JUSTIN
"Mr Forbes."
I look up from my computer and see Jasmine standing before me obviously waiting for my reply to something she said.
"Yeah, sorry what were you saying."
"I was just coming to tell you that you're due in the meeting room in 10 minutes."
I nod at her. "Perfect, is that all?"
"Yeah, it is, but are you sure you are ok Mr. Forbes?" She asks studying me.
Not wanting her to know about Crystal just yet I shake the thoughts out of my head and immediately look up at her and faintly smile trying to be convincing to her even though she will find out eventually with her being my secretary and Jasmine is very good at reading someone and knowing when something isn't right.
"Yeah of course, was a bit late this morning due to a personal matter. But I'm fine Jasmine and ready for the busy day ahead so make sure you get the meeting room ready." I say to her.
She nods at me. "Of course, I'll let you have some time to yourself before the meeting, excuse me." She says before turning around and leaving my office.
Soon after she's left I find myself thinking about the morning again like I was doing before Jasmine came in. A slight smile appears on my face as I think about the events of the morning and how out of all people, I could bump into - it was Crystal.
I can't believe I actually bumped into Crystal after all these years. It still doesn't feel real that I saw her. But I did and I just can't believe it.
She is just like I remember with her beautiful and naturally blonde curled hair and her beautiful blue eyes I remember so well after imagining them for so long.
She was the most beautiful girl I had ever met all those years ago and still is but somehow now that she is all grown up. She is even more beautiful, and I found myself being mesmerised by her beauty as we just stood there staring at each other.
It didn't occur to me at the time, but I was shocked to find out that after a did some research on her that she has been working at that little quaint French café ever since she graduated high school with her best friend Rachel. I don't know why I never registered the fact that she worked there when I bumped into her. There were so many signs in front of me; for starters she had all my coffee over her apron, her working the coffee machines should have been a dead give-away and of course the fact that she always was telling me she had to get back to work when she was trying to get rid of me.
I know the seriousness of the pain I must have put her through when I left her without a single word to her or even said goodbye to her all those years ago.
Growing up in a famous and well known family like mine was never easy with all the fame and the privacy issues. I never had a normal childhood like your average child and with me being the oldest sibling I had to grow up pretty fast and look after my little brother and sister at times when my parents were busy with work.
And when I was a teenager I dealt with being in the media and the headlines for the first time and ever since then I've had my fair share of being in the news whether its involved with work and the Forbes Inc, my parents and their careers or most recently my toxic on and off relationship with famous model Alexa Reid.
Being well known and famous I've grown to learn that you never really have the privacy and mostly everything about your life is known by everyone else and the world and with how badly my relationship with Alexa ended and how it was all over the news for months I realised that due to my status my private and personal life would always never be completely private and of course I can't help it with it being a small price I have to pay for being famous and well known and most of the time I've grown to not care about it.
That was until her.
When Crystal had her accident all those years ago, someone must've tipped the media off because the morning after we shared our first kiss, I woke up to her mother screaming at me for being the cause of all this paparazzi being outside the hospital and more worse pictures and a whole article of the media learning about my whole relationship with Crystal.
At first, I didn't believe her and explained to her how careful I've been when I've been around Crystal and her family to never bring that part of my life to them. But she was right when I walked out, I could see all these flashes of cameras through the glass doors.
I looked to Crystal's mum and knew the words she was going to say next and as much as I didn't want to leave Crystal. I knew I had to, despite how careful I was to not bring that part of my life into Crystal's life I did. I broke the promise that I made to her mother of never bringing any harm to Crystal, and I was crazy to ever think I couldn't.
The timing couldn't have been any worse with us just having shared our first kiss and I was ready to ask her to be my girlfriend with how close we were growing the past months before the accident. But no matter how much I wanted to be selfish with her and proceed with my initial plan of going back in her room and start having a future with her, I knew I couldn't and I would've never forgiven myself if I hurt her further down the track all because I was selfish with her.
Crystal was and is still the most precious thing ever in my life.
Which is why back then I made a vow when I first started falling for her that if the media ever got even a glimpse of any info about Crystal or her life, I would step back from her life to limit the harm of having that part of my life shadowing her and her worrying about it. And I've swore by it since now.
I may have been born into this life and in result I didn't have a choice but to just roll with it and grow to accept it, but Crystal does have that choice to live her life without all the fame. And what kind of person would I be if I didn't give her the chance to live her life and succeed in everything she does and will do without all that - no matter how much she wanted to be with me.
