Wish To Exit

The white text of the TAM summary sits there on the blue screen like a taunt. You consider calling Jayne over to take a look and ask her if she knows anything about this. You definitely would do exactly that... except for those pesky 'love' and 'lust' scores. And the affection score for that matter. You could just imagine calling her over to take a look and the way she'd arch a dubious eyebrow super high at you assuming you created this as some sort of incredibly lame flirtation.

Nah. This is deeply weird and more than a little troubling, but you'll try to figure it out on your own for now. So just rack your brain for an explanation, come on you're pretty good at problem-solving and thinking things through rationally. Just work it through logically one step at a time.

... shit, you got nothing. None of this seems even possible, never-mind logical. The more you think about it the less happy you are to be confronted by something so clearly real and yet so rationally inconceivable.

You do the only thing you can think to do when staring in the face of a true impossibility. You glance at the "PRESS [X] TO EXIT" that helpfully shows on the bottom right of the screen and take the application up on its offer. For a long minute, you stared into a broken reality, a universe that didn't add up, and you said nope. Fuck that noise.

Exiting back from the summary to the main welcome screen, you hit 5 to exit again.

===ARE YOU SURE YOU WISH TO EXIT The Affection Multiplier? [Y/N]===

You are very sure. With an actual queasy feeling in your stomach, you hit Y. The application then begins a very snappy shutdown. In a few seconds, the blue TurboPascal window is closed along with the TAM application it was running.

Feeling strangely better already, you shutdown the whole server. It takes Windows NT a minute to finally turn off, but as the screen goes dark and the fans stop spinning in the SGI box you breathe a sigh of relief.

Should you just unplug it all now? Toss it into the cage and fill out the Asset Disposal form to get it taken to the recycling depot right now? You're tempted for a moment, but eventually, you decide to not. Now that the server is powered down you feel a bit sheepish about how a few lines of text on an old program made you scared. You'll just ignore it for now and then maybe later an explanation will pop into your head. Then you'll have the damn thing taken away and tossed in a landfill.

You sit at your desk and bury your head in work for a while, firing off emails and completing some remote access forms for users. Some of this stuff should go to Account Management but if it was routed to you in error you'll just do it rather than go through the hassle of calling the queue manager to do a warm transfer. Besides, you can just zone out while doing this basic data entry and catch up on the Magnus Archives podcast, which is exactly what you do.

The zen state of mindless data entry is washing over you pretty good, because it takes you a second to notice someone in the doorway waving. Taking out your earbuds, you quickly finish the account you are on just as Jayne says "Jeez, Earth to Zach! Do you want to grab lunch or do you have?"

"I brought the world's saddest peanut butter and nothing else sandwich, so going out sounds great," you admit. You lock your PC and stand up, grabbing your wallet and phone from your desk. Jayne stands in the doorway, looking at the laptops and boxes you had moved around while getting inventory numbers. Before you got spooked by your name on a screen and stopped. Damn, the more you think about it the crazier it sounds. Maybe you just read it wrong?

"Pizza? Korean? That weird-ass place where you sit on toilets and eat sushi?" Whatever she thinks of the mess of old hardware you left strewn about she doesn't mention it. “Get it? Weird ass place?”

"Very droll. I will never ever go to the toilet place," you say confidently, "but beyond that, I'm game for whatever. Your pick."

The two of you start down the hall to the stairwell to the back door. "In that case, I had Korean on the weekend so I'm thinking some slices of Pizza Nova?" Jayne asks.

The walk down to the pizza place is quick but the lunch hour line is almost out the door. Still, you get your slices and leave, eating as you slowly walk back, commenting on the quality of the graffiti you see. The neighborhood is still somewhat rough, people keep saying it's gentrifying like most of Toronto but you've only been in the city for less than half a year so you have no idea how gritty it must have been before.

The late May weather is damn near perfect as you and Jayne approach the rear entrance to Bathurst Health. Dragging her feet comically, Jayne whines “Do we have to go back?”

You quite agree, and pointing to a stretch of wall in the sun you say, “Not for a few minutes. Let’s bask in the sun, screw work.”

“Hell yeah,” Jayne enthusiastically follows you and you both lean against the wall, the sun feels wonderful and the noise of traffic on Bloor is somehow distant and soothing.

