This night was an easy one, so she simply wrapped her body up in a towel, the edge was being pinned to her chest by one hand, and she let the water drip from her body to the floor, leaving a new trail of water from the bathroom to her space with the couch and a short table in front. It was more moments of staring before she would begin to clean up the mess she made in the doorway, when even the water in between her breasts were gone and she was dry enough to touch other things without leaving a watery handprint or a drop from her hair. 

There was computer on the short table, a wire was next to it, along with a mouse and some other wires neatly rolled up on the side. 

She propped it open and did her usual thing, working and tapping away at writing something until about one in the morning. she didn't bother to eat anything this night. The lady hasn't had much of an appetite for as long as I've known her, she's never felt much of a need to eat nor has her stomach ever often growled. But she could certainly benefit from eating some more meat, having avoided it for the whole month she'd been working at that strange place, it's not like the meat at the stores have faces on them.

The lady went to bed soon after writing another personal entry on a file and then closing it, at least that's what it looked like on the screen of her computer, and then heads to bed, still staring up at the ceiling, she tends to daydream before falling asleep and fully dreaming.

 She'll mumble things sometimes, on this night, her mumbling was a little louder than usual.

"Reste calme, tu peux t'en sortir." She whispered in shaky breath.

Some parts of her hair still weren't dry yet, she didn't seem to care as she just let the blanket drape lazily over her body, not caring about anything else that, sleeping nude and with a mess to clean up tomorrow. Her eyes slowly closed, and her body went limp. 

She'll come back to life again to the routine noises from her phone that she had left in her living room, forcing her to get up and move if she wanted the racket to stop. Her apartment isn't messy, but she didn't exactly clean up from last night, the clothes from yesterday that were thrown off in a trail to the bathroom, were collected piled into a laundry basket, joining the pile of laundry that she had yet to do. Her purse with all her items was still on the floor but nothing spilled out, the zipper was closed still, so when she entered the living room to turn of the noise on her phone, she picked up her purse and gently set it on the low table in front of her couch.

It must have been, eight? In the morning? A couple hours after the sun had risen, which was probably five in the morning. 

She freshened herself up the way other people did, brush their teeth, splash water onto their face, find something to wear, and run around, looking for the items they use every day but somehow always have trouble looking for on the start of each day. For Noemie, she was looking around frantically for her camera, which she had left in the office on her table, this she would remember after lightly smacking her face with her palm. 

Her blue pants that hugged her legs tightly were zipped on and one of her many button-up blouses were put on, she grabbed her bag from the low table and took a look around her apartment before leaving. 

The place was honestly a bit empty of decoration and trinkets, save for all the photos of her family, the only things covering the walls, but it's not like she doesn't keep the little gifts receives from her little friends every once in a while, those are kept in her bedroom. The lady sooner left before looking at any of them, somehow not tripping in her boots with heels and her purse not getting caught on the doorknob, she's a bit lucky sometimes. 

The bus stop was only a walk away thanks to the location of her home in the city, but morning bus rides are crowded. It's almost impossible to find a seat and you can't sit on the floor unless you want to risk getting stepped on, not at all a safe place for birds who can thankfully fly, and not a good place for people who wake up grumpy but again, luckily for Noemie, she wakes up with a clear mind every morning. 

The woman will arrive at her office like nothing happened last night, turn on her desk computer like work is the only thing on her mind, and begin working at nine on photos that she's taken or received like there's nothing else she's going to do today. Well, the human mind is a delicate thing, and some choose to cope by being busy. 

This business will be interrupted by her stomach growling, and a random coworker with a nice face next to her giggling before inviting her to have brunch with her and her other coworkers. Noemie doesn't remember the name of this coworker, or any of her other coworkers really, she remembers their faces and what they do, but names are forgotten, because sometimes she mixes up the coworkers she can get attached to, and the ones she shouldn't.

This nice lady is rememberable because she is a very lovely person, lively, and energetic, and she keeps flower seeds in her pockets. she was a bit taller than Noemie but the way she walked with a bit of joy in her step made her look very light.

