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Hyde had only been at work for 20 minutes, and Tommy had been standing in the same corner the entire time. It wasn’t unlike him to do weird things like that, but it sure was annoying. Hyde would argue that it was distracting him.
“Dude, can you, like… do something??”
It took Tommy a few seconds to notice Hyde was talking to him. “What?”
“You’ve been over there as long as I’ve been here. What the hell are you doing? You have a job, you know. That’s why you’re here. Maybe do it.”
“Huh. Good point.” Tommy understood what Hyde meant, but he didn’t leave the corner. He went right back to staring down at his shoes.
To Hyde, this was just normal Tommy behavior. Plus, he didn’t actively pay attention to how his coworkers (or anyone) felt, so he definitely wasn’t able to tell that Tommy was upset about something. Not until Julia entered the room.
“Tommy! What’s wrong?” Somehow, she was able to tell he wasn’t feeling the greatest as soon as she looked at him. It made sense that the two—for lack of a better word—dumbest employees would be able to understand each other this well.
Tommy didn’t look at Julia while he was responding. “I am… going to die alone, probably.”
“Aw, don’t say that. Don’t you have a girlfriend?”
“I did..”
“Oh… I’m so sorry. I get how that feels, it really sucks.”
Hyde, who had been listening in on them, suddenly decided it wasn’t unbearable to listen to anymore. Wait, his girlfriend left him? Should I say something? He may have been considered devoid of any compassion by most people in the workplace, but he did have some thoughts about Tommy that were unusual for him. He wasn’t stupid, he knew it was a crush. But he didn’t know how to show it aside from making dumb jokes about it, for example saying it was his birthday after Tommy suggested doing something rather improper on a customer’s own special day.
Fuck it, he was gonna say something.
“Wait, Tommy,” he yelled out from across the room, “she left you?”
Julia turned around to see Hyde, and Tommy himself finally looked up from his shoes to look at him. “Yeah. She did.”
“…does that mean you’re available?”
“I am. What about it?” Tommy didn’t mean that in a rude way, he just didn’t know a better way to say it.
“Well…” Hyde carelessly let go of the mop he was holding, letting it fall onto the floor as he walked over to the taller boy. “Maybe when we get outta here, you and I could do something together?”
“Are you serious?” Tommy may have been a little dull, but he knew that Hyde often just said things to mess with people.
But this time, he wasn’t. “Thomas. I assure you, I’m a hundred percent serious right now. When we get outta here, we could…” He did a little gesture with his hands, signifying that Tommy could probably fill in the blanks.
“You mean, like hang out?”
Hyde lowered his head a bit.
Tommy caught on quickly. “More than hanging out?”
“Yeah. Like… a date?” Hyde smiled, which was a rare sight.
“All right! It’s a date! Hah-hah!” Now that Tommy had said it himself, it was official… it was a date. Tommy’s mood was lifted all of a sudden, and he walked out of the corner. Now he was actually going to do his job.
Julia was impressed. “Look at that! You cheered him up,” she laughed, placing her hand on Hyde’s shoulder. “Great job, pal!”
Normally Hyde would have immediately brushed her hand off and said something like “We aren’t pals,” but this time he didn’t.
Maybe it was unusual for him, but he felt good.