Masked

VII.

Surprise, surprise! Who would've thought I'd update on a Wednesday? (Certainly not me, but oh well.) And look - a picture of a tatooed Lara, which is my guilty pleasure. 

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I immediately rushed to my father's desk, Lara was following close behind. Jonah, on the other hand instantly started searching in the book shelves and drawers. I sat down and started the computer. Logging in wasn't a problem as well, as father had provided me with his passwords in case I needed to look up information for an employee by myself when he wasn't within reach.

"I must say, I'm surprised that this office is almost as big as the office of my dad", Lara started while watching me opening the programs for filtering out information.

"To be honest I don't even know what exactly my father keeps in here either", I answered and then looked at Lara.

"While I'm working here, maybe you can help Jonah search. I'm not sure where father stores his material about all current projects."

Lara nodded and went over to Jonah. In the meantime, he was busy with something else.

"Oh, look what I found. Lara, come and take look at this."

I was so concentrated on trying to figure out how to filter out the right material about the Maya relicts, that I first didn't notice both of them muttering something, and that while sounding quite amused. I only noticed when I heard Lara's light chuckle.

"Oh dear, that reminds me of my own graduation."

My head shot up from the computer screen.

"What are you both do- "

I couldn't speak further when I saw what the two were looking at. I instantly knew what it was: A picture taken of me and my whole family on the day of my university graduation. I've seen that picture countless of times, father had placed it on one of the drawers standing around.

"That's a big family", I heard Jonah mutter.

I couldn't help but to just smile at them.

"Yeah, my family sure is huge. But most of them don't live here, so it was a big event when they came for my graduation."

"They don't?", Lara asked.

"Nope. Most of them live in Ireland – my mother's side, if you want to know. We don't see each other often, probably three, four times a year. ... And maybe that's a good thing – they're just stereotypical Irish folk. Loud, happy people that don't give a damn about strictness. I love them dearly, but they can be a handful."

I couldn't help but laugh to myself when I remembered what bizarre things my parents and I experienced with them. I looked at Jonah and Lara, and instantly noticed the light frown on the face of the brunette archaeologist. I thought it would be the best to change the topic.

"If you want, I can tell you both about them next time. But right now we should keep on searching for clues about the Maya."

"Already on it", Jonah answered and set down the picture again. Lara just looked at me and gave me an almost unnoticeable smile, silently thanking me. I returned the gesture before I set my focus back to the computer screen. Not even five minutes later, I finally found what we were looking for.

"Guys, I think I got the information we need."

Almost instantly, both of them joined me and stared at the desktop, full of expectation.

"Take a look at this."

Quickly, I showed them the virtual document and zoomed in to be able to read it a bit better.