“Really?”
“Absolutely. I’d like to formally offer you the position. You have to be vetted by my boss,but she takes my recommendations to heart so don’t worry, you’ll be accepted.” I stood up from my desk, offering my hand. “Congratulations, Ursol. Welcome to ORBIT.”
Ursol stood with an overwhelming wattage for a smile, grasping my hand with earnest and shaking it accordingly. “Thank you so much, Mr. Watson. You won’t regret this, I swear.”
“I’m sure I won’t,” I said back. “But please, call me Wallace.” When he nodded, I gestured to the door of my office. “Let’s have you meet the board, shall we?”
“Sounds great, thank you.” Ursol smiled sheepishly.
We sauntered out of my office and I opened the double doors of the boardroom, all heads turning to us as we walked in. Francyn was in front of the whiteboard, writing things down as Exo spoke. Somehow, he’d become my unspoken second in command when I wasn’t around. The other Orbs seemed to appreciate his opinion, and I wasn’t going to object to his willingness to take charge when I wasn’t around. ORBIT worked better because of the tenacity of the people around it.
Exo stopped himself at our intrusion. “Ahh, Wallace.”
“Sorry to interrupt, everyone.” I said, turning to clasp Ursol on the shoulder. “I just wanted everyone to meet our new ORBIT executive assistant.”
They cheered in a variety of ways, from simple clapping to hollering. Ursol smiled back, but he seemed very overwhelmed by it all, just giving a soft wave to everyone as they praised his presence.
“No one’s happier to hear that than me,” Francyn said, putting down the dry erase marker she was holding on the built in tray of the board. She dusted off her hands as she walked over to us and added, “My wrists were starting to hurt writing that stuff down!”
“I told you that you could use the laptop but you refused.” I rolled my eyes with a laugh.
“Nice to meet you, sweetie,” She told him as she completely ignored my rebuttal, pulling Ursol into a hug that he had no choice but to accept. “I’m Francyn.”
The rest of the board started to introduce themselves to Ursol, which I didn’t stop because Wrage stood up from his seat after giving the new hire a quick hello before he tilted his head, silently asking me to hang back. I walked back toward the still open doors of the boardroom, unnoticed and unheard as everyone went around speaking to Ursol and giving him details about them that he didn’t ask for.
“So,” Wrage said with a huff. “You and my brother made things official, I hear.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, trying not to blush. Speaking to my co-worker about his brother that I happened to be freshly dating wasn’t conversation I was well versed in. “We’re taking our time.”
“That’s good.” Wrage smiled, but it died on his face as he asked, “Do you love him?”
My knee jerk reaction was to say yes, but I stopped myself. Was I in love with Wrex? My hesitation took form in my brain because we hadn’t even labeled ourselves as official boyfriends yet, let alone whether or not we loved each other.
Panic throbbed in my veins. Had Wrex said something to Wrage about me? Was Wrex in love with me and speaking to Wrage about it to see if I felt the same?
Chuckling, Wrage jabbed me lightly with his elbow. “Stop freaking out, he hasn’t said anything.” He shook his head as if he could read my thoughts and I thanked the stars every day that petrylle couldn’t, even though both of them had the uncanny ability to act like theycouldread my thoughts. Maybe I was just that transparent. Although, sex would be interesting if Wrex was able to sift through my thoughts. I stalled myself from thinking about plowing his brother as Wrage kept talking. “Let me rephrase. Are you going to be good to him?”
“Of course,” I affirmed, looking in the eyes he shared with his brother as I nodded. “I really care about him, Wrage. I promise you, I’m going to do right by him.”
“That’s all I ask.” Wrage chuckled, clapping a hand against my shoulder blades. “Now if you could convince him to move out of the family home, you’d be a miracle worker.”
Our laughter struck us at the same time, with me shaking my head at him. Wrex and I had a long way to go before we talked about moving in together, assuming both of us even wanted to. But knowing that I had him in my life, ready to take on this crazy adventure of romance that was brewing between us, I knew that I could conquer anything.
Epilogue
Four Months Later
Wrex squealedin a mixture of delight and fear as the character he was controlling ran away from the killer. I started laughing, watching him try to avoid being downed as the sounds of Dead By Daylight barked from the TV.
Never in a million years did I think I'd be playing video games with a guy I was romantically interested in, let alone an Orb I was dating. I was such a champion for video games as not only an art form but also as an outlet, that I tended to keep it to myself, whether out of necessity or fear of being labeled weird. Matty had enjoyed video games, but only after I'd tried to get him to join me. And even then, he never really got into the ones I tended to like. But watching Wrex go full in with playing Dead By Daylight was searing a permanent place into my heart.
He'd taken a long time selecting his character, opting to play as Yun-Jin Lee but taking the extra time to select an appropriate outfit that he deemed acceptable. I was a Feng Min main myself, and I dabbled in perfecting an outfit, so I totally understood. It was just nice to see Wrex get fully invested into everything.
Things between us were going really well. It'd been months now of our slowly but surely dating, and I couldn't have been happier. We saw each other every weekend, usually, just like we'd planned. And if we weren't feeling the weekend or wanted some time to ourselves, we made sure to communicate as such and opted for a quick lunch or a dinner during the work week instead. Or course, our sex life was still rampant and just as intoxicating as it always was. We sure as hell didn't need any sort of help in that department. It was nice being able to take things slow, to revel in having our own space. I was able to game with my online buddies again on the weekends that Wrex and I weren't spending time together, or doing a gaming session after work.
I was equally enjoying my alone timeandenjoying the time I spent with Wrex, which was only measured and doable because of the slow pace we were taking. Neither one of us were sleeping with anyone else, something we'd talked about ad nauseam and made sure to check in with each other that nothing had changed between us. Everything was aligning perfectly in my life.
Work was going great as well. ORBIT had tackled five separate Orb causes since the warehouse incident, attacking pertinent issues within the virces, ausserknoch, zoudd, tythwig, and eamesr communities. We were currently working on a growing issue concerning the lycanthe, which Francyn was all giddy about solving by any means necessary. ORBIT was going so well that we were gaining more support than we knew what to do with. So much so that I'd been approached by my boss for a very particular promotion that was slowly in the works. I hadn't talked about it with any of the board members yet, or Wrex, because I was still waiting to hear from Cassandra if I was getting the consideration I was banking on. But if I did get it and things did move forward, I had the potential to not only change things for Orb kind in D.C. I'd be able to change things for every Orb in thecountry.
