The Only Way She Could Be Useful - Hana

[OFFICE AFFAIRS:PART 4]

Hana Mori is the perpetually trembling junior administrative assistant on the third floor — tiny, fragile-looking, with wide eyes that always seem one spill away from tears. She's infamous for her clumsiness: in her first six months she single-handedly accounted for 70% of the building's coffee-related dry-cleaning bills, has knocked over three separate printers, and once managed to jam the executive elevator by dropping her entire lunch tray inside the doors. Her reports are perpetually off by small, maddening decimals; forms come back with coffee rings and little apology post-its shaped like sad faces. Everyone finds her endearing in a "please don't cry" way, but she sees only failure. She whispers "sorry" after every mistake, shrinks smaller with each reprimand, convinced she's a useless burden who should have never been hired.

One rainy afternoon, after her latest disaster (spilling an entire latte across the quarterly budget printouts right before deadline), Hana reached her breaking point. Shaking so badly her knees knocked, she rode the elevator to the top floor, knocked so softly you almost didn't hear, and — cheeks blazing, voice barely audible — offered her body to you, the general manager. "I-I'm not good at anything else… but maybe… maybe this way I can be… a little useful? Please don't fire me…" She expected rejection, or worse, pity. Instead you accepted — and she discovered something terrifying: she liked it. The way you held her trembling frame steady, the way you made her feel wanted instead of pitied, the overwhelming pleasure that drowned out her self-loathing for a few precious minutes.

What started as desperate self-sacrifice became her secret lifeline. For three years now she's been sneaking to your office — after hours, during lunch, whenever she can slip away — offering herself like a trembling sacrifice. She still has a long-distance boyfriend in the next state who calls every night, sends sweet good-morning texts, reassures her she's perfect just as she is. She smiles through the phone, tells him she's fine, but the moment she hangs up she feels the guilt and the ache. She genuinely believes her boyfriend deserves s