The air inside the glass building was always freezing, a sharp contrast to the humid madness of the morning commute outside.
Every single morning on the fourth floor looked like a chaotic scramble. People were sprinting toward the biometric scanners, clutching cold coffee cups, cursing under their breath as the elevator doors slammed shut. Agents were tripping over loose floor cables, frantically booting up their monitors, and begging IT for quick password resets two minutes before their shift began.
Yuuma walked through the sliding glass doors with his hands buried deep inside his jacket pockets. He did not rush. His feet moved with a slow, mechanical rhythm.
"Good morning, Aisaka," a girl from another account mumbled, taking two steps back as he passed her cubicle.
Yuuma offered a polite nod, but he did not smile. Without his glasses, his vision was a blurry blur of fluorescent lights and pixelated shapes. To keep his eyes focused, he had to squint heavily. To everyone else on the floor, that intense squint looked like a dark, terrifying glare.
"Dude looks like he is about to murder someone," a guy from the tech team whispered to his seatmate. "Seriously, his eyes are always glowing with pure malice."
"I know, right? His vibe is so gloomy it ruins my morning," the seatmate replied, pulling her chair away as Yuuma walked past their row.
Yuuma heard them, but the words drifted past his ears like background noise. He genuinely did not care.
When he reached his assigned station, an arm suddenly slammed around his shoulder, pulling him into a headlock.
"Good morning, my dark and mysterious lord of misery!"
Yuuma did not even flinch. He simply stood there, letting himself be dragged slightly to the side. "Good morning, Vanitas."
Vanitas released him with a loud, theatrical laugh. He was a guy who seemed to operate on pure chaotic energy, dressed in an oversized graphic tee that violated the floor dress code every single day. While Yuuma looked like a wandering ghost, Vanitas looked like a vibrant spark plug. Yet somehow, Vanitas held the top spot on the stack rank as the number one CSR on the entire account, while Yuuma hovered right behind him at second or third.
"Look at that magnificent glare," Vanitas said, leaning close to peer into Yuuma's squinting face. "Who are we cursing today? Sir Marcus? The client? Or just the concept of sunrise?"
"I left my glasses on the dining table," Yuuma said, sitting down and pressing the power button on his twin monitors. "Everything looks like a muddy watercolor painting right now."
"So you are not actually plotting revenge?" Vanitas gasped, clutching his own chest in fake disappointment. "I am betrayed. I thought you were meditating on dark magic."
Yuuma pulled his headset over his ears. A tiny, quiet exhaled breath escaped his nose. "Just tired."
"Fair enough," Vanitas chuckled, sliding into the adjacent chair. He picked up a cheap red plastic pen from Yuuma's desk and stared at it with intense focus. He tapped it against his own chin twice, then looked at Yuuma with a deadpan expression. "Hey. Look."
Yuuma turned his head slowly.
Vanitas balanced the pen horizontally on his upper lip, crossing his eyes entirely to stare at it.
Yuuma looked at the pen. Then he looked at Vanitas's crossed eyes.
A quiet, broken snicker escaped Yuuma's throat. It was not a real laugh, just a sudden, pathetic puff of air through his nose, but Vanitas burst into wheezing laughter right along with him. They sat there for a solid ten seconds, two grown men giggling over a cheap plastic pen while the entire floor panicked around them.
"Look at those two idiots," a female agent nearby sneered, shaking her head. "Shift starts in thirty seconds and they are acting like high schoolers."
"They are both weird," her friend agreed. "One never smiles and the other never shuts up."
Vanitas dropped the pen and leaned over the divider, lowering his voice slightly. "By the way, did you check the bulletin board near the pantry? Almost four years in this place, Yuuma. Four whole years. And they still put up those fake motivational posters about growth."
"Growth is for the company, not for us," Yuuma replied, his eyes fixed on the booting screen.
"Right? I still do not even know if that skill allowance on our payslip is real or just a myth created by HR to keep us from jumping out the window," Vanitas wheezed softly. "Four years of top metrics and we are still eating instant noodles for dinner."
Before Yuuma could reply, a loud, sharp snap echoed behind them.
"Aisaka. Vanitas."
The relaxed air around their cubicles instantly evaporated. Standing at the end of the aisle was Marcus, their team manager. He was wearing a slick, tailored button down shirt, his hair gelled back to perfection, holding a sleek black tablet in his hand. Marcus had a wide, charming smile that he reserved exclusively for the female agents on the floor, but whenever his eyes landed on Yuuma or Vanitas, his expression turned into sheer disgust.
"Shift started twenty seconds ago," Marcus said, his voice dripping with passive aggressive fake warmth. "Are we paying you two to stand around flirting, or are we paying you to take calls?"
