The sparkle of the gemstones combined with the soft light of the racks stung Rin's eyes. The lack of restful sleep for the past week didn't help. He blinked and shook his head. He needed to hurry. More work awaited him back in the office.

"For your wife, sir?" a bubbly voice spoke from behind the counter. Rin's head snapped up and his gaze landed on a woman with a face painted white and lips, blindingly red.

Her question introduced more than a guilty twinge in Rin's gut. "I wish," he muttered under his breath and lowered his face closer to the glass covering the counter to see the rows of bejeweled accessories better. "I'm just here on an errand."

The saleswoman, to her credit, pretended she didn't hear it. She perked right up and launched into a rehash of what she was told to say to every customer coming by. Rin should know, having worked with people in the same nature of jobs as her. He even formulated some of those pitch scripts himself.

"This is part of our Winter Collection last season," the saleslady gestured to a row of pearly bracelets and necklaces that all look to the same to him. "And these are appraised by a well-known jeweler from the Continental Union so their market price just surged up. We're honored to be the place to be chosen to sell them."

Rin raised a finger when the woman took a breath in preparation to launch to a different script in her sales guidebook. He tapped Ashley's name on his contacts list and sent it straight into a call. She picked up after three rings. "What do you want?" her annoyingly shrill voice crackled over the other line.

He ducked his head at the saleslady, hoping it's enough placation for being rude. Time was of the essense and he couldn't afford to be hung back by one of Ashley Tasks. If he couldn't put it into his resume, what's the point of wasting more time than he already had on this?

"What gemstone do you want with your jewelry?" Rin asked, not bothering to keep his vexation in check. "What about the design? Which collection?"

The line frizzled with Ashley's tongue-click. "Pick anything that has a price tag on it," she said. "I don't care as long as I get to wear something to the conference. Use your brain, dimwit."

Rin opened his mouth to reply when the call cut with a final click. He lowered his phone from his ear and stared at the disconnected call displayed on his screen for a few seconds. Then, he squared his shoulders and faced the saleslady again. "I'll take that," he said, pointing to a random piece resting on a blue velvet cushion.

"What method of payment would you like to use?" the saleslady's smile was beaming knowing she had just scored a deal. Good for her. Perhaps, Rin would somehow be of use to her getting some sort of commission. The little good he did in the world. "We have wire transfers, credit and debit cards, checks, or cash. The last option is encouraged. Checks will need to be written by the end of the day and deposited by the end of the week."

He dug his wallet from his pocket and flipped it open. With a heavy heart, he drew his credit card and handed it to the saleslady. "Credit account, please," he said.

Soon, he ducked out of the shop and hopped into the first cab he found. He stomped his way through the office and came to his desk. He opened his drawer and started sticking Ashley's jewelry inside. He paused, taking a quick look around him, at the business people in power suits and sharp air around them. It's not like he's judging them to be thieves, but close. He didn't know these people nor did he trust them to be in the same room with something that razed half his life savings unsupervised.

Nope. He'd have to keep it close. Which meant bringing it home.

The house was dark when he came in at dawn. Ashley, despite being in a business trip with the management team, had managed to keep him in the office with additional tasks. Again. He took measured steps towards the room he shared with Hye-jin. He opened the door, making sure to keep the noise of whining hinges and the brush of his slippers against the floor to a minimum.

Like all the nights he made it home late, she was already collapsed on the bed, the sheets twisted around her legs. Her hair was thrown in sweeping webs. It used to annoy him, especially when the strands always ended up in his face in the morning. He sighed and stalked to the cabinet where their clothes were.

He slid the door to it with a careful yank. His and Hye-jin's clothes were divided with an almost-invisible line, giving him a perfect view of where his belongings started and where hers ended. Was it intentional? He didn't have the energy to think about that.

Instead, his gaze zeroed in on the dark space below his ironed slacks. He reached into his messenger bag and drew the glossy pink packaging of the necklace, taking out the blue velvet box. It would camouflage well with the darkness of the closet and all the black articles surrounding the space. So, he stuck the box in between his socks and handkerchiefs.

The door clicked shut when he slid it the opposite way. He glanced at Hye-jin's sleeping form again and heaved a sigh. His forehead smacked the cabinet's lacquered door and stayed there.

Why did he feel so guilty when he was just running errands for his boss? Was it because the last jewelry he bought for his wife was the crappy wedding ring from how-many-years ago? Was it because he couldn't even join her on the bed in fear of waking her? Was it because he couldn't find the courage to face her after all of the crap he's making her deal with because of him and his shortcomings?

He didn't know. Not anymore.

He crept out of the room and shut the door behind him. The couch called to him and his beat-down body. It'd have to do. It's just for a few hours anyway.

Daybreak was bound to come soon, and with it, the rest of another day in Nagara Rin's pathetic life.

Rin rubbed his eyes off the sleep that's been plaguing him since he left the house. The glossy paper bag screaming high-end luxury bounced against his leg on his way to Ashley's office. It was unsightly to see it anywhere near his person, even more so when he had no choice but to bring it home for the night. Leaving it on his desk with this much money riding on it was the most foolish thing to do.

