams for collaboration and chat. You like it because it makes it easy to share dumb memes and gifs with the other 9 people in the Networks team for the Ontario Health department you're a part of. The huge hospitals have their own large IT departments but you're one of the guys (and your team is all guys) who do all the smaller centers and clinics. Luckily, BHC is still big enough that you don't have a half dozen small facilities to take care of, you get to just chill out in your office.

But this message isn't from the Networks channel, but your neighbor.

Jayne Hall: yo Zach

You: Hallsy

Jayne Hall: hah I almost forgot about that. I'm stuck on this painful monthly managers call. 90 min of listening to ppl talk about parking issues *gunshot*
Jayne Hall: man, Teams needs an emoji for 'just shoot me' come on i bet Slack has one

You: That's probably why we use Teams instead. Hell, this is so corporate friendly it doesn't even have a thumbs down emoji. Well it has this (bomb) emoji, that's not bad?

Jayne Hall: yah but I really need a thumbs down one to react to your lame nicknames (cry)

You: ha ha good try Hallsy, you know deep down it's working

Jayne Hall: pfft. how was your night? do anything fun?
Jayne Hall: ...granted it was a monday night

You: I went home and watched some TV. Ordered in some Chinese, and the girl who delivers it told me she's going on vacation but she made sure her replacement knows they have to go around to the back of the building for my door
You: I *might* order too much from that place (thinking)

Jayne Hall: yikes
Jayne Hall: that's... shit i can't lie that's sad Zach (laugh)

You: well it got thrilling after that. I watched netflix until I fell asleep in the living room. Woke up at 2am sore as shit and went to bed. So... I guess no I didn't do anything that fun? lol

Jayne Hall: huh

You: ok I just depressed myself. Did you do anything fun?

Jayne Hall: oh no, just went to visit my family. Argue with my mom, annoy my little sisters, typical Monday night for me too honestly.

Jayne Hall: then I apldjfasdfx

You sit upright as you hear a bang from next door, a very unprofessional word, then suddenly Jayne is loudly apologizing on the phone. You can't quite make out what she's saying after that but you can tell she was startled and had to quickly unmute to respond to something. Well you're definitely not going to let that pass!

You: Uh, Hallsy? you ok?
You: Hallsy, did you bump your head? I can hear some weird mumbling. It sounded like someone dropped a phone and then yelled "FUCK" but you're in a big regional meeting so couldn't be you? That would be shameful.

Pausing from your typing, you cock your head and are gratified to hear the sound of Jayne stop talking, then clear her throat as if **** back a laugh.

Jayne Hall: I am going to end you Pritchard.

Laughing, you get up. You need to go to the bathroom anyway but as you s-l-o-w-l-y walk past Jayne's open door you can see how she's very carefully staring at her screen, ignoring you.

Her blush rises as she's holding the receiver to her ear, saying, "We did get the memo from HR about the rumours of the potential budget shortfall and closures and so on. I already forwarded it to the staff, of course, but I got some questions back..." As she goes on, ignoring you, you can see the headset she usually uses sitting on the floor next to her desk.

Ahh. She probably knocked the headset off her desk and then had to quickly unmute or something, which is why she's using the phone's handset like people used to do during teleconferences in the Dark Ages. Smiling, you take a few steps in and pick up her headset and place it on her desk.

She trails off slightly in her discussion of staff feedback. Looking up at you, you can see she is still slightly blushing and there's something in her expression, as if she's losing her train of thought looking at you, that you find incredibly cute.

You quickly turn and leave and she rallies and continues her discussion.

As you approach the bathroom, you realize you're blushing too. What the hell, are you 15 years old?

Pausing, you test the door instead of walking right into it. Locked. Oh come on. Instead of going back to your office, you just stand closer to the elevators and decide to wait for a minute. If you leave and someone comes out, then another woman might go in.

Finally, a woman unlocks the door and comes out. She sees you standing there but doesn’t react, so you go in and sweet merciful Zeus what the hell did she do in here?? It smells like the outhouse behind the cabins at summer camp on a hot day! It smells like Satan took a shit on a pile of rotting meat and then a hell-hound came and puked sulfur on it!

Ugh, no wonder she’s locking herself away to commit a crime like that. The other nurses would call an ambulance if she was doing that in the ladies’.

Granted, you aren’t there to plant a rose garden either. So you do your business (the human body is a grotesque mistake when you think about it, huh?) and then bail.

Finally able to breath again without regret, you walk past Jayne’s office but her door is closed. You can tell from the frosted privacy window by the door that someone is sitting in the chair talking to her so probably one of the clerks she manages.

Back in your office, you think about the rest of your day. Jayne will probably want to go get coffee in 45 minutes or so, and you’re done all the work you really have to get done this morning. Being the only person who has any clue what you do or how in the whole building certainly gives you a lot of leeway in setting your schedule.

Let’s be honest, in the back of your mind you’ve been thinking of The Affection Multiplier again. You want to see what it says, and you want to know if you just had a minor freak out yesterday over nothing.

Really, you want to see your scores again. You want to see Jayne’s scores.

Biting your lip, you think about what to do.

Author’s Note:

This will be a pretty significant branching pathway, but I will only really be writing one path to start. I am a total softy so I will be writing the happier, rom-comish, path first, then I’ll think about the darker outcomes more.