AN: I'm not sure anyone is still reading this story but if you decide to I think you'll be happy with this chapter. My apologies. I am going to try to finish this story. Can't make any promises on when the next update will be but I'm trying.
Last time (forever ago) A got drunk, flirted and drunk dialed C. C showed up and played knight in shining armor and was taking a still flirting A home.
Chapter 9
They arrive at Ana's hotel and Christian tries to wake her but she's dead to the world. He manages to get her out of the car and standing in a semi-conscious state.
"Ana, wake up or I'm going to throw water on you. You need to be able to walk a little bit here."
"I'm so sleepy, Christian."
"I know. Where's your key card? And what's your room number?"
"Purse. Presidential suite."
He manages to get the key and get Ana to the elevator. Once in the elevator, however, she puts her arms around his neck and lays her head on his shoulder again. Thinking that they probably won't run into anyone once they get to her floor he decides to just carry her the rest of the way. He gets her into her suite, finds the bedroom and lays her down in her bed. She immediately rolls over onto her stomach. Christian just laughs to himself, takes off her shoes and tries to wake her so she can get changed but he quickly realizes that she's dead to the world. Christian contemplates whether he should leave her as she seems fine but he worries that she will wake up and be sick. He sends Taylor a text telling him he's going to camp out the sofa just in case Ana becomes ill during the night.
As he turns to walk out of the room he knocks a piece of paper off the night stand. He picks it up intending to put it back but notices the name "Grey" on it. His curiosity gets the better of him and he reads the note.
It's time Grey takes care of business. And by business I mean you, Steele. But if he won't, meet BOB. He's always ready and willing. Don't know how you've survived this long without one of these. Enjoy! Love, K ;)
Christian rereads the note, which briefly renders him confused; but then he realizes what the note is about and guesses the K must mean Kate. His first thought is that Kate really is just like Elliot and he can't believe how perfectly matched they are. But then he looks around and sees a box on the nightstand from which the paper fell. He's tempted to look inside but decides against it feeling fairly certain he knows what is in the box and not wanting to snoop around Ana's room. He walks out to the living room area and starts to think about the night – Ana's flirting, telling him she missed him and him acknowledging the fact as well, and now knowing that Ana is definitely talking to Kate about him. He wonders what she must have said to Kate for her to buy Ana a vibrator. He's also wondering if Ana used it. He can't believe how all it took was a few drinks for Ana to really let her guard down. He wonders, though, if when she has a clearer head in the morning the walls will go back up. He wants to be excited because it seems that he and Ana are finally on the same page but he is trying to be cautious because he is really unsure how Ana will act once she's sober.
Ana opens her eyes wearily, groaning as the light hits them. She immediately takes note of her pounding head and the night before starts to flash through her brain. Club, dancing, Christian showing up. Christian taking her out of the club. That's about as far as she gets. She hopes that as she wakes the rest of the night comes back to her. She wonders if Christian took her home or just left her with Sawyer. She gets her answer when she rolls over and on the nightstand sees a glass of water, a piece of paper and what she assumes are two Advil. Knowing that Sawyer would not have left her a note or medicine she thinks it could only be from one person. She pulls herself up in bed and downs the Advil. Her face flushes in embarrassment as she reads the note.
Miss Steele,
I hope you had a beneficial sleep. Though I think you are going to need these Advil when you wake. I planned on staying long enough to see your adorable bed head but unfortunately had to run out to a meeting. Please give BOB my best. I'm thrilled to know that you have someone to keep you company on this long road trip. See you at the show.
Your shithead
"Oh shit," Ana mutters to herself wondering how she's going to explain this one away. She looks around the room and sees the box. She feels anger rising in her chest thinking that Christian violated her privacy by opening the box. But then she remembers Kate's note and she pulls herself out of bed to look for it. Not finding it she looks at Christian's note which is still in her hand and turns it over realizing that he wrote his note on the back of Kate's. Ana puts her head down, mortified that Christian saw what Kate bought and knowing that he likely will ask her and tease her more about it.
