With a sober mind, she contemplated whether calling him was a good idea or if this was best left as was. Guilt ridden, she deemed it the right decision.

"Hello?"

Arturia's breath caught in her throat as she hadn't expected him (yes him, she noted that much by his deep fluid voice) to pick up so quickly, well, who would after they were verbally harassed? She'd forgotten what she'd prepared to say, her mind blanked and she stood in silence.

"Hello?" His voice questioned once again.

"I-uh, I…" she stuttered, tripping over her words while she took a seat on her bed.

He waited. She wasn't sure why he didn't just go off on a tangent defending himself, tell her off for harassing him, or even throw in a couple of words to fill the silence, if anything. He just waited, it was a nice gesture.

"I wanted to apologize. I—"

"It's okay, really." It was the first time that he'd interrupted her. He hadn't done so throughout the many calls and texts she'd sent. "I'm guessing you already noticed you had the wrong number. It's really no problem, I sort of feel the need to back you up if you need help with that jerk."

She laughed. Oh god, she laughed. "Honestly," she sighed, "I feel completely horrible about what I put you through. I wanted to thank you. Thank you very much for listening to me. I wasn't in the right state of mind yesterday, I'd been drinking and I was livid with… I just, I'm very sorry to have put you through such a horrible and uncomfortable situation."

"As I said, you don't have to worry about it at all."

"I think I do. Thank you for listening to me...and not hanging up on me at all. I really appreciate it."

"I wouldn't dare hang up on someone distressed. Are you…" he paused, she guessed he got distracted, "are you feeling better today?"

She nodded. "Uhm, yeah, slightly. I mean the hangover is killing me but…but yeah, I guess I'm better."

He went silent for a while and Arturia thought he'd probably hung up on her but when she pulled the phone from her ear it confirmed he was still on the line.

She heard a click through the phone and a bit of shuffling, what sounded like a plastic bags. "You know," he finally spoke, "you should go out with friends. Have a girl's day out or something. That's usually what I do when I'm let down."

"I…" She thought about it. "I don't have many girl friends and they're not around right now…"

"Then," he breathed, "how about I invite you out? What do you think of a coffee? To brighten your week. It'd be good to get your mind off…" he trailed.

It was actually shocking that she let her mind linger on the thought. An idea popped into her mind and before she actually thought it through, she suggested, "We should meet, that way I can give you a formal apology." She guessed that a box of chocolates and an apology card would do the trick.

"I…" it seemed like he changed his mind, "that sounds nice. So, Emiya's?"

Arturia searched her mind, trying to locate the memory if she'd ever been there. "I don't know where that is…"

"Oh, I'll send you the address. We live in the same city so that shouldn't be a problem. It's in city center, thought it would be a good place to meet."

"Wait," she frowned, "how do you know that? That we live in the same city?"

He chuckled. "You mentioned it yesterday."

"Oh." Her voice was barely above a mumble. "When do we meet?"

There was shuffling again and she had to hold the cellphone away from her ear since the distorted noise intensified the pulsing in her head. The fact that she had agreed to meet up with a stranger hit her at that moment and she knew it was way too late to take it back.

"Uhm, what about this afternoon?" He asked.

She fell back on her bed and stared at her ceiling. Thinking about what she had planned for that day.

Cake choosing, she recalled. "Oh fuck no," she growled.

"Oh, it's no good?"

"No, I, I mean yes. It's just that...I booked a wedding cake tasting today… And the deposit, well, it's non refundable."

"Right," he mumbled, "are you still going?"

"To be honest, I do want to have cake, but there's no way in hell I'm going alone," she grumbled. "Would you like to come with me?"

"To the cake tasting?"

"Gil will not show his face anywhere near the place," anger laced her words, "so why won't you come along? And then we can go for the coffee afterwards."

"I don't…"

"Oh, you don't like cake? I understand, it's alright… I'll see what I can do…"

"No, I do like cake, very much. But, well, I don't think it's very appropriate to go with you to the, uhm, shop."

"That's okay." She smiled, "Coffee at three? That way I can just head over for the cake tasting right after. Is that alright with you?"

"Three o'clock? Yes, that sounds great. I'll see you then." She nearly hung up when the man asked her another question. "Oh wait, what's your name?"

"I, uhm, my name's Arturia."

"Diarmuid, nice to...talk to you. I'll see you soon."

After hanging up and leaving her phone to charge, she stood from the bed and huffed. What had she thought? That by calling Gil over and over he would return? That he'd grovel for her forgiveness? Was she out of her goddamn mind? At least she didn't hurt her pride and beg Gil to come back by calling the wrong number.

Arturia closed her eyes shut and rubbed her temples to ease the headache. She gathered a towel that was discarded on the floor and headed to the bathroom to let the warm water soothe her pain and muscles.

When she passed the mirror, she caught sight of how insane she looked. Her makeup was smudged, eyeliner clouding her eyes and mascara running down her cheeks, her white dress shirt had spills of wine and whiskey, her hair was a tangled mess and the anger in her eyes made her deranged. If someone were to see her now…

Arturia strode past the mirror and tried to stop the images of the previous night from replaying over and over in her mind.