The Heart Breaker Association

Chapter 25 - The Phone

No one disturbed me for a full hour. I sat alone in my office and finished off checking through all the case files in the pile.

It was my day off. I wasn’t supposed to be here. I was supposed to be relaxing at home. I was supposed to still be on track with… him. This case was supposed to be open and shut. This was supposed to be easy. I was supposed to be done with him. My hands were supposed to clean of him.

And yet, there I sat with my eyes dried out and my head in my hands.

There was a soft knock at the door and my head snapped up at the sound. Cecilia creaked the door open and peeked her head inside. She gave me a small smile as we made eye contact.

“Can I come in?”

I nodded as I wiped my face. There were no more tears but plenty of tear stains and red blotches. Cecilia entered and took a seat in one of my chairs on the opposite side of my desk. She just offered me a comforting expression.

After a moment of staring at her face, I laughed softly.

“It’s stupid,” I began. “I don’t know why I’m crying.”

“You might be this tough badass, Charlie,” Cecilia began. “But you’re still human. You have emotions. You liked Preston, at least somewhat, and you’re sad to see him go.”

I scoffed. “He’s not gone, far from it actually. I’m just going to have to keep seeing him but as Maggie.”

“How are you going to make him fall in love with Maggie without getting jealous?”

“Excuse me?”

Cecilia sighed. “Charlie, you like him.”

I shook my head immediately. “No I don’t. He’s stupid and annoying and a complete jerk and-”

“You like that,” Cecilia finished. “The sex was just icing on the cake.”

“The sex was a drunken mistake,” I corrected. “It meant nothing.”

“So give up the case,” Cecilia suggest with a shrug. “Should be no problem then if you have no feelings for him.”

I narrowed my eyes at her challenge. “Giving up the case would suggest that I do have feelings for him. I will not give this up. I will finish this out as Maggie.”

“We don’t even know what you have to do? Are you just going to date him until he dumps you for you?”

“He won’t do that,” I shouted. “He won’t see me again.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I asked him to,” I mumbled simply.

Cecilia nodded with a knowing smile. “Ah, I see. And he loves you so much that he’ll do what you ask.”

“He doesn’t love me,” I stressed growing irritated. “He’s just confused.”

Cecilia cocked her head to the side. “How can you know that?”

I took a deep breath. “He told me all about his little problem last night when we were getting drunk.”

“His ‘little’ problem? You mean the reason he is the way he is? You knew about it?”

“Sorry for not mentioning it sooner,” I replied sarcastically. “I was kind of preoccupied with other problems.”

“Right, the sex,” Cecilia agreed. “Okay, then what’s his deal? How do we break him?”

“It’s completely simple. Level one stuff.”

Cecilia looked at me in surprise. “Level one? Really? How did he get to be that way?”