"You look sick almost! Did you even eat anything this morning?

The woman turned away in embarrassment, realizing how little she took care of herself today, or maybe it was because she felt pitied? Who knows.

"I thought I was late, so I just rushed here." 

The lady crossed her arms and glared down at the woman who was still typing and clicking away, making photos brighter, or taking shapes or people from green photos to ones with backgrounds. Then, the coworker made a smile and clapped her hands together, perhaps at an idea that suddenly came to her, before searching through her bag slinged on her chair, and pulled out a notebook. She gave Noemie a light tug with a sparkle in her eyes.

"Let's go get something to fuel our heads, something sweet for my brain,,,," She began to massage the sides of her head. 

"AAaaaanndd some meat for you definitely." 

Noemie didn't respond, rather lightly shaking her head at her coworker as she held back a look of sickness, an expression that the lady misread as a dizziness as she just pats the lady's back.

They left their desks and walked through the halls to a station serving coffee, and some small pastries or sandwiches. Noemie didn't say anything, just let her talkative coworker order the food, and tried to hand over her card when the food arrived, but she pushed it aside. 

The talkative coworker ordered some sweet-smelling pastry, with a cup of coffee that had so much creamer put in it, it was a light beige. Noemie received what looked like a neatly packaged sandwich and coffee with the normal coffee shade. 

They went back to their computers, food in hand, and ate while they worked, the lady added in some talking as well.

The woman didn't look at her sandwich while she worked on her photos, the clicking of the mouse was louder than her chews, she ate very slowly and nearly paused as she could feel the piece of ham inside stretching when she bit in. This appeared to be something she couldn't stomach as she just put the sandwich down on the flattened-out paper it was wrapped in, and took it apart, taking the only slice of ham out and ripping it into pieces easier to swallow whole, before putting it back together and eating it slow but normally. 

"You must like meat if you ate that before anything else." Her coworker said, giving her a side eye as she worked on her computer. "You ate it like a bird too! That's kinda cute."

She was working on some sort of writing job, she was taking the letter keys more than the mouse, unlike Noemie. The coworker was a journalist, I think.

"I didn't like the way it stretched." The lady casually responded. 

This wasn't true for her, she liked food that stretched, it's just that the ham was making this noise as it stretched, it was too quiet for anyone else to hear but Noemie likely heard it. 

Around their more official lunch time, the time where it was ok to eat something larger than a snack, the two and two other workers left the building to go to a different building just a block away, it smelled very nice inside.

Noemie, the friendly lady, and the other worker were left to go find a table by the walls while the fourth went to the line to go order food. The woman didn't know these other people either, she just made facial expressions when they responded to her or told her something, maybe some small replies here and there. When the food arrived, it looked like the fourth person ordered these much thicker sandwiches for everyone, burgers, no ham inside, just a patty made from grinded up meat and molded into a thick disk shape. 

They looked difficult to eat if you didn't have a big mouth, but everyone seemed to eat them just fine, either taking large bites or eating slowly. The lady was telling everyone something funny as Noemie was shrunken beside her, merely nibbling her burger, repeatedly adjusting the paper wrapped around it. Her coworker elbowed and encouraged her to take a larger bite, to which Noemie reluctantly complied. 

She bit down as wide as she could and pulled pack, some pieces of shredded lettuce falling out as she embarrassingly hid her face with her hand, chewing slowly and looking at the table as the friendly coworker made a cheering sound along with the other two. 

Noemie was chewing and began to make a face, from flushed and embarrassed to curious and scrunched up and queasy as she gestured for someone to pass her a napkin from the box on the far end of the table. One of the coworkers ripped one out of the box and passed it to her, Noemie used it to cover her mouth as she leaned forward, eyes almost watery as she spit something out into the napkin. The lady beside her pat her back and looked at her, concerned. 

"What's wrong?" She asked. 

