We often fall in love with the most unexpected person at the most unexpected time.
Life is never fair.
It doesn’t stop to help those who had fallen and won’t take a single glance at those crawling on the ground. If you cannot run by its pace, you’ll be abandoned and forgotten.
Why did I ever think that it would stop to help me?
I was no longer sure if meeting Blake is something I should’ve just classified as bad luck. My brother is alive; we were doing just fine and lived in a place I wouldn’t have thought to be in a hundred years.
Perhaps it was quite hypocritical of me to speak of life, abandoning those who cannot mend theirs, when I, myself, was one of those people, firmly rejecting the whole idea of my life getting better.
Was it because of everything that had happened so far that I was stuck on that thought that the little bundle of happiness I finally managed to put together was going to fall apart the moment I remove my eyes from it?
Or was it because I began to doubt the one truth I knew my entire life?
It’s how people work, really. We, humans, can only either accept everything that went against us as the truth or everything that went in our favor. We can rarely accept both at the same time; it’s something I came to understand in my life. I was in that first group, and lately, I’ve been coming to the second one.
Why?
I didn’t know.
I no longer knew anything.
I couldn’t allow myself to do so.
“Merry Christmas, Kal-Kal!” It was the voice of my little brother that pulled me out of my thoughts. No longer did I think about life while staring at the ceiling. The thought hit me so hard, reminding me of my reality.
He was alive. My little brother was still breathing.
“Merry Christmas to you too, Ade.” He dashed through the entire living room and jumped into my arms. I couldn’t help but hug him the tightest I could.
“Look what Santa gave me.” Ignoring my nickname I knew he hated, he moved away to show me the toy he was hiding behind his back. It was probably Blake’s doing.
Blake in Santa suit. For some reason, I wanted to see that one.
Why?
“Who would’ve thought? That means that you were a good kid this year. Now you only need to be even better to get what you truly want for the next one,” I told him, and he grinned. Kids have no idea how happy they are for believing in Santa. Imagine one wish of yours coming true if you were good for an entire year, then there will no longer be people with regrets.
But no matter how much we wish for it, some things are simply never going to undo themselves. But maybe that’s for the best. All those happy and painful things from the past are what define us. Undoing them would be the same as deleting those unique pieces of ourselves we possessed that give us strength. Then we’d all be no different from each other.
So monotonous.
The only thing you can do about your past is to change how you look at it. Whether we fall or rise after that, it’s all up to us.
“You mean I can get a bike?” he asked excitedly. Getting back to the present, I nodded.
“Of course, if you’re a good boy ’til the next Christmas,” I said, and he started running around the room, the room he once destroyed.
Past. Forget about it. Everything was okay. A perfect example of moving on, wasn’t it?
“Stop zoning out for once in your life, will you?” Blake’s voice echoed through the house as he smacked the back of my head once again. He really loved to do that, didn’t he?
“I am so going to regret marrying you,” I mumbled as he raised his eyebrow. How do people manage to do that thing with only one eyebrow at a time? I will never know.
“What do you mean by that?” he asked, pouring himself some of the coffee I previously made. I was no longer afraid of burning down his house, so I took some liberty of preparing coffee for myself. But I couldn’t really drink it all on my own, could I now?
“You’re always smacking me. I’m a pregnant woman, remember?” I said before passing past him as I took his cup of coffee to finish making it. He didn’t really complain, just kept staring at me.
“It is honestly your problem for always zoning out. I only saw that as a chance to bring you back to Earth.” He shrugged.
“What the hell? Don’t!” he complained as I poured some milk in the coffee, mixing it with sugar at the same time.
“I know what I’m doing. Relax,” I told him as he groaned.
“I like my coffee black, without any sweet crap or milk in it.”
No one gets away for insulting milk in front of me. Milk is life. Do I poison Blake now? Nah, that will destroy the coffee, and that is not a price I am ready to pay for getting rid of him.
“Then I guess we have to change that.” I smiled as I handed him back his cup. “Try it.” I grinned as Blake glanced between me and the cup cautiously.
“You’re not trying to poison me, right?” he asked, and I just continued to smile. Well, in my mind I did. In real life, I wouldn’t dare.
