-Earlier that day at the office Élise, Nikki and Hilda work at-
I was working alone in the landscape office in the morning when Hilda walked out of one of the eting rooms on the side. She had a remote eting earlier, before Nikki and I arrived at work, and had decided to not bother with any sound, not that I would have minded particularly much. With most people these days working from ho, it was nice to talk to people occasionally, just to keep my focus.
“Good morning, Élise, could you give the report of the advertisent campaign of last month by the end of the day? I realise it’s a bit of a short notice but the higher ups kind of ambushed with it just now.”
“It’s almost done, I just need to spell-check it first.” I nodded.
Hilda then looked around and after she confird there was noone nearby she leant in a little. “How are Amicia and Sam doing by the way? Didn’t have the opportunity to ask yet.”
I leant back in my chair and wiggled the seat from side to side. “They are going to take it easy today but they both looked fine this morning.”
“Do you know what they are doing now?”
“We left them so waffles, because who doesn’t like waffles, and then my sister ssaged that they were going to ride bikes around the city to relax a little.”
“It’s good weather for it. That’s for sure.” Hilda nodded with a smile. “Where is Nikki by the way?”
“She is tinkering with the headsets in the workshop. Do you need her for sothing?”
“I wanted to ask her for a report too but I’ll just ask it through Coworkers.”
“That won’t work.” I pointed my thumb over my right shoulder. “That’s her laptop and her phone right there.”
“Ah crap…”
“Yes, that ans you need to take the stairs down to the workshop because the elevator is out of order. Whose idea was it again to rent offices in an old warehouse building?”
“Not mine.” She laughed. “But at least it looks cool, interior design wise.”
“That’s true.”
“Alright.” Hilda smiled. “I’ll go track Nikki down. Are you up to go eat sothing outside of the office for our lunch break? I’ll ask Nikki as well.”
“Good for .”
“Okay, I’ll co give you Nikki’s decision if I make it back up the stairs.”
“Good luck.” I laughed and waved my superior friend off before I got back to work. “Right… where was I… spellchecking…” Not my favorite kind of work but it had to be done. Wouldn’t want my boss her bosses to see there, their, they’re mistakes in a report. Not that it would matter too much, but it definitely doesn’t portray the image I want to have portrayed.
I had sent my spell-checked report to Hilda when I got notified that my partner had agreed on getting lunch outside. Subsequently the three of us left the office together at 12 o’clock to go and look for said food.
“What do you two think about a pasta bar?” Hilda asked, putting her sunglasses on her nose.
“Sure, I kinda want to eat so pesto pasta…” I almost started salivating at the thought of the food alone.
“Yep, give that pasta!” Nikki giggled cutely and fished for my hand which I gladly gave to her.
The arrival of a buzz in my pocket made use my other hand to see what’s up.
“A ssage?” my partner asked curiously.
“Yep, looks like it’s from Ami.” I nodded. “She says they are going to get dinner at Sam’s house.”
“Alright, then we don’t need to arrange food for this evening. Might want to take a salad from the pasta bar then.” Nikki nodded. “Does Ami know what she’s going to get served at Sam’s parents?”
“An entire laundry list it seems.” I laughed at Ami’s text. She was describing the food that awaited her in great detail. “I swear my sister sounds like she is constantly underfed. Yet we feed her incredibly well.”
“Maybe that’s the issue.” Hilda laughed. “Everyone is spoiling the girl which makes for… well… a spoiled girl.”
“She deserves to be spoiled though. I wouldn't want to have had that childhood at all.” Nikki comnted. “Fucking awful. Pardon my French.”
“Yeah, she definitely hasn’t had it easy.” I nodded in agreent and put my phone away again. “Well, we are here to bathe her in love now.”
“Also known as spoiling her.” Hilda smirked.
“Like you haven’t been spoiling her yourself?” I winked.
“Guilty as charged, your honor.” She raised her hand. “But yeah, I can’t really help not to. Such a good kid.”
“She truly is.” I agreed again.
