**A month and three weeks later
My first day at CovingtonGroup started at 5:45 a.m. with a wave of nausea. After completing my master's, I primarily worked as a freelancer and for small startups, although the assignments were often temporary.
I am rather attached to the informal setting of freelancing and you being your own boss so I wasn't a big fan of searching for work. This was mainly because I wanted to go on the startup route, but was paralyzed by my limited financial resources, and especially by the fear of getting my work stolen. Absurd right? But in tech, if your team members aren't really loyal, when your startup goes bankrupt, they get the idea and fund it.
But after my heartbreak, my concentration was seriously compromised. I found myself zoning out during work, telling myself I could have broken up with Alex earlier. I even moved back to my parents' house; I became incapable of cleaning around without spending at least thirty minutes on the thought of what could have been.
I was sleeping ten hours and waking up exhausted. My appetite had become a bottomless pit, with cravings for salt and spice that felt almost alien. The gym addict in me was now a stranger who could barely muster a walk. So, my mom suggested I look for a job in a formal environment, "It will help you refocus and reorient you toward your goals", she'd said.
I sent my CV a month ago and was called for an interview two weeks ago. Though I feel like I have started moving on already, I am very happy. Because I have the impression that inside all that glass and steel, in front of all those screens and under all that pressure I don't really have the luxury to afford thinking of Alex. Drifting off mid-work, there will be severe consequences, especially on the cv I have worked so hard to build.
I smiled as I headed to the shower. I was finally going to definitely move on with no risk of getting too comfortable in the love of my loved ones that I use it as a consolation plan and forget about work. I chose an entirely white suit and held my hair in a braided chignon.
"Mila!" That is my mom shouting, "Are you aware that it's already 6:30?"
"Yes mom, I am almost done",
I put on my high heels and rushed downstairs. I headed directly toward the door.
"Aren't you eating?", my dad asks from the kitchen.
"I am having nausea"
"But try and swallow something sweetheart, I can't have you pass out from hunger on your first day of work", my mom countered from the stairs.
I sighed and reluctantly headed to the table where I sat down. My stomach churned further, nausea and, more recently, vomiting were becoming less of a routine and more of a mode of life. I was fine most of the time so I believe it's fine. Fifteen minutes later, I left for work.
The CovingtonGroup headquarters was ambition personified, the building on its own was intimidating. It was early and the office was sparsely populated. I headed directly to my desk.
I have been coding since I was 14. I just loved the science of creating, styling, playing with shapes, and as a result, I did CS. Focused on full-stack development, did cybersecurity in my master's before freelancing.
Today was going to be interesting and I was going to be shown around. I was glad to meet, especially in the canteen, you know, all that food.
At ten exactly, a vibrant bundle of joy came to show me around. She'd said her name was Lyra. She was particularly open ranting the life out of her. We discussed from the latest tech to the sweetest snack. I found my fellow foodie and life was booming.
She was walking me back to my desk when she stopped in her tracks, turned, and blinked
"Oh yeah, there's still one person you haven't met. But technically, this isn't a meeting. You will see him from a distant"
She pulled me forward, turned my head to the office on the left, ...and there, right there, the world tipped on its axis. Adrian. The air left my lungs in a silent rush. All color drained from my face, replaced by a memory of skin. Did Lyra know?
"That's our CEO. Adrian Covington," she whispered, as if naming a deity. "One of the rare instances we actually get to see him."
I gave her a slide nod, my stare blank. Those curls my fingers were tangled in, I shook my head as if to snap myself out of my dream. I looked at her and smiled keeping myself from making any comment.
As I walked back to my desk, my heart was in a frantic beat against my chest, and I had the impression my day was ruined. I kept replaying that night on the rooftop then in his penthouse.
By eleven, a familiar, morbid fatigue possessed me. It wasn't heartbreak fatigue. It was a specific, heavy exhaustion that arrived like clockwork. And the timeline... a cold, slick fear coiled in my stomach. The fatigue, the nausea, the endless hunger... they didn't start after the breakup. They started after the rooftop. After him.
Tears prickled at my lashes, I wasn't sure why I wanted to cry, the man or the suspicion. And as I sat at the lunch table after charging my plate exclusively of spicy food that midday, I had simply decided to live in the moment until the next symptom decided to show up.
I was exhausted from the audit of my own life. For now, I would eat my dangerously spicy food, do my job, and forget the man with the devastating curls. Men were a universal constant of disappointment. If I couldn't control the storm brewing in my body, I could at least control my mind. And so, I decided, Adrian Covington would be evicted from it.