ᴛʜᴇ ʀɪᴠᴀʟꜱ ᴄᴏɴᴛʀᴀᴄᴛ

₀₀₁

𝘞𝘙𝘌𝘕 𝘑𝘈𝘔𝘌𝘚

I'VE NEVER FELT AS THOUGH my life was exciting. Until today that is. I woke up feeling... different. Puff, my cat, had snuggled up extra close to me this morning and the barista at my usual coffee shop put hearts near my name. If that's not an exciting life, then I don't know what is.

Pathetic, I know.

I make my way to the other side of the busy New York crosswalk, and slow my steps as I make my way to my office building. I'm always six minutes early for work everyday, I like to take a minute to cool down from my walk; so that i'm five minutes early.

I've been walking from my apartment to my office building everyday-excluding weekends-since I was nineteen. I went to night school and earned my college degree two years later.

I'm twenty-one.

I like being young and successful. The feeling is not unusual to me since all i've ever strived for was excellence. I've been pushing myself for greatness, starting when I got my first gold star in kindergarten.

Once my watch ticks to a full minute I pull open the glass doors and make my way into my second home. One foot in front of the other.

"Morning lovely." Gloria, a short, plump woman who's been working here since it was built, greets me like every other morning.

"Good morning Gloria." I mumble and hand her my card so she can clock me in.

"Do you always sound so cheerful in the morning?" I ignore the deep, husky, chilling voice that I know belongs to the most frustrating man alive.

Gloria holds out my card and wiggles her eyebrows in a suggestive way. She's been trying to play matchmaker ever since I got the internship- and keeps trying now that I have a secure position.

I snatch the card back and narrow my eyes at the older woman. She then fixes her hair before turning her attention to the second half of my "perfect match". Gloria's words, never mine.

Rhys Moore is one year older then me. One position higher then me. One less year of experience then me.  His office one floor above mine. And his ego, one-hundred percent bigger then mine.

Gloria smiles at said man and clocks him in. Not before giggling like a teenage girl. I like the woman, she's like a grandmother to me, but she still hasn't grasped the concept that Rhys is not someone to be swooning over.

"Do you always look as though you've just mauled a receptionist in a closet?" I run my eyes over his state with clear distaste.

Dark shaggy hair sitting on a chiseled face, tall frame, slightly broad chest. His dress shirt has a minor wrinkle to it, a black suit jacket rests on his arm, and-of course, his belt isn't fastened through all the loops of his dress pants. 

My eyes meet sharp gray ones; which are riddled with amusement.

"Don't say you're stalking me now." He shoots me a look before turning to Gloria and saying something to her.

I remain passive and start to make my way down to the elevators. My heels clinking on the marble floors. I don't entertain his childish acts of mockery.

He reminds me of a boy I knew in middle school. Never taking anything seriously. I tell myself that's why that boy rejected my declaration of love when I had made a PowerPoint presentation on why I felt a certain way towards him.

Now that boy lives in his parents' basement, living off of pudding and canned tuna.

While i'm thriving.

__________

"Wren, you've got a personal call on line three." Gloria's voice rings out from the phone on top of my desk.

I place my pen in between my lips as I reach over the stack of papers i'm going through and press the answer button.

I go back to highlighting the papers when my best friends voice hums through my ears.

"Hello." I mumble a 'mhm' so she continues.

"Oh, you're there. Listen, I was thinking back to the last time we had a girls night and was like 'Lex! If you have to think about it, then it's been too long!' and then I was like 'Lex you're so right!' so i'm calling you now and already planned everything out..." She has a tendency to ramble and I just listen.

Lex has been my best friend since kindergarten, we are polar opposites. She owns a bakery, and is an amazing chef. I don't personally like sweets but she makes a mean butter roll. Lex wears her heart on her sleeve and i've been her personal bodyguard for most of her life. She never fails to make my day calmer, even with her excessive rambling.

"...and a unicorn popped up and spoke to me- in a surprisingly sexy voice- and told me I should go to the club we used to go to when you were still in college. But of course I-"

"When were you thinking of going?" I cut her off so she doesn't pass out from not breathing between sentences. It's happened once, maybe twice.

Lex goes quiet over the line and I lean into it.

"Lex?" I question. She mumbles something in response.

"Lex?" I repeat.

"We're going tonight." She rushes out.

No. Not tonight. I'll probably be here until at least eight. With the amount of papers on my desk and the ones on my floor-make that nine.

"I can't do tonight. I have...a lot of work to sort through, maybe this weekend?" I click my pen while I wait for her disappointed sigh.

It never comes.

"I'm not taking 'no' as an answer Wren. You've been cooped up in your apartment, for like months now and i'm worried about you. Y'know you can always talk to me, right?" Lex shuffles on the other side of the phone.

I make an 'mhm' sound and she sighs.

"Okay. I'll be at your place by nine-thirty. I don't care if I have to drag you to the club in your underwear. You're going." Her voice is serious, something I rarely hear from her.

Then her voice turns happy and normal again. "Anyways, don't kill yourself because of all your work. Love you, Bye!" She drags out the 'e' and hangs up.

I groan and rest my head in my hands. Clubs are definitely not my thing, anymore. Sure I used to go to them, a lot, last year and the year before. I had wanted to live out my college years like the girls in movies.

But then I realized that the real world is nothing like the movies. People don't always get the life they deserve.

____________________