It's not like Hye-jin saw it and began suspecting anything. Besides, there's nothing to suspect other than the fact that Rin was being underpaid by being a sales rep, a secretary, and a personal errand guy all at the same time.

He knocked against the glass pane of the door to Ashley's office even though she could see who was coming and going even through the length of the corridor. Her head snapped up from her desktop screen at the sound. She waved him in.

The hinges creaked and whined as Rin stepped inside and closed the door behind him. "Don't make me buy things like this from my own pocket ever again," he trudged towards her desk and placed the glossy pink paper bag on it. The towering pile of clipboards littering the meager space between the edge of her desk and her keyboard told Rin enough about what she's really doing inside her office all day.

Ashley flicked her gaze at him for a briefest moment before grabbing her lipstick whose shade Rin picked out a couple of months ago. He made sure she liked the color too much to avoid her getting tired of it and sending him on another cosmetics goose-chase.

"Help your boss out, will you?" she said, running the lipstick across her stretched lips, using a desk mirror lined with rhinestones to check if she did it right. "I'm being tracked, and I really wanted that necklace."

Right. Her husband watched her like a hawk when it came to her spending. And rightly so. If Hye-jin was half as lavish as Ashley, he'd be worried too. But he wouldn't go as far as monitor each and every penny coming out of her pocket. He couldn't go about caring about his boss' personal life though, no matter how much she tried to make it his job.

"This will be the first and last time," Rin insisted, hoping Ashley wasn't as dense as she presented herself to be. She was smart, enough to keep finding ways to push him around. "I need to know I can get my money back."

Ashley blew a breath and replaced the cap of her lipstick with a final click. The look she gave him told him the same thing she had been telling him for a year—piss her off and he would be better off kissing that promotion goodbye. She didn't need to say it out loud now. It's that obvious.

"I'll transfer some to you in installments over the month," she said, taking out the mascara next from her curated make-up kit. "I'll disguise it as expenses for company dinners. I had to treat the guys out from time to time, right?"

Which was another code for Keep Rin in this place for a little while longer. Because knowing Ashley, the moment he quit, she'd treat her outstanding balance as sold and done. The little wench.

"Ah, right," Ashley waved her fingers in his direction as she moved to peel the layers off the paper bag. Before he left the house earlier, he had to dig around his bag to find the folded packaging and make it seem like it came straight from the store and hadn't hopped around places such as his house. "Ever heard of the Cance Expo?"

Rin shook his head. Ashley fished out the velvet box and flipped it open. Her eyes flashed and glinted, matching the diamonds embedded into the pendant of her newly-acquired jewelry. "It's the latest sales expo around town," she said. "Arrange it so the rest of the department can go together. Me, included."

"Can it wait at least until tomorrow?" Rin asked. "I have a meeting with a client—"

Ashley's hand slammed against the table, the sound making Rin's mouth clam up and his words die off in his throat. "Will you make me repeat myself?" she snapped. "It's this weekend and you still have to get the Director's approval. Do it now."

She clicked her tongue and slid the clipboards away from her. "Take those too," she said. "Hand it over to the guys and make sure everyone does their work. Is that understood?"

Rin, having no choice but to grit his teeth until his jaw hurt, ducked his head. "Yes, Ma'am," he said.

"Good," Ashley sighed and flicked her hair back, muttering under her breath about her ponytail getting looser and how much flying hair she had around her hairline. She noticed him still ingering beyond her desk and she shooed him off with a dismissive wave. "Go now before you annoy me further."

Rin gathered the clipboards and strode out of the room. His shoulders tensed upon seeing how much work got dumped upon him this time around. This was why he dreaded going into Ashley's office. He always seemed to come out with more work than when he first came in. It's gotten to the point where he had to make sure he had everything done before he even thought of answering her summons passed through Andrews.

As he reached his desk and laid the clipboards atop his keyboard, he looked around his office. Everything was chugging along quite well. The chatter was minimal and mostly work-focused. He raised one clipboard, hoping the action would gain some attention from a passing periphery. None of his colleagues moved from their seats. He caught Andrews' eye as he walked back to his cubicle with a cup of coffee in his hand. Without an acknowledging nod, he ignored Rin and proceeded to lock himself in his cubicle.

Of course. Nobody wanted the work that was already in his hands. No one wanted to work with a snitch and a police, so Rin couldn't tell them Ashley told him to get them to work on it. It's not just his manager he needed to please for the employee evaluations. He needed his colleagues' ratings too.

With a sigh, Rin collapsed into his chair—the only comfort he had in this jungle-like enclosure. Then, he leaned forward, took the topmost clipboard, flipped it open, and began the work that wasn't really his.

His elders used to say that nothing was eternal. Pain, suffering, and misery would soon pass. Rin knew that, but now that he was in the middle of the said dark tunnel, fed only by the hope of seeing light at its coming end, it was easy to think anguish would last forever.

Because forever didn't exist beyond time. It existed inside each person in this world. Here. In the present.