"Are you okay?"
Rebecca asked, looking at the pale face of Alexis. Her skin was naturally pale enough, now blood leaving its rightful place and making her look paler.
"I'm fine."
"Should we go to a good dinner place? Aren't you hungry?" Rebecca tried to smile through the tension and put a gamble on lunch to lift up the mood.
"I think I will retire for the day. Not feeling like it, Beck."
"Are you sure?"
Alexis nodded to her.
She then dropped Rebecca off at her home and checked at her constantly vibrating phone. It was filled with hundreds of notifications and calls from unknown numbers. All from past college group chats and classmates she deleted numbers of.
As far as she remembered, she left all of the group chats after graduation. She never liked them, it was full of people who loved gossiping and nothing else.
Someone must have added her again. Alexis clicked the first group chat which was most active and then found a few of her old classmates gossiping over a link. Just by linking on it, Alexis felt like throwing up.
She was recorded standing with Stefan in the mall and the voice was muted on the video. While Stefan's face was clear, the video didn't capture Rebecca's face that well. It was blurry but the caption of the gossip needed was enough for her blood to boil.
'The actual reason behind the divorce: Mistress kept hidden'
Ridiculous.
Although she didn't post her pictures on social media, her old classmates could easily guess from her silhouette who the girl in the video was. Everyone in her college knew about their relationship and the news was juicier for them. Thinking she was a home wrecker and ruined a girl's home involving herself with her ex.
She was becoming the villain again, just like six and a half years ago. When he left her without any explanation and landed in public with his marriage. People attacked her as if it was her fault that he left her.
At first, when they were together, people thought that it was a fairy tale. The heir of the richest business empire of the city and a girl with an ordinary background, fairy tale indeed. But as soon as it crumbled, they blamed her for being so ordinary. Felt pity for her stupidity to dream the impossible. Some called her shameless to look up so high.
Alexis never bothered about public opinion or what those shallow people thought about her. All she cared about was the man she loved with all her heart and yet he was nowhere to be found. He was busy playing the prince charming heir of the Ashford Industries and the prince needed a daughter of a king to get settled. Maybe Venessa was the perfect solution for the equation. And she was pathetic enough to let herself witness it with her own eyes.
That wedding aisle, that wedding dress, everything perfectly acted in its place, while she buried her dream of getting married with the love of her life forever. The public opinion she didn't give a fu*k about before, started to hurt her, shatter her.
And after all these years, she thought she was finally out of that bullshit to find herself tangled in it again. And exactly for the same freaking name she wants to forget.
The comments on the post circulated all the gossip from college days. Some of them mention her and call her shameless. She stared at them for a few seconds and her vision got blurry.
And then one called id filled the screen. Alexis couldn't clearly see who called her but received it instantly. Maybe she wanted to stop looking at those comments so badly that she immediately pressed on the answer button.
"Hello?" Her voice is a little hoarse. A little sniffling sound could be heard too. But she couldn't care less.
"Where are you right now?"
A familiar voice seeped inside her brain among all the chaos. Cool, deep and a little bit less distant than she remembered.
Alexis removed the phone from her ears to look at the caller Id. Mr. Grumpy.
She put the phone beside her ears again.
"I don't know," all of a sudden the sniffle turned into a full blown cry.
"Look at the things around you. Tell me."
Alexis did what she was told to do. It looked like a subway near her apartment. She clicked a picture and sent it to him.
"Stay put for 10 minutes. Okay?"
She nodded.
"Lockwood, are you there?"
She realized they weren't on a video call so he didn't know she nodded in agreement.
"Yes. Okay."
The call was cut instantly.
6 or 7 minutes later a familiar black SUV drove in front of her parked car and the man stepped outside with a small bag in his hand.
He was wearing a white t-shirt and khaki cargo pants. Super casual. Was he chilling at home?
Of course, he was. It was Wednesday and his day off from the restaurant.
Alexis saw him taking long strides before reaching her car window and gently knocking it. She unlocked the car door for him and found him to make room for his tall figure, careful enough not to bump on the car roof.
What a big guy.
He then carefully took out a vanilla ice-cream cone from inside and handed it to her.
Alexis didn't know when she started crying but looking at the ice-cream cone made her tears fall even faster. Arthur held her gaze while peeling out the wrapper with great care and then handed the cone to her.
Alexis didn't complain but took it from him. She gave a lick on the coating and tasted the sweetness with her salty tears.
He didn't want to be friends with her. And yet he came.
He didn't let her enter his life. Didn't let her have any chance to get to know him. And yet he came when she needed someone the most.
She thought she didn't and that's why she sent Rebecca home.
But it wasn't true. She did need someone real bad and somehow Rebecca being the sister of the reason she was crying wasn't helping her at all. She wished she could cry her heart out and tell Rebecca how much she has been hurting over the years because of her brother. But she couldn't do it.
How can she? She can't let anyone know that she still couldn't recover from the shock or someone leaving her in the middle of the road while planning the forever with them. She can't accept it out loud, that the existence of Stefan alone still held the power to ruin her mental peace and all rationality.
But if it was this man, maybe she could do that. Maybe just like six years ago, the young immature Alex did.
Alexis was extremely angry and sad all together. The only receiver of the emotion was Arthur alone. He didn't stop looking at her since he got inside the car.
"Why are you here? I didn't even ask you to be here," Alexis replied, looking all serious with her tear filled eyes.
"Did you not want me to?" He asked, his face looking all plain without any emotion to read for her.
"Why would I? Who are you to me anyway…," she muttered under her breath. But the distance between them was almost non-existent because of his huge frame fitting in the car and almost taking all the space himself and so, he heard her clearly.
"Do you want me to leave, Lockwood?"
Alexis looked at him straightly with her puffy green eyes, lips all pouty, making her look like a crying baby.
She then pointed an index finger on his chest and pushed it in annoyance.
"What do you even know? I don't want you to go. I want you to stay and watch me cry and nag and yell like I did six freaking years ago. I want you to listen to me, listen to my sorrow. I want you to understand me and want you to let me understand you too. I want to have a person like you beside me as my support."
Alexis blurted out whatever came into her mind, without caring about a single thing. She saw his gaze soften, his beautiful pair of eyes looking at her to continue.
"As a friend," she added, letting her index slide from his chest to her lap.
And then she saw his jaw muscle harden a little. He had freshly clean-shaved today. She didn't mind his scruff, but his jawline was much more prominently glaring at her in this state. The musky smell of after-shave was filling up the tiny car space, making her feel a little dizzy.
"I don't want any of that if you aren't anything to me. I don't like meaningless bonds. I know I suck at maintaining them but I hate not having them anyway," she replied again as she didn't get a response from him at all.
Her ice-cream was melting on her hands but she didn't care much. The discussion was much more important. Maybe more important than the reason she cried too.