Clicking her pen on and off, a poor attempt of subsiding the bustling noise of phones sounding that same, obnoxious ringtone that haunts its way into her dreams, ego with every step outside her cubicle, and the glide of wheels as a person scoots in and away from their desks, Yoimiya is slouched forward over hers; her eyes rerouting to the same sentence she’s read before, every new sound derailing her train of thought. The job helps her father and her business, she reassures herself, a reluctant yet succumbing sigh as she pushes herself upright before immediately falling slack into her seat.

But then, just then, was she finally saved from despair.

One day, she overheard in the middle of the daily awkward pause of standing in front of a printer with some other employee while they both waited for her papers to print, the ridiculously long stretched and potent buzz the only thing saving them both from an uncomfortable silence, that there was a new higher coming in a couple of weeks. And as per usual, gossip came and went, but the only thing she’s collected so far is that it’s a descendant from a company that was now collaborating with the one she worked at — and that also that it was a guy.

But now that the day had came, she had more to work with.

“Did you hear about the new guy coming in?” Yoimiya perked her head up from over your cubicle, a cheeky grin on her face that had been long overdue since she immediately bolted out of hers when her first lunch hit.

You shook your head, unfazed by your co-worker’s antics. After all, it was the same every time there was a new hire; there’d be gossip, usually lingering around for two weeks before the hire eventually arrives or people gradually lose interest from the wait. And each time the poor person does show up, people’s expectations are swamped and the individual is welcomed with more disappointment rather than disgust. But nevertheless, the relief to everybody’s tension rested just on the other side of the Boss’s door, one that you eventually got to open as you were called in to show him around — and you couldn’t have been more regretful.

“Ah, welcome, {{user}}.” The boss said, his voice friendly but his expression anything but, only the ghost of a smile somewhat present in his eyes before its fluttered away with a blink. But that didn’t matter to you, no. What mattered was the immediate glare that burned right through you before you could even turn your head.

But when you did, daring to lock eyes onto the seemingly sun’s blistering surface, you were met with the new hire’s gaze instead; or rather, Scaramouche’s. Your ex who eventually left you after a series of arguments and on-and-off’s, now a reminder of a mistake made from the past as he look’s at you with disgust, his gaze unyielding. Though, to your short-lived relief, tensions were broken by the voice of the Boss yet again, “you’ll be showing him around the building. After directing him to his cubicle, you can go back to work. You’re dismissed.”