Ana can't believe she doesn't have any memory of Christian taking her home. She can call Sawyer to find out but she's not sure what she did so she doesn't want to be chastised by him before she's woken up and got a handle on her headache. She grabs her phone to see if that offers any clues and sees that she has 50 text messages. This can't be good she thinks to herself. She scrolls down and sees the majority are from Kate but there are also texts from her dad, mom, Christian, her manager and countless others. Knowing that this means she must have made the news she decides to forego the texts and just googles her name.
Ana's eyes widen and she sees photo upon photo of she and Christian holding hands, Christian with his arm around her waist seemingly pulling her from the dance floor at the club with someone taking a swing at Sawyer in the background, her arms around Christian's neck with her shoulder buried in the crook of his neck, and then the one that really has Ana taken aback, Christian with Ana's hands pinned above her head with one hand and the other on her waist looking intently into each other's eyes. It's quite dark and grainy and taken from the side so Ana can't see their eyes, but the moment and the rest of the night comes rushing back to her. Ana remembers it all the flirting and teasing, thinking Christian was going to kiss her, the paparazzi, Christian carrying her to her room. She sends up a thankful prayer that no one got a picture of that. The more she thinks about the night though she realizes that as far as she knows nothing actually happened with Christian but thinking that he surely must know how she feels now, she can't fathom how it's possible. Ana sighs and wonders whether he is going to hold that one rejection against her forever.
Ana knows that she should call her parents and manager and Christian but she can't bear to deal with any of them at the moment. Her parents are probably wondering what happened to their daughter who never loses control in public. Ana laughs thinking how if she told them the truth it would be because of how crazy and sexually frustrated a certain touring partner is making her. She figures Christian is probably pissed because they have fueled the rumors of a relationship, which Ana finds hysterical because they haven't even kissed. Rather than deal with the fallout Ana decides the only thing for her to do is text Sawyer so he knows she's alive and go back to sleep and hope that her headache goes away before the show later that night. Eventually she will have to face the world but she's hoping that if she gets close to the time of the show she can avoid it altogether.
Meanwhile, Christian has been on the phone all morning with every person under the sun trying to deal with the media. He's given his general "no comment" or just ignored the questions for the most part. He thought about issuing a stronger denial of the relationship because it actually would be the truth but a small part of him is hopeful that Ana's drunken revelations will eventually come to fruition and he had a nagging feeling that if he did deny a relationship she would be hurt. Even though he is pretty pissed right now that she put them in this situation and isn't around to deal with the fallout. He knows she's awake because he checked with Sawyer and he said that Ana had texted him only to say she was alive. So here he is dealing with the mess that she created and she is not even responding to his messages or calls.
A few hours later Ana is mostly over her hangover, showered and ready to get to the arena for the last show before Christmas. She successfully avoided everyone except Sawyer all day. After she texted him he tried bringing up the shitstorm that her manager and likely Christian were dealing with but she shut him down. Ana knows he's going to give it to her later but she decided that she was going to take advantage of the fact that she writes his paychecks so he was going to have to listen.
While she was in shower she thought more about the whole Christian situation and he reading her note and it just annoyed her more. She came up with a plan for dealing with him and hopes that it doesn't backfire. But she is in a "don't mess with me mode" so she has reached the point where she doesn't care. She's going to need it when she sees Christian later for sure.
She tells Sawyer she's ready to go and he's able to sneak her out of the hotel without incident. The paparazzi are everywhere but Sawyer was able to at least get her in the car without anyone getting to her. The moment they pull out though it's like they were ready and are all over her car. She can hear them yelling questions at her, "Ana, are you in a relationship with Christian Grey?" "Did he stay over last night?" "Is Christian your boyfriend or are you friends with benefits?" "How big is he?" Ana raises her eyes at that one and the audacity of some of these people. She doesn't know how but Sawyer manages to get them out of there only to encounter more at the arena. Luckily there is an underground secure garage that they could park in without having to deal with them further.
"Sir?"
