CEO's Contract Obsession-Chapter 159: Wasted a Week

"Thanks for waiting," Mary who is now fully prepared to face the outside world after taking a bath, putting on her best clothes, and wearing some make-up finally faced Anton in a good and refreshed mood.

"Y-You look lovely," his jaw almost dropped and Anton stammered upon seeing Mary who was completely different from the woman he saw this morning and the woman he usually see in the office.

Mary is wearing a baby blue bodycon dress with a thin string strap. She usually wears slacks at work and loose formal wear so this is the first time that Anton is seeing her in a skin-tight attire.

"Thanks... Are you ready to go?" Mary teased after seeing Anton’s perplexed look as he look at her from head to toe.

"Y-Yeah, sure, let’s go."

They agreed to go to an art gallery to entertain Mary and to stop her from stressing about the delay in their projects. This way Anton can also muster his courage when he talks to her.

They arrived in the gallery early so there were not many people yet, but that didn’t encourage Anton to say what he needed to say.

"I suppose you like arts, Anton?" Mary asked as they browse through the displayed paintings.

"Yes, I actually took Fine Arts in college at first until my parents caught me. They wanted me to study anything related to business and not arts."

"I can understand that. So is that why you became friends with Henry?"

"Yes. I am actually older than Henry and Rei. I was already in my second year in arts when I switched to business management," Anton explained before they stopped in front of a huge floor-to-ceiling painting and sat on the bench in front of it.

"Does it mean that you are good at drawing?"

"I can say yes, I was, I haven’t tried to draw ever since I dropped my course. But it doesn’t mean I stopped appreciating art. I now collect exquisite pieces of paintings that catches my attention." Anton said with a sigh as he crossed his arms and pointed to the painting in front of them.

He added, "What do you think of that piece?"

"It’s beautiful but it’s too big."

"Is there any piece here that you found interesting?" Anton asked Mary who pointed to a painting on their left side.

"I like that one," it was an acrylic painting of 4 children playing on a stream. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮

"Why that?" Anton didn’t find that painting to be of high quality, plus the painter is not well-known and he is used to buying expensive art pieces.

"It reminds me of when me, Amy, Ash, and Amy’s brother when we were young. Remember the stream on the farm? The four of us always play there. That painting reminds me of the time when we were happy, not having any single problem in the world," Mary uttered.

Anton looked at one of the curators who nodded at him.

"You four seem to be really close huh?"

"Yes we are, or at least when we were young. Until Ash betrayed us. But a part of me doesn’t want to blame him. Some people just can’t control their heart and it makes them do things that even them doesn’t want to."

"How about your heart? What does it want?"

Mary was rendered speechless as she look at Anton. ’What does he mean?’ She asked herself.

"Mary, perhaps you are thinking that I am not serious with you. The last few days you were so busy and I can see how tired you are at the end of each day so I tried to hold off my feelings. But I can’t anymore, the more time I spend with you, the more I want you to be mine. Do you understand what I am trying to say here?"

Mary just blinked as she stares at him not finding the right words to say.

Anton held both her hands and said, "I am afraid that if I push myself to you, you’ll pull away from my hold. You said you like me too, but I am finding it hard to ask for a little time from you."

Anton then let go of her hands and rubbed his temples as he thinks of the right words to say.

"What I am trying to say here is, I want to be part of your life. I want to get to know more about you. I want you to give me some of your time and not work all the time. I want your commitment, Mary, can you do that?"

"O-Okay..." Mary nodded. Anton pulled back a little trying to gauge Mary but felt nothing, her face was blank.

"Okay? What do you mean okay?" Anton asked impatiently. He feels that his chest is starting to constrict with the anticipation.

The past week feels like hell for him. Mary had told him that she likes him too but whenever he talks to her at work or send her a message at night, she was always busy or already sleeping. He doesn’t know where to stand. He doesn’t know if she is avoiding him or not.

"Okay, I will compromise," Mary put her hand on her chest and released the breath that she was holding.

Anton stared at her in confusion.

"You know, I thought you were going to say that you realized that you don’t really like me," Mary exclaimed.

"What are you talking about?" Anton is now more confused than ever.

"You see it was just a misunderstanding. I was waiting for you to ask me out. You kissed me and you said you liked me but nothing followed. So what do you think I will think?"

"Oh, is that it? Well, I thought you were avoiding me."

"No, I was not. I was staying late at work trying to wait for you, that maybe after work, you will ask me out. Maybe dinner or a walk in the park. You know, the normal things that dating people do. And you are really bad at timing. Whenever you approach me, it’s either I am on my way to do an errand or on my way to speak with someone."

"Oh my God! So you mean to say that all this time we are just waiting for each other to ask each other out?" Anton trilled as he scratch his head with both hands.

"Yup..." Mary said as she pursed her lips into a thin line and nodded.

Soon they found themselves laughing at each other after they realized that they just wasted a week waiting for nothing at all.