When I Stopped Waiting

Episode Seven

Chapter 7

The Line He Moved

After Dakota joined the president’s office, my workload did not lessen immediately.

At least, not in any obvious way.

I still prepared Charles’s documents. I still reviewed his contracts before he saw them. I still arranged his schedule, screened his calls, confirmed his meetings, checked the weather before business trips, and memorised the preferences of clients who could affect the company’s interests with one careless sentence.

The only difference was that I began doing more of it from my desk.

At first, I thought Charles was only giving Dakota training opportunities.

“Dakota will come with me to the Henderson meeting,” he said one morning, without looking up from the file in his hand.

I paused for only a second.

Then I smiled.

“Of course. I’ll prepare a summary for her.”

Charles’s pen stopped.

He looked at me.

“You don’t need to go.”

“I understand.”

His eyes remained on my face for a moment, as if he was waiting for another reaction.

I gave him none.

After all, there was nothing unreasonable about the arrangement.

Dakota needed experience. I was responsible for training her. Client meetings were part of the job.

So I prepared the summary.

I marked Henderson’s personality, his negotiation habits, his habit of pretending not to understand unfavourable clauses, his assistant’s name, his preferred tea, and the reason he disliked sitting with his back to the door.

Dakota accepted the file with both hands.

“Mia, this is so detailed.”

“It needs to be.”

She flipped through the pages carefully, her eyes widening.

“You even wrote down what kind of tea he drinks.”

“If he asks for coffee, don’t correct him. Let the waiter handle it. But if the waiter asks you, say aged pu’er.”

Dakota nodded seriously.

“I’ll remember.”

She probably would.

She was not stupid.

Only inexperienced.

When Charles came out of his office, Dakota immediately stood. She held the file to her chest, nervous but eager.

Charles’s gaze fell on her.

“Ready?”

“Yes, Mr Yale.”

Her voice was a little too bright.

Charles did not correct her.

Instead, he said, “Don’t be nervous. Just listen.”

The words were ordinary.

The tone was not.

I lowered my eyes to the calendar on my screen.

“Mr Charles, the car is waiting downstairs. Henderson’s assistant confirmed the private room ten minutes ago. The signed preliminary documents are in Dakota’s folder.”

“Mm.”

Charles walked towards the lift.

Dakota followed quickly.

Halfway there, she looked back at me and mouthed, Thank you.

I smiled.

The lift doors closed.

For a while, I sat at my desk without moving.

Then the phone rang.

Work, as always, was considerate enough not to leave me alone with my thoughts for too long.

After that day, similar arrangements became more frequent.

A client lunch.

Dakota went.

A site inspection.

Dakota went.

An evening reception with a partner company.

Dakota went.

At first, Charles still asked me to prepare the materials. Then, gradually, he began asking Dakota directly.

“Mia, where’s the West City follow-up?”

“I gave Dakota the draft this morning.”

“Have her bring it in.”

“Yes.”

Or:

“Dakota, come with me to the finance briefing.”

“Yes, Mr Yale.”

Or:

“Mia, you can stay and finish the banquet seating plan.”

“Of course.”

It was not as if I had never wanted fewer outside meetings.

Business meals were exhausting. Clients drank too much, spoke too vaguely, and expected women in assistant roles to smooth over every awkward moment with a smile.

I should have been relieved.

In some ways, I was.

But a position, once occupied for years, became strangely painful to leave.

Even if it had never truly belonged to me.

One afternoon, Dakota returned from a client lunch with Charles. Her cheeks were flushed, either from the cold outside or from excitement.

“Mia,” she said, coming to my desk, “Mr Yale said I did well today.”

“That’s good.”

“He said I remembered the client’s wife had a charity foundation.”

“You did.”

“I only remembered because you wrote it down.”

“Still, you remembered when it mattered.”

Dakota smiled, pleased and embarrassed at once.

She was very easy to encourage.

That, too, was something Charles seemed to notice.

He came out of his office a little later and saw Dakota standing at my desk, still smiling over the meeting notes.

His gaze paused.

“Dakota.”

She turned at once.

“Yes, Mr Yale?”

“The client from today sent an email. Draft a reply.”

Her face lit up.

“Me?”

“You were at the meeting.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Send it to Mia before sending it out.”

“Yes.”

She hurried back to her desk.

Charles watched her for a few seconds.

Then he turned to me.

“Check it carefully.”

“I will.”

“She’s improving.”

I looked down at the open file in front of me.

“Yes. She is.”

Charles seemed to hear something in my tone, because his brows drew together faintly.

