Rory waltz into work, slipping around the desk and propping herself into it. Checking emails and replying to voicemails took up most of her morning, answering phone calls through that as well slowed her down, but nothing seemed to dampen her spirits. Even as her break started, she was so swept up in her work and her own thoughts that she didn't even notice.

"Hey, Rory, aren't you off for fifteen?" her co-worker Alana asked.

"Wow, is it eleven thirty already?" Rory was shocked, but pleased. "Today is a good day."

Alana raised an eyebrow.

"Hey, Alana, wait, do you want to head down to Starbucks for a coffee? I'm sick of that gross office machine that's never been washed and tastes like thirty different kinds of coffee." Rory made a face to accent just how much she didn't like it -she didn't really need more coffee, not after her multiple cups that morning, and the fact her heart rate was still raised due to Eddie.

"Since when you do say more than one sentence to anyone here?" Alana asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

Rory flushed, embarrassed. "Sorry, I don't open up easily... And I thought this job wouldn't... I didn't think I'd be here long."

"And yet you've almost been here a year," Alana said with an echo of her own want to leave this place.

"So, what do you say?" Rory asked.

"Why the hell not?" Alana replied, and together they headed down to the street, crossing the busy road and entering the Starbucks, joining the masses of people staring at their cellphones. Usually on her break, Rory slipped into the break room, grabbed her lunch and a molasses-thick coffee, then slunk back to her desk and didn't talk to anyone. Sometimes, if she was feeling up to it, she would doodle or read.

"Listen, you don't want to get stuck in this job," Alana told her after they talked about work politics for a moment.

"Of course I don't, but it pays the bills right now and the work is steady," Rory replied. She thought of Eddie and wondered how he was going to keep affording rent and wine.

"You got a degree?" she asked.

"In art," Rory told her. "Hard world to make it."

"Do you really try? If you were really wanting to sell..."

"Paintings, I paint."

"Sell paintings, then. If you really wanted to, you'd be out there pushing your work. Art galleries, a blog, website, something to get yourself out there. So what are you doing stuck at a dead end job as a secretary?"

"Ugly past," she replied. "Keeping my head down for a while."

"Oh." Alana sighed. They ordered their drinks and something to eat, then picked them up and took a seat. Alana looked at Rory again. "Why don't you leave? Or did you come here to get away from someone?"

"I stayed in the city, I'm not really sure why... Money, I guess, it's hard to move somewhere new when you have nothing much to your name. Anyways, I think I've been tucked away long enough, but I'm still worried, you know?"

"I do, but I don't. I've been with my girlfriend for six years, so, can't say I've been in your situation. But Rory? I know a lot of women who have. There are people out there who can help."

Rory nodded. "I know..."

Alana and Rory spent the rest of their work shift sneaking glances at each other and speaking through drastic gestures and wide mouthed words, trying to chat over their co-workers who were actually doing work. For the first time in years, Rory reached out to other people and found them kind, accepting – it was a long time since she had a friend, all of the ones she once had cut out of her life when she started going steady with him. She wondered if she reached out to them if they would accept her again, but she doubted it. All of them would have moved on.

Despite her new friend, the rest of the work day crawled along. The moment five o'clock hit Rory said goodbye to Alana, clocked out and moved at a much faster pace than usual down to the parkade. A place she once avoided due to parkades being a place well-known by women not to be a safe place, she spotted Eddie and waved with the hand that wasn't clutching the white helmet. Rory realized that morning that the helmet was Anne's, she had no doubt.

"Hey!" Rory said brightly, hopping off the curb and crossing the parkade to where Eddie was.

"You want to go somewhere?" Eddie asked.

"Like where?" she asked, cocking her head to the side.

"Dinner?"

A smile crept onto her lips. "Hey Eddie? Where were you four years ago?"

He grinned. "New York."

She shot him a look of interest but decided not to pry into it right then. There was dinner in the near future, dinner that she didn't have to make -not that she made difficult dinners. After a long day at work, Rory definitely wanted someone to hand her a plate of food that she didn't have to make nor clean up after. She quickly hopped onto the bike, not caring where Eddie was going to take her, not feeling the need to text Alana to say exactly where she was going to be, so that if she didn't show up to work tomorrow, Alana would know that Rory had been murdered.

