VANESSA
15th December
My eyes fluttered open as a pillow hit my face. I woke up, tangled in a blanket, smelling like wine and with no sense of time or place. I looked around, my eyes slowly adjusting to the brightness and I saw a dark figure in the center of the room. I rubbed my eyes and looked again to see that it was Adrian in a black three piece suit. Already? Does this man ever sleep?
Wait a second!
Why is he here? Where was I? And why do I have a terrible headache? Before I could answer any of that, another pillow flew up to my face and a voice boomed through my head, "WAKE UP! WE ARE LATE!"
"Ouch! Could you be any louder?", I complained as I scrambled to my feet, swinging my legs off the sofa where I had apparently been sleeping last night. Right now I felt like a high school hot mess.
I shook my head, pushing the various strands of hair off my face and straightening my crushed rose pink shirt and trousers that I had turned into pyjamas last night and walked up to where Adrian was, fixing his tie.
"I am awake now.", I informed him though I knew he could clearly see that.
He,now putting on his cufflinks, said, "We are late. Get ready quickly."
"Late? For what?", I scratched my head.
Adrian sighed and then looked at me, "We drank way too much than we should have, especially on a working day. The first board meeting of our company's partnership starts at 11:30 and what time is it?"
"11:00! Holy shit!", I said as I looked at my watch, "What should I do? I don't have time to go back home or any other clothes. And Nate will reach there before me. Why didn't you wake me up earlier?"
"Oh! I tried but guess who wanted to complete seeing her dream about riding away into the sunset...on a unicorn...was it??", He smirked.
I felt the heat in my cheeks grow. Oh god! What all must I have blabbered. I just wanted to crawl under a rock and never return.
"Vanessa, the washroom is on the left. Get ready as fast as you can. I will be waiting outside. And yes, drink this. It will help with the hangover.", He told me, pointing to a small glass with some yellowish liquid which I knew definitely had raw eggs. Though the very sight of it made me want to puke, I held my breath and gulped it down and after that, I left.
I went to the bathroom and quickly shed my crumpled office wear. I turned on the shower and the water began to rain down on me. Trust me, there is no such feeling as that of warm water pouring down your body, taking all signs of tiredness and sleep away with it.
Slowly the hungover feeling began to fade and last night came back to me. Boy! I have never laughed so much as yesterday. We talked about the silliest of things, from the conspiracy theory that our dads are friends because they like to kick their middle children out of the house to reading the label of cushion covers. I could never imagine I would get wasted on wine and that too with Adrian.
I turned off the shower, wiped myself and luckily found an unopened packet of brushes in the drawer below the sink. I wrapped myself in the towel and then sneaked into Adrian's room. He said he would be waiting outside and I had no choice but to take my chances that he would have stuck by his words because there was no way I was wearing that creased shirt to a meeting where I must dress to impress.
I picked out a black and white striped shirt which as I expected was way too long. I tucked it inside my rose pink trousers and rolled up the sleeves. I left the top button open because I remembered having a pretty golden necklace in my bag from a few nights ago and picked up a thin belt from Adrian's closet as well. I next picked up my blazer and pumps and scurried back to his waiting Lamborghini.
As I shut the door, he started the ignition and we left for the office. Inside the car, I finished my make up and combed my hair and we reached by 11:28. Close call!
We got into the lift and as it took us to the meeting hall, Adrian asked, "What the hell are you wearing?"
"Err...A shirt?"
He groaned,"My shirt! I swear to god, return it back to me by tomorrow and without lipstick or foundation on it."
"You know what foundation is?"
"Hmm. And you said I was the sexist pig.", He smirked cheekily.
I shook my head in dismay and walked out of the elevator and into an almost filled meeting room. Well I reached a minute late but it didn't matter since Adrian wasn't here yet. He asked me to go in first so that it didn't look like we came to the office together, keeping the tabloids and rumours in mind since my father was unaware about my last night's adventure.
I took my seat and soon enough the meeting began. It was so much longer than I expected. I almost dozed off thrice. It was boring, damn boring. I jotted my points down and then continued to randomly sketch the mug in front of me just to keep me awake, not taking note of how terrible it looked.
Across from me, Nate was pretending to pay attention too but he was getting equally bored. When our eyes met, I gave him a knowing smile and he returned it, shaking his head. We both realised how useless and misfit we felt right now. There was absolutely nothing we had to do, we were only present to listen to the board talk and to impress them by our ideas which would be presented last.
