NOVEL NEXT Chapter 2 – October 1st and 2nd
It’s been a few weeks at my job and everything has been going well. I’ve been learning the software well and everyone has been amazing in helping me and answering my questions. I am getting into a rhythm at work. Getting to a point where I can start relaxing a bit and joining my coworkers in conversation. If I were ever brave enough to talk to any of them. They are all far too attractive for me to approach them. Whenever I try I freeze up. So I sit at my desk. My mind starts to wander slightly as I don’t have anything I am actively working on. Daydreaming of what I would do if I could shapeshift, what wonderful forms I would take. Like what type of person I would want to be, how cute I would be if I were a…
“Let me go ask her” I hear Luna’s voice over the cubicles. I see Luna walk around the cubicle and over to my desk. “Hey cutie, what are your plans for Halloween at the office? It is all but required that everyone shows up in costume. We decided that we are all going to show up as magical girl maids. Basically maid outfits with various magical girl wands...”
I then barely hear over the cubicle muttering “not that we don’t already have wands.” before someone else says “shut up.”
I then focus on Luna again. “...but we girls decided we would love for you to join us. I am sure you would look so cute as one of us magical maids.”
I stammer only slightly this time; having mostly got used to the constant flirting; “Umm, I don’t think I could pull off the look. I will just have something else to do. Do you need like a butler or something?”
Luna looks a bit disappointed, and replies “Maybe, let me confer with the other girls.” She slowly walks away back to the rest of the floor.
I went back to looking off into the middle distance because it sounded better than looking at my computer pretending to work. I decide to start looking at the new Magic the Gathering cards for a Commander deck that I wanted to build. “Hey Z, watcha doing?” I hear behind me, I quickly minimize the tab and spin to see Alice behind me. Alice is wearing something similar to me, one might describe it as a semi butch lesbian look.
“Oh nothing much” I respond, trying to keep the blush from embarrassment from my cheeks.
“Those were magic cards right? Do you play?” Alice continues, as she pushes me to the side and brings the window back up. “Ah I see, red and black. Do you have many decks to play with?”
“Not right now, I am trying to build a new commander deck, I started playing recently with friends and I wanted to have a physical deck. I have had the game shop set the cards to the side, but I was just trying to think of any other things I could do to make it better.” I say with confidence coming back to me. MTG is one of the things I know after all. I may not be the best at deck building, but I think I have a winner here.
Alice smirks, and I can see a flash of brilliance in her eyes. With just a tiny hint of malice she states “Well why don’t you bring the deck tomorrow, we can play a round or two. I know some of the other people play commander as well.” Before I could say yes, Alice goes back over to the group and starts whispering amongst each other. The occasional eye glancing my way.
To avoid the embarrassment I just turn back to my computer and get to work. A few hours pass and I start to get ready to go home. Alice passes by on her own way home and quickly reminds me “bring that magic deck to work tomorrow, we can have some fun.” I nod in agreement and make my way to the game shop. I picked up the cards I had them set aside, some sleeves, and a box for them. After leaving the game shop and getting home I head to my room. I notice my full laundry and make a mental note that I should throw my clothes in the washer. I grab my purchases and start to put the cards in the sleeves and box everything up. I boot up my computer to continue playing Mass Effect 2, having recently beating 1 again. The adventures of Zoey continue!
A couple of hours later, my pillow sweetly calls my name. I decide the siren song is too powerful to ignore, I disrobe and lay down, quickly falling asleep.
I wake up the next morning to my phone blaring, interrupting the sweet release of sleep. As quickly as I can while groggy and wishing I was still asleep I prepare for the day. After showering and drying off. I check my cheeks again to make sure I didn’t miss any hair, I can’t see why people like beards, facial hair sucks. I start the process of getting dressed. I open my sock drawer to find it empty. I panic slightly, looking over at the pile of laundry I forgot to do. Looking back at my sock drawer I find one pair left. The clean and nicely folded thigh highs. I can’t wear dirty socks though, right? It’s either dirty socks or thigh highs. I rationalize that nobody would know, they would be beneath my jeans, and not visible. I quickly pull them on and continue getting ready for work. I remember to grab my MTG deck. Each mile I get closer to work my anxiety rises slightly, but the comfort of the socks does a decent job at keeping that anxiety at bay. I say hello to the receptionist as I continue to my desk. Hurrying but not making it look that way. I see a few glances my way from my coworkers, but that is normal. I say hello to the room in general as I get to my desk. I then sent a message over to Alice saying that I had remembered my deck and am looking forward to playing.
