“Is Dan home for the day?”
“He went into the office for a little bit, but I think he’ll be home around ten. We’re good, Ani.”
“Okay.” I racked my brain for anything else to talk about to delay my departure, but after a few moments, I sucked it up and nodded at Liz.
I left the house with a sinking feeling in my stomach and had to work really hard to keep the tears at bay while I drove to the logging office. It was silly. I’d left Arielle with Liz before, and I knew she was perfectly fine. Actually, leaving Arie with Liz didn’t bother me at all, normally.
But dropping her off so I could go to work was the first step in a precedent I was setting where I would be gone from her for nine hours a day, five days a week. Going back to work was the end of spending every day together. It was the beginning of our new schedule, and I hated our new schedule.
I would not cry.
I sniffled.
I would get my shit together.
I shuddered.
I would do my job, and I would not call Liz five hundred times to check on Arielle.
I glanced at my phone.
Stepping into the office a few minutes later was beyond odd.
So many things had happened since the last time I’d been there that nothing seemed familiar anymore. My desk and chair still sat in the front office, my photo of Kate and me was still sitting on the file cabinet against the back wall, and my coffee mug was still on the corner near my monitor, but nothing looked the same. Everything felt different.
For the first time, I didn’t want to be there. I’d always loved my job because it gave me a sense of safety. It made me independent, able to take care of my bills and provide for myself. Now, when it should have been even more important to me since I had another person to support, I hated it.
“Welcome back!” voices yelled as I set my purse down on my desk.
“Holy shit!” I yelped, jerking in surprise as Dan, Mike, Trevor, and Bram came out of their offices. I should have noticed that the office was abnormally quiet when I’d walked in. They’d been lying in wait.
“Bram brought donuts!” Trev called as they all lumbered toward my desk. “Dibs on the bear claw.”
“Happy to have you back,” Mike said sweetly, patting my back a few times as he leaned in for a hug.
“Arielle get all set with Lizzy?” Dan asked, hugging me after Mike had let go.
“Yep,” I said with a rueful smile. “She was fine. I was the one having a panic attack.”
I glanced at Bram across my desk as he grabbed a maple bar out of the donut box. When his head came up and his eyes met mine, he gave me an uncomfortable smile, taking a bite of his donut. He didn’t say a word.
While everyone else was teasing me about being gone so long and asking about Arielle, Bram was noticeably silent. He stayed in the front office with everyone else, but held himself apart.
“All right,” I finally said as Mike and Dan started arguing about some reality singing show they watched with their wives. “Everyone out. I have a ton of shit to go through to make sure the temp didn’t fuck up my files.”
“Nah, he did good,” Trev said, grabbing one last donut. “It was a guy who’d worked in an office like ours before.”
“Well, I still want to go through it,” I replied stubbornly. “Out.”
“Here for thirty minutes and she’s already bossing us around,” Dan complained to Mike as they walked back toward their offices.
“Thank God, someone needs to,” Trevor joked, following them.
When everyone but Bram and I had gone back to work, he finally spoke.
“You look miserable,” he said quietly, stepping closer to my desk as I sat down in my chair.
“It’ll get better,” I replied. “First day jitters, probably.”
“Did you even sleep last night?”
“Not much.” I pressed the power button on my computer and kept my eyes on the monitor. “Was there something you needed?”
Bram made a noise in his throat, then cleared it. “Nope.”
He walked away, and I breathed a sigh of relief. We hadn’t seen each other since the day he’d stormed out of my house, and I didn’t want to deal with our drama while I was at work. He hadn’t shown up to family dinner the Friday before, and I’d been glad then because I hadn’t wanted to see him, but I should have realized that it would make my first day back at work even harder.
I felt comfortable around Bram. Always. Even when we were fighting, I didn’t feel uncomfortable or weird. However, I knew that, the next time we talked, shit was going to blow up. I could feel it in the air, like the sensation you get when you walk outside and just know it’s going to rain. The minute Bram and I were able to exchange more than just pleasantries, everything was going to burst wide open. The last three times we’d seen each other was merely a prelude to the battle I knew was coming.