Chapter 3

WHEN ALBERT FINALLY arrived at the pool area, he was greeted by the fifth of the hid sun and a near-drunk multitude of company workers. A lot of them were in the little gray area of not-yet-that-drunk-but-trying-to-act-sober drunk. On the left side were patches of men wooing the ladies in their swimwear; and on the right side were the ladies trying to look prude but are enjoying the attention inside. He didn’t like to be rooting for either side so he went straight to the rainbow-decorated bar.

"Mojito," he ordered. Then he proceeded to whisper to the bartender a soft, "toned down, please." The bartender nodded and headed to make his drink.

"Toned down? What are you, pregnant?" a voice from his rear mocked. 

Albert turned around in recognition. He spotted two familiar faces he doesn't hate.  

“VP! GD!”  

VP, the one rocking the bottle of Sputnik Rose-flavored vodka is an all-rounder butler. He takes orders from all the higher ups but is usually discreet in obeying them; perks of being a half-Russian. Unfortunately, the opposite is to be expected from his mouth. The one behind him was GD, drinking a cocktail with one of those umbrellas Phil Coulson hates. 

Why didn't I order that? Albert thought to himself. 

GD was the "Tony Stark" of the butlers. Although they only use that as a definition for his brain, and never on his personality.  

These two, including VV, are just some of the hundreds of company butlers of Alfred Ent. They have a really intricate system and divisions that Albert never bothered to remember, but they all serve one purpose and that is to obey the seated officials of the company 

One thing he’s certain about though, is that he missed spending time with this duo. 

"Actually, VP, if a woman is pregnant, she should drink 0% alcohol," GD remarked.

VP looked at him in disgust. Then looked back at Albert whilst wearing the same expression. 

"You should really listen to your babysitter John Laurens," Albert said with a straight face. 

"Who?" VP immediately replied in much confusion. 

Albert just segued, “I missed you both,” Albert expressed with genuinity on his face.

“I did, too,” VP replies as he finished the man-hug.

But as he hugged GD, the smart butler’s smile had a faint feeling of dread mixed in. Albert noticed this so his hug had a few back taps mixed in to assure that he’s okay.

VP unknowingly interrupted the moment, “You have to tell me all about the island life, bud. I have always dreamt of retiring in one of those uninterrupted places.”

“You do?”

“Yeah, but I probably won’t so maybe downsell the experience a bit so that I would stop daydreaming about it.”

“Maybe one of these days,” he tries to dodge the topic, “Anyway, what are you doing here boys? Don't you have some girls to philander?" Albert casually switches the subject.

VP sat down. "Not me. I'm not even going near one of them. The wife has a nose of one of those fookin' bloodhounds." VP shivered in his seat. He then proceeded to offer his flower-flavored liqueur. He always had an eccentric taste in beverages and even though Albert is open-minded about this, he declined this time.

"No thanks. I don't drink vodka," said Albert. 

VP shrugged and continued, "And GD here doesn't even know how to start a conversation without getting sweaty like a bodybuilder munching on chili peppers."

"That's an odd way to paint a picture," Albert commented.

"That is quite factual, actually; most of the attendees are manual laborers, marketing and other positions where the physique has more importance than the brain. The IT people have most likely decided they are not fit for these gatherings."  

"That's fine, kid. You're young, you're weird, chicas dig that," VP said as he took a sip from his bottle. "But since you've already opened that topic, I don't see that much from HR either," VP continued.

Albert replied, "I'm pretty sure they're stuck with the same reasons as the IT department." 

"Yeah, it would not be a good image for them if they are seen with less clothing than the number of their appendages," GD uttered with a straight face. 

"Lucky for the sleazes in the company, the secretary of the mayor is making up for that." VP pointed his drink towards a group of people at the edge of the pool. Amid the commotion, one figure stands out from the rest and is drawing all the attention of everyone like an eclipse to a very hot flame. 

The flame being Ana Esther, the secretary of Charles; her hair a very natural shade of black, her smile a thousand-karat dazzle and her body a caramel-colored treat for the eyes. Her yellow bikini leaves so little to the imagination yet all eyes fixated on her. Some indiscreetly, like those guys who were really wasting their time trying to get her attention; and some subtly, like Albert who steals a look while he took a sip of his Mojito. He was only planning on glancing but during this short amount of time, her eyes met his. His eyes stayed a little longer, so did hers.

"Shit," he muttered softly.

She took this look as an invitation, for Ana stood up from her position and sashayed towards the bar. She smiled and greeted a few people on her way. 

"Is she coming here?" VP suddenly panicked. 

"Yeah, she saw me staring at her so I guess we'll get an earful." Albert painted a sort of horrified expression in his face and made sure VP saw that. 

This terrified VP and he immediately got up and drove away from the bar. GD remarked, "Did he not know about her fascination with you?" 

"I guess not." Albert replied while he wiped the phony aghast expression on his face. His eyes still locked on the Latina in her two-piece. 

"I guess I better leave as well," GD said as he was about to stand up. 

"Stay," Albert commanded. So he did. 

They both took a deep breath. 

"Gentlemen," she greeted them both upon arriving. Albert ignored this but GD greeted her back. 

"M-ma'am." GD lowered his glances while stuttering. 

She moved closer to GD, lifted his chin and raised his head. "Please, call me Ana." 

GD raised his head but kept her focus of her eyes on the left. 

"Stop torturing the boy, Ana," Albert finally spoke with a hint of authority. 

She looked at him with a smirk on her face.  

Realizing what he said, Albert quickly added, "Oh please don't take th—".  

"Is someone getting a little jealous of the attention?" He was cut off before even finishing his sentence. Ana said this a bit louder which turned a bit of heads towards their direction. 

Defeated, Albert stood up and walked away casually. 

Ana watched him as she quickly produced a short "What?". 

GD smiled and remarked, still with his gaze focused not on her. "I thought you would have known this by now Ana, but he doesn't like people tricking him." 

Upon hearing this, she threw the look of confusion in her face and replaced it with a look of 'oops'.  

When the leering eyes went back to their usual business, Ana proceeded to follow him towards the end patio where there were less people traffic. He was sat there messing with his phone. As Ana slowly approached, she became weary of the look of nonchalance in his face. She stopped

"Come on, you can sit beside me," Albert said out of the blue. He looked at her and looked at the empty chair across him. 

"I'm really sorry about that," Ana gently spoke. 

"About what?" he asked. 

"About that thing I pulled. It's just everyone else is easy, I just have to exist for them to be head-over-heels for me. But you're just so difficult and I just wanted your attention. In any way I could've gotten it,” she sounded so genuine enough but Albert was still waiting for something. 

Seeing his dissatisfied face, she resumed, “I didn't know you were going to walk away. I'm really sorry," she confessed.

"There it is. As long as you admitted it, I’m okay with that." He raised his phone to show her that he recorded the confession and apology. He smirked. 

Ana was stunned, this time a different type.

"Pull something like that again and you know what'll happen." He let out a small but visible smile. Again, the tone had authority with it. Ana was a bit scared but wanted to push with it. Still, while he was putting his phone back, there was a brief moment of awkward silence. 

Then he started talking again. "Now that we're even, let's start again, shall we?"

Ana chuckled at how she was easily outsmarted. "If I would've known better, you were just leading me here to get me alone." 

Albert raised an eyebrow. "I thought you'd be happy. Wasn't that your goal since day one?" Naturally, Albert flirted back to her remarks in his own pace. But it's still unclear to Ana if he's interested. But this seem good enough for her for the time being so they continued talking.