I've been in and out of planes for the last few weeks, and I feel like I haven't been home since the shitstorm dropped on my lap. It's now nearing Christmas time, and I'm feeling all sorts of nostalgia.

I get home just before six in the morning; I drop off my luggage, shower quickly, and get into some clean clothes before I had to rush over to work all before seven a.m. The few weeks leading into Christmas meant daily launches and working almost twenty-four seven before December 24th. I have been fielding calls from the media, clients, and my bosses, and now I have a migraine that's making me see double.

I don't even notice the gray outside change into complete darkness, my assistant left for the night a couple of hours ago, and now I'm all alone.

The press release I was trying to edit was making my head pound. The two Tylenol pills I took ten minutes ago haven't kicked in yet and my eyes felt like they were doubling in size. Being the workaholic I am I decide to ignore the lingering migraine and begin to rapidly type on my keyboard waiting for my Zoom call with one of my clients to hopefully agree to a photoshoot and an-in person interview.

Derrick Bow is a brilliant writer, but a recluse. I'm sure that he has anthropophobia and has acute agoraphobia since it took me making ten short personal phone calls with him until he was comfortable enough to finally agree to have a face-to-face meeting. And even then, he kept his head down and barely shook my hand, but it was about two months later when our relationship began to change. It was during his first appearance, that we had to cancel due to a severe panic attack. I was the only one he would allow to be close to him at the time and was able to calm him down, so ever since then, we became sort-of-friends… Well suffice to say our professional relationship flourished and we formed a quick bond; whenever he had any sort of problem, he would call me. Be it personal or professional.

"Derrick, I think you need to do this to further your career and broaden your audience. I know you don't like interviews but this one is with just one interviewer and a photographer. And it's not like you haven't ever had a picture taken-"

"Rose, it's not the same… I don't want to go to a hotel."

"Your mother will take you and stay there the entire time."

"Can't you just come with me?"

"Derrick you know I have a previous engagement and I can't make it down there for the weekend."

"Then can we reschedule it for another week?"

"Derrick, we can't. I already pushed it back… you'll miss the deadline for the magazine."

"Doesn't matter," he spoke adamantly.

"Well it does matter, as your publicist, I have to advise that you make this deadline. You've cancelled and rescheduled this too many times, so now you have to gun it."

"I'll pay for you! Whatever you want, 60% of my next book-"

"Derrick, absolutely not! That's ridiculous."

"I don't care, I won't do it without you."

"You're quite capable of doing this on our own," I coo. Look at me now, someone's very own cheerleader.

"Well you're my publicist and you have to be there."

I groan and take my hair out of its bun. "I'll see, but no promises-"

"Knock, knock," a voice rasps from outside my door.

"Thank you, thank you," Derrick exclaims happily.

"I'll call you soon okay?" I reply with a chuckle. I'm going to have to reschedule some things before I even pretend to think about going home tonight. "Goodnight."

"Okay, have a good night, Rose."

"Come in," I call out after I disconnect our call.

"Hey," Christian smiles at me, walking in with two large brown paper bags.

"Hi, what are you doing here?" I ask, rubbing my eyes.

"Well I heard from a little bird that you were still here, so I went to that Japanese place across the street."

"Ah, thanks," I smile, rolling my neck.

"How are you?" he asks, taking the seat in front of my desk.

"I'm great, you know… Been in and out of planes all month and have been here for almost twelve hours."

"That sounds terrible, I'm glad I fly private," he gives me a toothy smile. I wanted to wipe it off of his face.

"I forgot that you were a billionaire and so far out of this world," I roll my eyes at him.

"Hey, I'm a normal guy-"

I snorted… okay not so ladylike. "You're so far from normal. You own a jet or at least hire a private plane to fly you to wherever you're going."

"Once you fly private, you'll never go back," he smirks.

"I think I'll stick with my first class on commercial flights, thank you."

"I'll convert you in time."

"Enough trying to butter me up let's see what you got me."

"One of everything on the menu."

"Really?"

"Well one of everything we used to like if it hasn't changed-"

"It hasn't," I said shyly. Every time I'm with him like this all the memories I had locked away come back in full force, warming me from the inside out. No matter how shitty high school was there was no denying the true happiness I felt when we were together.

"My mom brought us some sushi, she's not going to be home," Christian offers the assortment on a platter.

"Looks great," I reply, "where is everybody?"

"Elliot has football practice, and my parents and Mia are at her ballet recital."

"Why didn't you go with them?"

"We had to do this," he shrugs.

"We could have postponed it."

"I promised you…" he grits out.

"Oh, okay well thanks," I reply sheepishly

He placed a small plate in front of me with chopsticks, a little saucer for my soy sauce, and our little shared plate of sushi, ginger, and wasabi.

"This all looks so good," I gush, then immediately felt bad. I'm going to look like such a fat ass.

He divvied up the food on our plates and we began eating, everything is so delicious.

"How is it?" he asks.

"So good," I answer with food still in my mouth. Fuck, you are a fat-ass.

"Good, I'm glad. These are my favourite."

"Mine too," I whisper.

"God, this is so good," he chews.

"Yeah," I smile him, beginning to eat our meal.

