An Arrangement between Coworkers

Claire stared at the clock on the bottom of her screen, watching it blink 4 p.m. Only one hour left before she could ditch work and start the weekend.

This week had been hellish - her clients had been rude and her manager kept giving her projects she had no motivation to finish. She was looking forward to a weekend of binging Netflix with her cat Dot.

Pushing back her chair, she stood up and stretched. She walked slowly to the bathroom, looking for a good podcast to listen for on her train ride home. Without looking up from her phone, she reached for the handle of one of the single-occupancy, gender neutral bathrooms in the hall of her office building, and pushed it open.

When she looked up from her phone, she let out an audible gasp. There was already someone in there, and he was hunched over the sink counter, his back to her breathing heavily as he watched a video on his phone.

The screen was tiny, but the room was small enough that Claire could clearly see it was porn. And not just regular porn - there was a guy on his back, wearing women's lingerie while he got pegged by a woman. And his dick was locked up, from what she could see.

Upon hearing her gasp, the man ripped his headphones out of his ears, locked his phone, and shoved his dick back into his pants. When he turned around, his face was bright red. Claire recognized him as her coworker Luke.

"Oh, fuck. I thought I locked - so sorry," he mumbled, practically shoving her out of the way as he escaped.

As the door slammed shut behind her, Claire took a second to process what the hell she had just seen. Luke - the quiet programmer she sometimes interacted with at work, but honestly didn't know at all - had clearly taken a masturbation break at the end of the work day, and he had...interesting tastes.

What idiot a) decides to jerk off at work and b) doesn't triple check that the door is locked?, she thought to herself.

Leaving the bathroom, Claire decided that the whole experience was her cue to get the heck out of the office and go home. She strategically avoided the area where Luke sat - and packed up her stuff and headed to the train.

*

When she got home, she was greeted by Dot rubbing against her legs. She threw her bag on her couch, taking off her clothes to change into sweatpants and a baggy t-shirt. She popped leftovers into the microwave, and turned on the TV.

As she ate her dinner and watched Downton Abbey, she heard a buzz from her phone. She opened it up, seeing it was an Instagram follow request - from Luke, of all people.

This will be interesting, she thought.

She accepted the follow request, and another notification popped up - this time a DM that he had sent along with the request.

It read:

lukesm102: Hi Claire. It's Luke from work. I don't have your number but I wanted to reach out and apologize for what happened earlier. It was really idiotic of me and I feel shitty that you had to walk in on that.

Claire thought for a moment then typed back.

clairebear22: Hi Luke. Yeah it was pretty awkward haha. Generally don't expect to walk into my coworkers watching porn in the bathroom at work...

lukesm102: I'm so sorry. I know it was super inappropriate. I don't really have an excuse for myself except I just had a really stressful day and needed to let out some energy. Just please don't mention this to anyone else at work - I promise it won't happen again.

Claire rolled her eyes. So he was messaging her to make sure she wasn't going to report him.

clairebear22: Idk, it's kinda uncomfortable to think that we have someone jerking off in one of the bathrooms we all share.

lukesm102: It was the only time I've ever done that, promise. I don't know what got into me. I'm really really sorry pls don't tell anyone else.

Claire smiled. She was enjoying the power she had right now, even if she felt a little guilty about holding it over him. She was about to respond to tell him to not worry about it, when she got another message.

lukesm102: Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?

She felt a little thrill as she got that message. Her curiosity piqued.

clairebear22: like what?

lukesm102: I'll pay for your coffee every day this week.

She grinned as she contemplated the offer. She felt bad about taking advantage of someone who had just done something stupid on a bad day. But he was the one offering...

And she thought about her bank account, and how much more she knew software engineers at her company made than her.

Fuck it.

clairebear22: it's a deal.

lukesm102: thank you so much. What's ur venmo?

Claire sent him her username, and flopped on her bed. What had just happened?

***

When she woke up on Saturday, she rolled over and picked up her phone. She had a text from her best friend Lily asking her about weekend plans, a bunch of marketing emails from brands advertising Halloween deals, and a Venmo notification.

She opened up the app, and saw a transaction from Luke for six dollars that read "I figured this would be enough for coffee and tip."

Still not quite believing the situation she found herself in, she double tapped the transaction to like it, and went to get ready for the day.

