Chapter 14 | Back to the Office

That morning, the office had exactly the same smell as usual.

Coffee. Air conditioning. Warm paper. Screens switched on far too early.

It was almost insulting.

I had spent the whole weekend trying not to think too much about the seminar, which, obviously, had led me to think about it almost professionally.

On the bus back, I had already started reorganizing the memories into little mental boxes: the cooking, the dinner, the terrace, the lake, the room, the morning, the documentary about sloths.

And the more I put them away, the more something bothered me.

The office had not moved.

Same gray open space.

Same sound of keyboards.

Same tired plants near the bay window.

I settled at my desk.

My computer turned on with the obscene calm of machines that know nothing about human dramas.

I put down my bag.

Took out my notebook.

Breathed once.

Then twice.

In the window in front of me, my reflection had that strange face I sometimes have after a weekend too full: not really tired, not really rested, just slightly displaced.

As if my face had come back to work before the rest of me.

I wondered if it showed.

I hoped it didn’t.

I feared it did.

Clara arrived a few minutes later with a coffee far too large to be reasonable.

“So?”

I looked up.

“So what?”

“The seminar, obviously.”

She half sat on the corner of my desk.

“You came back alive, so already, congratulations.”

“Thank you.”

“Were there scandals? Tears? Unlikely couples? A symbolic drowning?”

I focused on my screen.

“No.”

“Liar.”

“Why does everyone tell me that?”

“Because you lie badly.”

I didn’t answer.

She observed me for two more seconds.

Then she smiled.

“Right.”

She tapped my desk with her fingertips.

“If you ever want to tell me useless but juicy things, I’m here.”

“Noted.”

“Do that.”

She left with her coffee.

I watched her walk away.

I would have liked to have her level of lightness.

The kind of lightness of people who consider that a story remains a story as long as it has not decided to settle inside your rib cage.

I hadn’t even opened my first file when a voice fell behind me.

“So.”

I froze.

Lyralda.

I turned around.

She was there, standing near my desk, a file under her arm, exactly as if nothing in the world had changed since Friday.

Dark suit.

Hair tied back.

Clear gaze.

Perfectly professional.

Perfectly calm.

“Good morning, Lyralda,” I said.

“Good morning, Eliott.”

She tilted her head slightly.

Then, with that almost invisible half-smile:

“Was the morning good?”

I think my heart missed a beat.

“What?”

“The morning.”

She lifted one shoulder.

“This morning.”

Pause.

“Did you have a good breakfast?”

Her voice was neutral.

Almost light.

As if she were talking about some ordinary logistical detail.

As if the morning in her room had only been a practical parenthesis.

I could feel a strange heat rising in my neck.

“Yes.”

“Good.”

She tapped the file once against her hip.

“Glad to hear it.”

Then she added, very lightly:

“Sloths are a good influence.”

I looked at her.

She wasn’t smiling anymore.

She had already recovered her professional face.

“See you later, Eliott.”

And she left.

Just like that.

Without slowing down.

Without turning back.

I stayed there, sitting in front of my screen, with the very clear impression that I had just been run through by a very polite train.

The worst part was that her tone had nothing mean in it.

Nothing.

That was exactly the problem.

No embarrassment.

No tension.

No sign that last week had left any particular trace.

And suddenly, everything I had managed to keep at a distance for a few hours came back all at once.

Of course.

Obviously.

For her, it was simple.

A moment.

A night.

A breakfast.

End of story.

I looked at my screen without seeing it.

In the window in front of me, my reflection had changed again. It now looked like someone who had just received unpleasant information about his own market value.

I lowered my eyes.

It was ridiculous.

And yet, my brain was already drawing conclusions.

Around ten, my phone vibrated.

A message.

Jade.

“You survived the return?”

I stayed for one second looking at the screen.

Then I answered:

“Yes…”

Three little dots appeared almost immediately.

“Exploit.”

I smiled despite myself.

A new message arrived.

