|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 2:07:33 GMT
On her way out of the ballroom, Amber could have sworn she felt Brandon watching her leave. But she didn't bother to turn around for the simple fear that she was wrong, and she'd look back over her shoulder and he wouldn't have even registered she was gone. Despite the fact that her dress was only tailored well enough to be called form-fitting, she felt as though it was hard to take a breath. And so she kept walking, snagging a flute of champagne off of a tray passing by and gulping it down on her way out of the reception and into the hallway.
She was only a few blocks away from her new apartment and debated even walking instead of taking a car - oh how the years had changed Amber. She wished desperately that Parker Blye and Liv Warren hadn't managed to get under her skin, but they had. And she could not wait to get to the office the next day and point out to her assistant that she'd been right - attending her reunion had been a mistake.
In her haste to try and leave, she didn't notice a former classmate coming to greet her. For about thirty seconds, Amber made polite conversation before admitting she wasn't feeling well and had to leave. A moment later she was taking a step towards the lobby.
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 2:14:24 GMT
He had followed her as quickly as he could while still trying to gather the words he would say to her. It shouldn't be this hard. It should be hard, period. They had a history, they had been friends. Shouldn't it have been effortless to just open his mouth and say something to her? But it wasn't. Maybe it was because she had left? Maybe it was because he hadn't wanted her to go? Maybe it was because he would be lying to say that she hadn't crossed his mind regularly in the past ten years.
He was relieved when he didn't need to call out her name to get her to stop. Thankfully another classmate had done the courtesy of getting her to stop. But only momentarily before she started off again. Thankfully it had been long enough for him to gain ground on her.
He intercepted her before she made her way out into the street. "Hey," he greeted.
And then quickly began berating himself - hey ... that's what you were able to come up with? Ass.
"Those two have always been something else, you know?"
|
|
|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 2:26:27 GMT
She was surprised that he'd come after her. Amber blinked up at him for a moment and remembered that she'd really thought about this moment quite a number of times since she originally left New York City. 'Hey' was the grand declaration he'd decided to go with. Part of her wanted to laugh. She bit her lip and tilted her head up at him. "Hello, stranger," she greeted back with a small, hesitant smile.
When he mentioned Liv and Parker, she gave a slight nod. "They're the definition of misery loving company," she admitted. "But they also weren't exactly wrong. Though I appreciate you trying to..." she broke off and chuckled. "I appreciate you having my back, Finn," she said decisively.
She stood there for a beat, drinking in the sight of him before she glanced back in the direction they'd come from. "Don't you have a date in there you should be getting back to?" she asked with a small, forced laugh. "You can get back in there, you don't have to worry about me just because Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum were being particularly nasty. It takes someone much more important that Parker Blye to break me, Brandon."
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 2:38:35 GMT
It took all of his concentration to hear the words that she was saying. He had probably heard the expression "head over heels" a dozen times and thought absolutely nothing of it, but he was wondering now if it meant something like this. Something where his brain seemed to completely shut off, but he still felt perfectly capable of stepping closer to her, reaching out for her in a way that would be even remotely comforting. He shook the feeling off and shrugged at her.
"It wouldn't have been fair to let them continue to harass you when I could tell you stories about Olivia Warren that would make you thankful you left the city," he realized what he said after it had left his mouth. He didn't want her to ever be thankful that she left. But, she had.
"Aren't dates to this thing sort of a formality? Does anyone ever actually leave with who they arrive with?" He didn't even know the woman's name with whom he had been flirting. It had truly been a distraction. "Besides, who else am I supposed to be catching up with at this shindig?"
|
|
|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 2:54:48 GMT
Amber listened to Brandon for a moment and laughed. Some things never changed, really. "I didn't get the memo that I was supposed to bring anyone or leave with anyone, though that does bring back memories of prom," she teased. "I guess I'll just have to miss out again tonight. Poor me," she replied with a shrug and a coy smile that she couldn't fight. It was like habit, flirting with Brandon Finn was just a habit. That's what she repeated in her head - it meant nothing, it was just a habit.
She allowed herself to smile genuinely at him. "You look good, Brandon. Are you good? Have you been..." she trailed off and chuckled at her loss for words. "You look good," she simply echoed again.
She nodded at him. "Anyway, again, thank you for back there. But you didn't have to. They weren't wrong," she shrugged casually and smiled at him. "But you are you know," she pointed out, ticking an eyebrow up with a smirk. "I could never be glad I left. It's where I left my heart, New York's home," she stated matter-of-factly. "You should know that after all the years you knew me. I'll always be a New York girl."
