Chapter 275 - 275 Life is Short

275 Life is Short

Ace seemed surprised for the first time since I stepped into his personal office. I should have known that question would have sounded weird. It was also very straightforward; however, I didn’t want to evade it any longer. I just had to know his thoughts on this and because of that, I decided to wait in silence for Ace’s answer.

“Nothing,” he replied simply.

“Nothing?” I repeated his reply in surprise.

I hadn’t thought that the answer that he arrived to after being surprised and putting his thought into it would be so simple.

“Nothing. Nothing will change between us. Just because I won’t be working here anymore doesn’t mean that anything will change between us. Well, I’ll no longer be your boss and you won’t be my secretary anymore but that doesn’t have anything to do with our relationship,” Ace explained calmly.

I guess that did kind of make sense…

“Umm…do you really mean that?” I asked just to make sure.

“Of course. I mean it, and it’s true. We may see each other less if I no longer work here and you decide to continue working here, but we can make up for it in our free time,” he replied casually like it was no big deal.

I should have known that Ace would respond with something like that. After all, there shouldn’t have been any doubt in my mind about Ace leaving me simply because he was going to quit his job. The chairman was probably just saying that to mess with my head and I cursed myself silently for letting him mess with my mind like that.

.....

“Is there anything that I can do to change your mind? Is there anything that I can do to keep you here as the CEO?” I asked what I was supposed to ask him.

Ace looked at me with a sharp look for a moment before his expression relaxed and he smiled at me instead.

“No…” he replied without any hesitation.

“I see. That’s a relief to hear actually,” I replied as relief flooded my voice.

I let out a sigh as I pressed a hand to my chest before I returned his smile. It was the right decision for me to ask him that just to get the load off of my chest.

“Why is that?” Ace asked curiously.

“Well, you see…after thinking about it for a while, I realized that I want to support what you want to do rather than stand in your way. The truth is, I know and I can feel that you don’t like this job and that it isn’t fulfilling your career goals for you. Although I am not sure what you really want for yourself, I am sure that being here as the CEO isn’t it for you. So even if there is something that I can do to stop you, I probably won’t do it because I don’t want to,” I confessed honestly and then I couldn’t stop myself from smiling.

It really felt like a huge and heavy mountain had been lifted off my chest and I could breathe easily once more. After talking to the Chairman, I had thought that things would become difficult between us, and I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. However, after talking to Ace frankly like this, everything seemed much clearer, and it naturally became obvious what I wanted and should do.

Although I wasn’t sure what Ace wanted to do in the near future after he quit his job at this company, I had already made up my mind to support him and wish him the best for everything.

“You look much happier now than before. I don’t know, you just seemed very troubled before. Sorry for calling you here out of the blue like this…” Ace apologized with a gentle smile.

I think that was probably the time that I realized that he must have called me here to talk to him because he was worried about me after guessing that the Chairman must have come here to see me. His interrogation was tough at first, but it turned out for the better and it helped to ease my mind. Ace seemed more assured now that he could see that I was alright too.

“Thank you for worrying about me…” I thanked him wholeheartedly.

“I know from personal experience that talking to my father is nothing fun, so you don’t have to think too much of it,” Ace replied casually.

“I guess you’re right about that…” I replied.

I opened my mouth and then closed it before I could say anything without thinking. Honestly, I wanted to ask him what he planned to do after he left this company but then I remembered the promise that we made. There was no need for me to ask him, when the time is right, I just had to trust that he would tell me everything just like he had promised.

“Well, if there’s nothing else, I’ll head back to work,” I said as I got up from my seat.

Ace also got up from his seat, but he didn’t say anything to me as he took my hand walked me all the way to the elevator. Standing alone in the enclosed space of the elevator gave me a little time to digest my own thoughts. Since my conversation with the chairman there had been something nagging me at the back of my mind, and it seemed like I had just figured out what that thought was.

The most important thing that the Chairman failed to consider or mention to me was what Ace truly wanted. Perhaps his father did not care at all about what Ace personally wanted for himself and his career; however, the same couldn’t be said about me. I wanted to know what Ace truly wanted for himself because I could feel that working as the CEO right now wasn’t living up to Ace’s expectations of his desired career. If that was the case, it just felt so wrong for me to convince him to stay in this role any longer.

Life is short and we shouldn’t be wasting time doing things that we don’t really want to do, right?

–To be continued…