Five Years of Fame [COMPLETE]

27. The Monday Morning After

Summer, Year 3, Month 6

A rush of cool air welcomed Noah as he pushed through the revolving doors and entered the glass atrium of his firm's building. He had worked up a mild sweat walking from the parking garage, the hot June sun overhead beating down a heatwave that was to last all week.

He swiped his security card through the scanner and nodded to the security guard like every other morning. He opted for the stairs instead of the elevator, knowing a day of sitting lay before him.

He grabbed his mail from the front desk with a "Thanks, Gina" to the receptionist. Instead of ignoring him, like she did every morning, Gina sat back in her chair and gave him a scrutinizing look, like she was noticing him for the first time.

"You are most welcome, lover boy."

Noah's eyebrows pulled together at her response, confused, but he kept moving towards his desk, only looking back once more to find her watching him leave. He scanned through his mail, threw half of it away, and stored the other half to be dealt with later as he stored his satchel underneath his desk and took a seat.

His email was the first thing he pulled up. A long list sat waiting for his response but the one from a familiar address stole his attention first.

There was no subject and the email consisted of only seven words but Noah smiled nonetheless.

"Game night tonight. My house. You free?"

Noah had to double-check the schedule for his dad's nurse before accepting and shot back a quick "I'm there" in response.

He had never asked for her number. They saw each other in person frequently enough that it had never come up. But Reeve had figured out his work email from the firm's website and sent him messages, usually during the very early hours of the morning. This particular invitation was from two in the morning. He had a feeling she did this when she couldn't sleep or was just finishing up a writing session.

The firm of Foreman and Birch had software capable enough to keep all spam emails from their employees inboxes. If they hadn't, among the list of work-related messages, Noah would have received several messages from tabloid sites with catchy subject lines to get the reader to click through. And on that particular Monday morning, Noah would have found himself the source of the headlines, him being the "New Mystery Man in Reeve Keller's Life."

What the software didn't protect against was group emails from within the firm. And a particular one was shouting for Noah's attention with the subject line of "Very IMPORTANT! Open IMMEDIATELY!"

Noah's interest was piqued and to keep off from dealing with the messages he needed to read and respond to, Noah opened the email.

The text in the email was "Check out lover boy!" The rest were photos. Of Reeve. With Noah.

They were from different angles and distances, and varying qualities of cameras. All from the softball game last Friday afternoon.

Most of the photos weren't too incriminating, most of them were just of Reeve standing on the sidelines watching the games, Dani and Anton cheering beside her while she stood with her arms crossed. Three were of Reeve and Noah sitting close together, talking, but their baseball hats kept their faces obscure. But if you knew Reeve and you knew Noah, it was obvious it was them.

The worst of the photos and the two that made Noah's stomach drop were the last two. One was of the two of them from the side, walking together towards the parking lot, holding hands. And the last one was of the two of them kissing.

Noah's grip on his mouse tightened as he moved to delete the email. He didn't need to see the smile on Reeve's face as he remembered it vividly having been there in person. He had said something and she had smiled. He didn't even remember what he had said as he was too focused on the fact that she had held his hand in public, in front of her friends.