Chapter Text
The office was quiet except for the constant hum of the computers.
Abigail rubbed her eyes and leaned back in her chair. The glow of her monitor painted the room in pale blue light. It was late—far later than she should have stayed—but deadlines didn't care about exhaustion.
Rows of cubicles stretched across the room, empty now that everyone else had gone home. Only she remains.
A half-finished cup of coffee sat beside her keyboard. "Just one more hour," she muttered to herself, sighing. That was what she had said three hours ago, too.
The screen in front of her displayed lines of documentation she barely understood anymore. Words blurred together. Numbers swam across the page.
Her reflection stared back at her: messy hair, dark circles under tired eyes, Twenty-something years old and somehow already feeling decades old
The thought made her laugh. A short, humorless laugh. When has everything become so repetitive? Wake up, work, eat, sleep, and repeat.
Every day felt like a copy of the last. Finally, her work ended. She stepped out of the office building just as the evening air cooled.
Streetlights flickered to life one by one, painting the sidewalks in soft amber light. Cars passed by in a steady stream as she adjusted the strap of her bag and checked the time on her phone.
Her manager forced her to work overtime. Again. At least she hadn't missed the bus. There, a middle-aged man was already sitting down. Then a woman stood beside her, followed by a guy in a hoodie whose hair was covering his eyes.
Abigail couldn't help but glance at the man in the hoodie. 'My God—do people seriously still dress up like that these days? I thought we left that in 20XX?'
She hadn't even noticed that the man was already staring back at her. 'And what's up with that hair—No, Abbigail! Don't judge too quickly! He might be homeless—wait, no, it's rude to assume people are homeless!'
She snapped her thoughts back to the present when the man spoke up, "Don't you know it's rude to stare at strangers? Judgementally too."
Abigail quickly looked away, embarrassed. Abigail quickly looked away, her face heating up.
"Sorry," she muttered.
The man in the hoodie snorted. "Wow. A whole apology. That's rare."
Abigail frowned. "What? Excuse me?"
He shrugged.
"What? Most people just pretend they weren't staring. You at least admitted it." His tone was casual, but there was something annoyingly smug about it.
Abigail crossed her arms. "I wasn't staring."
"You absolutely were."
"I glanced."
"You were judging me."
Abigail opened her mouth, closed it, then pointed a finger at him. "You saw wrong."
"Thought so." The man grinned. Or at least she assumed he did, since a curtain of hair cloaked half his face.
Abigail groaned and checked her phone for the time. She couldn't wait to get as far away from the man as possible.
"You're making funny faces."
"I am not."
"You are."
"I'm literally not."
The man tilted his head.
"There. You did it again."
Abigail resisted the urge to throw her phone at him. 'God, please just shut up!' she begged internally.
The woman standing beside them glanced between the two and quietly stepped a little farther away.
Abigail folded her arms and narrowed her eyes at him.
"You look younger than I am."
The man tilted his head. "That's your comeback?"
"I'm serious."
"That's concerning."
She pointed at him accusingly. "How old are you, anyway? You should talk to me with a little more respect."
For a moment, he just stared at her. Then he burst out laughing.
Not a polite laugh. Not an awkward laugh.
The laugh that immediately made Abigail regret opening her mouth.
"Oh, wow."
"What?" she snapped, her arms instinctively crossing.
"Oh, you're one of those people."
Abigail frowned. "One of what people?"
"The people who think being older automatically makes them wiser."
"I didn't say that."
"You definitely implied it."
"I implied that you're rude."
"And I implied that you're judgmental."
She opened her mouth to argue, only to realize he wasn't exactly wrong. Unfortunately, he seemed to know that too.
The smug grin on his face was unbearable.
"You're impossible."
"And yet, here we are."
The bus pulled up beside the curb with a hiss of air brakes. Abigail immediately climbed aboard and headed for a seat near the back. She was halfway through congratulating herself on escaping the conversation when the stranger dropped into the seat across the aisle.
