Begin of e-mail = \~/

End of e-mail = /end\

Arthur's phone pinged in the middle of the meeting. His cheeks pinked when his father threw him a disapproving look to which Arthur immediately apologized. He pulled his phone out of his pocket to mute it completely, but did caught a glimpse of the name who had send him an e-mail and he had to try really hard to hide his smile.

Looking up, he saw his father's glare and he apologized once more as he was putting his phone back into his pocket. He was just glad that this meeting would soon come to an end., because he was honestly bored out of his mind. And not only that, his fingers were now also itching to see what kind of message Merlin had sent him this time; perhaps some real intellectual question, or maybe some dumb joke he had heard somewhere. Whatever it was, it would mostl likely make him smile broadly and giggle like a little girl.

"So, Arthur, don't forget; hospital visit tomorrow morning." Uther said as he gathered the papers on his desk and put them in a nice pile.

"Yes, father."

"And the opening of the new City Hall tomorrow afternoon."

"Yes, father. I won't forget."

Uther gave a short nod. "Good. And please, for the love of god, don't embarrass our name. You're still young, I understand that, but it's time you learn, Arthur."

"I'm twenty-four!"

"Arthur, don't talk back to me. If you want to be treated as a twenty-four year old, than I suggest you would start to act. like. it."

"Yes, father." Arthur mumbled back and moved out of the room. God, he couldn't stand that man sometimes, well most of the times. At least his mother was there most of the times to keep his father in check, but she was away for a state visit this week.

But, hey, at least he was done with that meeting now, and he could not wait to see what Merlin had sent him. He just had to wait a little longer until he was actually inside his room. He just couldn't let anyone know that he was talking to Merlin. If his father would find out he'd get a fit, for sure. He cocked his head at that thought, thinking; well at least something good would come from it then. He snickered and shook his head in a playful manner. At least these weren't the middle ages anymore and he couldn't be sentenced to death for such treasonous thoughts.

It was weird to think he had gotten such a good relation with this one guy he met on Omegle at a lazy and boring Sunday afternoon, some roughly five weeks ago. Arthur could still recall that specific afternoon. They were both at the chat function (because Arthur could honestly not appear in the video-chat part of the site. If word were to come out that the Crown Prince of England was chatting with strangers on camera, than the paparazzi would have a field day).

He'd been looking for a normal, non-creepy, conversation partner that afternoon, but all he'd gotten were messages like: 'ASL?', and honestly that wasn't the kind of conversation he wanted that day (and yes, he'd realized later that day that Omegle probably wasn't the best place when looking for a normal conversation).

He had been pressing [Stop] and [Really?] for nearly fifteen times in a row, and had pretty much given up hope in find a non-wanking, non-sexual person, but then - then he stumbled upon Merlin who had immediatel started to write upon connecting: 'Hope you're not some perv, because honestly, click away now. I'm just waiting for my croissants to bake and so I'm looking for some random conversation partner while waiting. Don't know if you're the one?'

Arthur had smiled at the total randomness of that message and didn't know when he'd even began to reply, but somehow his fingers had typed a reply and pressed [Enter] before his mind had even registered that. And before he knew it he was drawn into the conversation with a complete stranger for nearly an hour and a half.

Time had been flying by, but Arthur felt good talking to this person. It felt freeing to talk (alright type) with someone who didn't know he was the Crown Prince, but after those one and a half hours, Arthur had been none the wiser what his conversation partner's name was. He'd gotten an age (24), an occupation (baker) and a gender (male), but no name. So he made a brave move and asked it.

There had been a few seconds of silence and Arthur really thought he'd scared the guy away, but after ten seconds there was an answer: Merlin.

Arthur replied with his own first name, because that was the least he could give Merlin besides his age. He had already lied about his occupation and told Merlin that he was working in management at some big company his father was the boss of. He hadn't been totally lying, per se, but he had been hiding the truth that this big company was named: The United Kingdom.

Two hours (and a batch of burnt croissants) later, Merlin had asked him if he was interested in continuing the conversation via mail and Arthur had to think long and hard about that, but finally agreed to it. He gave Merlin an alternative e-mail address of his that almost no one knew off besides his closest friends.

