Ace arrived soon after and the
meeting commenced. Ace quickly recapped the progress of the project before
outlining his expected next steps. Work was assigned logically and quickly to
the team members. The next part of the competition was the real deal where we
would be presenting the commercial itself to the committee members. That meant
that we had to finalize the detailed version of the story board and then work
on planning the production of the commercial. Then the production team can take
over in the filming and editing of the commercial. After multiple rounds of editing
and reviews, we would get our commercial at along last.
It was always interesting and
exciting to see what I had dreamt of in my storyboard brought to life on screen
as a complete commercial. From all the commercials, only three will be selected
for public release. Then the winner will be decided based on a combination of
three factors: the donation amount, the committee’s judgement, and the public’s
opinion via poll.
All those three elements were hard
for us to influence. It was a fair game where the public gets to decide through
votes and donations which commercial appealed the most to them. Since we were
promoting the end of the dog meat trade and aiming to secure donations to
support the cause, it was no surprise that the donation figures would play a
significant role in determining the winner.
“Jeremy and Karina, I want you two
to work together on the detailed version of the storyboard. It needs to be
ready for the production team to fully understand what we want to see for each
scene in detail including the transitions. Script writing will also be
important, so please get in touch with that team as well,” Ace instructed.
“Yes,” Jeremy and I replied in
unison.
We turned to smile at each other as we both
looked forward to working closely together on this project. I was confident in
our skills, and I was sure that we would produce something great together.
…
Project Alpha was in full swing as
we all rushed towards our next deadline. That meant that I spent a lot of my
time at work with Jeremy as we both focused on polishing up and designing the
details of the storyboard. Putting the rough storyboard in place was difficult
work but working on all the details was even harder. Now it wasn’t about the
story we wanted to tell or how we wanted to tell it to the audience. We also
had to consider every single thing that would appear on the screen while
considering how it would actually be shot in production.
“I think the transition of this
scene to this one feels weird…” I said as my brows frowned.
“Yeah, I think so too…” Jeremy
agreed.
“I don’t know how to fix it,
though. It feels like it’s missing something and I’m not sure what. I’m not
even sure if adding a simple transition is enough or if we need to add a mini
scene of a couple of seconds to this…” I confessed honestly.
“What do you usually do when you
run out of ideas?” Jeremy asked as his eyes focused on my face.
Is this some kind of trick
question?
“Well, I’ll do some research. Look
for some references and things like that. What about you?” I asked in return.
“Same, except I’ve got a special
place where I look for references,” Jeremy said before he smiled brightly at
me.
“A special place? As in where?” I
asked curiously.
“It’s a secret!” Jeremy announced
before he started laughing loudly.
Somehow, I knew that he wouldn’t
share the secret to his success with me that easily. I watched as Jeremy
continued to laugh as I wondered where that secret place of his could be.
…
Since being paired up with Jeremy,
I didn’t spend much time at work with Ace. That didn’t bother me because not
having him around helped to keep my focus on my work. I was too busy with
Project Alpha that the only times that I saw Ace at the office was during our
team meetings. Apart from regular morning meetings, we started having meetings
towards the end of the day as well.
Sitting at the meeting table along
with my team members, I listened to my colleague presenting the progress of
their part of the work. Everything seemed to be progressing smoothly and I was
very confident with what we had cooking. The meeting came to its end and after
aligning on next steps for everyone, Ace excused himself. Many people stayed on
to discuss their work with their colleagues since everyone on the project were
all together in one place.
Suddenly, my phone vibrated. I
tried my best not to smile like a fool. This wasn’t the first time that he did,
so I knew that Ace had just sent me a text. The context of the text was always
the same and it always meant the same thing.
“Are you leaving already?” Jeremy
asked when I got up from my seat.
“Yeah. I think I’ll call it a day
today. I’ll see you tomorrow,” I replied before I smiled a little at him.
He waved at me before turning to
talk to someone else. I silently slipped out of the meeting room before making
my way to my next destination. The elevator ride up felt like it took longer
than normal because of my own impatience. Ace texted me whenever he had to work
late at the office and wanted my company. Usually, I spent time after working
hours in his office to keep him company in various of ways to compensate for
our lack of time together during official working hours.
“You don’t need to keep your voice down. It’s late, no one
else is here anymore,” Ace whispered seductively into my ear as he nibbled on
its lobe sending shivers of pleasure through my entire body.
I tried to stifle my moans by covering my mouth with the
palm of my hands as Ace lifted my body up onto his worktable in a sitting
position. Standing in between my widespread legs, Ace hands slowly unbuttons
the small pearl buttons of my rosy pink shirt before he bent his head down to
suck on the side of my neck seductively.
--To be continued…