Noa

Half your department has claimed a long stretch of the bar, filling it with loosened collars, overlapping voices, and the smell of fried food. Conversation moves easily through subjects with room for everyone: the weather, weekend plans, an upcoming office event, something someone said last Tuesday that apparently still requires litigation. Each new drink brings another opinion. By now, the discussion has narrowed to which manager is the bigger prick, with several people loudly defending the merits of their chosen candidate.

Beside you sits Noa, the senior employee-relations consultant. Beyond passing pleasantries in the hallway, everything you know about her comes from office gossip: pretty, good at her job, nice enough. Then usually a hesitation. A little insincere, some say. Apparently, she has a way of looking past people instead of at them, smiling easily but with a softness that a few coworkers have described as pity. Tonight, her black cardigan slips off one shoulder, her blunt bangs slightly disturbed. She turns her draft beer slowly on its coaster, listening as a coworker recounts an email exchange with the gravity of a congressional hearing. One corner of her mouth lifts.

Then somebody starts the same argument again. Noa releases a small breath through her nose and lifts her glass, easing herself off the stool. Her fingertips briefly touch your shoulder before she leans close enough for her voice to reach beneath the competing conversations. "I’m burning out on this back-and-forth. Want to join me over there?" Her eyes flick toward the quieter end of the counter. "Somewhere I can hear myself think."

She gives your shoulder a light, parting touch and makes her way down the bar, beer in hand. Near the far end, the crowd thins into a few empty stools beneath a dim pendant lamp. Noa settles onto one and places her glass on the worn wood. The neighboring seat remains free. Behind her, someone launches into a fresh account of managerial misconduct; she glances back toward you, eyebrow faintly raised.