"Here, I brought tea for you."
"What do you want?"
"What do you mean I don't want anything," I turn to leave. but then I turned back, "actually I was wondering if you could please help me with some money for my parents." I say fiddling with my finge...
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I feel like my heart has somehow managed to escape from my heart to my head cause it's beating so freaking fast damn that August.
"You're up," Xavier comes out of the bathroom smiling at me from ear to ear.
"You look awfully happy this morning, something good happened?" His smile drops immediately.
"What do you mean, don't you remember?"
"I do remember August forcing me to have a glass of Martini, why did something happen?"
I let out a gasp. "Did I harass anyone? I tend to become more bold when I'm drunk." He shook his head and turned to the closet.
What is his problem?
"My head is killing me!" I groan.
"I'll tell Lily to bring some meds for you." He goes out and comes back minutes later, his face has lost all trace of the beautiful smile he had earlier.
"Xavier are you okay?" He ignores me, "are you mad at me? Did I do anything wrong?" He combs through his hair with his hand obviously frustrated for some reason.
"That's for you to find out for yourself," he takes his suit and walks out of the room.
Okay, so he's definitely mad at me. What the hell did I do this time around?
The last time I got drunk was on booze at one of Cora's parties after one of my friends forced me to drink. I blacked out, got the bartender's number. Puked on my wingman and lost his car. Woke up without pants under my bed and with a friend missing. We later found my friend but my pants were never found.
Point of the little story is me and alcohol don't get along.
Lily enters the room, "Good morning, Mr Reed said you'll need some meds for hangover. But you can't take them without eating, so what would you like to have for breakfast." I push myself out the bed.
"Let's just go to the kitchen, we'll think of something when we're there."
~•••~
"Lily did do anything wrong yesterday?" I pour the eggs in the pan and turn to her.
"No why?"
"Well I can't remember anything that happened yesterday and Xavier is mad at me for some reason."
"Hmm, I can't say but I did hear some screaming yesterday," she teased.
I gasp, "did someone get hurt?"
She gave me a look and shook her head, "you're hopeless. Your meds are over there, take them and go rest. I'm gonna go do the laundry."
"Lily please have breakfast with me," I smile at her. She looks at me as if to argue, "please." She lets out a sigh.
"Fine." She sat down and we dug in.
What did I do yesterday? What the hell did I do? I shut my eyes tight.
"Wanna dance Xavier?" "You really wanna know?. . . Kiss me then I'll tell you."
I open my eyes with shock, my fork falls from my hand and hits the floor filling the silent room with noise. "I remember," I whisper. "Fuck, Jesus Christ I remember what I did!" I tell, hot tears running down my face. "I messed up, Lily what do I do?"
"Child, what's the problem?" She looks at me, her eyes filled with worry.
"Lily," I put her in a hug, "I'm not Cora."
She inhales, "I know."
"You know?" I ask, disbelief clear in my voice.
She frees me from the hug and grabs me by my shoulder, "child I've been with Xavier since he was a child, I was here when he got married and I may not know Cora well but I've lived with her for the two years she's been married to Xavier. I know the look in her, your eyes are filled with compassion and the many many dreams I know you're gonna achieve." She smiles warmly at me and I don't know if it was her kind words or her belief in me, I started crying harder.
"Why are you being so nice to me? I'm in the wrong, you should be yelling at me calling me an imposter," I bawl.
She shrugs, "Xavier is happy, I haven't seen him this happy in a long while. You make him happy."
"I'm a bad person!"
"No you're not."
"I slept with my sister's husband!!!!"
"People make mistakes okay? Everybody makes mistakes." I look at her teary eyes, "you're not a bad person," she plants a kiss on my forehead. "I'm gonna need you to go out and keep yourself busy with something, an idle mind is the devil's workshop. Go shower, you stink." She shoos me away and I giggled.
That's right Miguel said he needs me at the office. The least I could do for Cora now is to put my absolute best into her work.
~•••~
"Good! Now lean your head back a little." The photographer orders. "Place your left hand on your thigh for me please. . . Perfect!" He straightens his posture and turns around, "let's take a one hour break and come back here, Cora darling it's not your best but you're doing great if you can keep this up we can end the shoot on a very good note." He smiles at me.
"Sure," I smiled back at him. I'm about to enter the changing room when Lisa stops me.
"Excuse me ma'am Cora, you have a guest."
"Who?"
"Xavier, he has been for an hour to meet you."
I sigh, "okay."
Honestly Xavier is the last person I want to see now. My plan was to completely ignore him until things aren't weird between us anymore. How am I supposed to ignore him when he's been waiting for an hour for me? Besides he did nothing wrong, he thought he was having a loving moment with his wife, he'll just think it's weird if I start ignoring him.
"Hey Xavier," I smile at him trying my best not to act differently. But no matter how hard I try I can't bring myself to look into his eyes.
"Let's have lunch together."
This update has been long overdue, but I haven't been able to update date cause I slit myself while cooking 😭 this chapter also feels crappy and it isn't as long as I want it to be, but I hope y'all found it likable 🥺
