Elliot and Julia have a complicated relationship. Since they met in the seventh grade, the only heart-to-heart conversations they've had have been strictly over text. But they don't mind this lack of intimacy. If anything, they enjoy it.
Don't thi...
After a few more weeks of horrid blind dates and not being able to focus on my work because of them, I banned Abby from setting me up on even more. My job was as wonderful as ever but it required me to do a lot of overtime and I couldn't handle going on blind dates with assholes after I had just worked for twelve hours straight. I was still pretty young but I wasn't young enough to do that. I was one of those young people who was supposed to be able to handle staying up all night and just bounce back but I never seemed to have that ability (even though I really wished I did).
Besides, I kind of liked the atmosphere when I was working late and everyone else had gone home. The office, which was usually so loud I couldn't think, grew quiet as the hours went on and I didn't have to deal with distractions. The only people left at night were some writers who weren't even in my department. I wouldn't have been able to function if the office was this quiet all the time but the quiet was a nice change of pace.
One of the most frequent night workers was a writer named Ryan Osbourne, which I still think is a great name for a writer if you forget the whole Spider Man thing, who never seemed to get anything done during the day. All the times I had seen him around the office, before I had even learned his name, he seemed like one of those frat boys who got this job because of plain old nepotism. The kind of kid who's just waiting for Daddy to call and say that he's not in trouble anymore and he can go back to traveling the world with supermodels. But the Ryan I saw during the day was different than the one at night.
His performance during the day seemed so contrived as soon as I saw how hard he was working. Maybe he just wanted to be liked or maybe he couldn't focus with so many people around, but it was clear that his apparent laziness was just an act. Or at least part of an act. And one night, after several nights of saying hello when we passed in the hallways, I went over and told him that. I would have understood if he had been completely offended and hated me forever for that but instead he laughed and pulled a pizza out of nowhere. He explained that he ordered a pizza almost every night and he would be happy to not have to eat it all himself and share it with a fellow workaholic. And I agreed because he was nice and I was hungry (it never really made sense to leave in the middle of the night to get food).
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"So where are you from?"
"California."
"Where in California?"
"Why does it matter?"
"Cause California is huge. You could be a SoCal girl or one of those Northern California freaks."
"Fine. I'm from ----------."
"A freak then."
"I suppose so. Where are you from?"
"Chicago."
"Ooo a writer from Chicago, how original. Tell me, did you also work in a pizza parlor and help perfect deep dish pizza?"
"Of course. Every teenager in Chicago is taught to perfect deep dish pizza."
"Awesome. So why are we paying for pizza every night when you're from the home of pizza?"
"I think the Italians would disagree with you on that one."
"Whatever. I just don't get why we keep paying for pizza when you were born in a place that makes amazing pizzas. Like come on, dude."
"I'm very sorry to disappoint you."
"Thank you. Tomorrow I expect you to make some pizza."
"Yeah no. But I would be happy to take you out to get some deep dish pizza. At some time not in the middle of the night."
"Like a date?"
"If you want."
"All right. But if we were going to go on a date, I would prefer that we didn't go out for pizza. I'm getting a little tired of a pizza every night."
"Do you like Chinese?"
"Nah."
"Mexican."
"That sounds great."
"So it's settled then, on Friday we'll go get some Mexican food."