A couple of hours go by and I go to our little break room to grab some food. I can see Alice, Luna, Lily, and Chloe all in there with their own decks. “How are we going to do this? There are 5 of us.” I say as I look around and take a seat.
Alice pipes up saying “Lily won’t be joining, she is just going to watch. She hasn’t gotten into magic yet.” Lily just nods in agreement.
We all shuffle our decks and start to play. I am doing well enough, I can see my deck can use some work, but it can hold its own. I ignore Chloe because she can’t seem to get the mana out to play much of anything. Luna and Alice are my main threats. With a little bit of help from everyone else, we manage to take those two out. “I need to grab some water, I will be right back.” I respond after Alice has been removed from the game. I go to stand up from my chair and get my foot caught, slipping slightly as the chair pushes up on my leg. I go over to the fridge to fill my water bottle. I can hear whispers behind me and I think nothing of it.
As I sit back down Luna whispers in my ear “So you like the thigh highs?” I blush and look down. One of my pants legs has been pushed up to my knee, exposing my socks. I quickly push the pant leg back down.
Stammering, I respond “I didn’t have any other clean socks.” my face is blushing so hard you could cook an egg on my face, or maybe a cookie.
Alice then adds onto my embarrassment and says “How about we make the rest of this game more interesting? If Chloe wins, you have to join the rest of us girls as a maid on Halloween. I can see you are already preparing for it anyways, those socks would go nicely under a skirt.”
Lily quickly admonishes Alice, “behave yourself Alice. Z, don’t feel pressured to agree or anything. Yes the rest of the team would be thrilled if you were to join, but you don’t need to.
Without thinking I quickly answer “It’s a deal.” I could swear I could see the tiniest of smirks on everyone’s faces.
We continue playing from where we left off. I look at the table and everything is as it was. No foul play there. Chloe goes and plays a land, and a couple of cards. She then passes the turn to me. I think I am just a few rounds from winning. I play another card, and attack with everything I have. Chloe has just one creature, but declines to block, she takes all the damage. Her life counter shows her at 1 life. I pass the turn back to her. Chloe draws a card and I can see a huge smile on her face. She plays another land, and plays two cards. The first card is Witty Roastmaster, then a presence of Gond which she plays onto the Midnight Guard she played last turn. She then proceeds to blow a bubble, let it pops and says loudly “Good game”. She then taps Midnight Guard which due to Presence of Gond creates a 1/1 creature, which then untaps Midnight Guard. And since a creature is put on the battlefield I take 1 damage. She then does this over and over until my life counter reads 0.
My jaw drops. Just like that I had gone from full life to none. I drop my hand onto the table. Alice, Luna, and Chloe all cheer together. Before Luna turns to me and says “Well let's find you a maid dress.” Luna proceeds to stand and takes my hand and leads me to her desk.
We get to Luna’s desk and the shock has worn off. I see Luna pull up and search for some maid outfits. She turns to me and asks “Do you have any preferences for styles or anything?”
“Ummm, not really maybe something similar to Tohru from Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid” I responded before realizing what I just admitted to. I just have to hope beyond hope, Luna doesn’t know what the show is. My hopes are dashed when I see a smirk and a raised eyebrow. In order to save any sense of dignity or pride I add “I’m going to leave all the planning to you, get what you think would be appropriate, I’ll repay you for everything.” I then leave her desk and go back to my own. I focus on work for the remainder of the day, only pausing briefly when Lily drops off my cards.
Lily takes an empty chair next to me and says, “you should have won that game”. She then shows me a picture on her phone, it was my hand. There as plain as day, an instant that would have killed the creature preventing the infinite combo. It would have done 2 damage to Witty Roastmaster, preventing the damage. “If you want, you can back out from the bet, I am sure the girls would understand.”
“Thanks for the offer, but I lost fair and square. If I didn’t realize I had that card, that is my own fault. I will take my punishment like an adult.” I respond with just a tiny bit of pride, not taking the easy way out. Lily then leaves and goes back to her office. The rest of my day being unbothered by anyone else, the clock finally hits 5 and I head home.