She stared at him.
He stared back.
"What?"
"You followed me." Abigail frowned.
"No, I didn't."
"Yes, you did."
"There was an empty seat."
"There were ten empty seats."
He considered that for a second before shrugging. "Okay, but this one annoys you the most."
Abigail let out a long, exhausted sigh and rubbed her temples. Somehow this stranger had become the most irritating part of her day. And she'd spent nine straight hours reading documentation.
That was honestly impressive.
The bus pulled away from the stop, and for a few moments neither of them spoke. Abigail turned toward the window, watching the city lights blur past.
Maybe if she ignored him long enough—
"Hey, miss~" he started, grinning at her. He's clearly having fun annoying her. "You're 'AbbysAdventures57', aren't you~?"
Her head snapped to him almost immediately. "What? How... How did you..." A blush crept up her face, clearly embarrassed. And this didn't go unnoticed by the man.
"Wait, you are? Oh, man!" he laughed, clutching his stomach. "I just thought your voice sounded familiar and tried to see if it was really you."
Abigail froze. For a solid three seconds, her brain completely stopped functioning.
Out of everything this stranger could have said, that had not been on the list.
"...What?"
The man was still laughing. Several passengers glanced in their direction, making Abigail sink lower into her seat. The stranger seemed only the more entertained.
"What is wrong with you?" Abigail whispered, hissing.
"A lot of things, actually." He grinned, not caring about the gazes of the other passengers. The man watched her expression change again and again, his chin resting on his hand.
The bus stopped near Abigail's apartment, and she dashed off the vehicle, never wanting to see the stranger again.
However, fate is not so granting.
The next day, her company ordered lunch, and they sent her out to get the food from downstairs. When she made it outside, she froze when she saw who the delivery man was.
"Oh, look, it's you again~" he grinned, taking off his hat and handing her the bags. Abigail acted as if she'd never seen him before in her life.
Her expression became professionally blank as she held out the company card. "Payment."
The deliveryman stared at her.
She stared back.
For a few seconds, neither moved.
Then a grin slowly spread across his face.
"No way."
Abigail's eye twitched. "What?"
"You're pretending~," he grinned. "That's so cruel, Abigail~"
"No, I am not pretending—and who said you can call me by my name?" She clicked her tongue, annoyed. Her hand was still holding out the card, her foot tapping rhythmically on the ground.
"Payment"
"You're acting like we didn't just spend twenty minutes arguing."
"Payment."
"Like you didn't just accuse me of being sixteen."
"Payment."
He sighed dramatically and finally took the card from her. While the machine processed the transaction, Abigail silently prayed for this interaction to end as quickly as possible. "Stupid old hag—"
"What did you just say to me?!"
"What? I didn't say anything, ma'am."
Abigail could only narrow her eyes and reach out to take the bags. "Well," she said, reaching for the bags, "have a nice day."
The delivery man immediately pulled the bags back.
Abigail froze.
"What are you doing? Give it to me." She reached for it again, only for the man to pull it back once more.
The delivery man hugged the bags to his chest and looked genuinely thoughtful, as if he were seriously considering the answer.
"Hmm."
"Hmm?"
"Hmm."
Abigail stared. “Come on, man. Spit it out!” Finally, he nodded to himself. "I've decided."
"You've decided what?"
"I'm not giving these to you."
A vein in Abigail's forehead nearly popped.
“Excuse me, what?!”
"You hurt my feelings."
"I did not hurt your feelings."
"You pretended not to know me."
"I don't know you."
"You know me well enough to be annoyed by me."
"That's not an achievement.”
Abigail took a deep breath. “Look, we're both just wasting our time here. Give it to me.”
She waited for him to hand her the bags, and when he didn't, she just snatched them from his hands and walked back inside. Luckily, their bickering only took 5 minutes, so her co-workers didn't mind it.