And that's how their friendship grew more and more over the weeks. He learnt little traits from Merlin and what his everyday life looked like, and who his friends were. And he liked the random photos of cakes or sweets or any other type of random thing Merlin sometimes sent with his e-mails. They never showed his face, or his friends' faces, and Arthur was okay with that. He'd rather not sent Merlin any pictures of himself either, mostly because he would not give Merlin the feeling that he'd been lied to all along.

But Arthur had a secret of his own; he actually knew what Merlin looked like.

Arthur opened to door to his room and pulled his phone out of his pocket before flopping down onto his king's size bed. He unlocked the screen as soon as he was in a comfortable position and his smile was instantly back on his face. It grew even more when he saw that Merlin had sent two e-mails.

Arthur clicked the earliest e-mail.

\~/

From: m_emrys
Sent: 12:04

Hey, sorry for not saying good morning to you this morning. I had a crisis back at the bakery.

There was some stray cat that had gotten into my bakery (at least, I think it was a stray anyways, because if it wasn't than the owners of the cat have some serious outrageous cat with no manners on their hands!). Anyways, it had gotten into the storage room and had put its claws into a bag of flower, ripping it open. Jfc! There were floury cat paws… EVERYWHERE. Just kill me now.

The culprit was long gone when I found out of course, figures. I've only found some floury cat paw prints leading to a hole in the wall close to the door, so I had called a carpenter to see if he could fix it today. Still have to hear back from him about what time he'll come by. Grr, I hate waiting.

It's the tragic life of a baker, I tell you!

But at least I have some wonderful staff that helped me cleaning up… and that at five in the morning. So please help to remind me that I have a huge thank you to give to Gwen and Freya. Not to Will, that lazy sod just clicked my call away! No cream puffs for him today!

But, anyways, after all this rambling, I just want say what I've wanted to say from the start of this message:
Good morning (although it's now 12:03, so I guess good afternoon as well).

- M

/end\

Arthur could already imagine a frustrated Merlin going on a cat hunt, and then not being able to find the damn thing.

He couldn't wait to see what the second message was about and he quickly opened it.

\~/

From: m_emrys
Sent: 12:43

Attachment: cup cake

Also, I have a new bakery joke. Well, perhaps not a joke per se, but I thought it was hilarious. Because, well, I'm hilarious.

See attachment.

- M

PS. I might need some more sleep. Might.

/end\

Arthur clicked the picture in the attachment and when it was fully loaded he nearly had to face-palm himself by the sheer stupidity of the picture, but at the same time it was sooo Merlin. He just couldn't help but grin at it.

The picture was taken in the back of Merlin's bakery; he'd recognized that place from the numerous pictures Merlin had sent him (which Arthur saved in a specially created folder). This time it was a picture of a bare sheet cake with a cup on top of it.

There was a comment typed at the top of the picture: Now this is what I call a cup cake!

Still smiling, Arthur opened a new e-mail and began typing.

\~/

To: m_emrys

Nooo, don't go to sleep. People want your pastries!

And at least the cat-crisis is averted right now, at least if the carpenter comes by today. If he doesn't, than perhaps you can tape some cardboard in front of the hole? Don't know if it'll work or that the cat will just claw right through it, I'm not that much of a handy man... nor having the ability to think like a cat.

And how will you thank the girls? Maybe give them a personal message on a brownie or something?

- A

PS. Good morning/afternoon to you too.

/end\

Arthur clicked [Send].

He then opened another webpage and went to his personal bookmarks to click the one he'd saved as 'Emrys Bakery' some three weeks ago. He had found the site after looking on the internet if he could find the bakery Merlin owned and he got the right one after only two hits. Mainly because he thought the word emrys in Merlin's e-mailaddress could have possible be Merlin's surname.

He sighed almost love-struck when the page had loaded completely and he could see Merlin's picture. He was dressed in a black baker's uniform and a comment below that said; Merlin Emrys, owner and head baker at Emrys Bakery.

And dammit, Merlin was completely his type with his slender body, shocking blue eyes that had a gentleness in them, and then there was that dark unruly mop of black hair.

Hngh! He was screwed and he knew it.