Suddenly, Nate's mobile buzzed. He looked at it and frowned. He then turned to dad and whispered something before he walked out of there only to return two minutes later, beaming with joy.
He cried, "Dad! Olivia is in the hospital. Her water broke. I got to go!"
I was so not expecting that. Wait! Am I an aunt now? Oh wow!
Everyone congratulated him and he rushed out. This led to the meeting thankfully wrapping up almost quickly but not before I placed my point which they decided to take up as a topic of discussion in the next meeting. Nate, since he wasn't there he couldn't say his points giving me kind of an advantage. This also made me realise something else and I couldn't wait to tell Adrian about it.
Once the meeting ended, I shook hands with the board members, making small talk and relying on my wits to impress them, which if I am not wrong went quite smoothly. Then, I went with Adrian to his office cabin and sat opposite to him.
"Did you realise something?", I looked at him hopefully.
"I did. You are even wearing my belt. I shouldn't ever have let you into my penthouse, oh, wait! I didn't.", He cocked an eyebrow at me.
"Whatever. Yesterday was fun, admit it."
"It was a very foolish decision."
"You are talking as if it is just my fault.", I complained.
"No. It is mine as well. I..."
"You really have a lot of ego, not being able to say fault and mine in the same bloody sentence.", I rolled my eyes and he nodded his head.
"Ok! Back to what I was trying to tell you when you misinterpreted me."
"Go on", He said, leaning back in his chair.
My smiled slyly, "Nate just had a child, his wife is in the hospital and we are leaving for Egypt tomorrow. What do you make of that?"
Adrian frowned, contemplating this information and then looked up at me catching onto my train of thoughts, "He won't go."
"Um hum. Christmas came early for me."
"Using Nate's child as a defence, that is the first thing that came to your mind?", He looked at me scepticaly.
"Well what do you know, I am wicked.", I gave him a guilty smile.
At this he just shook his head and shifted his attention back to his laptop. I got a reminder message for my scheduled meetings from my
secretary. So, after excusing myself for going over to a few meeting, I left.
■■■
I unwrapped my hamburger and dipped it into the tomato sauce. I was about to take a bite but then my phone began to ring. I groaned and then heavy heartedly leaving my burger, I picked it up. On the front screen flashed the name: "Kate"
"Hi!", I said. The last time we talked was when she had come to The Greys mansion.
"Hello Vanessa. Olivia just got shifted out of the operation theatre.", her delighted voice said from the other side. It was almost as if I could see the expression on her face from this side of the phone.
"So...?"
"It is a girl! And Nate thinks we should name her Avery Harper Hudson. What do you think?"
"It is indeed a beautiful name.", I smiled.
"Umm...well...why don't you come to the hospital too?", she asked me.
"Is Jennifer there?", I asked.
"Uh...yes. The entire family is here. You can come too, you know.", she insisted.
"You're sure about that?", I tested her. I knew that she had called me out of politeness but in reality no one wants me there, not when my sister, Jeniffer and I have yet to bury the hatchet.
"You know what is best for this family. If you think you should be a part of it, I won't stop you, I never have.", I heard from the other side. It was the same Kate I remembered from three years ago, with a metallic coldness in her voice. Also it was the same statement she said to me when I questioned dad about his decision of throwing me out of their house. She had definitely convinced him but I can't blame her. What she had done was right in her own sense, then and maybe even now.
I swallowed a lump in my throat painfully and shut my eyes, steadying my voice, "You know my answer then. It is the same as it was three years ago. I know, I don't belong."
I heard nothing but silence from the other end if we exclude the noises from other people in the hospital and then the call ended but not before I heard something that I bet was a sigh of relief.
I put my phone on the desk and let my tears flow, it was the only way to get rid of my suddenly aching heart. One question that burned in the back of my mind was, Why me?
I am strong, I told myself, I had to be or else I couldn't have kept myself sane for those agonising three years.
I stared at my phone, debating if I should call Sarah or Eric. I desperately needed a friend to fill this void I was in and to remind me I wasn't alone but what would I tell them. Even three years ago I had told them that me and my family had a rough patch on the road, never the whole truth.
What could I do? I was afraid they would push me away too, reprimand me for what I did just like my family. Right now Kate and the rest of my family was behaving very cordially but we all know how insincere they were being. They never forgave me, probably they never will and that was going to keep me confused because I didn't know what to do. But that wasn't the worst part. The worst part was that I couldn't even bring myself to apologise. Why?
Because I didn't feel guilty.