Here it is....
Carol was annoyed. She wanted everything to go back to how it was, but she knew that it couldn’t. Because he was gone and he was never coming back.
She wants to move on but everyone keeps reminding her. Reminding her with their condolences. With their pity. With their treating her like a child.
And everything keeps reminding her of him too. The couch in her apartment with its cat scratches even though she doesn’t even have a cat where they ate cheap pizza and binged tv shows and gorged themselves on ice cream. Her table with the uneven leg and her mismatched chairs where they ate waffles and drank coffee and made fun of the articles in the paper. The bay window and its pillows that his mom handmade where they had deep conversations while drinking tea and staring out at the city.
Everything makes her think of him and she just wants it to stop. She wants to forget about him completely because remembering him isn’t doing her any favors.
She tries and tries but it’s hard to forget someone you loved that much.
She goes to work and pretends everything is okay even though it’s not. Her boss assigns her only inconsequential puff pieces which are not helping her to improve thank you very little. She begs and begs and they assign her a story that, while it isn’t a murder mystery, is more exciting than reviewing ‘white girl meets white boy and they fall in love’ number 1994529.
There’s a charity gala in New Jersey, at the mansion of a rich guy, Peter Yates. He is more interesting than she originally thought (or maybe she just convinced herself of that so she wasn’t disappointed with getting the story).
He’s an orphan, since he was very young. He’s never had any sort of long-term romantic partner, even though he has lots of kids. The people in his city love him and his kids, and it seems that he never has been involved in some sort of scandal which is rare with rich people. Or he just covered it up really well. Who knows.
That thought, the ‘who knows’ scared her. Who was she anymore? A potential story and her response is ‘who knows’? She has to get her head in the game. That’s what he would’ve wanted. No. That’s what she wants.
The mansion is posh, and the guests are just what she expected: rich people, all with dresses and jewelry that cost more than her year’s salary that they’ll probably never wear again. Mr. Yates is 30 minutes late, even though he is the host and it’s at his own house. He arrives wearing a Fioravanti suit, looking like he stepped out of a commercial. He is followed by four of his kids, all looking equally dashing in their suits and dresses. There’s music, and it’s nice, though it’s not really her favorite.
She socializes with the other reporters for a time while searching for a good story to tell.
It’s nearing the end of the night, and the only story that she’s gotten was the same one everyone else there had gotten, which, while not being the worst thing in the world, was not ideal if she wanted to prove herself again.
A new song starts. Someone taps her on the shoulder. “May I have this dance?” She turns around, about to decline, but she finds herself face to face with the man of the hour, Peter Yates. “Sure.” She says, while wearing her ‘you are beneath me but I will still talk to you’ face which she has perfected over the years of talking to rich entitled men.
It seemed unnecessary though, after she started talking to him. He was respectful and that was so refreshing. They dance for a while and made small talk and it felt so natural, like they could just talk and talk forever.
She barely notices that they’ve been dancing for far too long, and it seems like he did too. Guests start trickling out and a man taps Peter on the shoulder. The man is older, and has white hair and a timeworn face.
“Not to intrude on what seems to be a lovely conversation, but sir, you are not completing your duties as host. Your guests are starting to leave.”
Peter looks around, and when he notices that the old man is not, in fact, lying to him about the present-ness of the guests, he sends her an apologetic look, “I’m sorry, I have to- you know-”
“I get it” she cuts him off. “Go. Go off and fulfill your duties or whatever.” He smiles gratefully and weaves his way to the front of the crowd, starting to say his thank you’s and goodbyes to all of the guests.
The old man leans towards her a whispers into her ear “If you stay, he might just give you an exclusive interview” She looks at him, eyebrows raised with disbelief. “An exclusive interview? For real? Or is that a euphemism?” The man looks at her and his face reads ‘I don’t know’ or ‘you decide’, both of which are not helpful.
She does get her interview. She listens to Peter and his twin children, Samantha and Scott, talk about the charity they founded (the one the gala was about). Their story is interesting, hopeful and heartbreaking and inspiring, and she’s swimming in ideas for her article.
When the interview is over, Samantha and Scott go off to do who knows what, and Peter invites her into his kitchen.
It’s nice, and it doesn’t feel like the kitchen of billionaire. There are stacks of papers everywhere, there are dirty dishes in the sink, and the fridge is covered in magnets and pictures and flyers like any other house with lots of messy people.
“Coffee?” He asks.
She nods and sits on one of the stools at the breakfast bar, wanting to take off her heels, but not knowing whether it was okay. He goes to the coffee pot, a huge, bulky thing that probably made, like, six gallons a pot. He hums as he makes the coffee, an astoundingly normal thing to do. When the coffee is done, he pours her a mug and then makes himself one. He hands her a cup and it warms her hands and the warmth seeps into her bones. She smiles and takes a sip of her drink as he sits in the stool next to her. Sitting makes her notice how much her feet actually hurt from wearing heels for hours. She starts to push at her heel, uncomfortable, not because her feet ached, but because taking off her shoes felt like passing the line of professionalism into ‘I'm casually sitting in the kitchen of a billionaire drinking coffee’ and she’s not sure of the implications of that. Or maybe she is and she doesn’t want to think about them or acknowledge that maybe she would like some of the theoretical implications.
Maybe he noticed that she was halfheartedly trying to take off her shoe, or maybe the pain on her face was just really evident, but regardless of the reason, peter asked her “Do you want to take your shoes off? I can take them for you.”
“Sure, thanks.” She fumbles with the straps of her shoes and unintentionally shoves them too hard into his hand. He lets out a tiny yelp and she notices “Oh shoot, sorry.”
“It’s fine.” He smiles and makes his way out of the room, putting her shoes who-knows-where. She starts to halfheartedly rub her feet to ease the pain and waits for him to come back.
When he finally does, he seems to notice the awkward situations that his action had created. Letting her take her shoes off implies that he wants to let her stay longer, but it was nearly 11:30 and really, any later would be considered staying the night. They were both stuck, not wanting to say anything in fear of an awkward conversion, which, admittedly, was what was already happening. She gathered her courage first. “Can I stay the night? I don’t think that I’ll be able to make the drive home, and hotels here are really expensive.”
“Sure, it would be no problem at all.” He answered, looking extremely relieved. “Do you want clothes to change into? Sleeping in a dress doesn’t seem like a comfortable thing to do”
She nodded, laughing slightly, “That would be nice, thank you.”
He led her to a parlor with lots of big windows with a pretty view and comfortable-looking couches, where he told her to stay while he got her clothes. He returned with a sweatshirt and sweatpants and then left the room so she could change. She called him back in and they sat together on the couch next to the window with the best view.
They sat, staring at the stars, and talked about anything and everything they could think of. Sometime while they were talking, the sky darkened and it started to rain. At first it was a light drizzle, but soon it evolved into a full-on storm. Their view out the window changed from picture-perfect to blurry, but it made the city’s lights seem brighter. She leaned back onto her pillow and closed her eyes. She doesn’t know where this -whatever it was- will go, but she’s okay with that.
And maybe, in the morning, she'll regret it.
Maybe, in the daylight, he won’t be as good as she thought he was.
But for now, she's happy looking at him lit by the faint light leaking in from the crack underneath the door, the distant glow of the city, and the moonlight.
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