“Maybe, maybe not. Depends if you could actually die from my tasty specialty,” I said and grinned.
“Specialty.” He scoffed like a child that was still unsure whether he should try something or not.
“Yeah, you didn’t see, but I also put a bit of chocolate powder in as well.” Maybe this was a bad idea after all since he scrunched his face in disgust. Well, if he doesn’t try it, then he won’t know what he is missing.
“I’m so not going to drink this.” He pushed it away, but I grabbed the cup from him and moved it even closer to his face, putting on my puppy face. I did not dare to accept no as an answer.
“Just a sip. If you don’t like it, I promise to start drinking the same black coffee, as you even thought I hate it from the depths of my soul,” I said dramatically as he sighed and hesitantly took a sip without showing any kind of reaction. Few seconds passed in silence before he shrugged and started to leave the kitchen and said:
“Whenever I want it, you’ll bring me this ‘specialty’ of yours, you’ve got yourself a new job, as my personal assistant.”
I only blinked in confusion at his words. Did that mean that he liked my coffee? Forget the coffee. I just got a job! Wait, what does a personal assistant do? Was he even serious?
What?
“Wait, what do you mean by that?” I yelled as I rushed in order to catch up to him before he can leave the kitchen. By now, Ayden has already disappeared somewhere, probably playing with his new best friend, Alexander, while I was left alone to deal with Blake.
As soon as I caught up to him, I was about to say something, but he interrupted me.
“I meant what I said. You’ll bring me this weird thing you call your specialty when I ask for it, and you’ll work as my personal assistant,” he said in serious but calm tone while I just parted my lips and scrunched my eyebrows.
“What does a personal assistant even do?” I asked, suddenly remembering my previous question.
“Bring me coffee, make me something to eat, and take care of documents I give you and do with them what I tell you to. Also, I’ll give you a list of people, and if they call me on the phone, you’ll direct the call to me. But if it’s someone other than those on that list, just forget about them and say I’m in Hawaii or whatever you want. Use your imagination,” he said as if this was his thousandth time explaining this. “The only difference is that you won’t work at my company, just at our home,” he said, and I nodded, too occupied with the fact that he’d said “our” instead of “my” home.
“Wait, are you even in a position to have a personal assistant?” I asked. I didn’t know where he worked now that thought about it.
“Kaley, I am CEO of one of the most successful companies in the world, so yes, I can,” he said, looking like he couldn’t believe that I just asked him that. “You really don’t know who I am?” he asked, and I shook my head, looking at him curiously. I actually had no idea who he was and what his job was. He might’ve been Batman as I previously doubted, or even a vampire. It’s a wild world after all.
“Well, this is new,” he mumbled, gripping his chin as he bit his lip, thinking. The sight was just too much for my innocent eyes to look at and remain calm, so I turned around. He was hot. Calm yourself, Kaley, you hormonal girl.
Wait! I did not just call him…
“Come here,” he said, indicating for me to follow him to his office. I instantly forgot about my thoughts. Once we entered inside, I was in awe with his black and white themed office. On the other side of the room is a huge door that leads to the balcony. There is a perfectly cleaned and organized desk with a leather chair next to it.
“Sit there,” he said, pointing to a chair I went over to before sitting down. It felt so weird sitting in his chair. I felt like I was the boss. Soon, I felt his presence behind me as his hands went around me to turn on the laptop on the desk. On his background was a photo of a girl with long black hair and heavenly blue eyes just like his. She was gorgeous, and I couldn’t help but feel a bit of jealous. Why was she in his background? The photo suddenly disappeared, and the web browser opened showing Google as the home page. He entered his name and clicked “search,” making many links appear on the screen.
“Here you go. Take a look for yourself. Find out who are you marrying.” He grinned as he grabbed his cup and some papers from the desk and moved to a sofa lying down and skimming through them. Well, it’s his office after all. Hold on. Where is the mouse for this thing? I didn’t see where he moved it. It was my second time seeing a laptop in my entire life, and the first time, it had a mouse attached to it, but there was none here.
“Umm…Blake?” I called, and he just mumbled. “Where did you put the mouse? I can’t find it anywhere,” I shyly asked. How could I not pay attention to what he did with it? I felt really stupid.