You glance at your friend, her tight black pants and well-cut blouse highlighting her slim build. You’ve seen enough of her in her tight office wear to know she’s in extremely good shape. She has her eyes closed and she’s holding her glasses in her hand, a small satisfied smile on her face as she basks in the sun like a cat.

You follow her lead and lean your head back and close your eyes as well. Best to not think about Jayne in that way, that whole nonsense with The Affection Multiplier has clearly affected your judgment. You know damn well you can’t be involved with her, no matter what you imagined some old computer said.

“Aww! Look at you two!” At the familiar, excited voice you open your eyes. Karissa Martin is the very young, objectively beautiful, absurdly sexy clerk for the managers on the third floor. She has shoulder-length blond hair, warm brown eyes, and a nearly perfect body usually busting out of her barely work appropriate outfits. She’d almost be annoying except her bubbly personality is legit and she’s as friendly with you as she is with anyone else, which makes her a bit of a rarity.

Feeling guilty, you stand up and look over at Jayne, who is putting her glasses on to peer at Karissa.

"I didn't mean to interrupt, you guys just looked so happy. You were even leaning against the wall in the same way, like perfect work spouses!" Karissa was walking by through the parking lot but now she's approaching you both, holding a Subway bag in one hand and a drink in the other. You can't help but notice how short and thin her sundress is, showing off a lot of her tanned legs and a hint of her well-sized chest.

Clearing her throat in a way that only makes her sound extra suspicious, Jayne says, "We are just relaxing in the sun Karissa, settle down."

Grinning mischievously, Karissa nods and says, "Oh for sure. Everyone else always lounges in the sun at the side of the building, hidden away from prying eyes like this."

You can feel your face start to burn and you doubt you'd gotten that much sun in the past 3 minutes. Turning to Jayne, you decide that making light of it is probably the best response and you say, "You're her supervisor right Hallsy? Can't you just fire her or something?"

As soon as you say it, you realize your horrible mistake.

"Hallsy! Ohmygod that's so adorable! You have a nickname for her!" Karissa all but dances as she squeals, she's so thrilled. Dammit.

With a sigh, Jayne ignores your gaffe and tells you, "Sadly no, I'm the supervisor for most of the program clerks but Karissa reports directly to the managers as she's their clerical support. I can't even yell at her for being super annoying, nevermind fire her."

Undeterred, Karissa giggles (adorably) and says, "Ok fine, fine! I'll leave you two alone. Don't worry, my lips are sealed!" And with that, she grins and spins around, her uncomfortably short (for you) skirt flashing a dangerous (for you) amount of sun-kissed upper thigh as she bounces away to presumably bring joy and inappropriate levels of workplace thirst to whoever she crosses paths with.

You heroically avert your gaze and stare at a passing car instead as Karissa skips away. You can feel the muscles in your neck trying to move your head when she hops up the back steps in your peripheral vision. Oh god you'd have seen her panties if you'd looked. Thank god you didn't look. Is it too late to look?

"Fuck me," Jayne mutters, staring after Karissa. She sees you looking at her and flushes, "Well whatever, how can you not notice? Congrats on not peeking, by the way. I was impressed with your willpower just now."

"And I was impressed with your lack of same!" You reply, arching an eyebrow.

"It was just morbid curiosity about whether she'd stop that jumping walk of hers when she got to the steps, I wasn't creeping on the girl. I'm glad I'm not her supervisor, summer always means the younger clerks start wearing sexy workout clothes and club dresses to the office and then I have to quietly tell them if I can see their underwear while they're sitting down we have a problem."

She pauses, then looks at your painfully blank expression, "Uh, too much?"

You shake your head, "Sorry I just had a mental image and I'm trying to not!"

Jayne laughs and pokes you on the arm, "You cad! Thinking about poor, sweet Karissa in her workout clothes huh?"

"Not her, no," you say honestly looking at Jayne more intently than perhaps you should. Suddenly her eyes widen slightly as she takes your meaning, then you both quickly look away. Oh shit, you really can't be doing that!

"Uh, well, better get back to it," Jayne says as she starts to head to the office. But you can't help but notice her smile as she turns away.