But before he could speak, Dakota dropped her pen.

It rolled beneath her desk.

She bent down too quickly and knocked her shoulder against the edge.

“Ow.”

Charles looked over immediately.

“Careful.”

His voice was low.

Almost gentle.

Dakota looked up, one hand on her shoulder, and laughed awkwardly.

“I’m sorry. I’m always clumsy.”

Charles’s expression eased.

“Then slow down.”

It was the kind of sentence he had said to me many times.

But with me, it had always meant: you are making a mistake.

With Dakota, it sounded almost like concern.

The coffee changed on a Wednesday.

For years, Charles’s coffee had been my responsibility.

Not officially, of course. Nothing between us that mattered was ever official.

But everyone in the office knew I handled it. They knew Charles’s preferences were difficult enough that no one else wanted the risk. Temperature, bitterness, cup, timing. If any detail was wrong, he might not say a word, but the cup would sit untouched on his desk like a small public execution.

That morning, I was reviewing a contract when Dakota stood beside my desk holding a takeaway cup.

“Mia,” she said carefully, “can I try making Mr Yale’s coffee today?”

I looked at her.

She seemed nervous, but hopeful.

“I’ve been practising,” she added quickly. “I know the temperature matters. I asked the pantry staff about the machine, and I watched you yesterday.”

I should have refused.

Not because coffee was important.

Because it was not.

That was the ridiculous part.

It was only coffee.

A cup. Some beans. Hot water. Milk for other people, never for Charles.

But some duties became intimate after years of repetition. Some small, ordinary acts absorbed too much unsaid feeling. They looked harmless to everyone else, yet carried the weight of all the mornings, all the nights, all the quiet places a person had been allowed to stand.

I smiled.

“Go ahead.”

Dakota’s eyes brightened.

“Really?”

“Yes. But don’t fill it too much. He dislikes carrying a full cup.”

“I remember.”

She hurried away.

Shane, sitting opposite me with a stack of reports, slowly lifted his head.

“Mia.”

“What?”

“You just gave away the sacred coffee.”

“There is no sacred coffee.”

“There absolutely is. Last year, Finance gave him coffee at the wrong temperature and three people resigned emotionally before noon.”

“They recovered.”

“Barely.”

I ignored him.

A few minutes later, Dakota carried the cup into Charles’s office.

The door was not fully closed.

I did not mean to listen.

But I heard her voice.

“Mr Yale, I made this. Mia said I could try.”

There was a pause.

Then Charles said, “You made it?”

“Yes. If it’s wrong, I can make another.”

Another pause.

I looked down at the contract.

A moment later, Charles spoke.

“It’s fine.”

Dakota’s voice brightened.

“Really?”

“Mm.”

Then, after a second, he added, “Better than last time.”

Last time.

So she had made it before.

I stared at the same line of text until the words blurred.

When Dakota came out, her smile was impossible to hide.

“He drank it,” she whispered.

“That’s good.”

“I thought he would hate it.”

“He doesn’t hate everything.”

The moment I said it, I nearly laughed.

Because it was true.

Charles did not hate everything.

He had standards for some people.

And patience for others.

By Friday, the office had begun to change around them.

Not obviously.

No one was foolish enough to gossip loudly near the president’s office.

But people watched.

They noticed Dakota entering Charles’s office more often.

They noticed Charles asking her questions directly.

They noticed him looking at her when she spoke, not with impatience, but with focus.

They noticed the way he let her interrupt him twice in one afternoon and did not once tell her to think before opening her mouth.

And, eventually, they noticed me.

Or perhaps they noticed my absence.

At lunch, I went to the pantry to make tea and found two assistants from marketing speaking in hushed voices near the coffee machine.

“Do you think it’s true?”

“What?”

“That Ms Lane is special.”

“She must be. Mr Yale took her to three client meals this week.”

“Maybe she’ll be his girlfriend soon.”

“Shh. Miss Bennet is close to Mr Yale too.”

“That’s different. Miss Bennet is capable.”

There was a brief silence.

Then the other voice said softly, “Exactly.”

I looked at the tea bag in my hand.

Capable.

What a clean, useful word.

It made everything sound respectable.

The assistants noticed me then. Their faces changed so quickly it was almost impressive.

“Miss Bennet.”

“Morning,” I said.

“It’s afternoon,” one of them blurted.

I smiled.

“So it is.”

They fled.

I made my tea slowly.

Outside, the sky had darkened without anyone noticing.

Rain streaked down the glass walls of the building, turning the city into a blurred grey painting.