Love and Beasts

Chapter 39

"The manager is calling you." Rebecca told Izabela. The girl eyed her friend suspiciously and asked "Did he mention what for?" "Unfortunately no. But when I was leaving the office there was some guy around your age entering inside there. He definitely isn't from our company nor have I ever seen him make any visits here. But know this - I've never ever, in my life, have seen someone as unique as him." Izabela hearing this thought about it a bit and remembered. "Ahh! Recently I heard our company was looking for new workers that would take some free now positions. Maybe he's a new hire?" "Probably. Either way you better go now because I'm sure that Mr Oliver has other matters to tend to." After that Izabela thanked Rebecca for her information and did as she was told. She soon found herself by office door and knocked gently on them. After receiving a short 'Come in' she entered inside and realized that Rebecca was right.

Next to her manager stood a young man. He was slim, rather petite for a man. He was around the same height as the girl. Maybe a few centimeters taller, which made her wonder about his age. What really caught her eye though was his nearly white skin and practically white hair. When he turned in her direction she noticed that he had heterochromatic eyes: his left one was brown, and his right one - blue. But despite their beautiful light colors, these eyes seemed to be hollow, full of void. His hair was short, wavy and at the same time, smooth. He had it combed to the side, making it look neat and suitable for work. He was wearing at the moment a dark blue suit with white shirt and red tie. He looked rather young, probably due to his baby face that made him look like a high schooler and the flawless handsome face he had.

When she approached them, both men looked in her direction. The new person seemed to have a face of both sadness and relief seeing her, which surprised her. But nevertheless she shook it off and raised her hand in his direction, having a genuine smile on her face. "My name is Izabela Steinberg. Nice to meet you, sir?" "Jacques Leere. The pleasure is mine, miss." He said with a small smile. "I can see that you two have familiarized with each other. Steinberg, he's our new office worker which you probably figured out already. I would like you to take care of our trainee, because I know that I can entrust you to this. And here are the documents Rebecca was supposed to give you but I forgot about it." Mr Smith said, giving her in the same time a few piles of documents. The girl took it and said she will take care of them. "Well then off you two." He said, opening the door for them. They said their goodbyes and went in direction of the office.

Izabela was leading the way, and the male obediently followed behind her. It was really quiet, but none of them felt uncomfortable in it or awkward. But since they were going to become coworkers, the girl didn't want to make the new guy feel out of place. "So Jacques, was it?" She said, trying to start any form of conversation. The guy suddenly seemed to be dragged back to reality by her words, as he was left with his thoughts on his own a while ago. "Yes, but since many people have problem with saying and even writing it, I don't mind if I'm being called 'Jack'. You can also call me that, miss?" "Since you allowed me to call you by your first name, you can drop the formalities with me, Jack. You can call me Izabela or Iza in short." "Wouldn't that be unprofessional though? I don't mean to be rude or disrespectful." He said with a flustered face. The girl smiled to him while laughing warmly. "Don't worry Jack. I actually prefer when people in office call me by this name, because I'm rather younger than the rest of the office." "Could it be you're 20 years old?" "22 actually. But you were close." "Then you're right. You're really young, to be honest. But if you're the teamleader, then I'm sure Mr Smith had good reasons for nominating you to this position." "Thank you, you're flattering me."

After a moment of enjoyable silence Izabela remembered something. "Hey Jack?" "Yes?" "How old are you? I don't want to be pushy but I'm curious, since you look really young in my opinion." The man then laughed awkwardly, as if hoping he wouldn't be asked this question by anyone. "Promise you won't laugh?" "Why would I? To me age isn't a cause to laugh at someone." The man then scratched the back of his neck awkwardly, but eventually sighed in defeat. "I'm 32." When he said that, he looked at the girl and saw her with a shocked expression on her face. "You're kidding me, right?" She asked, unable to believe that a man that looks like an 18 year old teenager is actually a full fledged adult. "No, I would never joke about my age like that."