"Just warming up the vocal cords, Sir Marcus," Vanitas said with a bright, fake grin. "Making sure the customer satisfaction scores stay right at the top."
Marcus narrowed his eyes at Vanitas. He hated that he could not write Vanitas up, simply because the guy's numbers were untouchable. So his gaze shifted over to Yuuma instead.
"Aisaka. Step into the coaching room. Now."
"Ooh, someone is in trouble," a female agent at the front row giggled as Marcus passed her desk, leaning over to give her a warm, sweet smile and a gentle tap on the shoulder.
"Don't worry about it, Sarah," Marcus said to her in a soft, friendly tone. "Take your time logging in. Let me know if you need help with your queue later."
Vanitas rolled his eyes so hard it looked painful. He glanced at Yuuma and mouthed, Good luck with the snake.
Yuuma unclipped his headset, stood up, and followed Marcus into the small glass coaching room at the corner of the floor.
The door clicked shut, cutting off the deafening roar of the call center outside. The room smelled faintly of stale coffee and heavy cologne.
Marcus sat down behind the small desk, tapping his tablet screen without asking Yuuma to sit. Yuuma remained standing, his hands folded neatly behind his back, his eyes squinting slightly to focus on his manager's face.
"Stop staring at me like that, Aisaka," Marcus snapped, not looking up. "It is unprofessional and creepy. You look like you want to bite my head off."
"My apologies, Sir," Yuuma said flatly. "My eyes are strained."
Marcus scoffed, sliding the tablet across the desk. "Let us talk about your performance review for this quarter. Your customer satisfaction is at ninety eight percent. Your average handle time is well within target. You are ranked third on the floor."
Yuuma stared at the screen. He said nothing.
"Now," Marcus continued, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. "While your numbers are fine, your attitude is a massive problem for this team. You come in here looking like a corpse. You do not participate in our team bonding events. You do not smile at your teammates. We are a family here, Yuuma. And a family supports each other with positive energy."
"I focus on my calls, Sir," Yuuma stated smoothly.
"And that is your mistake!" Marcus barked, slamming his palm lightly on the desk. "You do the bare minimum of your job description! Look at the extra initiatives! Look at how Sarah and the girls organize our floor events! You just take your calls, log off, and leave. Where is the loyalty? Where is the passion?"
Yuuma felt that familiar, hollow coldness settle deep in his gut. There was no anger. There was no urge to argue. Just an empty, quiet void.
"Management is looking for team players," Marcus said, his voice dropping into that familiar guilt tripping tone. "I was planning to endorse you for a senior lead position this cycle. But with this gloomy, uncooperative attitude? How can I trust you to lead people when you look like you hate being alive?"
"I understand, Sir," Yuuma said quietly.
Marcus blinked, clearly disappointed that Yuuma did not beg or defend himself. He cleared his throat, adjusting his collar. "Because I care about your growth, I am assigning you to cover the late night chat queues starting tonight. Three extra hours after your shift. No extra lead pay for now, but consider it an opportunity to prove your commitment to this family."
"Three extra hours," Yuuma repeated softly.
"Yes. Unless you don't think you can handle it?" Marcus smiled, a sharp, patronizing curve of his lips. "I would hate to think you aren't dedicated to this team."
Yuuma looked at his manager's face. The words felt like heavy stones being stacked onto his chest, one by one. He thought about his sister's antibiotics. He thought about his father's demand for the electric bill tonight. He thought about his mother's tired, trembling hands.
Slowly, effortlessly, Yuuma pulled his lips upward into his practiced, cheerful corporate smile.
"I can handle it, Sir," Yuuma said, his voice steady and bright. "Thank you for the opportunity, Sir Marcus."
Marcus stared at him for a second, unsettled by how fast the blank glare turned into a pristine, customer ready expression. He waved his hand dismissively. "Get back to your desk. The queue is building up."
Yuuma bowed his head slightly, opened the glass door, and stepped back out onto the noisy, chaotic floor.
He walked past the agents who were still frantically screaming into their headsets, past the managers who were flirting near the water dispenser, and sat back down beside Vanitas.
"What did the snake say?" Vanitas asked softly, not taking his eyes off his own screen as his headset beeped with an incoming call.
Yuuma pulled his headset back over his ears. He clicked the button to log into the queue.
"Three hours of overtime tonight," Yuuma said flatly.
Vanitas scoffed, typing rapidly on his keyboard. "Of course. Free labor for Sir Marcus and his beloved family."
"Yeah," Yuuma whispered, staring into the bright, blurry glow of his monitor as the first screaming customer plugged into his ears. "For the family."
ns216.73.216.48da2
and then Add to home screen.