Alex
"Oh keep them coming, my guy. We got a long night ahead of us!" I heard Joan say to the bartender. She had to raise her voice to be heard over the loud music that was playing through the event room, and spilling out into the bar.
"She's joking!" I interrupted as soon as I could make it to her side. "We're cutting her off after three drinks." The bartender's gaze ripped away from Joan to glance in my direction. He was an employee I surprisingly hadn't recognized before.
Usually we booked all our catering and bartending through the same company, which meant we often ran into the same employees. It was sort of fun seeing the same group of guys every few months. We got to know them... They got to know us... and our go-to alcoholic drinks. It was comforting seeing a familiar face around while we were working on networking.
This one, however, was new.
"Are you guys guests or something?" He asked me in a very dull toned voice. He immediately struck me as someone who would have rather been literally anywhere else on the planet right now. This isn't to say that the rest of his coworkers were excited to be here or anything, but they at least tried to look like they were approachable. It felt like I was wasting his time by making him do his job.
"No, we both work here. No more than three drinks, and if you see a shorter man in a bright neon green suit, don't serve him more than three drinks either. No exceptions, understood?" I asked him. His eyebrows furrowed slightly at my admittedly odd request.
"I... guess?" He replied.
"And I mean it. They'll do it all to get to you. Bribes. Tricks. Thievery. I need you to be strong-" I glanced down at the bartenders name tag. Okay, his name was... Thad?
The only Thad I knew was from the show Blue Mountain State. Up until this point, I thought the name was a myth conjured by the writers of one beautiful show.
Yet here I was...
... face to face with a Thad.
"... I need you to be strong, Thad. If I find out these two have gotten far too wasted, it's your company's Yelp rating I'm coming for." I finished. Thad gave me one of his blank stares that was nearly indecipherable, and that was where I decided to leave it at. I dragged Joan away from the bar and back towards the main event room.
As soon as we made it into the main hall, my eyes immediately zeroed in on Derek. With his bright ass fucking suit on, his location at the snack bar was a dead giveaway. He had his hand alternating between the cheese platter, the truffles, and the chocolate fondue fountain. Joan followed as I speed walked towards him.
"You two are absolutely ridiculous, you know that?" I scolded Derek and Joan. "We're working tonight. This means no stuffing your face with food, Derek. And no overdrinking for either of you two."
Derek was midway into a bite of a cheese cube when he turned around to look at me. His cheeks were puffed up like a chipmunk, from all the food he had stored on each side.
My eyes immediately rolled at the sight of him. "Derek, there's no way you can possibly be this hungry right now."
He tried getting that last bite in before he replied, yet all it did was mumble whatever the fuck he was trying to tell me.
"What?" I asked him. He held his finger up, giving me the signal to wait a moment as he began the difficult process of chewing all that food. The puffed cheeks slowly began to shrink in size, until he had managed to swallow the rest.
"I was saying, this is Wyke Farms Cheddar. The particular cheese usually averages out at around $200 a pound. I'd be fucking damned if I don't eat what I can while I still can. And I won't let you take this away from me, Alex. I won't."
I rolled my eyes at Derek's dramatics. Regardless of how much that cheese was worth, the success rate of this launch is worth a lot more. "How about this," I countered, "I'll bag some cheese for you and stash it in the breakroom fridge. How does that sound?"
Derek was quick to reply. "No! I don't trust these fuckers. We gotta stash the goods somewhere else."
The way in which he was talking, made it sound like the goods we were smuggling were far more valuable than some fucking cheese. But to Derek, cheese was indeed the most valuable. I did my best to think of other places I could put the cheese. It was looking like the best option I could come up with, would be my office.
"Alright, I'll bring it up to my office and I'll grab it for you before we leave today, okay?" I asked. From the look on Derek's face, it seemed as if he was happy with that alternative.
-
I sent Derek and Joan back out onto the floor to mingle with guests. Derek kept telling me the cheese and wine mixture was making him sleepy. I told him that that was just something he was going to have to deal with today, and if I saw him knocked out anywhere, I would not hesitate to set his entire body ablaze.
That was where that conversation ended.
The hardest part was really just snagging the cheese itself. With an increase in traffic at the snack bar, it was difficult slipping the cheese into a cloth napkin. Joan did her best to block one side of me, while Derek worked on blocking the view from the other. Once the cheese was successfully placed in the napkin, Derek and Joan went back out to do their jobs, and I made my way up towards the fifth floor.
More people were starting to flood through, which was the best news I'd had all day. It wasn't that the initial crowd was sparse, it just wasn't the turn out I was expecting when I walked through the event.
I noticed the greeters at the main doors, directing more guests towards the main room. Luckily, I was smart enough to grab my access card to get into my office because I hadn't anticipated even needing it today. I used the access key to get past the secured check in, then I made my way towards the elevators.
These elevators always took forever to make it back to the first floor, so I wasn't surprised as I waited there for a few minutes. Once those doors did finally open, my feet hesitated when I was met with familiar blue eyes.
He was wearing a very neat dark blue suit, one I surprisingly hadn't seen before. The suit included a vest underneath the jacket, with fitted trousers that matched both the jacket and suit color. It was tailored to fit him perfectly. And I mean perfectly. As his muscles flexed against the fabric of the suit, I could already feel my cheeks burning up. The pop of color he brought to the outfit, was the wine red tie he had paired this look with. In his right hand, he was holding onto a Manila founder.
"Christian." I smiled nervously at him from his position in the elevator cab. He placed his free hand out to stop the elevator doors that had suddenly started to close again.
"Alex."
Christian
"Brad, you're a fucking idiot you know that?" I whispered into the phone as I jolted up the last two flights of stairs.
"Listen, I got the main floor fax and your personal office fax mixed up. I can't even remember the last time I used a fucking fax, man, let alone having to remember your fax number." Brad countered immediately. I could hear the sound of his vehicle starting up in the audio background of the call.
"Brad. Brad. You sent background information of our mother to the main floor fax. Luckily, I don't think anyone is up there right now but we're fucked if there is." I was huffing and puffing between words as I started to clear the last steps in the staircase. This was a great reminder of why I never took these stairs. They were fucking ridiculous and impractical.
Once I made it out onto the fifth floor, I was greeted immediately by one of our janitors.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Ivanov." He gave me a nod. I gave him a smile in return, and let him carry on with his work. The company fax was located in an open office supply room. Once I all but sprinted there, I noticed there were papers in the tray. Just like Brad said, the fax had come through already.
I pulled the pages out from the tray and flipped them over to take a look. The first photo was a mugshot photo of a woman. She looked young, still in her teens I'd say. It may have been years ago, but I recognized those eyes anywhere. They were my mothers.
Realizing there wasn't much time to investigate, I pulled one of those large brown folders out from the storage cabinet, and slipped the pages inside. Right now, I needed to head downstairs and greet my guests. I would have to look over the pages later tonight.
There was another soft thud from the floor, as I made my way towards the elevators. I noticed it was just the janitor cleaning out the shredding bin. Someone from the floor must have jammed old end of month work in there, because when he pulled the top off the bin, pages flew everywhere.
He glanced up from his spot a few meters away from me. "Sorry, Mr. Ivanov. I'll take care of it." He rushed out.
"No worries." I replied with a smile, before disappearing into the elevator. The folder was wedged tight against my arm and side aa the elevator started to descend. I needed to get this paperwork to Brad when he got here, so he could at least take a look before the night got away from us both. Once that all too familiar ding erupted from the elevator speakers, I started to step out onto the first floor.
That was when I was met with familiar hazel eyes.
••