Desirae walked the halls of her school with a frown, hugging her book close to her chest as she fidgeted with her uniform. She had three days to figure out what info she was going to give DeVile’s contact, but she was still just as clueless as she was a few days prior. School was a joke, studying was impossible, and all her ‘friends’ were sticking their nose up at her. Not that she blamed them, Desirae did everything possible to piss them off whenever possible. It was just so fun to see their frustrations.

Walking by the western wing of her school, she peered her head into a classroom and looked at her favorite teacher. Mrs. Ghalinksky was a bad-ass robotics teacher, and one of the only things keeping Desirae sane. She donned a purple augmented eye that had supposedly cured her of blindness, and a singular metallic finger that allowed her to control any electronic with minimal effort. Tapping her finger on the doorframe, Mrs. Ghalinksky looked up with a smile. She waved her hand to welcome Desirae, leaning back in her chair as Desirae took a seat at one of the tables nearest to her desk.

“Desirae, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Killing time,” she responded and held her head up by resting her chin on her palm. The teacher leaned forward and raised a brow.

“You look tired, what’s been going on? You haven’t been to class lately.”

“Senioritis.”

“I never took you to be a slacker.”

“What can I say, daddy’s money has my eyes set on new horizons…” Desirae fibbed as she stood to her feet, grabbing a pen from the rack. As she took the cap off, an infrared light made contact with the holographic board, marking wherever she traced. She smiled at the idea, wishing it was an ordinary dry erase marker. Those were so cool, so vintage. She had only seen a few in her lifetime, mostly in the dollar stores hidden beneath the rubble of paper plates and other items severely out of place.

“Daddy’s money will only get that brain of yours so far. You’re a smart girl, Desirae. What do you want to do after graduation?”

Biting the inside of her cheek, she shrugged her shoulders as she continued to doodle. The school day had long since ended, but yet, Desirae found the idea of going home hard. She found little comfort in her home whenever her father was home. A constant aura of tension hung over her head, so many silent thoughts threatening to break free in some kind of psychotic meltdown.

“Shame,” Mrs. Ghalinksky sighed and turned her head back to the papers. “If you don’t turn that assignment in by Friday, though, you won’t see past the graduation ceremony this year.”

Friday. The more the days dragged on, the more she realized the idea of staying in High School just a little longer might not have been as bad as she originally thought. Dropping the pen on the rack, she mumbled a goodbye and made her way out of the classroom without another word.

⟨ᴠᴀɢʀᴀɴᴛ⟩

Home is where the heart is. As far as Desirae knew, this house was the last place her heart ached to be.

The curtains swayed from the ceiling fan as she sat in the living room, ignoring the hollering from her father down the hall. He was on the phone with one of his former law partners, arguing about god knows what. Rich people's problems hardly interested her.

Eventually, after the argument ceased, her father walked into the room with red cheeks and furrowed eyebrows.

“Hello, Nathaniel.” Desirae greeted him formally on purpose, it always ticked him off a little. After her mother left, she found no reason to keep her cool. There were no good influences in her life, so she decided to make an attitude of her own. It was full of scorn and bitterness. “Problems with your servants?”

He mumbled something under his breath before grabbing his coat, throwing his arms through the holes before straightening the collar. She looked towards him, raising a brow. He almost never left the house at night without an escort, he was far too ‘important.’

“Your attitude is something I don’t have time for tonight.”

“You never have time.”

He looked at her through the mirror, eyes narrowed and lips pursed. She smiled in response, tearing her stare away to avoid any awkward tension.

“I don’t? I suppose you're right…”

Her eyes grew wide, but she didn’t look back at him. There were two possible reasons for his change in attitude: the first, being the least likely, was because he felt a rush of remorse fall over his shoulders; a dramatic realization to how badly he had parented her. The second, being the most likely, was because he was being a sarcastic, egotistical asshole who thought he did nothing wrong.

“Since I never have time to be with my darling child,” he began, the words dripping off his tongue with a sardonic tone, “why don’t you come along tonight.”

Darling child… Desirae recoiled at the nickname. He made everything awkward—even things as simple as calling his daughter by a nickname.

“Come along? To where, exactly?” She responded, turning around to face him with her mouth parted. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. He never invited her to attend outings with him, whether it was social or professional. His life outside of this home was a mystery, and honestly, Desirae didn’t mind that.

“Dinner with a friend.”

“Friend, or business partner?”

Her father smiled, waving his hand up. “Come on, Desirae. Since I’m so uninvolved, you have to come along. No choice.”

Pursing her lips, she stood and grabbed her jacket off the coat rack. Instances like this were why she chose to stay quiet whenever her father opened his mouth. Just when she went against that instinct, she was forced into some ritzy dinner with people she could care less about.

⟨ᴠᴀɢʀᴀɴᴛ⟩

Zeke never knew what stress felt like before today.

Filing systems full of papers. The stacks practically went to the ceiling, and all of them needed to be filed. For a company that prided itself on having an economical, eco-friendly, and technology-forward mindset, they really loved killing trees more than any other modern company. With all of the holographic smart boards and computer databases, he figured they would have had, at the very least, everything in their cloud system. He decided the only way to get through this first day of intern-esque Hell was by convincing himself they were using this old-school paper filing system in anticipation of their cloud database being overthrown and killed. That was utter bullshit, but it kept him from giving up halfway through the organizing.

Zeke kept grumbling to himself that this had to be a poor trick done on the new guy that would put him in his place. Keep him humbled. Blowing out a huff of air, he threw the last of the papers in the filing bin and made his way to the lounge. The office overlooked the western side of Chicago, just blocks away from the Chicago River and multiple stories into the air. Laughter filled the hallway, echoing as the voices got closer. Originally, they passed him by without a second thought, but one of them retreated and stuck their head through the doorway.

“You’re the new guy, no?”

He turned his head and smiled awkwardly, dropping the stack of papers on the tabletop before nodding. "That’s me! I’m Ezekiel.”

"Ezekiel… badass name,” the man said with a chuckle before offering a handshake. His hair was dark and short, gelled to the side in a way that reminded him of New Jersey. All the oil practically dripped onto the ground as he moved his head around.

“Zeke, for short.”

“Well, Zeke, surely you’re more than a filing boy. You got hired on as a…”

“Data analyst,” Zeke nodded and shoved his hands in the pockets of his suit pants. He turned his gaze to the stacks of papers that remained, the idea looming over his head that the data he was analyzing could have been entirely on paper, and not behind a bright, luminescent screen that would degrade his vision.

“Well, you got some good old fashion data analyzing done today—in the form of filing.” The guy chuckled, peeking his head out the door to nod towards his friends, letting out a sigh. “My name is Markus, you wanna go grab a bite with some other co-workers?”

Zeke blinked, looking at the papers again before tapping his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “I don’t know… I have a few stacks to get through.”

“I think you’re good,” Markus said with a gummy grin. “I’ll let Pop’s know you did your due diligence.”

“Pops?”

“Keep up, cub scout. My dad owns the company. Now, you down for a bite, or are you gonna stare at the dead trees for the rest of the night?”

“I guess the rest can wait for tomorrow,” Zeke sighed and shrugged his shoulders. If he was going to even attempt to fit in, he had to push his anxious mindset to the side long enough to make a few friends. “What’s on the menu?”

“Pizza and babes, dude. Pizza and babes.”