“It doesn’t have a mouse. Use the touchpad, silly,” he said as he kept reading the documents in his hands.
“The touch…what?” I mumbled weakly. What the heck was that?
“You’ve got to be kidding me. Is this your first time seeing a laptop?” he asked, removing the glasses he had on.
“Second…And it had a mouse…” It was true. And it wasn’t in such a good state as this one, I wanted to add but decided against it.
He stood up and came to look at me like he was trying to solve a puzzle. I only turned my head away, not wanting to deal with his intrigued eyes.
“It’s 2013, how come? Don’t you have one at your workplace?” he asked, and I shook my head in shame. I knew nothing. Probably noticing my discomfort, he only grinned and touched the space under the keyboard which had two big buttons.
“This is called touchpad. It serves as a mouse for laptops,” he informed me, sounding as if he were explaining this to a little kid, and I eagerly waited for his explanation. “Just put a finger on it and move it. Now, pay attention to the arrow on the screen,” he continued, and the arrow really moved. “Tap once on a link, and it’s just like if you were to click on a mouse. Wait, you do know how to use the Internet, right?” he asked, and I nodded.
“Good. Those two buttons under are like left and right click. Do you think you can manage it?” he once again asked, and I nodded. I think I got this.
“Alright, try it,” he said, and I gladly took over, amazed at this technology. It was so interesting moving a finger across it and watching the arrow on the screen move as well. I was too busy with it that I almost jumped when I felt Blake patting my head.
“Read now and tell me when you’re done. You can play games on it if you want later,” he said, and I nodded before frowning at him. Games? He had games on a laptop? Blake? Like, he? Shaking my head in defeat, I started to read information about him I never knew.
But boy was I amazed of what I learned. I found an article about him and his company and immediately proceeded to read.
“Blake Blackburn, probably the most well-known and handsome man on this planet.” Exaggerating much? What journalist starts a report like that? “Especially when it comes to business. He was born on March 25, and some may say that he might’ve been born under a lucky star. He took over his parent’s company when he was just eighteen while the company was failing and nobody had hopes for it. However, Sway & Stray became very successful and famous by the time he turned nineteen the following year. After the successful return, everyone was greedy and wanted to get a piece of it, but the company remained independent and in the following two years, bought more than 70 percent of those that wanted to buy it instead. Now, five years later, Sway & Stray is a leading force in all industry branches because of the success of its CEO, Blake Blackburn. The only thing remaining now is for the twenty-six-year-old to get married, but can he really find the love of his life? We all know how greedy and money hungry some women can be.”
So, he’s twenty-six, born on March 25, and managed to save his company at the age of eighteen. Yet all I managed at eighteen was to get pregnant, but he was like Superman or something. I so needed to borrow that lucky star from him.
“Wow,” was all I could say.
“Everyone has had that same reaction when they found out who I really am…Well, except for some old geezer I once met from Britain that called me Super Brat and wasn’t impressed at all,” he said as he got up from the sofa, stretching. And of course, he just so happened to wear a tight white t-shirt, allowing me to see all of his muscles flexing beneath the material.
Why, bad Kaley! Go away, horny Kaley!
“How—” I started, but he answered, already knowing the rest of my question.
“Hard work and a bit of luck in the beginning, I guess. Few gambles and risks with closing deals, gaining support from others and using games of words to my side.” I nodded taking it all in. “So what do you think?”
“Amazing,” I replied sincerely since I didn’t know what else to say. Super Brat indeed. I give credit to that man whoever he was.
“In that case, get up.” I raised my eyebrow. “We need to get you ready for tonight’s party,” he said, and I gulped. No way, I hated parties!
“What do you mean? I’m fine just as I am now.” Really, what was wrong with my outfit? It was warm, comfy, and I didn’t look like a monster from Loch Ness in it. It seemed perfect to me.
“Do you have any dress?” he asked, and I stared back at him like he was an alien. Was he kidding? Me in a dress? No! A big no! Please, I’d rather go naked than wear a dress.
I shook my head.
“That’s it. Get dressed. We’re going shopping.”
Noooooooooo!