My Secretary *On Hold* [TomTord/TordTom]

~Chapter 8~

It had been a few minutes of awkward silence as the two walked down an almost deserted hallway. Every once in a while, another soldier would walk past and wave at Pat, but otherwise, it was just the two awkwardly walking towards where Tom assumed the cafeteria was. Because Tom had no idea where he was going and had proceeded to make multiple wrong turns, Pat had taken the lead, though he still stood beside Tom even though he was a higher ranking than Tom currently was. Sure, Tom did the same when he was with his soldiers, but he never expected someone so close to Red Leader would do the same considering the show Red clearly liked to put on when he is walking through the halls.

Tom sighed as the awkwardness was starting to get to him. "So..." Tom glanced over at the man walking beside him and got a better look at him. First, he took notice of the badge sitting on the left side of his chest that read, "Patryck" in clear letters. Then he took a closer look at Patryck's hair. It actually looked a lot like chicken wings. Huh. I wonder if he styles his hair like that on purpose. Apparently, Tom had said his thoughts out loud because Pat looked over at him with a questioning confused expression.

"What?"

"Oh. Well, I was just wondering if you purposely style your hair that way or if it's just natural."

"It's natural. I can't do much about it, so I let it do its thing. Would you mind if I asked about your eyes?"

"Well, might as well since almost everyone does at one point." Before Pat could continue, Tom interrupted and answered any question that Pat might have. "No, I am not wearing contacts. Yes, these are my real eyes, and yes, I was born with them. I got them from my mom's side of the family and my hair from my dad's. Does that answer everything?" Pat nodded. "Good. So... what do you want to talk about now 'cause silence just isn't doing it for me."

"Um... so why are you so intent on pissing Tor- I mean Red Leader off?"

"Wait. Were you just about to say Red's real name?"
"No..." Pat avoided Tom's gaze causing Tom to know that Patryck was lying to him immediately.

"Wow, that so doesn't sound like you are lying to me." Tom's eyes narrowed, then he sighed and shrugged. "You know what? I'll find out at some point so might as well answer your original question. Why do I really want to piss Red off? Hmm, well. I don't know... maybe it would be because he kidnapped my soldiers and me. Or maybe I just want to be troublesome so that he can realize his mistake. Besides, I'm not the one that he would really want. I'm not that important anyway..." Tom's expression dropped from being sassy and sarcastic to show his profound sadness, but the weakness in he had shown vanished almost instantly making Pat question whether it was there at all. "Anyway, let's get back to the topic at hand! Hey... we haven't formally met. Sure, you have seen parts of me that shouldn't be known to most of the world, but that isn't important. Heya, Patryck. The name's Tom. Please don't call me anything else."

"Okay? Well, my full name is Patryck, but I prefer if everyone called me Pat so do that and I'll follow your name rules. If you don't mind me asking, is there a reason behind all of that?"

"Just past reasons... nothing for you to dwell on. That and how Matt always liked to call me Tim or something like that. He knows how much I hate him doing it so he only really does it on a bad day but still. I'd prefer it if everyone called me Tom. I don't want to go back to that whole mess... Anyway, how close are we to the cafeteria?"

"We're almost there. Once again, if you don't my questions, who's Matt?"

"Oh, Matt is just a friend of mine. Not super close or anything and we are more of acquaintances at most. I mean if he can't ever get my name right that would make sense, right?" Tom's words got more desperate, the more he continued talking. He knew that he shouldn't have revealed Matt's name, but clearly Pat didn't know anything about him. And even if he did, Tom could say that it was a different Matt. It totally made sense in Tom's mind, but Pat could clearly tell that this topic was making Tom flustered. He didn't know why, but they were too close to the lunchroom to find out.