Chapter 5: Awful Romance

Why indeed? Being transferred to this small office was some sort of a demotion for a top editor like Tohru James. His presence there was some kind of an odd happenstance that Yanee wanted to get to the bottom of.

However, her initial impression of the man won, and Yanee decided it was better to steer clear out of his way as much as possible. She would just do her best at what was asked of her and stay away the rest of the time.

She reckoned she was lucky she'd have a very capable superior, thus she wouldn't be needed much at work. Her previous interview with the man gave her a chance to talk to his assistant at Niji International and learned that Tohru James mostly kept to himself and didn't really need help. In short, being his assistance was a piece of cake. But of course she still needed to work on projects like a normal editor, and there would be times she needed to work with him since she's his assistant.

Or so she thought.

By afternoon, Yanee had already memorized her new boss's schedule. She had also taken the initiative to learn some of his tasks ahead of time as she was told it was her boss who would be showing those to her. She studied them anyway as there was nothing else she was busy with after learning his schedule.

"Here we go…"

She puffed her chest as she gathered her bearings in front of the man's door after lunch. He had told her earlier to look for him after she had her briefing with Chummy, Her friend said that her boss had been waiting for her to return from her vacation since he had a big project he wanted to work on, and so now she's here.

Tap Tap Tap

Yanee knocked nervously against the door, and the man's baritone called out from the inside to beckon her in.

"Sir?" she called out, and the handsome man paused from his work to look at her direction and signaled for her to come and sit on one of the chairs in front of his desk.

There was a huge pile of documents on his table that made Yanee wonder what was going on. After all, there was nothing about them mentioned in her briefing. Since she was his new assistant, she was supposed to know everything he was working on.

Then again, she remembered that this guy wanted her to learn the ropes of the department first before giving her a task. This might be what Chummy had told her earlier so she was not asked to memorize other things aside from his schedule.

"Sit there," he said as he removed the glasses he had on and placed them on the table.

He normally didn't wear spectacles, and Yanee had to admit he looked really good even with the pair of glasses on. It didn't make him appear nerdy. Instead, he looked very much like those handsome intellectuals Yanee was totally a fan of.

Urgh…

Despite saying she didn't dare have a crush on her boss, Yanee still wished he'd stop being this handsome. Even without romantic inclinations, looking at him made her heart race and she had to forcefully remind herself of how much he gave her a hard time the last they talked to calm herself down.

That bad experience and her total dislike about office romance were her salvation against this illegally handsome man. If she wanted to survive, she had to put up an armor – a tough one.

"I have finished memorizing the schedule, sir," she reported.

She didn't bother with other pleasantries such as welcoming him – he wouldn't care any other way. She had tried small pleasant talks with him before when she interviewed him for the magazine feature and was shot down and curtly told to get down to business.

"Un-memorize them then. We have other urgent business to take care of," he said nonchalantly as he put his glasses back on and started going through the documents again.

Huh?

"E-excuse me?" Yanee wanted to make sure she didn't mishear him.

Did the guy just tell her to forget what he asked her to memorize earlier?

"Aside from being late, is being deaf also the norm for you?" the guy countered shocking Yanee.

She sat straight up, her feathers totally ruffled. What did this guy just say?

"Excuse me. I just want clarification as I was told to memorize your schedule just this morning."

"And I said to forget about it just now," he countered, as he put the documents back down again.

He removed his glasses and placed them on top of the paper before giving her a look, and surprisingly, a rare smile. However, Yanee was too annoyed to appreciate the beauty in front of her. Well, she didn't want to acknowledge his handsomeness in the first place. She's not a fan of crushes at work as well. So, from now on...

Potato. You're a friggin' potato, so stop smiling, she mused, unhappy as she looked at her boss.

She wouldn't say that out loud, though. Even if she heard that he was somewhat a nice boss, she wouldn't dare give him a reason to sack her.

"These are possible new projects," Tohru James said, indicating the paper in front of him, and Yanee's annoyance toned down.

She looked at the stack of papers and wondered what those were. As if reading her mind, her boss picked up one set of documents and handed it over. It was a proposal for a series. It was a literary work – children's general fiction proposal and Yanee was impressed with it immediately. Even if she disliked literary works as she preferred magazines, she couldn't deny the appeal of the series and could already imagine its popularity once it came out on paperback.

"This is great," Yanee said with excitement in her eyes.

"Is it?" Tohru countered with one brow raised at her questioningly.

"Definitely! I would love to work on this," Yanee nodded.

She reckoned her boss was showing this to her as he wanted her to handle this project. She totally misunderstood.

"Ms. Lee, what kind of department are we?" he asked in light tones.

"The literary department?" she wondered why he was asking her that.

Tohru nodded. "That's right. So, what books do we have that are earning a lot these days?" he prompted again, and Yanee had to search her mind for the title of the book which was number one in sales.

"The School Patrol," she answered.

The mentioned was also a series dedicated to kids and was the number one bestselling series in this department. Yanee didn't really memorize the books they had ongoing in the department, but since the book was popular, she was able to answer.

"That's right," Tohru agreed, before turning to her again with a questioning gaze. "So please tell me Ms. Lee, why do you have to personally handle a project that already has a very good following?"

The question made Yanee frown. Well, the following didn't matter. A project was a project, right? But of course, this was Tohru James. The guy had a penchant for doing things the hard way. Instead of working on already popular genres, he preferred to work on the least popular one and develop it into gold. It was how he earned his reputation back in Niji International.

Seeing as she seemed to understand that, Tohru James took more of the documents from the table and handed them to her. "Give this to the editors. Let them handle these," he ordered and Yanee clamped her mouth shut as she stood.

Since there weren't any initial problems with the proposals, it seemed they wouldn't be handling projects personally. But her boss called her here so there must be something for her too, right?

She was on the way to the door when she couldn't take it anymore and turned to her boss. "Sir?" she called, and Tohru James looked up at her again.

"What are we going to work on then?" she finally asked as she tried her best to remember which genre sold the least in her company, and she nearly groaned out loud as she realized what it was.

Tohru James grinned. "Do I have to answer that Ms. Lee? You already know the answer, right?"

Yanee of course nodded, the light vanishing from her eyes as she answered. "Romance."

Friggin' awful romance…