Black Licorice

Wendy kept a jar of black licorice sticks on the corner of her desk. This was solely because Giovanni had asked her to ‘put some candy out or something’ to create a more personable workplace environment. She had purposefully chosen black licorice because no one in their right mind liked to eat it; this way, no one in particular would be attracted to her little area to have a snack and, consequently, annoy her while doing so.

Professor Namba loved black licorice. He had discovered the jar on her desk by the accident of Professor Sebastian’s absence on one First Monday of the Month, when it was Namba instead who dropped off a budget request for Wendy to submit to accounting for analysis. He apparently loved it a lot, because every day since then, at precisely 1:55pm, Namba would make a special trip that was entirely out of his way to a corridor of the building that he otherwise had no business in, to have one piece of the black licorice that Wendy left out on her desk.

Of course she was mortified to have a regular visitor. Her first course of action was to shoot the doctor a very dirty look every time he came to collect on the candy. Surprisingly, this did no good. He was a regular space cadet, always seemingly zoned out and in his own little world.

The reality was that Namba had never really talked to Wendy before this, and thought her face just looked like that all of the time.

She became bolder in her efforts to deter him. Little things like clearing her throat or drumming her fingers and staring at him when he came by also had no effect. Before she knew it, the First Monday had come around yet again and Professor Sebastian was back to drop off next month’s forms.

Wendy saw the potential solution to her problem.

“You know, you ought to put some licorice or something out in the lab for the guys who work down there. They might like that.”

As soon as she’d said it, he looked as if a great realization had dawned upon him, and he smirked at her, grabbing a piece of candy.

“I almost forgot.” He pointed at her with it. “He’d want to thank you for reminding me.”

She scowled at the professor’s retreating back. As 1:55pm rolled around, she stopped everything she was doing and glanced down the hallway. A minute passed. Wendy stood and walked down the hallway to peer around the corner. No one was there. She shrugged a little bit and went back to work.

The next day Namba faithfully returned, and she knew it was time to resort to more drastic measures.

She attempted to engage him in conversation.

“Looks like I’m going to have to buy more of those soon.” she said, watching as he took a piece. Her laugh sounded every bit as forced as it was, but this seemed to go over Namba’s head just like everything else.

He stared at her blankly, as though he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to respond or not, then chose not to. After a sufficiently awkward silence, he turned to leave.

“Really?” Wendy threw her hands up and yelled at no one but her stapler, as if it could understand her frustration with this strange little man and his love of her candy.

Before the end of the second month, there was only one thing left to do. One day, Professor Namba came by for his daily visit, and there was no licorice on her desk. He seemed slightly confused, and looked at her with pitiful eyes. He didn’t have to ask where it was, because she answered before he had the chance.

“Yeah, the store I got it from stopped carrying it. Too bad, huh?”

It was an obvious lie, but he was an oblivious person.

“Hm.” He said nothing else and put his hands in his pockets as he walked away.

The first few days were marvelous. She answered phone calls, created spreadsheets, notarized papers and sent them to the appropriate persons for signatures. She had probably never been more productive.

Then, there was a lull in the work. The solitude she had been missing most definitely returned. The First Monday of the Month came again, and Wendy stopped everything she was doing at 9am and looked up expectantly as Professor Sebastian came with the paperwork. He stopped a few feet away from her desk, giving her a look that suggested he thought she might be crazy.

“What?” He arched an eyebrow at her, approaching with exaggerated caution.
She hadn’t realized she had been smiling at him so pleasantly. She did realize that he was the first person she’d had contact with outside of a telephone call for…how long had it been?

“N-nothing. It’s…nothing.” Her face fell and he slid the report across her desk before leaving her with another strange look.

Professor Namba’s day became at least twice as exciting as it otherwise would have been when he read the typed memo that had been placed in his inbox the next morning.

‘To Whom It May Concern: We would like to inform you that we have replenished our supply of black licorice sticks. Thank you. Wendy, Human Resources.’