“Definitely didn’t get it from you.” Nikki squeezed my hand.
As she said that at which I just turned towards her and deadpan stared in her eyes. “Really?”
“You were quite the rebel, weren’t you?”
“Only when my parents weren’t around.” I scratched my cheek. “And I did go out of the way to be ho the least amount of ti possible...”
“See.”
“What do you expect? loving people was seen as completely diabolical by them. Not to ntion how they treated Amicia… Fuck… I should have just taken her with . Urgh…” Bad mories ca flooding into my mind again.
“Both she and you know that you couldn’t at that ti.” Nikki was quick to catch my mood swing and pulled in by releasing my hand and draping her arm around my waste. “We could barely support ourselves at first, let alone taking care of a kid who still needs to go to school.”
“We would have managed though. Sohow.”
“Élise, just look at the future. No point at looking at a past you can’t change anyway. That’s done and over with. That chapter has been turned and you’ve begun writing a completely new one with a heck of a lot more positivity encapsulated in it.” Hilda took up her ntor role with flair, holding out a hand for a fist bump.
As is written, you do not leave your friends hanging, so of course I fist bumped her in return, also taking her advice to heart. “Right, positivity, here I co. That said, sadly I do need to work in the afternoon, which puts quite a damper on said positivity.”
“If you are trying to fish for a free half day off, you are kind of out of luck, Élise.” Hilda shook her head softly.
“But can’t you see I’m incredibly depressed right now?”
“Ah yes, right, I guess I’ll won’t treat you to pasta either and send you ho imdiately.”
“Oh… Hilda, bad move.” Nikki chuckled and clenched her fist in front of her mouth. “She is going to take that offer if you seriously propose it to her.”
“No pasta in exchange for half a day of? Damn sure I’m taking that deal.” I nodded aggressively.
Hilda smirked. “Sadly for you we didn’t shake on it.”
“Ah shit.” I laughed. “Oh well… Pasta is still good.”
“That’s the spirit.” Hilda softly punched in the arm. “Co on, before we need to queue for 45 minutes…”
Luckily we didn’t need to queue for 45 minutes as apparently we had picked a quiet day to go out eating. With so pasta and other foodstuffs in front of us, the conversation went back and forward between things to do at work and stuff going on in our private lives, often getting back to Amicia and Sam.
“By the way, how long do you plan on having Amicia live with the both of you?” Hilda scooped so pasta up with her spork and ate it gleefully. “Have you thought about what happens when she gets a job after she’s done studying.”
“You an if she doesn’t just magic an enormous house into existence for us all to live in?” I chuckled, adding so salt and pepper to the tomato soup I had picked as a starter.
“Uh… yes?”
“Hmmm… not really.” I shrugged and looked over to Nikki who mimicked my shrug.
“That’s still quite a while away. No point in thinking about it now. We are just going to support both Sam and Amicia the best we can and I’m pretty sure Sam’s parents are in the sa boat.”
“Why are you asking?”
“Just wondering.” Hilda replied. “Your apartnt isn’t that big to comfortably house 4 adults.”
“That’s not untrue…” I admitted.
“Especially the mornings are pretty hard to schedule around with only one bathroom.” Nikki added. “But that’s currently not really an issue.”
“Because their uni has pretty flexible hours.”
“Yeah…”
I took my phone and started typing in so realtor websites, looking at so of the house prices on there. “The housing market is pretty shit though. And we don’t really have that much money sitting around either.”
“My place is definitely big enough if the need would ever arrive, but you will probably want to resolve it yourself, right?”
“Mhmmm.” I nodded. “But thanks for the offer of assistance.” I smiled at our friend. “Maybe when they start getting an inco we can get so cool loft or penthouse or sothing like that.”
“A penthouse does sound really cool. I’ve always wanted to live in one.” Nikki agreed.
“Sadly they aren’t cheap.” Hilda laughed, taking another bite from her pasta. “But they are pretty amazing, that’s for sure.”
-The penthouse life does sound very appealing, not going to lie… Perhaps one day…-
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