"Yes, Taylor?"
"Miss Steele has arrived."
"Is there a reason I need to know that Taylor?"
"I thought you would want to address the media issue with her before the show."
"Well, Taylor, Miss Steele avoided me all day when it was time to fucking deal with the media. So I will be damned if I am going to go running to her for her input when she seemed to not give a damn about me or what she caused all fucking day."
Christian was obviously and with reason still reeling from the fact that Ana flirted up a storm with him yesterday, practically begged him to come to the club where he saved her ass and then proceeded to ignore him for the last 18 hours. Yes, he was pissed and he was going to make sure she knew it.
Meanwhile, Ana, dressed and ready to go on, hadn't heard from Christian or her dad for the pre-show ritual. She asked Sawyer if Christian was around and he said that he was and nothing more. So it became clear to her that everyone, including Sawyer, were pissed at her. She realized she had a lot of groveling to do so she decided to at least get a start. She didn't want to go on stage stressed out. She decided to just rip the bandaid off and text Christian.
"I'm sorry."
Christian sees her text and is further infuriated at the fact that that was all she said. Then he sees that she is typing.
"I'm sorry for everything Christian. I woke up this morning and didn't remember most of the night. I was first embarrassed by the fact that you saw Kate's note about BOB and then when I started to piece together the rest of the night I was embarrassed by everything else. I saw the pap pictures and just couldn't deal with it. If it makes you feel any better I haven't responded to anyone else's texts either. I haven't even read them. Not my dad, not Kate. Sawyer is giving me the cold shoulder too. I suck. I know. I shouldn't have left you to deal with this alone. I will make it up to you. I promise."
Christian thinks about whether he should just leave her hanging like she did to him all day. He knows he should but he can't because despite everything he still cares just enough to not let her go on stage thinking everyone is mad at her. So he responds:
"I'm still pissed. But ok. We can talk about it later. Have a good show."
Ana feels the coldness in his text but takes some comfort in the fact that he responded. She is just about to reach out to her dad when she gets the call to go on. So she sends him a quick "I'm sorry" promising to call him later.
Ana is able to put the events of the night before and the day behind her for the most part as she takes the stage. The only indication that something is awry are the small glances she keeps giving to stage right to see if Christian is watching her. She never acknowledges him or lets him know that she sees him there but she always gets butterflies every time she sees him watching her. It is just another part of their routine that always brings her some comfort during the shows. He usually arrives about a quarter of a way through her set and he stays until she has about 5 songs to go. She's about halfway through and he still isn't there and so she thinks that he must really not be happy with her. She understands why he would be upset that she wasn't responding to him all day but she's frustrated with him too. She flirts with him but it still seems to her that he's still punishing her for that one time she rejected him and for which she apologized. She knows he knows she wants him but she can't figure out why he still hasn't made another move. She had decided while she was in the shower to sing a song for him but she planned to do it when she saw him to the side of the stage at the usual time. She decides she's going to sing it anyway and if he doesn't get the message, then likely nothing will at this point.
She only has a few more songs to go so she thinks it's time to let her frustrations out so she begins to introduce her next song to the crowd as their cheers from her previous die down.
"So tonight, since you guys have been so amazing, I've decided to do something a little different. Something I don't normally do." The crowd began to cheer again and Ana smiled thinking to herself that she could seriously say anything and they would probably cheer.
"As I'm sure many of you saw, I was featured in the tabloids today. And that's not normally my style but sometimes a girl has to have a little fun, right?" The energy of the crowd was electric. She knew people were going to flip. She was starting to question whether she should be doing it but she was so annoyed at this point that she didn't care. "So anyway, I spent the day ignoring every call from all my family, friends, managers, agents who were going to get on me about it and I decided to give my fans something different for always being there for me.
So I'm going to sing a cover, which I rarely do, but I thought about this song while I was in the shower today. And then I heard it on the radio on the way over here today. So it seems like fate. Something or someone is telling me that I should be singing this song today. And you know when sometimes a song or even a line from a song just speaks to you or just sums up what you are feeling. Well that was me today. So here goes, one of my favorite songs from the very talented Thompson Square."'