Noemie held her hair back as she pulled the napkin away, not responding as she observed the thing she spat into the napkin. 

A pinkish looking thing, it almost looked like a bone, but with better eyes, anyone could tell it was the very tip of a finger, the nail still connected.

Everything else in this part of the story was a blur, some annoying screech sound here, a bunch of squabbling there, one of those workers took their phone out and frantically stood up, while the lady beside Noemie went up to the counter, skipping the line and shouted something at the person handling the big number machine up front. 

Some cars with blearing lights and sirens came about a few minutes later, Noemie during all of this just stayed quiet, but not before rushing to the bathroom and punching herself in the chest, vomiting into the sink and ignoring the eyes of the other women passing by. She was tilting as she walked back, holding her head in her hands and groaning, one of her coworkers helped her stand up, walking her back to their table where a person wearing blue and white was standing there, clearly waiting for them. 

The friendly coworker was holding her phone up horizontally, taking a video of everything as she talked, the blue and white person, the officer was talking seriously to everyone in that restaurant, it was not a happy or fun moment as everyone either seemed tense or scared. the napkin holding the spat-out fingertip was put inside a clear bag by someone in a jacket, and taken to one of the cars, and the two coworkers took Noemie outside, still helping her up as she stayed silent. She no longer made a sick expression and instead held her arms around her figure, not paying attention to anything. 

The friendly coworker was still inside with her phone recording, trying to talk to the officer and the restaurant staff, along with some people in jackets who also came in the police cars. 

Noemie's senses after that have both heightened and dulled, darting her eyes as she heard doors moving, radios, chairs shuffling, the sound of her feet walking back to the office, clinks of glass, people talking in the background, the clicks of heels, just the kind of sounds she'd hear in the kitchen. 

She took her bag from her chair, turned off her computer after doing some clicking, and went to one of the people wearing a nice suit around the office, telling them she was going to take a sick leave. They let her go saying, "You might be feeling sick for the rest of the day, from the looks of it."

They clearly had heard the news of the incident.

The woman didn't ask about her other coworkers who came back to the office with her, she search around for the friendly lady who was still down the block at the fast-food place, just kept her head down and held her stomach as she made her journey home, dozing off on the bus to ease herself.

It's not good to doze off a lot, otherwise time will pass by quickly and you'll find yourself in a place that you didn't realize you had gone to, like Noemie right now, back in the red kitchen, staring at the much larger amount of meat needed for tonight.

Someone was snapping their fingers by the lady's ear, she blinked at looked in the sound's direction. 

Charles was looking at her with some confusion and concern, knitting his eyebrows together. 

"Are you alright?" He asked her. 

She simply nodded, looking away.

He stared at her, but that wouldn't elicit any answers, so he moved around to get some scissors and took a hold of the tarp that was covering the many different pieces of meat they would be using tonight. There were about six chefs that night, and what looked like two newly hired dishwashers. 

Noemie began to shake her head and focus, realizing that she had been daydreaming about that incident at the fast-food place. It was hours ago, and she had dressed into her chefs uniform just a few minutes ago, finding a paper with the new meal of the night to make for the patrons. She walked into the kitchen last but not late as usual, to find a large pile covered by a tarp, laying on the kitchen island in the middle of the kitchen, in reach of everyone's stations.

As Charles took the tarp off, it was clear that some of these were newly harvested, there were thick bags covering all the pieces. 

Noemie noticed a tool with a tiny spiky circle attached to the end, that was just put down at her and Charles' station and breathed in and out heavily, going to put on gloves and grabbing the tool.

Charles first grabbed one of the rounder shaped packaged meats and cut it open to reveal a freshly cut head inside, the skin still had its color. It was sad to look at this time, she would be missed.

Noemie turned around to look at the head, pausing as some emotion finally appeared on her dozed off face. 

"Lilia?" She called out quietly, looking at the head that wore the face of eyes like a deer caught in headlights, and a mouth hung open like a fish' mouth caught on and yanked open by a hook.