A playful blue cartoon stork carrying a baby bundle was affixed to the back window of Jeremy’s minivan. The words “Hello, World! Our Little One Is Here!” were printed below it. Maria stared at it, her mind reeling. She and Jeremy had only been dating for a few months, a lighthearted, low-pressure relationship. This sticker, however, was anything but low-pressure. It was a statement. A declaration. And it didn’t belong on the car of a man she thought she knew.
When she asked him about it, his face went from bemused to horrified. “Oh, no. No, no, no,” he said, his hands in the air. “It’s not what you think. I swear.”
He explained that the sticker wasn’t for a baby. It was for a webcomic. Jeremy was a graphic designer, and for the past year, he had been working on a new comic series about a family of storks. The main character, a clumsy stork named Bartholomew, was known for his motto: “Hello, World!” The first issue of his comic had just been published, and the stickers were part of a viral marketing campaign. He had put a sticker on his car as a joke, a way to promote his work to friends. He hadn’t expected Maria to take it so literally.
Maria’s initial alarm gave way to a mixture of embarrassment and relief. It was a ridiculous misunderstanding, one born from her own assumptions and his lack of communication. The sticker wasn’t a sign of a secret baby, but a testament to his passion for his work. It was a funny, absurd truth that was far more mundane than the dramatic lie she had imagined. The incident, while trivial in the grand scheme of things, became a turning point in their relationship. It opened a conversation about their future, their dreams, and the importance of communicating even the silliest details.
