18. "Hi. I'm Matthew."

                                    

                                          
"You can go through now." Robot lady spoke. Slowly, I got up on shaky legs and, surprisingly, walked steadily through the doors. This morning, none of us could eat breakfast, and when I tried, I nearly threw up with how nervous I was. My whole body was shaking.
We sat down. His office was quiet except for our breathing. He was writing something down before looking up to us. His eyes scanned us and stayed longer on me. On the now-scabbing cuts. 
"Are you healing well?" His voice was deep, and somehow the way he asked felt comforting. Maybe it was because I missed my dad, but in that moment, I didn't want to hit this man in the head. Nodding, I gave him a closed-lip smile.
"Yes. Everything looks okay. And we had no problem with that person, so I don't think it's a stalker." I added, and he nodded. He took a sip from his cup and then leaned back in his seat. 
"Okay, that's good, yes. Now why are you here?" Okay rude? I was just starting to sort of like him. Brushing off the anger, I shook my head.
"I had an idea about our situation."
"What is it?" He waved his hand around for me to go on.
This morning, before we came here, we spoke of my plan. Of how we'd try to negotiate so we can stay. We wondered how much of our plans with Le Sserafim we should mention but decided not to say anything as the videos were already posted.
"As you probably saw, we met up with Le Sserafim and did a few tiktoks." I spoke slowly so as not to stumble or stutter. He nodded, and I inhaled. "What if we film a tiktok with the boys and say that's the reason we met up? No lawsuits, no stalking accusations. And we can stay longer."
He scratched his head, eyes roaming over each of our faces, before looking out the window. He stood up and sighed loudly, cracking his knuckles.
"You want to meet them at the same place as last time, film a quick video, and claim it was taken back then?" Not sure if it was an actual question or if he was just repeating what I said, but I nodded.
"Why did you think of this only now?" He asked, rubbing his chest. It was Vic who answered now, anger in her voice.
"We were under too much stress to even think straight. And yes, your 'options'", she made quotation marks with her hands, "added even more stress. I'm sorry if we thought of this only now, but we had a pretty rough time." His shocked expression stayed on Vic. He was as shocked as Madi and me, as Vic was never the confrontational one. She'd avoid it as much as she could. Silence stretched as we all looked at him, and he looked at Vic with furrowed brows.
"Well. Okay. You'll film it when they come home. We'll let you know. You can leave."
"Just like that?" I asked. This seemed too easy. Especially after everything we went through. I was both relieved and suspicious of how okay he was. He scratched his chin and put his hands in his pockets.
"I mean, we said if you have another option that could work, we'll go with that." He spoke as he walked towards us, around his desk. He leaned against it in front of us, causing us to look up to him. Wait. When did he say that? When did we have a say in this? And if he had asked, we would have thought of something like this.
"No, you didn't. We asked what we could do, and you laughed. You said to leave or get sued. Leave or be known as stalkers all over." I jumped up, my chair screeching. "We were ready to leave; hell, we would've been gone if it weren't for the accident. And you're saying we could've just given a good enough excuse?" My voice came out hoarse and louder than I wanted it to. But I was angry. I was pissed.
And the cherry on top was him just shrugging as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Well. The past is the past. We'll let you know when you and the boys will meet. I felt a hand on my leg. Looking down, my racing heart stuttered. Madi shook her head, knowing I would blow up. She knew why I was this angry. She saw the results of saying goodbye. Nodding, I took a step around the chair as they got up. Madi kept her hand on my back.