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 3:03:31 GMT
It was the coy smile she tossed him that reminded him in one second all of the reasons that he had loved her. Or loved her in the sense than a young adult man can love a young adult woman. Passionately, truly, and without consequence. But, there were consequences now. Three failed engagements proved that, with not a single woman proving to be someone he thought that he could spend his life with.
He looked her over again at her statement of him looking good. She was also looking well, far better than he would have ever thought a recent widow to look. "You look beautiful, as always. That high-powered job of yours must suit you," he knew exactly what she did. He had heard it through the grapevine that she was working for Glamour magazine, but he assumed that it was best that she didn't know that he knew.
"What about you? How are you doing?" He didn't want to talk about what had happened inside the reunion - that wasn't important - what was important was how she was getting on being back in New York.
|
|
|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 3:19:28 GMT
Amber gave a slight laugh when he mentioned her high-powered job. "I'm...I'm okay. When I graduated, I was offered a job at TeenVogue, which was incredible. And then..." she cleared her throat and looked down. "After the funeral, I requested to be transferred back to New York. Now I'm the Beauty Editor at Glamour. The girls at work dressed me for tonight." She gestured as though to show off jokingly.
She had loved Brandon and to this day would argue that it wasn't in the way that girls fall in love with boys when hormones and sex were involved. She loved him the way a girl loves a boy who's also her closest friend. For a brief period of time, she'd allowed herself to forget exactly who they both were, and she thought maybe he would ask her to stay or show up after she'd left to ask her to come home. She felt silly when she realized that Brandon wouldn't do that - that she was waiting for no reason. She'd contemplated coming back, but she wouldn't admit that she possibly wanted him more than he wanted her.
She shoved those thoughts aside and sighed. "I should get going, Brandon. My entire apartment is still in boxes and I really shouldn't have even bothered with everyone else back in there," she admitted, though at first she made no immediate movement to walk away. When she finally unglued her feet from the floor, she leaned up and pressed a quick kiss to his cheek. When she pulled back she beamed up at him. "If you missed me, you should come around sometime, we can have a drink," she suggested. "But only if you did," she teased.
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 3:29:48 GMT
She really hadn't needed to show off her outfit. The number of times he had found himself looking her over from head to toe had been enough convincing that the women she worked with knew exactly what they were doing. And while the physical was certainly nothing to shy away from, it hadn't been solely the physical that had kept him coming back to her, even after break up upon break up, upon break up. For years they had played that game with each other, and he had known that eventually they had widdled down their relationship to friendship of sorts, but somehow that that had never been enough.
He had always asked himself if he should have asked her to stay. But what if he had and she was unhappy? Would she have resented him?
She pressed a kiss to his cheek and the feeling of her lips lingered on his skin. "Are you sure? I'd be more than happy to get you that drink now. As friends. Just catching up." He tried to seem nonchalant and feared he was failing miserably. "Unless of course you need to get going? In which case, you're right - I should probably at least excuse myself from the party."
|
|
|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 3:48:42 GMT
Amber smiled softly at Brandon. Part of her would have liked nothing more than to go back into the ballroom, get a drink with him, and catch up for old time's sake. They'd talk, and gossip a bit, and laugh. And eventually the woman from earlier would come back to interrupt and take him home. Or maybe Amber could have told him to forget about excusing himself from the party and tell him to take her home, because that was familiar and because her lips still tingled from kissing him on the cheek.
Instead, she reached out for his hand for a brief moment, squeezing his fingertips. "I don't need to get going, I just should," she nodded. "But I want to see you again," she admitted, cursing in hear head how weak that admission made her feel. "Unless you want to come help me unpack my apartment," she joked before reaching into her clutch and pulling out her business card and a pen. On the back of the card, she jotted down her cell phone number. "Call or text me any time and we'll catch up," she instructed hopefully.
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 3:53:48 GMT
He wouldn't let go of her hand. It was instinctual, really. She squeezed his fingertips and he squeezed back, not releasing the grip he held on her. "Why?" He asked, trying to feign as much innocence as he could get away with.
Brandon was sure that she wouldn't believe it - the innocence, that was. He didn't have an innocent thought running through his head. He was picturing a thousand scenarios of what would happen next and all of them ending up with her in his penthouse, sans a few key pieces of clothing.
