My Husband's Girl

2.29 - Taking a Break

Fortunately, Chef Steven liked the macaroons and gave me a thumbs up. Although he just said thanks to me when he saw the cake, I saw the grin on his face when he turned around. Maybe he forgot that there was a mirror on the opposite wall.

I began making more macaroons because the guests loved it and the orders were coming one after the other. Soon it was lunchtime. The entire kitchen staff gathered around the round table and sat on their individual seats to share and eat their lunch. I quietly ate mine whilst listening to Amanda rant about how she and Steven met, for the fourth time.

After finishing our lunch we stood up and made our way back to the kitchen. Suddenly Chef Steven stood in front of me, blocking my way. "Yes, Chef?" I asked with nervousness making its way to my stomach. "You can leave." He said making my eyes go wide. "What? Why? Did I do something wrong? I'm extremely sorry. Please give me another chance, I promise I won't give you a chance to complain." I ranted with anxiety clear on my face. The corner of his lips tucked upwards seeing me rant like this. He glanced over his shoulder to look at Amanda and then patted my shoulder before walking towards the kitchen.

"Saph! Breathe! Steve is not firing your ass. You have to go pick the kids up from school, right? So go and do that." She said and hugged me before following her husband. I breathed in relief and went to change back in my normal clothes. I wore my coat before stepping out of the hotel. The winter breeze brushed my face making a shiver crawl up my spine.

I shoved my hands in the pocket of my coat and walked towards my car. Settling in, I drove towards the kid's school. I parked the car in front of the school and glanced at my watch. One more hour.

I decided to take a walk in the park nearby so I locked the car and shoved my hands in my pocket before walking on the pavement. As I took a silent walk under the naked trees my thoughts ran back to the mess, that is my life. I miss those days when I was just an owner of a small cafe and a mother of two beautiful children along with a friend of a handsome man and today I have an unknown person who is a danger to my life and the ones related to it. My life was suddenly surrounded by lying people who knew everything about me but decided to remain silent about it.

It's been one month since I talked to anyone. I still remembered the crying face of Marie while I was leaving the house and the way Nathan looked at me with doe eyes. It almost compelled me to stay but then I saw the blue-eyed man who is partly responsible for my leaving.

It was too much for my mind to take in. First Caleb's kiss and then the entire story of my past.

I never saw Caleb after that day. He just dropped me a message that night saying that he was ashamed of his action but that still didn't change the fact that he asked me to choose between him and Ian.

It's like choosing between my past and present.

After deciding to take a break from all this I searched for a small apartment for rent. It only took me a day to do so and I am sure Ian was behind my quick house hunt. I decided to let that slide and moved in. To keep my mind busy I took driving classes and worked as a barista in a small cafe.

The reason I took a leave from the hotel was that of the fact that the hotel belonged to Ian. I had no intentions of running into him anytime soon so I did everything I can to stay away from him but the truth came crashing down to me when the landlord knocked on my timber door for the monthly rent. That's when I realised that I'll soon run out of money, grudgingly I had to come back to Sizzle.

Every moment in the hotel, I had butterflies in my stomach. I tried to tell myself that the butterflies were because of nervousness for facing Steven but when I caught myself sighing after seeing that the orders are from normal guests I realised that those butterflies are because I was secretly hoping that Ian would show up even though I told myself otherwise.