More Potential Unwanted Attention: Part 3

In which my colleagues finally catch a glimpse of the guy they've teasingly dubbed my 'stalker'.

Today, our team had just driven back from a long out-of-office morning meeting and were ravenous for lunch, so we stopped off by the shops- the same one where this guy works, but I was too hungry to really think about that. Besides, I had been out plenty of times since the last run-in (in the company of a colleague or two, of course), and seen no sign of him.

It was reasonably busy in the shop so the all of the tills were being manned, but most people like me just had one or two things and it was going quickly. As the queue moved along I chatted to my colleagues and read the nutritional value of my carrot sticks and hummus, and eventually I made my way to the next available cashier.

I plopped my lunch on the counter, still daydreaming.

"A very light lunch today, I see!"

"Yes, I-" I started at the familiar voice, and blinked upwards and out of my reverie, feeling myself going into manic friendly mode. "Oh- hello! How are you?"

"I'm good thanks! Yourself?"

"Oh, same old, same old," I laughed uncertainly.

"How's your work going at the moment?"

I glanced behind me like a panicked bunny rabbit looking for a way out of a fox's path, and I saw my opportunity.

"It's going well- look, I know you're busy and there's a queue building up- I don't want to get you into trouble! I'll see you around, alright?"

"Sure, see you later!"

I hurriedly bustled towards the exit, catching up with one of my colleagues. I caught her gaze, wiggling my eyebrows jerked my head wildly in His direction, indicating that this was the guy I'd been talking about. She raised her eyebrows in return as if to ask 'who, him?' I nodded, and she grinned.

One by one my other colleagues (who were behind me in the queue) caught up with my by the exit, and it was apparent that they'd clocked what was going on, and were very amused.

"That was him, wasn't it! At first I thought you were just randomly being really friendly to someone you'd never met before, but then I remembered about him."

"I'm so sorry Tash, I should have offered to pay for your thing so you could escape, but by the time I realised who he was it was too late."

"Only you could wait in a long queue and end up being served by the one person you want to avoid, Tash."

"I heard your excuse- nicely done!"

"Did you see how he craned around afterwards to check if you were really leaving or not?"

We were outside and I was cracking up by now. "At least you all know for real I haven't made this guy up, now! I just hope he didn't see us convening like a coven and whispering and cackling, or he might get the wrong end of the stick and think I'm interested after all..."

One rolled her eyes in mock-despair. "Of course Tash, now that he knows we work with you he might start asking us about you- so now we can't go to these shops, either!"

It's a shame, because the food in that shop is really good.

To be continued?