[This chapter is dedicated to Amandam357. Thank you for choosing our story. I couldn't be thankful enough for your support!]
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"0229...0229...0229…" Noah has the stupidest grin on his face as he utters repeatedly the numbers Jess gave him. She told him to memorize it, but that wasn't the reason why he kept on saying the four digits numbers.
"0229." He chuckled heartily, saying the set of numbers again. The grin on his face doesn't seem to leave his lips anytime soon. The fact that Jess entrusted him with her passcode to her apartment, for him to drop by anytime, was making him giddy like a teenager.
And the excitement he's feeling was not just because Jess trusted him enough to give him her apartment's passcode but most especially because the passcode to her apartment was his birthday! February 29th.
He had his passcode set a long time ago to her birthday and when he gave Jess the passcode to his house, she didn't react to it. Although he was sure that she knew that the number wasn't random.
What he didn't expect was for her to set her passcode for his birthday!
Another burst of laughter escaped his throat. He wondered when Jess planned to tell him that her apartment passcode is his birthday. Telling him today was out of the blue. He was just being his annoying self, feeling insecure because of Markus's teasing, hence, even though he knew Jess was busy, he still gave her a call.
It was one of his best decisions. He got her apartment passcode that happened to be his birthday! He started humming the OST of the film Howl's Moving Castle as he walked to his study to do some work himself.
He never felt so motivated to read a contract pertaining to some investors. He walked along the corridor of his house as if his feet had wings. It wouldn't be too much if he twirled like a ballerina with how happy he's feeling.
Meanwhile, Jess in her own apartment still hasn't been able to return to her reading. She was stunned by how much her heart capacity to pump in her chest.
She's panicking about Noah thinking that she had his birthday as the passcode to her apartment. When Noah called her, she knew that he was just masking his security of her being away from him for a long period of time with his clinginess and being annoying.
And since she can't actually tell him the three words that could probably make him feel a bit more secure of her feelings for him, she decided to give him her apartment passcode which she thought was also a big leap when it comes to commitment and letting him know that she was into their relationship as him.
To tell him that she was also thinking seriously of what they have. However, the passcode actually hasn't been set as his birthday in her security system. When Noah was pestering her, she was thinking of a way to tell him not to worry that she would fall for another man.
She found it annoying that he would even think that her feelings would be shaken by any advances from other men, yet, she can't tell him those words that he would like to hear. Hence, she suddenly blurted out his birthday.
Now, instead of reading the documents she brought home, she was on the phone with her security system company and logged into her computer changing her door passcode. She already set the passcode to 0229.
What Noah didn't know was her house has a different set of passcodes that she set by the user. Like her father has the passcode to her apartment but the passcode he knew was different from the one she's using.
Same with Luke. And now, she gave Noah a passcode that would be exclusively his to open her apartment door. She set her passcodes on those systems so her security company would know who entered her apartment.
She refused to put a camera inside her apartment so she set up her house security that way. It sounds complicated especially that her house security system wasn't available in the market.
Ellise and her friend Nina were the ones who set it up. They were using the same security systems that they developed on their own. And the system was only for personal use. They have no plan to sell it. The reason why Ellise made such a complicated security system was to make sure that no one could break it.
According to her, it would be more difficult to break if it wasn't available in the market and no one knows how it works except her. Jess was sure that there is more to it but she didn't ask since she wasn't knowledgeable about computers and high technology. She was just glad to enjoy the secured security system by being friends with Ellise who has a crazy brain when it comes to such things.
She rolled her neck from side to side to ease the taut muscles on her shoulders because it took her about forty minutes to encode and set up the complicated security system. She was glad that Nina was available to take her call.
Since the security system was for personal use, they don't have a customer service that she can call whenever she had something to change. She has to call either Nina or Ellise.
And setting a passcode for Noah that was his birthday was something that she would never ask Ellise because she would mock her if she would know that she gave Noah access to her place.
And to set it as Noah's birthday, Ellise would forever bully her for it.
She was just about to shut down her desktop computer when she received a video call request from none other than Ellise. She knew she was screwed up when she accepted the call and the first thing Ellise said was, "Why do you need my birthday as an extra passcode to your house? I already have mine."
She forgot that Noah and Ellise shared the same birthday!