He released her hand and she pulled out a business card, which he studied for a moment as the ink seemed to dry. "Really?" he laughed. "I'm not going to call you," he informed her. "Come with me. Come get a drink. Catch up. It'll be like old times."
|
|
|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 4:17:00 GMT
Amber bit her lip and looked at Brandon. It would be so easy to let him take her back in there and laugh and flirt over drinks for another hour or so before his hand touched her thigh and his breath fanned out over her neck when he whispered that they should go and he'd give her a ride. It would be familiar if his hand tangled in her hair in the back of a town car before he muttered that the driver should just take them right back to his Penthouse. It would be simple to fall right back into his bed and slip out before the sun came up and continue that cycle until eventually she was given the chance to believe again. And she was certain when that time came, if given the opportunity, he still wouldn't ask her to stay. And that belief was cemented in her head when he said he wouldn't call.
The statement struck her in such a way that she immediately took a step back and then chuckled. Maybe she'd spent too much time watching bad romantic comedies on network television. Maybe, in the years she'd been gone she'd changed and mistaken her past relationship for something that it wasn't. "Don't call then," she shrugged. "I just thought maybe..." she shook her head and then laughed humorlessly. "I don't know what I was thinking," she insisted before stepping towards the exit and glancing over her shoulder at him. "Good night, Finn."
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 13:45:54 GMT
Brandon smiled at her as she made moves to exit again. She always seemed to be making sure that she had some sort of exit strategy around him. Whether it was running off to California for reasons he had long forgotten, or running out of the reunion to escape ... what? Him? This whole place filled with people that she would have loved to have forgotten as well? But then why did she bother coming at all? Maybe it wasn't an exit strategy from this place, maybe it was just from him.
Whatever the reasons for leaving for California had been, over the years he had become so convinced in his own justifications that he was convinced they were true. And perhaps the bottom line is that he was afraid of telling her to stay, because telling her to stay might have been an admission that he loved her, that he wanted to make things work with her, that he was willing to try and be a better man for her - a more monogamous man. And so he was convinced that she left because of him. That she left because he wouldn't commit and he wouldn't do all of the things that a person should do in a true, adult relationship.
But even now, at 30, he didn't feel like an adult. That was way there had been too much alcohol on yachts, too many beautiful women, and too many drunken proposals. He had barely noticed when any of his former girlfriends or fiancees had left, when they dropped off boxes of expensive gifts he had given them over the course of their relationship. And he certainly didn't notice them after he asked the valet to have them removed. Not because it hurt him emotionally to look at them, but because the contents of the boxes never meant anything - a dress was just a dress, jewelry was just jewelry. But it was different with Amber.
Even seeing her name printed in the gossip columns or on the front covers of her magazines caused a pang to shoot through his heart. Maybe everyone is destined to have the girl who got away. And maybe - just maybe - it was his fault for not fighting for her.
"Amber," he called her name in an attempt to draw her attention back to him, and not the door, "Get a drink with me."
|
|
|
|
Post by Amber Jacobs on Aug 13, 2015 14:43:12 GMT
Amber was never good at being direct. After all, her own mother had taught her the best ways to manipulate a man without ever admitting weakness or appearing vulnerable. Then again, Amber was never entirely certain that her mother loved her father. And she had loved Brandon. She had loved him up until the last moment that she realized that he wasn’t going to ask her to stay or come home and then she forced herself to resent him for making her weak and vulnerable. Or that was what she told herself. Standing near him, she was hard pressed to be angry.
She’d been well informed on what he’d been up to in her absence. The gossip columns, blogs, and quick phone calls from the girls back in New York. She would have kept a running list of the women she heard cycled in and out of his life in her absence, but her pen would have run out of ink. In fact, there may or may not have been an incident where she’d been reprimanded for unfairly cutting a model’s booking for Teen Vogue because she’d appeared on Page Six during a trip to New York City on the arm of Brandon Finn himself.
When he called out to her, she slowed her steps and turned over her shoulder to look at him. She took a deep breath before holding up her index finger. “One drink," she said with a slight nod.
|
|
|
|
Post by Brandon Finn on Aug 13, 2015 14:52:44 GMT
He grinned brightly and nodded at her, "One drink."
After all, how much trouble could he possibly get her into with just one drink? Or two, or hell, even three? He knew that by getting her to agree to a drink, it wasn't just the solitary beverage that had opened the door for him. One drink was never just one drink, at least it had never been before. One drink had generally led to more, which led to their involvement in something illicit. Generally involving illegal or ... physical activities.
"I know a place you might like," he told her, leading her out the door of the hotel.
|
|
