Office Diaries - Chapter 128

Jena stepped in under the shower and gloried on the hot spray of water cascading on her skin. She hadn’t done much physically today and yet she still felt exhausted.

Reaching for the bar of soap, she started on cleaning and scrubbing the day’s dirt off her body as she let her mind drift on the events of the day. Having done so, she set her lips into a grim line and let out another frustrated sigh.

Sam’s growing too fast, and the day that he would really ask about his father was coming sooner than she had expected. Her son acted too old for his age, and she worried. She loved Sammy so much that it would hurt her to lie to him, but lie she must if that would stop him from asking too much questions she wasn’t prepared to nor she wanted to answer in the first place.

She had already made Sam believe that his father was dead— died before he was born. It was a lie of course. The truth was that Jena had no idea who his father was.

Exposing her soul as she ripped open her box of memories, Jena’s lips trembled as she remembered that one night eight years ago. She was still on her sophomore year in university back then. She was such a timid person, and she had been bullied into attending a party at a club by people who called themselves her friends. Like a naïve little lamb, for the sake of trying to belong, she had forced herself to bear with that one single night, and learned too soon the harsh reality of other people’s deceit.

Eight years ago…

The place was dark save for the flashes of light in tempo with the blaring music. Like a sore thumb sticking out, she sat awkwardly at one of the tables trying her best to make herself blend in the background but to no avail.

“Why won’t you dance?”

Her ‘friends’ had long since abandoned her at the table for the dance floor to watch someone called ‘king’ perform and she was left on her own device with this guy who seemed to have been born with eight hands. The guy was forever trying to grope her since meeting her but she had managed to fend him off so far.

“I don’t know how to dance,” she answered a little stiffly as she shifted on her seat, as far away as possible from the octopi.

She prayed the others would come back to their table before she’d be forced to slap the ‘nice guy’ she’d been hooked up with. She really wanted to go home. She already regretted coming here just to experience a sense of belonging with her own peers. She realized too late that it was a huge mistake. She shouldn’t have cared.

A few minutes passed and some of her ‘friends’ returned to the table and she hastily tried to bid farewell.

“What? You’re going home already?” they asked incredulously as if she’d grown mad but Jena was adamant about leaving.

“Yes. I forgot I have a report to finish,” she excused just as she stood, but a hand snaked on her arm and clamped on it hard.

“You can’t leave yet,” the irritating guy said and Jena bit her lip.

She was really getting angry but stopped herself from speaking her mind when a glass of wine was suddenly shoved up her face.

“Drink this first before you go,” one of the girls ordered as she handed her the glass which Jena studied with a frown. “There’s no use attending a party if you won’t have even just a glass of drink right?” she taunted and she reluctantly took it and drank its contents just to make them shut up and let her go.

It’s just one glass, right? And it wasn’t even full. The alcohol was just a third of the glass they had given her. With a sigh, she placed the glass against her mouth and drank.

The amber-colored drink tasted bitter and it stung her throat, but the others coerced her into finishing the glass up. Soon, the crystal container was empty.

“I’m leaving,” Jena announced afterwards in a half-choking sound as her throat felt raw and she hastily stood up.

She wanted to get away from there. She felt disgusted.

As she crossed the room amidst the dancing crowd, Jena felt a little odd. She couldn’t understand but the liquid continued to burn her throat and stomach. Sweat broke all over her body and she felt like being sick. Instead of going out of the club as she planned, she turned to the left where the restroom was to freshen up and probably throw up. If she forced herself to go home at her current state, she felt like she’d have more problems.

Entering the restroom, she felt her body begin to burn, her breathing turning ragged as her vision started to blur.

“What’s going on?” she whispered as she desperately clung to consciousness.

Buzzing sounds also started to fill her ears. It felt as if she were submerged into water and she was slowly drowning but at the same time, the heat that she felt earlier started to consume her.

“Hey, are you okay?” a kind voice inquired, but her vision was already too blurry to recognize the stranger’s face. “Hey!” the voice called out again, but for her, it was just a distant echo as darkness claimed her.

Jena’s breath hitched, remembering those years that passed by. After that time at the restroom, she couldn’t remember anything. She just realized that she had woken up in a strange room, on a strange bed with a strange man she didn’t even bother to see the face.

She was beyond horrified. She’d never been with a man before. But even without prior experience, she was not so stupid not to know what happened to her.

Panic ȧssailed her as she pushed her sore body to move, gathering her clothes and dressed up as fast as she could in spite of the pain on her head and forbidden region. It didn’t take a genius to know she’d been violated, and it didn’t take a genius to know what happened a few weeks after.

It was even anticlimactic when she received the news.

She found out she was pregnant and she was immediately kicked out of the dorms. Her university didn’t allow their students who were unwed but pregnant to continue education. It was a shame. It was a good thing her family was very understanding of her situation and they helped her through those very painful months. They didn’t push her into revealing about her child’s father either— not that she had some answers for them if they did.

At first, she’d been horrified of her pregnancy, and admittedly, there was a very low point in her life when she had thought of ending her life and the life within her. But her fear of the heavens, the idea of another living soul in her wȯmb, and consequently feeling that life move inside of her, Jena had fallen in love. She did not regret having her child now. Sam was her precious child, her treasure. She was glad she was able to push those dark thoughts away and clung onto life.

Now, years after, she had gotten back on her feet. She was able to finish university albeit a little later than she was supposed to and was able to land a good job at the IT Company as a secretary to the president.

She was comfortable with the position and had worked hard for four years under the old president who had treated her and her son like family. Sam had marveled at his ‘adoptive’ grandparents, as even the president’s wife was enthralled with her bright son.

Her old boss had chosen to retire a little early though because of health reasons and was replaced by his son who had been staying in America for the past eight years since finishing university. The younger man was now her boss, the boss who had smilingly declared his attraction to his shocked secretary.

What’s more? The love declaration wasn’t private. It was announced in front of the old president and his wife over lunch the first time that they met. To Jena’s further disbelief, the old president and his wife approved of their ‘union’.

In all honesty, if Jena hadn’t had a bitter past she was ashamed of, she would have gladly fallen in love with the charismatic young president. But she had. Because of that horror, she was absolutely, positively sure that she’d rather live quietly alone with her son.