Who: Rob and JP What: Bumping into’s over books Where: Barnes and Noble When: This afternoon Warnings: Awkwardness. Quasi-flirting. Swearing.
Rob had spent the morning chasing someone he thought he’d seen at the party a few weeks ago, with a woman he hadn’t attended with. Mason seemed to go for the gossip articles and frankly, Rob took any excuse he could to spend some time out of the office. Bobby seemed irritable as of late; not that Rob blamed him. He remained healthily respecting Bobby Big as far away as possible.
The lead turned out to be a dud around lunch time, leaving him in an unfamiliar corner of the city with too much time to kill. (If an interesting story had come up, he was sure he’d have gotten an irate call.) He grabbed lunch at a deli, eating his turkey sandwich as he explored. His camera went into his bag rather than thumping against his chest and he had one of the most pleasant afternoons he’d had since arriving in Musings. He felt in-tune with his senses – the mayo on his turkey smelled ridiculously pleasant, the music from the street magician from a few blocks down was catchy, and he didn’t have any headaches. Best of all? He didn’t dodge when someone came up too close from behind him. Apparently he was getting the hang of this.
As a partial reward he ducked into the nearest Barnes and Noble. He tossed the wrapper of his sandwich in a trash can at the front door, wandering inside. The last time he’d bought a full-price, non-schoolwork related book felt like years ago – it might as well have been. Hands went in his pockets and he merely enjoyed wandering around, stopping occasionally when he saw something that caught his eye. Rob was a person who easily could have spent four hours in a bookstore and leaving any book behind was torture. He managed to only pick up an anniversary edition of I-Robot when he saw a familiar face.
Crap.
Rob waited one beat, then two as she remained bent over what she was looking at. He could make a run for it – he thought he’d spent enough time on the treadmill for that to be successful – or he could remain as he was. Or he could approach her. Number one was difficult indoors though, number two would be awkward. He waited another beat before swallowing and moving forward. A hand tapped on her shoulder and he offered an awkward smile. “Fancy meeting you here.”