Work turned from something to pass the time while she prepared for her Interior Designer Licensure exam to something she dreaded everyday. Unfortunately she was bound by a 2 year contract and she rued the day she signed the dotted line only to be handled by an odious infidel like Raffy Kofdamani.
Raffy never thought he would meet anyone as charming as Hannah. He was smitten by her. He tried to impress her by showing her what he could do with design and layouts. He was glad everytime she came in at exactly 10pm everynight to do around 20 layouts slick as eye candy and faster than the most seasoned layout artists he ever worked with. He was not bothered by her shy demeanor at all, he knew that he must take the first step always and show her his appreciation of her and her work but mostly her for he had finally found the lady of his dreams. If only he could ask her out and not fear instant rejection, he must know everything about her as he can before proposing. Maybe more layout demonstrations would impress her enough for him to be sure she thought highly of him as he thought of her. The only thing he disliked about work was that the clients they worked for were so difficult to please.
Geth Davol worked with Hanna at the design company BPO as a web designer. He saw how she hated her new manager. She always confided in him about how she thought the handsome Persian Pinoy was actually a creep in disguise out to ruin the company. Geth took it all in and agreed with her, he laughed at all her jokes and even consoled her that the work should give her a fantastic portfolio for any future gigs even if she was going to be an Interior Designer. Geth had a crush on Hannah. Something that was rather disturbing, because he knew he couldn’t lose her to anyone. Even if he saw that she was actually falling in love with Raffy the Creep.
It was a rainy August Friday night and though it was a happy end for the week for most people who worked at Makati, it was only the beginning of the workweek for Hannah. There was a storm warning that night and Typhoon Luring was indeed pouring down like Shirley Manson bawling out how happy it was when it did. Hannah parked her old car in the underground garage of the ultra modern building she worked in. She saw that the doors’ rubber lining had rotted to the point that it was leaking water into the car when a Shirley Manson torrent bawled out over Manila. Man, she thought, I should buy a new car but I’d rather keep my nice place, maybe Kuya Karn can stop being a mindless golem and fix this rig for me.
Hannah entered the elevator with her jacket ready for the freezing midnight shift ready to take on a nother 20 layouts for web page wireframes when a very distinct musky perfume, the type only he would wear hit her as she pushed the elevator button for her stop at the 27th floor. He was standing there looking charming like an Arabian Don Johnson, smiling at her and greeting her as she forced a smile back at him even as her blood was starting to boil. Her face couldn’t take off a permanent pout, resigned with the thought of ‘Oh God, him again. Why me?’
As Hannah and Raffy walked out of the elevator towards their work station at the end of a very long room, Raffy’s heart was skipping as he stole looks at Hannah pouting like a minx of a woman. She was hot and she didn’t even know it. Most of the Filipinas he had seen during his visits to the Philippines were mestizo types who looked all identical with or without makeup. Hannah was different. She was mestiza too but he had never seen anyone like her. She looked like a young boy with her short cropped hair but she was too handsome to be a boy, and boys around the Makati looked too pretty to be men. She reminded him of that TV celebrity Valeen Montenegro.
He wished he could steal a candid shot of her with that minx pout and set it as his wallpaper on his home PC so he would never forget her. It was all he could do not to ask her out because they had only been working for a short while and it would be mighty improper and his employers would frown on him hitting on his charge. Damn it, why should it be so hard to fall in love when the right girl comes along. But Raffy thought he could manage for a while and eventually ask her out when they could get an extra designer that he had been requesting. For now Raffy would try to charm her with his old world cultural heritage and show her that he wasn’t what what the obnoxious office staff had been calling him behind his back—Pepe le Pew.
