“What have I done?” Dola fell back into the hard plastic of the subway seating in a daze.
“What have I done?” She folded forward over herself, her head falling into her hands as she groaned. The woman next to Dola stood and moved away, eying her suspiciously as she went and Dola sighed. If only it was that easy move away from her own issues.
She felt like she’d kept it together pretty well back in the apartment. She’d focused on getting ready for work and not folding under the immense weight of her hangover, but now? All she could think about was how screwed she was.
The situation with Fylson had been weird enough, but she’d grown used to the brooding man’s presence. He might have been grumpy, but he never got in the way, never interfered with her living her life as normal, and for the most part it was nice to have someone to split errands and chores with and who would occasionally binger reality t.v with her. She never forced her will over him as the contract holder and he never really asked her to do anything more than the bare minimum to maintain the project, it was basically like having a roommate that happened to have weird magical powers and cooked really well.
But Eirlan?
What was she supposed to do with Eirlan? When she met him at the bar the night before, she only chatted up with him because she thought he was cute in a stuffy, bubblegum, businessman kind of way. The long pink hair and stuffy suit was such a weird contrast that she couldn’t help but be intrigued. Signing the contract? Well that was more or less a blur of her trying to give him her number and when he helped her home, well she got the wrong idea… And now here she was.
“I’ve got to stop drinking.” She grumbled to herself, wishing she’d made the time to get a coffee before heading out to work and then like magic, she found one being shoved into her hand.
“Yeah, you’ve got to stop. You look awful.” The man who eased into the seat behind her watched her with a teasing grin, one that she would have been more upset with if he hadn’t shoved a coffee in her hand.
“Easy for you to say, Mr. ‘I’m a real adult and I have my life together’.” She grumbled, taking a sip of her coffee and sighing. 2 creams and 2 sugars. Perfect.
“You’re the one that turned down the raise at the office. I didn’t make you do that, much less make you quit.” He replied with a teasing smile.
She scowled. No he hadn’t made her turn down the raise, but after their boss’ son came on to her at a company dinner and she’d turned him down, she’d known that she wasn’t getting the job. After the whole fiasco that followed, she found herself more or less invited to find employment elsewhere.
Now she was the assistant manager of a fast food chain with a 19 year old manager to report to. She went from over $100k a year, a penthouse apartment and a promising retirement plan to less than half of that and two magic men living with her in a cramped 2 bedroom apartment with bad plumbing and a leaky ceiling.
“Hey, I didn’t mean to rub it in.” Raj nudged her elbow with his, an apology clear on his face as he did so and she felt the frown that tugged her mouth downwards.
“It’s fine.” She pulled away, too tired, too out of it to say anymore. It wasn’t like he knew about what happened at the office and she was too busy thinking about other things to even care about all of that at the moment. Where Eirlan was going to stay, whether she should report her second familiar to the Company that the two supposedly came from, whether the Company would even listen to her considering that she did the bare minimum when it came to assignments.
Her job for ‘The Company’, as Fylson called it, was to make the world a better place and to use the powers awarded to her to do so. Apparently she could sense others intentions, she could command her familiars and could harness their powers to make things happen… What those things were? Hell if she knew. Whatever powers she was meant to have didn't seem to come easily to her. She’d used compulsion today over Fylson and Eirlan to make them get along, but that had kinda been an accident and she was exhausted from the force it took to do so, any other powers she was meant to have seemed to escape her so she usually settled for making a donation every month or so to meet the bare minimum requirement to keep her contract. Her life force was attached to the contract now, she didn’t read the fine print on that, she was quite sure that if she did less than the bare minimum someone would swoop down and do a lot more than recall Fylson… She figured they’d recall her soul.
“You really look like you’re going to be sick, you okay?” Raj was leaning in now, looking quite worried as he did so and Dola snapped back to reality, her eyes darting from him to the digital red lights that read out her stop’s name as it was announced over the speakers.
“I’m fine.” She said the bald-faced lie, rushing to her feet and hissing through her teeth as she spilled coffee on the leg of her khaki pants, “This is my stop, I’ll catch you later!” She waved at him without looking back and squeezed through the press of people that also were making their way through the door.
