If you’re still doing the question prompts: ‘Why do you care?’ For MLQC Victor because who doesn’t love an angst filled question prompt :)))))
Thank you so much for asking! Here’s the finished result, completely unedited at the moment but I will come back to it at some point and correct any mistakes!
Victor: Prompt - Why do you care?
You were at the end of your tether. Victor had criticised you report on exactly the wrong day. You woke up in a pool of your own blood; thanks Mother Nature for being a week early; you dropped your coffee and ruined your new shoes, you missed your train, which in turn made you miss your first meeting, then the server crashed, leaving you less than an hour to rewrite your proposal from memory while the IT experts tried to recover the servers. And now Victor was yelling at you because what you had managed to cobble together wasn’t up to his unattainable standards.
‘Exactly what were you thinking, turning in something this…amateurish?’ He threw the file across the desk towards you. ‘After all this time you should know better.’ His sharp tone bit through your usual strong exterior and brought all your walls crashing down, any self esteem you had left after today withering.
Victor continued to rant about how bad your proposal, how you would, if you did not turn things around, lose your funding and, with it, your father’s company, walking across his office as he did so, his back turned to you so he didn’t see your bottom lip trembling as you fought back tears. You had explained to him that it was a basic copy and that you would e-mail him the original, complete proposal once the server was back online, but that seemed to have gone in one ear and out of the other. And you had finally had enough. Before he reached the end of his pacing and turned you stood, picked up your file and bag, and walked out of the office.
Victor turned in time to see the door finishing its swing open and the very back of you disappearing from sight. Sighing, he considered stopping time for a moment but knew that Goldman, and anyone else passing, would have seen you leave and probably realise something out of the ordinary had happened. All he could do was follow you. ‘Which way did she go?’ He asked his assistant as he headed towards the door to his office suites.
‘The ladies room, I think.’ Goldman called after him, confused by what had just happened, having heard Victor yelling and then you rush by close to tears.
You sobbed into your tissue in the locked stall. You had planned on leaving LFG entirely but the tears made a break for it before you reached the elevator and you had no desire to embarrass yourself by walking through the lobby in tears. No, instead you would relieve some of the tension you felt with a cry in the bathroom and then escape once you had calmed down, not that you knew when that might happen. With how angry Victor was you were sure he would send you an aggressive message or e-mail, possibly via Goldman, but you were certain he wouldn’t come after you. Obviously, you were wrong.
‘MC?’ You heard Victor call your name through the outer door but you couldn’t answer, your throat too choked with tears to make any sense. Instead you pressed your forehead against the stall door as you tried to quiet your sobs. ‘MC, I’m coming in.’ He stated firmly and you heard the muted sounds of the office increase as he entered. ‘Open up.’ His gruff voice made you wish you could just flush yourself away and out of this situation, but as that wasn’t an option it was time to try and say something.
‘No.’ You cringed, hating how your voice was nothing more than a thick whimper, more full of emotion than you would ever want Victor to hear you.
‘Are you…crying in there?’
‘No!’ This time it was a definite sob and so squeaky you wondered if Victor would even understand.
‘You’re in the big leagues now, MC, crying when you don’t get what you want isn’t an option.’
You could envision him standing with his stupid muscular arms folded over his stupid broad chest, his stupid perfect eyebrows frowning disdainfully at your emotional outburst.
‘I’m not crying because I didn’t get my way!’ Was what you tried to say. What came out instead was; I’ ot cryn cos I dint gt m’ way!
You heard Victor sigh and the door shift slightly where he leant on it. ‘I have no idea what you said, but I assume it was arguing against my point.’
For some reason that was what shoved all your upset into anger at him. He was not only your financial backer but more recently your boyfriend. He had told you from the beginning he wouldn’t be giving you any preferential treatment in the work place and you respected that, but sometimes he just needed to read the damn room before opening his mouth. You yanked the door open and there he stood, stupid and handsome with a face like thunder which changed to surprise for a brief moment when he took in your watery, puffy eyes, before returning to a sterner expression.
‘You should have your report by the end of the day. As soon as our server is recovered.’ You succeeded in keeping your voice firm but there was no hiding the fact your nose was stuffy. ‘Even if I have to stay up all night, I’ll make sure you get it by start of business tomorrow.’
‘We have a date tonight.’ He reminded you as he watched your reflection splashing water on your face before dabbing it with a tissue.
‘I’m sorry, something came up at work and I can’t afford to take the time off.’ You gave him the excuse you would have used if he wasn’t also your funder. Your work was important and dammit you would make that point to him if it killed you, and at this rate it might.
‘I pulled a lot of strings to get the table for tonight because you specifically wanted to try their dessert trolley.’
‘Then you go alone. The way things are going for me today I’ll probably get food poisoning anyway.’ You threw your bag on your shoulder as more tears threatened to spill over your cheeks, starting for the door.
You didn’t get far. Victor caught your upper arm and stopped you. ‘What happened today?’
‘I told you already but you were so tied up in your paperwork you didn’t listen!’ You shook his hand off you as the tears reinforcements arrived and trickled down your face like lines of betrayal.
His face was still straight and unmoved by your plight with no apology on his lips. You just didn’t know how it would work if Victor couldn’t be even remotely sympathetic to you having had a bad day.
You threw your arms in the air dramatically. ‘Today has gone completely wrong but all I warned you about was of the server issue at the office, because I wasn’t going to let my personal problems get in the way of business, but you couldn’t even let me have that!’
‘Tell me what happened?’ The demanding tone in his voice pushed you over the edge and the only thing you could do was yell at him.
You couldn’t help but yell in reply. ‘Why do you care?’
‘Because I love you, dummy!’
‘Don’t call me dum…wait, what did you say first?’ Your snappy retort quickly changed to a meek, confused one as your brain tried to process what you had heard.
‘I said,’ he approached you slowly, ‘that I love you.’
You shifted awkwardly as a whole host of different emotions coursed through you, threatening tears again but for an entirely different reason. ‘You didn’t call me dummy.’ You muttered mostly to yourself.
‘Do you want me to call you dummy?’
‘I don’t know!’ You burst into tears again but this time he pulled you into his arms, stroking your hair with one hand as the other held you close.
You felt his lips press against your head and he spoke while still curved around you. ‘Obviously more has happened today than I know about and I’m sorry I didn’t take it in when you told me about the server issue. I had my fill of excuses today and I let that cloud my judgement. I apologise and you don’t need to work late. Just send me the original document as soon as you can, within working hours.’
‘You’re such a sweet talker.’ You murmured, finally feeling as though this day might be getting better.
‘And,’ he cleared his throat, his voice suddenly sounding more awkward than you had ever heard it, ‘if you want to reply to the fact I just put my heart on the line for you, that would be great. No pressure though.’
You were torn between kicking yourself for not telling him and wanting to laugh at the nervousness in his voice. Instead you swallowed down your tears and turned your face up to look at him. ‘I love you too.’
He lowered his lips to your forehead, leaving a lingering kiss that made your skin tingle. ‘How about we close business early today and I take you to Souvenir? You look like you need some pudding.’
‘I’d like that.’ You nodded gratefully.
‘And don’t ever tell anyone I told you I loved you for the first time in a ladies bathroom.’
You couldn’t help but laugh at that. What else were you going to do? Cry?
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