The Forgotten Clan

06 [ Night Routine ]

Amica stretched her limbs with a satisfying crack, massaging her temple with one hand as her other reached for the mug on her desk. She just finished outlining Mr. Fenrir’s schedule for next week—a monstrosity of a calendar thanks to yesterday’s conveniently skipped meeting. Her ever-so-dedicated boss decided to ghost a department-wide discussion like it was just another Tinder date.

"Asshole," she muttered under her breath.

She took a long sip of milk and bit into a cookie—her low-effort, high-reward snack combo to fight sleepiness and avoid the ever-feared hANGRY mode. Hungry and angry? Not cute. She wasn't about to Hulk-smash her laptop just because someone failed to feed her.

Clicking through her tabs, she responded to emails with copy-paste precision, finalized a few tedious reports, and even polished Mr. Fenrir’s upcoming presentation. It was almost laughable.

Correction—insulting.

She wasn’t even his secretary anymore. At this point, she was his handler. His babysitter. His loyal unpaid intern with benefits—minus the benefits.

“That jerk’s lucky I haven’t stabbed him with a pen yet,” she grumbled.

Finally—finally—with the last doc exported and scheduled emails queued, she closed her laptop. Her shoulders sagged with the weight of her non-existent day off.

“I should start charging him therapy rates,” she said to no one.

Sure, the job paid five times more than a typical secretary gig, but it also came with one hundred times more stress and one thousand percent more boss-induced rage. Amica swore she was the one running the damn company. Mr. Fenrir? He was just a disturbingly handsome distraction with a credit card and a talent for avoiding responsibility.

Just as she reached for her glasses and tucked them into the hem of her oversized tee, a voice chimed from the kitchen.

“You still awake?”

Amica glanced over her shoulder to see a very familiar figure waltzing out of the kitchen like she owned the place. Quaszi. Barely dressed in her underwear set—again. The woman was sipping from a bottle of water while blindly grabbing snacks from the grocery bag Amica had forgotten to unpack.

“How shameless,” Amica muttered, not even trying to hide the eye-roll.

“Stop being a parasite,” she called out, shutting her laptop with a satisfying snap.

Quaszi smirked, tossing a granola bar in the air and catching it like a smug cat. “You say ‘parasite,’ I say ‘cozy room accessory.’ Tomato, tomahto.”

“You’re the mold in my bathroom.”

“Ouch,” Quaszi faked a wince. “How cruel of you. Leaving a poor, freezing girl outside the door. Heartless. Just pure evil.”

“Sure,” Amica replied flatly, standing to stretch. “I don’t really mind.”

Quaszi gasped, placing a hand over her chest. “The betrayal! I thought we had something special.”

“The only thing special about you is your ability to survive this long without contributing a single useful thing to society.”

“And yet, you made me a room.” Quaszi gave her a cheeky wink. “You love me.”

Amica shot her a look that could curdle milk. “I made a room for your inconvenient existence. I was one step away from dumping your stuff into the hallway, so count your blessings.”

The banter continued, with Quaszi throwing increasingly dramatic lines about abandonment and suffering while Amica responded with cold, uninterested savagery. It was their usual nightly routine. Like a sitcom, except one of them had functioning brain cells.

Eventually, they both drifted to their rooms. Amica paused at her door and glanced at the barely-converted stockroom she reluctantly allowed Quaszi to claim as her own.

Tsk.

The woman was richer than her by miles. Her family probably wiped tears with gold-plated tissues. And yet, here she was, infesting Amica’s modest apartment like a stray cat that just refused to leave. Five years. Five damn years of freeloading nonsense.

“She’s got screws loose,” Amica muttered as she pushed open her door and entered her own sanctuary.

And by sanctuary, she meant a glorified hospital room.

White walls.

Cream-colored curtains.

Beige everything.

Her appliances matched, not out of aesthetic, but because she had zero time to care. Still, despite how boring it looked, it was hers. Her bed. Her space. Her breath of solitude.

Amica collapsed onto her bed, face-first into her pillow. The fabric smelled like her detergent—clean and vaguely citrusy. She exhaled, half muffled.

“I swear, one more stunt from Mr. Fenrir and I’m putting silver in his coffee.”

She turned to her side, staring at the ceiling. It was almost too quiet. Peaceful, even. But her mind wasn’t ready to shut off yet. It ran through the day's chaos on repeat, and inevitably, back to her boss.

Mr. Fenrir.

He was tall. Always too smug. Always too casual. The type to flash a grin and make a joke when people were seconds from murdering him. And worst of all—infuriatingly competent when he actually tried. Which was rare. So rare it should be documented by scientists.

“A waste of potential,” Amica muttered, poking her pillow.

If she had even half his abilities, she'd be dominating industries, not babysitting meetings and organizing lunch breaks.

She sighed again and closed her eyes. Her last thought before sleep took over?

She imagined herself plotting the many creative ways to eliminate her boss. Perhaps drop-kicking him into a werewolf cage. Or slowly convincing him he’s allergic to oxygen. Too bad werewolves couldn’t read minds—or else she'd be jobless, homeless, and probably hunted.

Welp. Count your blessings, I guess.

And that’s how she fell asleep.

Just like that.

Every day.