The audience starting cheering, possibly louder than Ana has ever heard them cheer, and Ana just let go…
We were sittin' up there on your momma's roof
Talkin' 'bout everything under the moon
With the smell of honeysuckle and your perfume
All I could think about was my next move
Oh, but you were so shy, so was I
Maybe that's why it was so hard to believe
When you smiled and said to me
Are you gonna kiss me or not?
Are we gonna do this or what?
I think you know I like you a lot
But you're 'bout to miss your shot
Are you gonna kiss me or not?
Ana was so into the song and blown away by the audience's response and thinking she needed to do covers more often, that she didn't realize that Christian made his way to stage right and heard everything she said. He thought about not going out to watch Ana but he couldn't do it. He knew that she always looked forward to him watching her. She never looked his way but he never missed the small, shy smile she would give. He liked to think it was for him. He was pretty sure it was. So even though he missed most of her set he didn't have the heart to totally avoid her. But now he felt that she had put him on the spot. He wasn't sure if she knew he was watching.
Was she really calling him out? He couldn't help but think to himself. He just stood there staring. Taylor who was also watching said, "Well, are you?"
Looking at Taylor with confusion on his face responded, "Am I what?"
"Christian, if you don't get out there and do it someone else will and you heard the lady, you're gonna miss your shot."
Christian tried swallowing the lump that was lodged in his throat. "Now? You think I should just go out there now? Haven't we given the tabloids enough to talk about for today?"
"So what's one more thing?"
Christian is never nervous to go on stage but his whole body started to shake. He knows there is a chance he is misreading the whole thing and going out on stage will just piss Ana off but she has been pissing him off all day so he figures it doesn't matter at this point. Thinking that he never imagined their first kiss would be on a stage in front of tens of thousands of people, he realizes that if he's going to do it he needs to do it right. So he waits.
It was the best dang kiss that I ever had
Except for that long one after that
And I knew if I wanted this thing to last
Sooner or later I'd have to ask for your hand
Now was the time. He starts walking onto the stage. Ana is on the opposite side of the stage and facing the crowd to the side. But as he starts walking out the crowd starts to cheer like crazy. Ana, visibly confused just kept singing.
So I took a chance
Bought a wedding band and I got down on one knee
Then she turns around and sees Christian is only steps away from her. She can't quite figure out what is going on so she just keeps singing but as she does her eyes widen in recognition of what she hopes is about to happen.
And you smiled and said to me
Are you gonna kiss me or not?
As she sings the words Christian reaches her, takes her face in his hands and kisses her as if it's his first and last. The noise in the arena is now deafening but Ana and Christian are too lost in the kiss to even notice. Ana opens her mouth letting Christian in, relishing the feeling of his lips on hers and his tongue in her mouth. She hopes to remember this moment always. Tomorrow they would deal with the implications of the publicity of their relationship but Ana no longer cares. She knows there is something special between them. She feels it. She never knew that she would trust again but somehow she trusts Christian.
She waited for this moment for what feels like an eternity. It finally happened and she couldn't wait to see where it would go. After the first time she met Christian she never imagined that she and Christian would even become friends and now she can't imagine a life without him. Her deep feelings for him make Ana nervous. He's a friend, confidante and now more. She hopes for much more and by the way Christian is kissing her she now knows that they are on the same page.
When they finally come up for air Ana and Christian turn towards the crowd and Christian is now holding Ana's hand and looking at her with a magnificent smile on his face. Ana's smile matches Christian's who mouths "finally" to her and she just laughs and nods her head. Christian then winks at her, kisses her on the cheek, waves to the crowd and makes his way off the stage. Ana, still flustered after everything that just happened, watches Christian leave, regains her composure and puts the mike back up to her mouth.
"Well, I guess that worked."
The audience goes wild once again. Ana laughs and looks at her band, shrugs and says, "Now, where were we. Let's get back to some music."
