The next day, I was so excited and nervous at the same time. I wore one of my smosh shirts and a pair of nicer jeans today. Nobody normally sees me, so I'm fine to wear pretty much whatever I want, as long as I don't end up looking like I'm from the Jersey Shore. I was excited because of winning the contest, and nervous because Nicholas always gets to work before me to feed the sharks and probably everyone already knows. Great. I took Seumas for a quick walk before driving to work. Once I got to work, Nicholas was standing on the sidewalk behind my parking spot, a huge grin on his face. I was suspicious. Very suspicious. Nothing good could come from this. I got out and locked the door.
"What's this all about?"
He smiled even wider. "You won! I wanted to give you a warm welcome/goodbye." He ran up and gave me a rib-crushing hug. "Congrad-u-lamations, Caitie!"
I coughed. My head was being crushed into his chest, him being 6'and me at a decent 5'5. He's one of the only friends of mine that's taller than me. "Can I be released, please?" I croaked out.
"A little more. You love it."
"Just let me go." He did. "Can we go to work, now?"
"Okay." We walked out from the parking lot, talking about the contest. He was just as excited about it as I was. We talked about how I would have to take vacation days.
"The boss already loves you, just ask and he'll do it." He winked.
"I hate you so much."
"You love me."
"Mmhmm. Suuurrrre." We finally got to the zoo's entry. My boss was standing there.
"Hello, Miss Renne. Nicholas."
"Hello." Nicholas said cheerily.
"Hi." I didn't want to to talk to him.
"I heard you won, Caitlin. Good job!"
Nicholas elbowed me. "Um, thanks. I wanted to talk to you... would it be possible for me to-"
"Be off? Of course! I know how much you wanted to win. Why, you never shut up about it!"
Do I have to talk to him anymore? Seriously. He kept staring at me and it was creeping me out majorly. I pretended to be grateful. "Thank you so much! I don't know exactly when, is that okay?"
"Yeah, sure."
"Awesome!" I was actually happy now. I almost hugged him before registering the Oh wait, he's my creep of a boss.
The rest of the day, nothing really happened. I was anxious to get home to call Joven again. Oops, sorry Joshua again.
*
*
*
After the long drive home, I took Seumas out and quickly called Joshua.
Ring.
Ring.
After only two rings, he picked up.
"Hello."
"Hi. It's Caitlin again."
"Oh hey!" He paused and called away from the phone, "It's the contest girl." A mumble from afar. "Shut up Lasercorn! Just because Iancorn didn't work out, doesn't mean anything!" I stifled a laugh.
"Um, should I call back later..?"
"No!" He said quickly. Um, awkward much? "I mean, no. What's going on?"
"I wanted to know when I'm flying down."
"What time works for you?"
"My boss is really.." Creepy. Egotistical. "Easygoing. He said I can go whenever just not in July, which is our biggest season." It's late May now.
