10 The Projects

Meredith spent all day Monday with Karen in the meeting room with their laptops going over the ad campaign and adjusting and perfecting their designs. Mr. Hubert kept walking up to the glass window and just watching them without coming in. They knew he was anxious when he kept pulling out his mustache comb and running it through his mustache over and over. It just added to the creepy effect he was creating, which wasn't helpful to their concentration.

"Even if they don't see this as amazing I'm proud of what we have going here. It truly is amazing." Karen told Meredith as they looked at the preview on the screen. "Choosing to go with the more risky font without a backup is a bit of a gamble but it allows us time to perfect it rather than split between two projects essentially."

"Exactly. Mr. Hubert wants us to wow them and we aren't going to do that by playing safe." Meredith clicked a couple of things on the screen then they both decided what to focus on each for the rest of the day and would regroup in the morning.

The next day Meredith woke up in a start on the loveseat in her living room with a terrible crick in her neck. She groggily got up only to land her foot in a half eaten noodle cup from the previous night. Kicking it across the wood floor she slipped and fell in it and was covered in noodles and rehydrated vegetables. She found her phone and looked at the time only to frown. She was going to be late again.

Meredith jumped in the shower and washed the noodles and vegetables out of her hair and did her best to towel it as dry as possible before throwing on a pair of slacks and a short sleeve blouse, grabbing her jacket and bag and rushing out to work.

She rounded the corner and nearly crashed into a man again as he was closing the door to a town car.

"Oh my god. I'm so sorry. Sean was it?" She remembered him from before when she had collided into him. Sean, one of the David's drivers.

"Yes. I don't remember giving you my name. Did you inquire about me?" He asked with raised eyebrows.

"No. Mr. Maxwell called you that." Meredith told him and they both looked at Mr. Maxwell's expensive back as he entered the office building and disappeared.

"Oh. I guess he did." Sean chuckled nervously. "You are probably running late, considering your rush. I'm sorry if I'm holding you up."

"No, no. It's my fault for almost smashing into you again." Meredith blushed and turned to leave.

"Oh wait." He handed her a card. "If you're ever running late and I can assist."

"Thank you." Meredith took the card and turned even redder. "I wouldn't want to get you in trouble with the boss." She chuckled, waved goodbye, and entered the building while searching for her badge.

"Are we still on for Saturday?" Ben asked as she approached the scanner.

"We sure are!" Meredith grinned at him looking forward to it and glad Taylor had pushed her into the dating life again. "I'm running late. Text me." She called over her shoulder and headed into the elevator to her floor.

*****

Meredith and Karen had made great progress and were sure to finish up Wednesday. Meredith knocked on Mr. Hubert's door to let him know and he quickly put his mustache comb in his pocket and straightened his sweater vest.

"Come in." He told her.

"Mr. Hubert, I wanted to give you an update on the project Karen and I are working on for Edward Maxwell's office."

"Yes? How's it coming? Will you have the revisions done on time? We really need to knock this one out of the park. You're my Babe… Ruth on this one." He sneered at his inuendo thinking it was clever and Meredith found it a stretch.

"Actually we should be done tomorrow and I wanted to have a meeting with you on Thursday to get your ideas on any possible last minute changes before Friday."

"Perfect. Have Greg set up the meeting times and prep the prints. He wont be going to the thirtty-fifth floor for the meeting with you but he needs to get your presentation prepped. Make sure to double check his work just in case."

"Yes, sir."

"Good work. You and KAren get some rest tonight and finish up tomorrow then. We'll go over it on Thursday like you have planned."

"Of course, sir. Good night."

"Good night."

Meredith closed out her station and put her things away for the day and headed to Grant Park to meet with Jordan. She found him near the memorial fountain. He was wearing a short sleeve button up white shirt and khaki shorts with sandals. He had a photography bag over his shoulder and was fiddling with his drone when she found him sitting off to the side.

"Hey, Jordan." She said as she approached.

"Hey Luv! I'm glad you made it." He responded and stood up and gave her a big hug and a kiss on the cheek taking her by surprise.

"I'm sorry I came straight from work I didn't have time to change."

"Oh my apologies I forget what odd hours lab workers can keep. Not everyone is on my time schedule." He chuckeled lightly.

"So what's this project of yours?"

"I wanted to capture the different parks of downtown Chicago from odd unusual angles and see if I can prepare an show to be on exhibit at the phototgraphy musuem."

"Oh! I've actually never been to the photography museum."

"It's pretty amazing you should check it out."

"Maybe you can take me to your exhibit." She smirked at him.

"Maybe." He smirked back. She noticed in the sunlight his facial features were a lot more angular than she had originally noticed. It made him look a little older and more his age which was six years older than her. But she didn't mind, she was enjoying herself for once.

"So how does this all work?"

"Well this is the controls for the drone and these control the camera here. I have special lenses I can attach to change the effect but I can also do that in post production. See like this here."

"Oh that's cool." Meredith was surprised at how cool drone photography actually was. And while she didn't have the time personally to learn it all herself, it was very fascinating.

Meredith and Jordan walked around the park and he flew the drone around. Under and over and through trees and fixtures taking pictures at all sorts of angles. Two hours had already passed and the light had long dimmed. Jordan had gotten a few more pictures in the dimmed lighting and then they both agreed on Gino's for dinner.

At Gino's Meredith and Jordan opted to sit at the bar to avoid the long wait time and found two open stools towards the end of the bar. They ordered some beers and a pizza to share.

"You're really good at photography. You could be a professional." Meredith said to Jordan after their order ws in.

"Thank you. It's just a hobby. But I am very passionate about it. I think I'm too lazy to be a professional photographer. I would want to be my own boss so I can decide my own projects and what to work on but that takes too much work to freelance or go independent like that."

"But isn't the chemistry lab a lot of work."

"Yes and no. Mostly you have a set of specific assignments and experiements to do so there isn't a ton of thinking most of the time. Just repetative note taking and conducting something or another. The difficult part comes in putting it altogether and making meaning of it but we generally work together with that and it's rather scientific so it follows a set of rules. I can be lazy and let someone or something guide me in work. I don't want to go out and try and get together clients and rely on that as a living."

"I see your point. So what other hobbies do you have."

"I like to upcycle, you know take something and find a new use for it. And I love rubix cubes. I have a bit of a cube collection at home."

"Oh wow. Nice! I don't have any kind of collection really. Well…"

"What? Tell me?"

"I collect and shape origami. It's a secret hobby of mine."

"That's really cool. I heard there was an exhibit coming to the art musuem soon. That would be cool. I keep up on the exhibits in case they show case any photography I like to go and get inspiration."

"Oh yeah. Me too. Sometimes I just walk around and soak it all in to get inspiration for my work designs. Meredith and Jordan continued to talk about random topics and she had a wonderful time. They ate the pizza and ordered several more rounds of beers. They were both pretty tipsy on the way out of the restaurant and shared a cab to Meredith's apartment where she had promised to show him her origami.