They raced through the busy rush hour roads, Eddie slipping between cars as they slowed and stopped, a fluid motion like the bike was liquid, filling in all the open gaps. They were through the thick of it within minutes, but Rory didn't really care how long it took, she just liked leaning against him, wishing the bulky helmet didn't prevent an even closer feel.

After they got out of the city limits, the roads thinned out and they lengthened, making for long streets that wound and wove. The ride was exhilarating, the way she had to lean when Eddie leaned, the way she held a bit tighter each time he did but knowing that she trusted he wouldn't crash. She trusted him in so many ways she thought she'd never trust anyone again.

An hour later they arrived at a little Thai place; the smells of the rich, delicious foods inside came out through the wide-open front door. People bustled in an out, carrying take out, smiling with their friends. No one looked like they had a care in the world, and for once, Rory felt the same.

"You like Thai?" Eddie asked.

"I like food," she replied with a quirky grin.

They sat in a booth after they ordered, waiting for their food to be made up. Rory was looking around, soaking in this restaurant that was right up her alley; no need to dress up in revealing red dresses with diamond necklaces and matching earrings. No, she was wearing her work garb and had messy, unbrushed, helmet hair. She liked it that way.

"You know I haven't gone out for dinner in over a year?" she asked, though it was rhetorical.

"That's a crime, you mean you've cooked your own meals for over a year?" Eddie asked, surprised.

She nodded. "I enjoy cooking, it's like my art, it takes work, but the end product can be so..."

"Beautiful," he finished for her.

She made eye contact with him and felt her stomach twist in that excellent way, that way that made her want to forget about their order and fly back to their apartments. There they could shut the door and-

"Order for Eddie!" Someone called.

The food was put into a backpack, which Rory wore because she was on the back of the bike. She clutched onto Eddie again, thinking what might happen after dinner, but knowing nothing would because it was too soon. They both said it, they both knew it. Just as Eddie respected her boundaries, she too respected his. Only a month fresh out of his relationship, it was too soon for him. Rory leaned in a little closer to him on that bike.

Ten minutes later they were at a well-lit park and took a picnic table. They spread out their take out and Eddie pulled out a thermos.

"What's in there?" she asked.

"Coffee -we couldn't have wine, so I went with our alternate drink of choice."

She laughed, smiling brightly at him. "You know, this is my first picnic."

"You're serious?" He asked as he used chopsticks to dig into his food.

Rory nodded, eating as well before her stomach growled at her in anger. The food was delicious, she could hardly contain a moan as her eyes rolled in her head. Eddie noticed and grinned. "First time eating Thai take out too?"

"No, but it's been a while," she admitted. "Getting out of the house is hard for me, so thank you."

Eddie shrugged. "You shouldn't feel like you need to stay behind closed doors."

She nodded. "I know."

"You have something else to say," he noted.

"I was just thinking..." she paused to figure out how to word what had been running through her head. "You... You look like you could do well in a fight or something..."

"You want to learn self-defence?"

She nodded.

"Could you teach me?" she asked. "I could pay you."

"I won't take your money for that; I'm not a specialist, I just know the basics, stuff that's kept me alive when I went after people who didn't want me to."

"Staying alive is my one and only goal for the year," she said sourly.

"Then we can start tomorrow," Eddie suggested. "But right now, you're having your first picnic, you recluse."

She chuckled; it was true, she didn't have many experiences like this. So, swept up in school then her work, she lost sight of the importance of leaving the house and getting out there. It wasn't until she met him that she even had a relationship that last more than three or four months. She'd never been all that interested in long-term relationships, and the first one she had scared her off men for a good while. She resorted back to one-night stands, even fearing those.

But when she looked at Eddie, she saw promise. 

-----

Sort of a lame chapter, but I want to introduce more of my own characters; Rory needs friends, it's part of her growth.

We almost hit 5K yesterday, I can't believe it! 

Vote, comment your thoughts on the chapter content (asking me to update and speaking nothing of the story is nice, but hey, tell me why you want me to update ;) ), add this story to a reading list! You know the drill!