D:CM Reasons

PREVIOUS (Stories)
“Jeriah? Why are you even aiming for head of the group?” 

“Because I want to live a cushy life and never touch another firing-pattern transliteration graph again,” he muttered back, not looking away from the screen. “Seriously, what the hell do these valences even mean?”

Amy laughed but set the textbook in her lap on the ground and  leaned down to see what he was working on. She skimmed through his detailed notes and markings before remembering something from her clinical experience. “Zoom out?”

“What?”

“Zoom out. Can I see the overall notes?”

“The software keeps saying depression, but I don’t believe it.”

“Did you meet the subject?”

“She seemed nervous. I would have guessed anxiety if anything, but all her readings are looking like depression. Normal answers though. She didn’t seem too nervous about being hooked up to the dream-reader.”

“Go back to the spike you were wondering about?”

He did so. “Amery? What do you think?” 

“Sarcasm,” she guessed. “This whole part about never having trouble with her clients— The subject is amused. This activation sequence and the general positive reading—but I’ll bet there’s something bitter in there was well. Corresponding with right ventromedial prefrontal activation that matches the time of utterance—yeah. I’d say she was being sarcastic. You didn’t pick that up?”

“No. She seemed pretty deadpan.”

“It was your first time meeting her, it’s ok.” Amy reached over and hit a button to pull up a transcript of the interview. “Not quite depression or anxiety? Hm… It reminds me more of some minor PTSD cases.”

“Trauma?” 

“Nothing like war or death. Just small things. In her case, her client’s words. 
This sounds like sexual harassment.” Amy looked down and noticed Jeriah staring at her with awe. “I-I’d have to take a closer look though,” she said nervously. “It was just a guess.”

“It’s all yours,” he replied, sliding the mouse and headset to her. “Thank you for volunteering to finish this for me.”
She laughed and backed away. 

“Please? Translating always takes me forever!”

“You were able to translate my interview readings,” Amy protested, but pulled a 
cushion to the floor to sit next to him. “Dinner says you’re thankful.” 

“Right. Hand me my phone, I’ll get pizza.” 

Her hand froze around the phone. “What, I can do that. Go cook something!” 

“I have Kevin for that!” he shot back, reaching over her. “Come on!” 

“My my, I’m learning so much about what you can’t do today,” she laughed, 
scrambling to her feet, phone in hand. “You can’t code simple data, you can’t 
cook, next thing you know it’s that you can’t do your own laundry—“ 

“Amery!” He stood up to give chase, reaching around her in a vain attempt to 
reach the phone. “Hey, watch—“ 

The warning came too late. Her foot caught against the book she had set down. 
She stumbled, but her balance was way off and her foot flew out. She winced as she fell, more from surprise than actual injury.

It took her a moment to realize she didn’t hit the ground as hard as she thought she would and that she wasn’t staring at the ceiling. The way she was angled, her head ought to have smacked into the table. Yet there was a gentle hand on 
the back of her head, prevent her from colliding with the sharp corner of the 
table. The other hand held Jeriah’s weight off her. 

She stared up at him, surprised he’d reacted fast enough to even catch her. 
Their eyes were wide and their faces frozen in surprise. He was a little taller 
than her, and his shoulders were broader than she’d noticed before—he usually 
seemed so much smaller. For the first time, she noticed just how light the gray 
of his eyes were, and how dark the bags that traced under them were. 

They were so close, she could feel his sharp intake of breath before they moved 
apart in a hurry. “Thank you,” she murmured. 

“Sorry,” he apologized at the same time, immediately putting a yard between 
them. “I mean, yeah. No problem.” 

Awkwardly, Amy held his phone out, focusing on the floor. “You wanted this.”

“Right.” He took it, sounding just as flustered before heading for the kitchenette 
like he was escaping. The room seemed unusually silent as Amy sat down by his computer, fiddling with the headset. 

“If you want, I can cook a little,” Jeriah finally said, checking the refrigerator. “It 
isn’t as good as yours, but it should be edible.”

“Y-Yea, that’s good,” she said. “Ok. I’ll finish this.”

When Gareth got back, he complained loudly that his cousin’s food was probably poisoned and commented even more obnoxiously his surprise that at least the poison tasted decent. Amy tuned it all out of course, but for once she was glad for Gareth’s noisiness—it masked the silence that had settled between her and Jeriah. It continued even when he had finished his shower and they danced around each other, standing on opposite ends of the room. Amy wondered how they usually functioned at night. And what even had started this whole awkwardness? Her tripping? They had been talking normally about work before then.
He pulled his blankets over his shoulders and leaned against the window, book in hand. Nestled on the oversized bed, Amy looked up from her own text and stared at him. She wasn’t exactly unhappy with the distance, but its suddenness seemed concerning. 

“Oh! You never answered my question earlier!”

He narrowed his eyes and the book remained closed. “What?”

“Why are you even aiming to be head of the group?”

He hesitated. “Eternal funding,” he joked again.

She rolled her eyes. “It doesn’t make sense. You love your work, and Gareth 
seems like he would enjoy running the business anyways."

Jeriah’s eyebrows knitted together. 

Aha, I’ve struck something. She shifted on the bed, rolling onto her stomach 
and facing him. 

“I don’t plan on running the company,” he said finally, then shut his mouth, 
pursing his lips. “Anyways, it’s something else.” He opened the book, and that 
was the end of the discussion. 

Amy watched him for a while longer, before finally sighing to herself. She shut 
the economics textbook and left it on the bedside table for tomorrow morning. 

“Goodnight, Jeriah.” 


She didn’t expect a reply, but a few minutes later, when he thought she was 
asleep, she heard him murmur in reply. “Goodnight, Amery.”

NEXT (Lunch)

Notes:
This was one of those scenes that I forced in for the sake of otome-ness and for the sake of showing that some relationship is indeed happening. It hasn’t deviated much in terms of content from draft 1, but the actual writing of it has changed a lot.