"Is that your phone?" he asks, after a few bites.

I look at him and then phone, "Ugh, it could be two people. Derrick Bow or Tim Delaney." It was neither, "Sorry."

"It's okay," he gave me a reassuring smile and continued eating.

I finally picked it up, "Hey, Gerard."

"Hey darling, how was your day?"

"It's good," I answer, this was uncomfortable. With the mention, Gerard's name Christian began to look uneasy but pretending that he wasn't listening… which was impossible since we were sitting across from each other.

"What are your plans tonight?"

"Still in the office."

"Do you want me to come down there, bring you some dinner?"

"It's okay, my friend Christian is here."

"Grey? From the party?"

"Yeah…"

"Oh, well…" his voice falters a tad bit, but he recovers quickly. "Can I take you out tomorrow?"

"Umm, sure what time?"

"Whenever you're free."

"Well I'm not sure the exact time, but I don't think I'll be staying this late tomorrow."

"Send me a text tomorrow and let me know okay, Rose?"

"Sure, I'll talk to you later."

We both hang up and I'm left with Christian's inquisitive eyes.

"Going out tomorrow?"

"Yeah, I haven't seen him for a couple of weeks."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, for like an hour by accident."

He chuckles but there was nothing jovial about it, in actuality, it seemed rather forced to be completely honest. "How does that even happen?"

"When I had a couple of hours to kill before a flight to Miami."

"Miami?"

"Yup, bikinis and suntan lotion," I giggle.

"Missed out on that experience," he smiles at me with an exuberance that he was lacking when Gerard was introduced to our conversation.

"Nah, after my little freak out I had to get back on the healthy kick."

"You don't have to change a thing-"

"Oh please, kiss ass."

As we finished our last bits of food, Christian waited while I struggled with my schedule. He listened patiently to me bitch about all the running around and travelling I did, and for the first time I was completely comfortable with him. In high school, he was the guy that everyone wanted to be with, and I used to think about how lucky I was to have his attention even if it was only in private spaces. When we were sharing a laugh, it was easy to slip into that time and I could allow myself some sort of nostalgic comfort.

When I think about it too much, I feel like that this whole thing is so toxic and backwards that I immediately want to run away. I'm so glad that I was finally able to fit an appointment with my therapist tomorrow during my lunch hour. Hopefully, she can give me some sort of clarity.

"Don't you have to run a big empire?" I tease, "you don't need to hang out all night with me."

"I want to," Christian replies, "do you have any Christmas plans?"

"Just me some Christmas movies and takeout, why?"

"Don't you want to spend it with your family?"

I bark out a laugh, "What family?"

"Your dad, I heard he remarried."

"Ray and I are estranged at best."

"Oh, I'm sorry to bring it up," he replied sheepishly.

I shrug, "It's okay-"

"No need to explain, Ana."

"Don't worry about it, I don't mind," I shake my head. "I haven't spoken to him since I left for university. He was still my emergency contact when I had the accident, but he didn't once visit me. I once walked past him at a store nearby and he didn't even recognize me or if he did, he didn't bother saying hi."

What Christian didn't know was that Ray and I had a closer interaction that I had let on.

I was popping into the local grocer near my place to grab some salad for dinner. As I was ruminating over adding some beans since I already went over my carb intake for the day, but damn, I'm fucking hungry. I tried to go over everything I ate today before grabbing a spoonful.

"Are you almost done?" a gruff voice cuts me out of my musing.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I reply quickly. I look up to face the side where the voice was coming from and I noticed the dark familiar eyes first and just above those were two very large eyebrows. Those belonged to Ray Steele. My eyes go wide as I step back in shock.

"Are you almost done?" he repeats himself.

"Yeah, yeah," I reply quickly. I was so sure that this was going to come to blows.

"You're taking too goddamn long," he whispers under his breath.

I was shaken and utterly shocked. I was hurt that my father that I grew up with did not notice me even when we were face to face.

"All yours," I walk away quickly. I quickly packaged up my salad and head straight to one of the checkout lanes. It was pretty busy, so all lines were full and moving slowly.

Groans were coming from behind me because the lady at the front was taking a bit longer with her groceries.

"Some people have places to go," I hear that same gruff voice. Ray.

When it was my turn, I quickly added my items to the conveyer belt.

"Ugh not this chick again," I hear him bark out, "we should have lined up somewhere else, Denise."

"Ray, just a bit more patience."

I snuck a glance in their direction and saw the woman he was with was a thin blonde. I didn't dare look at them for longer than that since I was already embarrassed and red in the face. Once the cashier checked me out, I grabbed my things and fled as soon as I could. What a nightmare.

"Why?" he asked with sadness in his tone. I was brought back from my memory.

"When he and my mom broke up, she ran away and left me with him and I think he's always considered me a burden. You know what he was like when I was in high school. Well, once I turned 18, he couldn't be bothered, and it seems like he hasn't looked back since."

"Ana, I'm so sorry," he shakes his head.

"Ahh, it's okay, it's on par with the rest of my life," I bark out a laugh.

"I thought it would somehow get better," Christian shakes his head, "I wish I could make things better for you."

"You don't have to, I'm doing okay now," I try to assure him.