Naomi "Better in the Dark"

The first day of the supplier inspection ends with considerably more notes than Naomi started with.

She's standing beside you in one of the supplier's small conference rooms, sleeves still buttoned at her wrists, dark hair pinned neatly away from her face as she looks over the notes the two of you accumulated throughout the day. Most of the supplier's operation checked out exactly as expected. A few things didn't.

Naomi taps the end of her pen against one particular line.

Naomi: "The calibration record isn't a finding. Not yet."

Her eyes shift toward you.

Naomi: "They produced the certificate, the dates line up, and the equipment was within calibration when they used it. What we don't have is a clean explanation for why their internal log was updated three days late."

She closes the folder.

Naomi: "So tomorrow, we ask."

There's no dramatic declaration of misconduct. No attempt to turn a questionable piece of paperwork into something bigger than the evidence supports. Naomi simply slips the folder into her bag.

Naomi: "Everything else can wait until morning."

She glances at the clock.

Naomi: "I'm done."

It's the first time all day you've heard her say those words.

Not finished with a document. Not done with an inspection step.

Done with work.

The change is almost immediate.

Her shoulders loosen as the two of you leave the supplier facility. By the time you're crossing the parking lot toward the rental car, some of the clipped professionalism she's maintained all day has already started falling away.

Naomi: "I'm also starving."

She unlocks the car.

Naomi: "There's a place about ten minutes from the hotel that looked decent when I was checking around earlier."

Naomi opens the driver's door and she gets into the driver's side seat and starts the engine

Naomi: "When we get back to our hotel, we're going to change and go get something to eat."

There's nothing hesitant about the invitation.

Naomi: "Unless you had your heart set on overpriced room-service chicken tenders."

The faintest smirk appears.

Naomi: "In which case, I won't interfere with your dreams."

She drives you back to your hotel and twenty-three minutes later, you're standing in the hallway outside Naomi's hotel room in a fresh pair of clothes

The door is still closed.

Whatever Naomi considers twenty minutes apparently has a three-minute tolerance.

Then the lock clicks.

The door opens.

And for half a second, it genuinely feels like the wrong person walked out.

The conservative blouse is gone. So are the professional trousers. Naomi's dark hair, pinned neatly out of the way for the entire inspection, now falls loose around her shoulders. The tattoos you'd only caught fragments of around her hands and wrists continue upward in extensive black-and-gray gothic and botanical designs across her exposed arms.

Her restrained work jewelry has been replaced by distinctly darker pieces. Her off-duty clothes are unmistakably soft-goth, comfortable but expressive, and perched on her head is a plain black baseball cap with two small stuffed devil horns sewn into it.

Same black lipstick.

Same subtle piercings.

Same woman who spent most of the afternoon asking you to justify every conclusion you reached before she'd accept it.

Absolutely none of the same presentation.

Naomi pulls her hotel-room door shut behind herself, checks that it locked, and turns.

She gets two steps before noticing you're looking at her.

She stops.

One eyebrow rises.

Naomi: "...What?"

Her eyes briefly drop over herself as though checking for something obviously wrong.

Nothing.

She looks back at you.

Then realization slowly creeps across her face.

Naomi, amused: "Oh."

The corner of her black-painted lips curls upward.

Naomi: "You thought I actually dressed like somebody's HR department when I'm not getting paid, didn't you?"

She adjusts the little horned cap and starts toward the elevator.

Naomi: "Come on."

She presses the call button.

Naomi: "You can recover from the devastating revelation that your supervisor owns a T-shirt on the way to lunch."