Stuck On You

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"Is that everything?" Reggie asked as he looked through the papers.

"Should be. Everything is printed and ready to be reviewed," I confirmed. Just need your old man to sign off on it."

Reggie Evans could be all business when needed, but that was as rare as possible. He was the type to do all the work in two hours and spend the next six slacking off. Me? I'm Tierra, his well-paid personal assistant. And best friend.

"Just need to bring this to him, then we can fuck off and enjoy the rest of the night," Reggie said with noticeable relief.

"Reggie, it's 10 PM."

"Going home and passing out is pretty enjoyable." He gathered up the folders and started stacking them into a box. "Get the sandwiches and put them on there too. That way, we can drop all this off and go home."

"Submarine sandwiches that make chain restaurants look like garbage" was how Reggie described them, and he was right. The Evans Ranch had the best chefs in the state of South Dakota. Though honestly, they could compete with the best of New York and California.

So when we were burning the midnight oil and working far past dinner time, Reggie would request the kitchen make us some sandwiches. They came with homemade potato chips and the most sinfully decadent brownies you could get without adding an illicit substance. That certainly made the extra work worth it.

"Water bottles, too. I don't want to come back here at all," he said, hoisting the giant stack of folders.

"That desperate to get away from me, huh?"

"Never," he said quickly. "I'd spend the rest of the night with you if you wanted. I just think you'd prefer to do it somewhere that's not here."

"Spend the rest of the night with me, huh?" I crossed my arms, shook my head, and then resumed gathering our dinner and water.

Reggie smiled. God, what a smile it was. Every time he looked at me like that, it filled me with joy. But I knew we were a fantasy that could never come true. Reginald Evans was destined to find some pretty, skinny white girl and marry her for the rest of his days. I was literally the opposite of all that, except for the girl part. And a chubby Black girl was far from the kind of girl he would spend his life with.

That I even knew Reggie was a weird mess of happenstance. My father was a janitor at the local private school, so I received free tuition, and that was where we met. After grade school, Reggie begged his parents to pay my way at the same high school and college he attended. I literally owed my whole education to Reggie just because I was his friend. Considering all that, my feelings for him were only natural.

But I was smart enough to know better. Maybe Reggie was too, and that's why he didn’t make a move either. Neither of us wanted to cause trouble for the other. It was best we stayed friends and looked elsewhere for romance. We had never actually said that, but we never needed to. It was an unspoken truth between us.

Instead, we had a bond of friendship. That was worth more than any romantic relationship, or so TV shows and movies told me. Then again, others suggested I was in the "friend zone", the last possible place anyone would want to be. I didn't know which was right, but I knew how I felt about Reggie was more than just friends. Regardless, we had a job to do. The quicker we did it, the sooner I'd go home and stop being tortured by his handsome face.

Following him along, we went to the elevator. It was old and rickety, from the 1950s when the building was built. I was surprised it was still up to code, honestly. But there hadn't been an accident since the 1970s, so Quinton Sr., Reggie's dad and owner of the ranch, never felt the need to replace it. Still, using it always freaked me out. When we walked onto it, a chill ran up my spine.

Thankfully, we didn't go into that building often, only when the quarterly reports were done. The shareholders shat their pants if they didn't get them on time, and it was our job to make sure they did. After we delivered the box of documents, we could head out, the last to leave the ranch. I just needed to do it, and then I wouldn't need to return and test the death elevator for another three months.

With both of us inside, the doors closed, and Reggie hit the button for the top floor. When we reached our destination, he rushed out, dropped the stack of folders off, and then returned to the elevator. His heavy footsteps shook the ancient thing as he jumped onto it.

"Piece of cake," he said, grinning. "Down we go."

The L button was hit, the doors closed, and then...the sound of metal grinding on concrete echoed through the car. That was rather alarming to hear as the elevator descended, the metallic groaning getting louder and louder. I looked at Reggie, and he looked back at me. Utter fear and shock were on both our faces. We were both thinking the same thing: this is it. The death elevator finally got around to killing someone.

With a last high-pitched squeal, the elevator froze in place. The doors were stuck closed. Nothing moved, nothing changed. After what seemed like an eternity of stunned silence, I finally spoke.

"So...uh...are we going to plunge to our death or what?"