The doors shut behind her, the train whooshed away and she ran up the steps of the station and onto the bustling street, deciding not to think anything more about her newly acquired living situation. It was a Tuesday, Tuesdays were usually the dead day of the week at her job. With everything else that was going on, she was looking forward to getting to work and not having to think about any of it. It would just be her, her thoughts, and the white noise of the deep fryer. The bar was low.
She should have made them lower.
By the time Dola was leaving her shift, her hair had escaped the hurried bun that she’d thrown it into, the coffee stain on her pant leg from the morning was now joined by ketchup, mustard and oil stains, her head ached from a yelling match that broke out between some customers and her jaw ached from when she tried to break up the fight and caught a right hook to the jaw. The police came, Sandra, her 19 year old manager, told her that regional wanted her to go home and get some rest, most likely out of concern that she would sue or something.
She'd take it though.
All she wanted was a pack of frozen peas on her jaw, a burrito and to watch a movie in her bed. The day had been so overwhelming and awful that she’d almost forgotten about Fylson and Eirlan until she approached her favourite burrito truck on the way to the subway and saw the two of them standing there looking as shocked to see her as she was to see them… Well Eirlan looked shocked anyway, Fylson just looked tired.
Crap. There was still this whole mess wasn't there?
“My lady!” Eirlan ran to her and started to bow, but Fylson reached out to roughly yank him upright.
“Don’t do that.” Fylson hissed, looking to Eirlan with disdain, “ You’re gonna make us look like we’re into some weird- Holy shit.” Fylson’s eyes went wide as he looked to Dola, seeming to take in the stains, the bruise on her jaw and the look on her face, “Did you get in a fight?!” He demanded, pushing Eirlan aside as Eirlan gasped in horror as he took in her face as well.
“Oh nah.” Dola shrugged, “Two other people got into a fight and I was dumb enough to try and stop it.”
“That was pretty dumb.” Fylson agreed, but he still looked at the bruise with eyebrows knit and mouth drawn down. Eirlan mirrored his expression.
“My lady- I mean-” He trailed off when Fylson shot him a withering look, “Perhaps we should get you home. I know we’ve only begun working together, but in my class healing was my specialty. Any discomfort you’re feeling I’m sure I can help ease it, any bruises I can erase if you permit it.” He gave a short bow of the head, obviously barely stopping himself from a full blown bow with an arm sweep and Dola felt a weak smile crawl onto her face.
This morning, Eirlan had been her biggest concern, she was worried for reasons that she didn’t even know. Being tied up in things that she didn’t understand was… complex, but she already had Fylson and maybe, just maybe it was time for her to start taking this job seriously. It was clear that her current job was not the place she was going to find financial security, so maybe she should consider putting her all into working with the company. Maybe, just maybe, Eirlan's arrival was a sign of the times. Maybe this was all going to be a good thing.
“Sounds good.” She smiled a little wider, her jaw aching as she did and Fylson rolled his eyes.
“So we’re keeping him.” He scowled. It wasn’t a question, but Dola’s smile was very much an answer. He groaned as he realized it.
“Tell me, Eirlan,” She started, moving past Fylson and throwing an arm over Eirlan’s shoulder, an action that seemed to scandalize and confuse the poor man, “Have you ever had a carne asada burrito?” She asked, dragging him back towards the truck as Fylson trailed reluctantly behind.
“N-no.” Eirlan stammered looking hurriedly from the hand on his shoulder back to Dola’s face.
“Well, you’re in for a treat my friend. Consider it a welcome present.”
As they walked back to the food truck, Dola could feel the eyes of the people around her on them. They were a sight to see. A woman with stained clothes, messy hair and a swollen jaw, a man with long pink hair that looked like a model, and another dude that looked also like a model, but like an angry one. They strolled past a group of friends that had been obviously staring and she overheard one of them speaking through a mouthful of burrito.
"Who is she?"
It was a good question, she certainly did look out of place standing between them, but it was never too late to turn things around, she was going to make sure of that.
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