She left the house around 10 to go on her usual Saturday errands, starting with the coffee shop down the road. Although it was only $6, Claire felt like she had a fun little secret as she paid for her coffee, getting an extra shot of espresso since it wasn't on her dime.

In the afternoon, she met up with her friend Lily at a park they went to regularly together. Lily walked toward her, and gave her a hug.

"Lil, you will not believe what happened at work yesterday," Claire said.

"Ooo, work drama? I want to hear it all," said Lily, smiling as they sat down on their usual bench.

Claire laughed. "Well, it's definitely not your usual office gossip..." and went into the story of how she walked in on Luke.

"Wait, WHAT? What kind of porn was it?" asked Lily.

"Femdom porn. Pegging and that kind of shit," Claire said, giggling.

Lily let out a shriek, and grabbed Claire's arm.

"And that's not all - he DM'ed me on Instagram asking me to not tell anyone, and told me he'd buy me coffee every day this week as an apology. Including today." Claire said, nodding at her almost-empty coffee from earlier.

"Ahh Claire, you're basically findomming him now! This is totally a kink thing for him, too," Lily said, smirking.

Claire looked at Lily sheepishly. To her, findoms brought to mind women in leather corsets yelling at men to give them their credit cards. Not exactly Claire's style.

"I don't know...it's just coffee for a week. Plus he seemed to be doing it out of desperation rather than something erotic."

Lily gave Claire an exasperated look. "Don't be naive, Claire."

Claire didn't consider herself naive, but her friends certainly did, as she gave off an innocent vibe. She definitely wasn't unfamiliar with kink - she had experimented quite a bit over the years in a variety of roles and had even been to a dungeon with a particularly adventurous partner.

However to her, kink was something that happened during sex - not receiving coffee money because you walked in on your coworker jerking off. But - and she wouldn't admit this to Lily - the thrill she got this morning with the Venmo notification wasn't entirely a chaste one.

After a bit, the conversation shifted to Lily complaining about her roommates and discussing Halloween plans for the following weekend.

*

The rest of Claire's weekend passed uneventfully, aside from the Sunday morning Venmo notification with a coffee cup emoji.

The same message arrived on Monday with a "Happy Monday!" message as she was frantically getting ready for work after oversleeping, nearly tripping over Dot as she ran out of her apartment.

She didn't have time to stop at her local place for coffee, so she grabbed some on the walk from the train station to her office. After dropping her stuff off to her desk, she went over to her coworker Jamie's desk to look at a report he wanted to show her, not realizing that his desk was directly in front of Luke's.

She noticed him looking at her, then her coffee in her hand, then back to his screen nervously, as if he was trying to pretend he didn't notice her at all. His face had turned bright red however, giving him away.

Claire was also distracted by the fact he was now shifting uncomfortably in his seat, the red spreading to his ears and neck.

Wait - was he shifting because he got a boner? Claire wondered to herself. Now it was her turn to blush, as she tried to refocus on Jamie's powerpoint. Maybe Lily had been right about this being a kink thing for him.

One of Luke's developer coworkers called him over for their morning meeting.

"Uh, be there in a minute," he said, shifting again, seemingly concentrating extra hard on his screen.

Definitely has a boner, Claire thought.

Claire returned to her desk evaluating this new piece of evidence. She felt a bit giddy over the fact she had turned him on just by him holding the coffee he had paid for. And Luke was definitely cute in a non-threatening, dorky way - which was honestly Claire's type.

The work day passed faster than usual. At one point, Claire got up to go into the hallway to take a break and reply to a few texts.

She heard the bathroom door open and of all people, Luke stepped out.

He looked up at her, and stopped.

"I hope you were behaving yourself in there," Claire said, before she could stop herself.

Luke looked at her, clearly mortified.

"Um, yes - just you know, usual bathroom stuff. Nothing weird. Like I said, that was and will be the only time" he said with a nervous chuckle.

Claire smiled, enjoying how uncomfortable he clearly was.

"Glad to hear it. Although another week of free coffee would have been fun," she said. What had gotten into her?

Luke looked surprised and even more embarrassed at how openly Claire was discussing what had transpired between them. So much so that he mumbled something Claire couldn't make out, and darted out of her way to get back to his desk.