She may hate me as a result. But it was better her hate me then have that part of my life harm her and that was a risk, I was willing to make.
There have been times where I've doubted if I made the right decision but, in the end. I know I have with how much she has been achieving with how I closely follow her through Insta, and it still surprises me that she hasn't blocked me but I'm thankful that I can still see a glimpse of her life from afar. And in the end, I know I made the right decision.
Ever since I left her all those years ago there hasn't been a day where Crystal hasn't crossed my mind and I wonder all these things about her like; what she's doing right now, what's she thinking about in that beautiful mind of her, what she's wearing or most importantly if she ever thinks about me like I do with her, but I doubt it with all the pain I caused her. But that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.
But I can deal with her hating me if it means she's free from harms away and is happy and succeeding in life like I always knew she could do.
I may not be as happy without her, but I've always grown up knowing that I have my own responsibilities and obligations I must fill for my family when the time comes. I am a family man at heart. I love my family and would do anything for them even if it meant to put their wellbeing and happiness before mine. And that's what I had to do when I left Crystal all those years ago, I had to step up for my family.
Now 5 years later I'm the CEO of our family business 'The Forbes Inc' here in LA, we have many chains around the world and my older cousin Kyle is the CEO of the Hawaii chain after he left LA 5 years ago with Crystal's older sister Kayla.
Yeah, pretty ironic that we both fell in love with the Riscosta sisters but of course you can't help who you fall in love with and we both really fell in love with them and as much as I was sad that I couldn't have a future with Crystal at the time. I was indeed happy for my cousin and of course surprised because I couldn't believe he would actually fall in love let alone settle down. But I guess Kayla had something special about her that made my cousin want to change his typical ways for her and to have a future with her.
I wasn't surprised to see Crystal there on their wedding day 3 years ago before they left to start their lives in Hawaii. Crystal is Kayla's sister so of course she would have been there.
From the time I've spent with Crystal all the years I learnt just the level of inseparability the Riscosta sisters have with each other, which all came down to how traumatic their childhood was and as a result they naturally grew closer together and are always there for each other. Which was another reason why I didn't feel so bad about making the decision of leaving because I knew she would have her older sister to rely on.
Their wedding day was the first time I doubted about if I made the right decision but seeing how free and happy she was, answered my question. And as much as I wanted to go over and see her, I couldn't because it would be breaking my promise that I made to myself of bringing no harm to her when she looked like she moved on and was happy and she did look pretty happy as I watched her from afar talking to her sister about probably how happy she was for her and how beautiful the ceremony was, and it was beautiful for a little intimate beach wedding with how much Kayla loved the beach just like Crystal did too.
So in the end, I kept my distance and looked at her from afar and made sure she never ran into me or saw me because she was enjoying herself and who would I be to take her happiness away on such a special day for her sister and my cousin.
I wanted her to enjoy this special time with her sister and of course wanted my cousin and his new wife to enjoy the rest of their wedding without me bringing unnecessary drama to it just because I wanted to be with her. So, the rest of the wedding day I watched her from a distance and admired how beautiful she looked in her bridesmaid's dress.
And she looked absolutely beautiful and the image of her on their wedding day is still very vivid in my mind, the way her blush pink dress hugged her body perfectly despite it being very long and how it showed off the right amount of cleavage. The way her beautiful naturally blonde curled hair hanged loosely down her back and how her skin glowed with just the right amount of makeup and how it made her looked more grown up then she was for an eighteen-year-old.
There were multiple times where I wanted to tell her how beautiful she looked and wanted to surprise her and ask her to dance with me. But no matter how hard I wanted to do that I stayed where I was away from her sight and would imagine me being with her to ease the endless pain I was feeling.
I would imagine us in a perfect world being in each other's arms dancing under the open stars and moonlight. How while we were dancing I would tuck her hair behind her ear and touch her soft skin, breathe in her signature strawberry scent that I love, look into her beautiful blue eyes and get lost in them and most of all kiss her beautiful pink lips till they were swollen that I've so wanted to kiss since our first perfect kiss which has been replaying in my head all these years.
But at last this isn't a perfect world where we are together. This was real life where things were anything but perfect for us - my relationship with Crystal in one word was so complicated to sum it up.
