To Call My Life My Own

“Alright guys, so we all know why we’re here,”

Willem forced a smile onto his lips as his boss started talking. All his team had been asked to stay late at the office to work on a new advertising campaign they’d received – a very high profile campaign – which meant very little sleep and a lot of stress. Oh, and a lot of late nights, apparently. Luckily for Willem, Lucy had no problem looking after his sisters, and the twins were happy to spend a few nights with Aunt Lucy. At least he had that going for him.

“…so I want you all to just come up with ideas, use sketches, use flowcharts, use whatever you can, and I want to see at least 5 ideas on this board as concepts before we leave,”

Willem wasn’t the only one that groaned. 5 concepts?! It was already 6 in the evening! Gah!

Reluctantly, Willem opened his notepad, staring down at the project brief in front of him. Surely something would come to him, right?

~

Two hours passed, two long long hours, but there were already 3 concepts up on the board. And one was Willem’s, so he was ecstatic. Only two more to go, then he could go home and sleep. Only two more. Only two more. Only…

Three timid knocks on the boardroom door.

“Come in!” Willem’s boss boomed.

The door opened and Willem’s jaw dropped slightly. No way. No freaking way.

Bakery boy?!

Surely he was hallucinating.

“Fantastic, catering is here. I hope you guys don’t mind but I’ve bought in some sandwiches and pastries for you all, just to keep us ticking over,”

A general bubble of consensus rose up but Willem stayed silent, just staring at the boy. This was unreal. This had to be a dream. Why was bakery boy of all people here?

“Sh-Shall I set up in here?” the boy stammered.

“Sure, sure, over on the far table,” Willem’s boss nodded.

Everyone went back to work, the noise level rising again. Bakery boy looked terrified. Without thinking, Willem stood up. Bakery boy’s eyes snapped straight to him and widened in shock. Willem ignored the reaction.

“I’ll help set up,” he announced to no-one in particular.

Two people nodded. That’s better than nothing. With a nervous smile on his lips, Willem walked around the meeting table to the bakery boy, hand slid into his suit pants pockets to hide the slight shaking.

“Hey, I didn’t expect to see you here,” Willem said.

“I-I didn’t know y-you worked here, I swear!” the boy insisted.

“I know, I know. Can’t say it’s not a good surprise though,” Willem admitted.

The boy blushed, smiling back. That was a good thing, right?

“Want some help setting up?” Willem asked.

“Thank you,” the boy nodded, smiling a little more.

Willem picked up four of the boxes from the floor, leaving two for the boy to pick up, and carried them over to the table on the farthest side of the room. There were already some silver trays laid out, so Willem just started unloading the sandwiches, the boy doing the same.

“So, um…”

Shit. He couldn’t exactly call him Bakery Boy could he?

“Noah. My name’s Noah,” the boy blurted.

Noah. Wow, that really suits him. Innocent, pure, sweet…perfect.

“W-What’s your name?” bakery boy…Noah asked.

“Willem. But you can call me Will,” Willem replied.

Noah smiled and nodded, his eyes lighting up slightly. Willem couldn’t believe it. They actually knew each other’s names now. After all this time.

“S-So what do you actually do here?” Noah asked, still looking a little nervous.

“I work on the graphic design side of the advertising campaigns, like what the adverts will look like and so on,” Willem explained.

“Wow. That’s so cool,” Noah said, smiling a little wistfully.

Oh bless him.

“It pays the bills. I loved art in high school so I just developed it into something that I could actually get a decent job out of after college,”

“College. Yeah,” Noah mumbled.

Oh. Noah never went to college.

“Hey, not everyone has to go to college to be awesome at what they do. I’ve tried and tasted at least half your shop – I know how good you are,” Willem reassured.

Noah blushed deeply, biting his bottom lip. Oh wow, he looks good like that. Like really good. Like…

“You look cute when you blush,” Willem blurted.

Shit. Oh fuck. Oh fuck why did he have to go and ruin everything?!

Noah blushed even more, his eyes wide.

“I-I should get back to work. Um, see you Saturday,” Willem grumbled.

Without another word, Willem went back to his seat, watching Noah pick up the empty boxes and leave the conference room. Fuck. He really had fucked that up. Why did he have to say something so sappy? Fuck.

“You were over there a long time,” the guy next to him smirked.

Willem rolled his eyes.

“I’ve known him three years. Family friend,” Willem muttered.

Close enough, anyway.

Although, who knew after tonight?