SERENDIPITY
TWENTY-EIGHT
After Taylor had called and 'convinced' Gabriella to come for the shift, there was little time remaining before they'd have to get ready. Gabriella had a momentary freak out that she didn't have any work appropriate clothes with her, but Troy assured her that a pair of jeans and a top would be perfectly appropriate – they were just a call centre after all, and the usual dress code was more casual than a usual office. The only reason for a dress code at all was to maintain the sense that they were in a work environment. He too dressed down for the occasion, wearing a pair of jeans and a navy blue knit.
When they arrived, Anita was over the moon. They feigned that they'd just so happened to drive in at the same time and Anita didn't bat an eye. She took fifteen minutes to get Gabriella settled in, having her log onto the computer beside Troy's usual one, going over some basic protocols and getting her set up with access to their support team e-mail account. Troy assured Anita that he would take care of the rest. Before walking out the door she went through a few of the procedures that Troy would be in charge of ensuring were followed. He was quick to shoo her out the door, and then to turn back to Gabriella with a smile on his face.
"Just you and I, babe."
Gabriella had a slight panicked look on her face. "Okay um... what do we do? How... I'm... what if... did they give you a handover just then? I feel like you didn't get given much of a handover. It's just you and I here, you and I in charge of all of the United States of America and I feel like it's really just you because I..."
"Gabriella," Troy interrupted her. "We get an e-mail handover from team to team, just like you send through to us. So the day shift guys today each did a handover report which we can access. While Anita was setting up your access, I've already read through. It's dead. Your clients aren't in the office, they're out celebrating Christmas. You and I being here is honestly just a formality. They don't actually even have a lab tech on duty – just one on-call, 'just in case.'"
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure. We may get an occasional call, more likely from Inspire staff calling in with pay queries and other boring shit. Relax. Let's put on some music."
Troy was right. In six hours, Gabriella answered the phone four times – although granted, Troy answered the phone the majority of the time. Two of the calls were just inquiring about their holiday hours, one was someone wanting to reschedule an appointment they had in one of the branches the following week, and another was a pay query from one of the contractors.
They spent their evening talking and laughing, joking and teasing. The pizza which Anita had ordered for them arrived at 8pm, and it was double the amount of food which the two of them could eat, which was fine by Troy because he planned on taking home the left overs. Gabriella was about to start trying to work on a report which she had due over the coming weeks but Troy shut down the behaviour straight away, distracting her with light, playful kisses.
Had the night been with anyone but each other, it would have dragged, but they were both still in the completely enraptured with each other phase whereby any time spent in the presence of the other was time well spent. Anita had left Troy with a few random chores that needed to be done, including taking out garbage since no cleaners would be in the next day and they didn't want to cause a pest problem. Gabriella took control of these, feeling a little guilty that they were actually paying her to hang out with her boyfriend. As it approached midnight, Troy began to take care of the business end of things – including making sure that the voicemail had been changed, to indicate that they were closed until 6am Monday morning, that he'd set up the 'out of office' e-mail reply for the official support team e-mail account.
He was all set and ready to go, and at precisely 11:59pm he put the out of office e-mail on to both the official account as well as his own e-mail address; and then dialled in to divert the phones. He turned back to Gabriella with a gleeful look on his face.
"That was pretty cool! I feel kind of... powerful," he mused.
Gabriella, on the other hand, was distracted by something else altogether. She rolled over in her chair to sit right beside him and leaned over.
"Hey Troy?" she said lowly.
"Yeah?"
"It's after midnight. Merry Christmas."
His lips curved into a smile. Without a doubt, it was the best Christmas ever. He gave her a soft, gentle kiss, before responding to her greeting lowly. "Merry Christmas to you as well."
Her index finger landed on his chest randomly, trailing up and down.
"I think I wanna unwrap my present now. Do I have to wait until morning?" Gabriella asked throatily.
Troy swallowed. "Mmm... how about... how about you wait 'til we get home. If you can be patient and wait until we get home, then you can unwrap it tonight..." He trailed off, and then added lowly, cockily, "and then play with it again in the morning too?"
She smiled. "What are we waiting for then?"
They were waiting for nothing, as far as Troy was concerned. He zoomed around, flicking off the lights, gathering their food and practically dragged her out. He locked the building – again taking a moment to enjoy that he'd been vested with the responsibility of locking an office which was almost never closed for business – and then turned to her.
"Can you carry this?" he asked, gesturing to the pizza box and bag in which he'd placed the smaller box with garlic bread, cheese sticks and a half consumed bottle of soda.
She obliged, taking the items from him, assuming he needed his hands free to do something related to locking the building – and instead, found herself being swept up into his arms, and let out a shriek. He was carrying her bridal style, a grin upon his face.
"Troy!" she shrieked.
"Okay. Time to go. Let's see if I can break my record to get home."
She giggled all the way down to his car, where he had to reluctantly set her down so he could unlock the car and get her safely inside.
"Hey Troy?" Gabriella said softly as they were headed south on the interstate.
"Yeah?"
"I feel bad that I didn't get you a proper Christmas present..."
"I didn't get you one either. And I don't need one, babe. Seriously, it's cliché but... having you here..."
"Is better than any present?"
He nodded. "Exactly."
"I feel the same."
"If you like, I probably have some ribbon, we could uh... be creative?"
Gabriella burst into giggles, her brain being filled by awesome imagery.
"I have no intention upon putting any extra... wrapping... around my present this Christmas. The goal is to remove the wrapping, not add more," she said, smiling as her hand rubbed on his right thigh.
He groaned, and pressed his foot down on the accelerator. "How fast does this thing go?"
