Heartthrob ✓

twenty four

T W E N T Y - F O U R

I WAS GLAD TO HAVE MY PLACE BACK.

While Bretton had been intent on not giving it back to me, all it took was a shove to get him out of there, that shove being the paparazzi catching him while he was leaving the building. Thankfully, they had no idea which apartment he came from, so I didn't have to worry about any scrutiny whenever I came in and out of the building as I pleased and I was also able to take only one bus to get to work instead of getting rides and calling cabs. Which meant I was saving the money I made at my job to put it to other things that were equally as important.

Things like grocery shopping for myself, which happened to be a lot harder than I remembered. Bretton had a grocer to keep him from starving if he planned on eating in, and I was given a taste of her selections from higher quality markets where everything was fresh and organic. Of course, that was not where I was shopping at today or shopped at anytime ever. Instead, I was pushing my heavy cart down the produce aisle at Loman's Market, a lower end marketplace that was right down the street. I could say that I missed the lap of luxury I lived in, but this was a welcome trip back to my reality if anything. Bretton was my cousin and he was okay with making sure I was being treated well, but I had to treat myself well too. That was partly why I got the job in the first place.

I sighed, reaching into my purse to pull out the list of things I needed to pick up from here. The cart had a faulty wheel that caused it to either roll without easily stopping it or be a pain in the ass to make it move forward, so I needed to take a break from pushing it and assess what I needed before struggling with it again.

As it turns out, I didn't even need that much in this section. Struggling with my cart, I finally was able to get able to get it to roll as straightly as possible, of course until it slammed into something heavy, something that let out a terrifying scream that made me jump.

So maybe it was someone.

"Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry," I said, stepping away from the cart to make it to the person I had crashed into. When I finally reached them - what looked like a young woman with dark hair, but I didn't want to assume since they were hunched over - I reached out to grab their arm and steady them. "Are you okay?"

When they looked up to respond, I knew I wasn't because they weren't exactly the first person I expected to see nor wanted to. After all, I was just going to have dinner with Ashton tonight and i was badly in love with him, so running down his little sister with a shopping cart wasn't exactly a topic I would want to be brought into conversation.

"Fiona?" Vivian asked, her eyes widening when she recognized me. "Wow, I haven't seen you in ages. You look older now."

It was last month and no, I did not look older than I did, but at this point, there was no point in correcting her.

"It's me," I said, "the one and only. What are you doing here?"

She sighed, running a hand through her dark hair. "After the whole getting arrested thing, my parents cut my budget to only like fifty-thousand dollars - can you believe it? So I have to shop for my dorm at the poorest place to shop that I could think of," she said.

Ignoring the fact that she basically called me poor to my face - because it was simply that, a fact - I asked her, "you're here all alone?"

Vivian shook her head before her eyes got all dreamy. "Luke's here."

My cheeks instantly flushed at the mention of Luke Johnson, who I hadn't seen since the night of the release event. The closest I've been to him since was reading a text he had sent Elijah, one that was very cryptic and troubled me to try and wrap my head around.