“My back still hurts because of the bus. Your fault, you weren’t soft enough.”

I let out a small breath through my nose.

“Sorry for not being a premium seat.”

Her reply came.

“Work on that.”

I put the phone down.

It was stupid.

Light.

Almost nothing.

And yet, it did me good.

Maybe because with Jade, at least, I knew what to expect: play, jabs, sentences that advanced masked, but not too much.

It was tiring, yes.

But readable.

Lyralda had suddenly become much harder to understand.

Or maybe she had always been clear and I had invented the rest.

Around noon, Jade passed near my desk.

She slowed down.

“Lunch break?”

I looked up.

“Uh…”

“That was an invitation, not a tax audit.”

I straightened up.

“Yes, okay.”

“Perfect.”

She pointed toward the elevator.

“Five minutes, not one more, I’m hungry.”

Then she left.

I watched her walk away.

In the open space, everything seemed ordinary.

Clara was talking with someone near the printer. Or with the printer, I still don’t know.

Mister Delmas was coming out of a call in the glass corridor of the legal department.

Lyralda was right beside him.

They were speaking in low voices.

Mister Delmas had that slightly leaning posture he sometimes took when he was explaining something complicated.

Lyralda was listening.

Very focused.

He said something.

She smiled briefly.

Very briefly.

Then they separated.

Nothing abnormal.

Absolutely nothing.

And yet, my brain immediately decided that this scene probably contained several tragic subtexts.

I looked away first.

Lunch happened in the cafeteria, almost empty at that hour.

Jade placed her tray across from mine.

“I’m already done with this week.”

“It’s Monday.”

“Exactly.”

She took a sip of her soda.

“It’s always the worst day to have emotions.”

I looked up.

“That’s very specific.”

“I’m very specific.”

She grabbed a fry.

“Did you have a good weekend?”

The question seemed ordinary.

But her gaze wasn’t completely.

“Yes.”

“You’re still lying badly.”

“It’s become a tradition.”

She smiled.

Then her expression changed slightly.

“My father called me on Sunday.”

I blinked.

I wasn’t expecting that.

“Ah.”

“Yeah.”

She lifted one shoulder.

“It had been six months.”

I didn’t know what to say.

So I chose honesty.

“That’s… good?”

She gave a small laugh.

“No idea.”

She looked at her plate.

“He calls when he feels guilty.”

I stayed silent.

This time, I didn’t feel tested.

Just… witness.

“And you?” she asked. “Do your parents call you often?”

I lowered my eyes to my tray.

“Not really.”

“Healthy atmosphere.”

“We do what we can.”

She looked at me for a few seconds.

Then nodded, as if that answer was enough for her.

The silence that followed wasn’t awkward.

Simply strange.

Softer than usual.

On the way back up, I caught myself thinking that Jade might be simpler than Lyralda.

Not kinder.

Not healthier.

But simpler to read.

With her, everything at least seemed to exist on the surface.

Even her jabs.

Even her little games.

Even what she chose to show of her fragile side.

Lyralda, on the contrary, gave the impression that she could look straight at you and let nothing out of what truly mattered.

And I, obviously, was only attracted to things I did not understand well.

Very bad reflex.

Very old reflex.

The afternoon resumed.

I worked.

Well, I tried.

My phone sometimes vibrated with a brief message from Jade.

“You surviving?”

“Not asleep?”

“If Pascal buries you under Excel, blink twice.”

I always answered.

And each time, something loosened slightly in my chest.

No tension.

No expectation.

Just… a conversation.

Deep inside me, a thought was starting to take shape.

Small.

Embarrassing.

Maybe Jade was easier.

Maybe with her, there wasn’t all that blur.

Not that feeling of falling into something deeper without knowing if the other person is really there with you.

I hated that thought as soon as it appeared.

But it stayed.

And I did not yet realize that what I truly liked in those messages probably had nothing to do with a relationship.

Just with the fact that, for once… someone was talking to me without making me feel like I had to guess the rest.