BUSINESS MARRIAGE

010

There's is no one I'd rather be than me

                                                                   -Wreck it Ralph

HIM

Life has been good-ish. I always made time off work to take lunch to Alexandria and sometimes spend time with Ava after work. It has been nice but they are still staying at that guy's house. I know I messed up and all but I apologized and everything but they aren't coming back. Today is this week's date and I have the whole thing planned out. I wanted to rent the whole place but father says we need the paparazzi there to witness it.

I'm picking her up at 7pm at his house. When I got there she wasn't ready yet. I waited in the living room, the only thing preventing an awkward silence was the cartoon Ava was watching as the guy and I had a silent stare off.  Ava was down about 20 minutes later in.

Wearing an all black outfit. Her sense of style didn't really affect me anymore; she always wore something she is free with or feels comfortable with. After saying bye to Ava we headed for the car

"You look good" I said as we exited the driveway. She looked down at herself before looking back at me and saying "I always do".                                                                                                                        

The ride was silent but a comfortable silence. She was already nodding off when we got there I parked near the entrance before shaking her awake. As her head rose she took in the sight before her and I could have sworn that her eyes became saucers.                                               

She jumped out of the car and headed for the entrance like the amusement park, I was trailing behind her. I paid for two passes after Alexandria finished protesting to pay for her own pass. We headed straight into the zoo. It's a good thing I didn't rent this place since it is so terribly deserted. 

A few people noticed us and waved but that was pretty much all the paparazzi we got but I am pretty sure that some were off in the distance. We saw monkeys, tigers, lions, pigs,snakes,turtles, giraffes, zebras and many other animals in the zoo. Then we headed for the indoor/outdoor aquarium, after much persuasion from myself and the aquarium attendants that the animals were tamed she agreed to go swimming with the dolphins with me. We rented a pair of trunks and dived in, a lot of people were inside the giant fish tank(as Alexandria called it). We spent under ten minutes before she practically ran out when she saw a shark. I couldn't help but laugh at her, it wasn't even swimming in our direction.

 She got mad at me for laughing at her but I could see a faint smile on her lips. We were heading in the direction of the park when I heard Alexandria's name being called. She turned around and was immediately crushed  by a male figure who was hugging her, I was overwhelmed with the urge to pull him off her and it took all my willpower not to do just that the only thing that was stopping me was the thought of Alexandria being angry at me again for over reacting.

HER

I could recognise that voice anywhere. Xavier enveloped me in a bone crushing, gut spilling hug and of course I hugged him back. After about 30 seconds had passed he let go of me still holding me at shoulder length then said "Love, how have you been?" placing a kiss directly on my lips causing Paxton to tense noticeably. This is gonna be interesting.

HIM

It all happened so fast, I pulled the guy off her and my fist connected with his jaw and a loud c***k sounded from the punch. I was so sure I had broken something but frankly, I did not care. I took Alexandria by her hand and started to pull her towards the exit when she jerked her hand out of my grasp and went back in the direction we were just coming from, where the man was still nursing his bloody jaw. She walked up to him and got some wipes out of her bag to help him with his mouth and I just stood there staring. Surely I cant be jealous because of she left me for the other guy.

'keep telling yourself that'

I shook my head trying to shut the voice up and succeeded

'just because I feel like shutting up doesn't mean you've won'

I ignored it and took two deep breaths before approaching them  

Alexandria just whispered something in his ear making him laugh.

I cleared my throat twice before they turned to me. They both looked angry and I'm sure I had the same look on my face. There was a silent stare-off for about 3 minutes before the guy gave in. "Darlin' it was nice seeing you again and by the way you look more beautiful than ever, I haven't changed my number, call me so we can catch up". He placed another kiss on her lips and eyed me.

She gave him a hug and started walking away. She was obviously pissed off but so was I. We walked side by side, holding hands out of necessity and pretended to enjoy each other's company for the sake of the hidden paparazzi. An hour later I pulled up into her friend's driveway still in awe of the house and was surprised that she still stayed in the car after the uncomfortably long silent drive. She turned in her seat to face me and said "What was that in the park?"

I stared at her for a whole minute before answering "Was I supposed to stand there and let him kiss you like I wasn't there? ".

 Something flashed rough her eyes before I could figure out what it was "NO, but you could have asked who he was or something". He rolled his eyes at me and I sighed at the same time

"Look, we are both stuck in this situation unless one of us is willing to loose our companies and I dont see that happening in the nearest future. So we have to find a way to deal with each other one way or another. I am not asking you to love me but if we are going to spend the rest of our lives together we could at least be friends" she said all in one breath. 

Before I knew what I was doing I grabbed her face and drew her lips to mine. It took a little while for her to respond but she did, well, until little raindrop began to hit the roof and we jerked apart. Her face turned 3 different shades of red while I awkwardly cleared my throat and said; "You should probably head inside before the rain gets too heavy". If possible, her face turned a whole new shade redder before she replied, "Umm, Tristan moved our stuff back to our place." 

I loved the sound of that even though I knew I shouldn't ........our place. I moved out of the driveway and headed towards our place. The drive was silent and awkward. Ten minutes later I pulled into the 4 car garage and turned to her, took a deep breath then said,  "I'm sorry about how I've been behaving. This is not the first time I'm apologizing for something like this yet I hope yet doubt it will be the last. I want to be your friend, I really do but I also have to be your boyfriend, then your fiance and then your husband and its very hard to adjust for me. I know you were also thrown into this and all but..... It's hard." When I looked back to her face, her eyes were glistening with unshed tears, she just nodded and stepped out of the car and we both headed for the house with an unsaid promise to try harder.