EROS CASHBACK SYSTEM: You Can't Fake the Interest

Chapter 15: Chapter 15: The second conversation

Garrett turned expecting nothing in particular.

Emiliana Vane was standing close enough that the "hello" had clearly been meant for him rather than anyone passing behind him.

He recognised her instantly. He didn’t say her name, mostly because using it felt like it would announce that he’d been keeping track, which he had, but not in a way he wanted advertised.

"You’re Daniel’s friend," she said, which wasn’t quite a question.

"Depends what he’s done."

That got the smallest flicker of something at the corner of her mouth, gone before it became an actual smile. "Have you seen him? I’ve been trying to catch him for the last twenty minutes."

"Not since lunch. He mentioned the library, but that was hours ago."

"Right." She looked faintly deflated by that, glancing down the hallway like Daniel might materialise out of the pavement if she looked hard enough. "Okay. Thanks anyway."

---

She was already half-turned to go when something in her expression shifted — the specific look of someone remembering a thing they’d meant to do and nearly hadn’t.

"Actually...wait." She turned fully back. "I never said thank you properly. For the spider thing."

"You did...sort of, Right before you left looking like you wanted the ground to open."

"I did not look like that."

"You did a bit."

"I was mortified for entirely reasonable reasons and you’re not allowed to use it against me."

"Noted. For the record, though.." he shrugged slightly, "...you’re welcome."

She rolled her eyes, but the embarrassment had gone soft around the edges, closer to amusement than the raw mortification from the corridor. "Right, Thank you."

---

"Anyway," she said, already stepping back, "I’ll catch him tomorrow, it’s fine..."

She was three steps into leaving when Garrett heard himself speak before he’d fully decided to.

"What do you need him for?"

She stopped.

She turned back around, a small crease of surprise between her eyebrows, like she hadn’t expected the conversation to have a second half.

---

"It’s a bit of a favour, really," she said, walking the few steps back toward him. "There’s some material for a thing I’m working on, through Ashcombe, it’s a whole story and half of it’s not in English. Daniel did his placement there last year, he knows the building, the staff...all of it. I thought he might actually know someone who could help translate it properly rather than me running it through some app and hoping for the best."

Garrett considered that for exactly as long as it took the sentence to finish.

"I might actually be able to help with that."

---

She blinked. "You?"

"We did a module on it, more by accident than by choice, if I’m honest." He said it flatly, no attempt to dress it up. "International business, second year — half of it was working through case studies that hadn’t been translated properly, so you just had to muddle through the original. It’s not exactly a specialism. But I’ve done enough of it that I probably won’t make it worse."

"That’s oddly specific for something you’re calling an accident."

"Everything useful I know, I know by accident."

---

She studied him for a second, recalibrating something. "You’re serious."

"I wouldn’t offer if I wasn’t. I’ve got no particular interest in doing unpaid translation work for fun."

That, finally, got an actual laugh out of her — short, surprised out of her rather than offered. "Fine. Fair enough." She glanced past him toward the building, then at her watch. "I’ve still got two more lectures today, I can’t really do it now. Later, after five, maybe? We could meet in the courtyard, somewhere a little quieter."

"Works for me."

"Great." She didn’t move to leave straight away, which he noticed without saying anything about it.

---

"So what’s your actual degree, then," she said instead, arms folding loosely, "since apparently it comes with a translation module nobody warns you about."

"Business Management."

"That explains the slide-title voice."

"I don’t have a slide-title voice."

"You absolutely do. You said ’ it’s not exactly a specialism’ like you were reading it off a module handbook."

"That’s just how sentences work."

She laughed properly at that. short, surprised out of her. "What year are you in?"

"Second. You?"

"Same." She tipped her head slightly. "What’s your dissertation going to be on, assuming you’ve thought that far ahead."

"I haven’t. I’m still recovering from first year."

"Fair. Mine’s something to do with market access barriers, probably. I keep changing my mind about the actual angle."

"Sounds thrilling."

"It’s genuinely not. You’ll find out next year and regret asking."

---

"Anyway." She checked her watch again, and whatever small window she’d been borrowing had apparently closed. "I actually do need to get to this next one, sorry..."

"Clearly."

"Five, then. I’ll meet you in the courtyard, seems more private"

"Works for me."

"Right. See you later."

---

She was halfway down the hallway before she turned back once, the way people do when they’ve already said goodbye and think of one more thing.

"Thanks again. Properly, this time. No sarcasm."

"I’ll allow it."

"You’re insufferable."

"So I’ve heard."

Then she was gone, folder under one arm, back toward whatever lecture was waiting for her.

Garrett stood there a moment longer than the empty hallway really called for, aware in a way he hadn’t been an hour ago — that this hadn’t happened to him the way the corridor had.

This time, he’d been the one who stopped it from ending.

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