At least I had the memories of all the special and happy times we spent together to look back on and how much they have been a help for all these years to help with the pain and heartbreak I have been feeling. And the one thing that I learnt that has made being away from Crystal all these years easier is that I truly believe the timing back then with us having a future and being together was wrong for both of us with her just being in her last couple years of high school and me about to step up to run 'The Forbes Inc' alongside my father.
The timing couldn't have been any more wrong, all those years ago we both were in completely different places and wanted different things. I may have been ready for a real future with her and if the incident at the hospital didn't happen, I probably would've asked her to be my girlfriend but as much as it sucked I'm glad the incident happened because it made me realise that as much as I was ready for a future with Crystal, she wasn't, she still had so much to learn and so much of her life to live with her still being in her last couple of high school.
Even my parents never accepted Crystal and would always disapprove of me spending all this time with her. I didn't think too much about it back then and wouldn't really care about it. Now looking back on it I know it wasn't so much about them hating her and more of them trying to keep me on the path of undertaking my duties when I needed to and not get distracted by a girl and fall in love with them, because that would've changed the whole plans they had for me and I know they were just trying to do what was best for our family and the company's fate.
Again, it came down to the timing with my parents because I could tell they loved her and her older sister Kayla. They loved the Riscosta sisters with how close we all became with Crystal and I spending a lot of time when Kyle and Kayla would, and it became a weekly thing where we would all get together every Sunday for lunch and I loved seeing how we were all getting along.
My mother fell in love with her instantly and of course pictured I and her having a future together. My father need convincing and he grew to love her but as much as they loved her the timing was the issue and got in the way of my parents approving of me having a real relationship with her.
I'm a firm believer in everything happens for a reason and I truly believe the incident at the hospital happened for a reason and if not, that reason being to make me understand the bigger picture of the problem that was in front of us – that Crystal was too young to be in a relationship with me and still had a life of her own to life and experience without me and I had my own duties to fulfill.
I don't even want to imagine what would've happened if I asked her to be my girlfriend that morning because I truly believe we would be in completely different places then where we are now.
Now where I'm sitting at my desk in my office still wrapping my head around the fact that I bumped into Crystal this morning after all these years. I just can't believe it.
I was so happy that I wanted to hug her and tell her how much I've missed her but the look on her face stopped me. I could tell as well as being surprised to see me she wasn't happy either to see me, which is understandable for all I put her through. But it sure hurt.
I know I shouldn't be surprised that I got that from her because if someone put me through all I did I wouldn't be that happy to see them either.
But I can't deny that it felt so good that I saw her because the last time was the wedding day, but I didn't really see her, and she of course wouldn't know about me being there not that I wanted her too so of course the morning was the real time I really saw her, and she saw me.
This morning I quite literally bumped into her and what are the chances of that. Out of all the people I could've bumped into it was her and if that didn't happen for a reason then I don't know what to think because there's no way it could've been a coincidence because if it was, we would've met way earlier with that little French café's being my usual spot to get my morning coffee with how close it is to work and all the times I've been there I've never seen Crystal working not that I was looking.
As much as it surprises me that I bumped into Crystal the morning I was even more surprised that she even agreed to let me explain myself tonight not that I gave her a choice to say no and I literally stayed there till she said yes just so she could get rid of me.
I know I shouldn't get too excited about tonight, but I am and it's on my mind all throughout the meeting and the rest of the day.
As much as I'm glad that I bumped into Crystal I would be lying to myself if I'm wasn't nervous about how tonight is all going to go. I've always imagined the day when I would come face to face with Crystal again since I left her and I knew it would happen eventually and I would have to deal with the consequences of the decision I made all those years ago. And I can't pretend that everything is going to be fine and will go back to the way things were because I hurt her pretty bad with the decision that I made but at least she gave me the chance to tell her the truth.
At least she is willing to give me a chance to explain the truth. She may hate me now for leaving but I'm sure once she knows the truth of why I left she may understand me a little more and I want her to know more than ever I want to have a future with her now. Because I truly believe we bumped into each other for a reason and what better reason then for us to give us a shot at a future with each other.
I know it will take some convincing and some hard work for her to trust me again after hurting her so badly. But I will do whatever it takes to get her back and make her trust me because I believe the timing couldn't be more right for us this time.
I never stopped loving her and I don't think I ever will.
She's my first love for a reason and everyone can see that even the universe for making us bump into each other all these years later.
It's our time now to have a future with each other and I truly believe that and will do whatever I can to make her believe that too.
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