Chapter 9
NINE
Mona
I expected Alex to freak out on me when I ordered the steak. I’m sure it’s really expensive, and he is not the type who’d spend this kind of money on food, especially on someone other than himself.
When I heard him order a salad, I about fell out of my chair. It took everything in me not to laugh, especially since I had planned on ordering just that upon leaving my apartment earlier.
Now, as we stare at each other with the plates of food in front of us, I can’t help the feeling of joy at having him here. I hate that I am so happy to see him after doing everything in my power to avoid him for the last few months. I missed him, though, and I hate myself for it.
Julian Lewis. I have to repeat the name in my head in order to remind myself that he will be my saving grace.
I might ask if there’s anything I can bribe him with so that he’d take a stroll with me by the building where Alex lives, or where he works, anywhere that he might be able to see us together.
“Dig in,” he now tells me. He winks at me as he points to the large plate in front of me.
I clear my throat a couple of times. “This is a lot of food.”
Alex’s face becomes serious. “I hope you came hungry.”
That reminds me that I ate before coming here, so I am not hungry at all. But now I have to eat this steak, even if it is out of spite.
“Starving,” I smirk at him, lying through my teeth.
I pick up my utensils and cut into the meat with aggressive moves. With no elegance at all, I shove that first bite into my mouth, and I swear my eyes roll to the back of my head as it literally melts on my tongue.
“Oh my God! This is so good!”
I cut another piece, and then another, not stopping until I am at least halfway through. I lean back in my seat, needing a break from eating. I feel like I am about to explode, I am that full.
“Don’t forget about the sides,” Alex reminds me. It’s as if he knows I am close to passing out from eating this much.
I pull the baked potato closer and take a large scoop of it, which I then proceed to shove into my mouth. I chew extremely slowly to make sure that it won’t come back up.
“How’s your salad?” I ask. A glance at his plate shows that he is close to being done with it.
“Good.” He scoops a tomato and pops it in. “Very refreshing.”
I let out a silent groan of distress. I am literally sick from eating. This is not a predicament I’d foreseen for myself before leaving the apartment.
“You want the rest to go?” he asks me with a knowing look.
I want to say no and continue eating, because I want to show him. But I just can’t. I am physically incapable of taking another bite. I push the plate forward and lean back in the chair. There’s a possibility that I won’t be able to get up. How am I going to make it home like this?
In the corner of my eye, I notice Alex signaling for the waiter, who rushes to our table.
“We’d like a couple of boxes,” he tells him.
The waiter, just as before, bows in response, making me slightly uncomfortable. I don’t get why they do that. Is this what it means to have more money than you know what to do with it?
“Would you like to see the dessert menu?”
I almost start crying at hearing that question. I can’t even take a sip of water, no way I can deal with dessert.
“None for me,” Alex responds. “Mona?”
It’s as if he is expecting me to say no, which is why I decide to go with the opposite.
“I would love to see the dessert menu,” I say.
Alex’s eyebrows go up in surprise while the waiter produces a menu on the spot. I take it and start looking over it. It all sounds delicious, but since I am so stuffed, the more I look over everything, the more I feel like the food is about to all come back up.
“I’ll have a slice of Death by Chocolate,” I finally say. “To go.”
Hopefully it’ll keep for a few days until I recover from the current food coma I am about to slip into.
The waiter picks up the plates off the table, and, not going to lie, all I feel is relief at not having to look at it anymore. I guess they’re right when they say that too much of a good thing can be a bad thing.
I can feel Alex staring at the side of my face, but I really don’t feel well, and I wonder if it would be impolite to ask to go to the bathroom. Hopefully, I’ll be able to relieve myself of all this food. I am having cramps now.
“Are you okay?” Alex asks when I press a hand to my stomach. When I look down, I see how bloated I look. What the hell did I do to myself?
“I’ve never been better,” I snap at him. “Thank you for showing up here and basically high jacking my date.”
He smirks. “How did I highjack your date if he never even showed up?”
That raises my hackles. “He is a very busy person. Him missing our dinner is not a common occurrence.”
“Oh, you know that for a fact?”
I swear it sounds like he is teasing me. I don’t like it.
“He is a gentleman,” I continue defending this man who I’ve never even met.
Alex watches me thoughtfully without giving me any clues as to what he’s thinking.
“How long have you been seeing him?”
I swallow and look away as I prepare to lie to him to his face. I bring my eyes back to his, and there is no hesitation in my tone when I reply.
“Long enough to know that what you’re trying to imply is not accurate.”
He snorts. “I am not implying anything. I was just being curious. Is he the reason why you blocked me?”
Anger takes over, and I see red. Just in time, I do remember that this is not the place where I should be going off on this man.
“No, Alex,” I smile sweetly, a bite to my tone. “I blocked you because you treated me like trash, and I finally had enough of it. I didn’t want to have to always be bracing myself for yet another rejection from you.”
He didn’t expect my candor, that much is clear.
The surprise on his face is expected in a way.
I don’t think he was ever aware of the damage he did to my self esteem while we were together, all because he was scared to commit while he couldn’t let me go.
Whether he did it on purpose or not doesn’t even matter anymore.
All I care about is the fact that I will never put myself through that again.
I jump when the waiter materializes next to the table. He only addresses Alex, which gives me the opportunity to take a deep breath in and focus once again on how miserable I am.
“Sir, the doggy bag is ready for you to grab on your way out.”
Alex nods gracefully. “Thank you, we will remember to pick it up.”
He stares at me while I have this sudden urge to burp. If I don’t do it, it may come out the other way, and I don’t think the patrons of this restaurant would appreciate it. It hits me so suddenly, I don’t know what to do. Panic takes over, and I stand up abruptly.
“I need to use the restroom.”
Without waiting for anyone to respond, I start marching away from the table.
I have no idea where the bathroom is, and I don’t realize that until I find myself in the middle of the quiet restaurant.
Since I am being me, I somehow manage to gather attention when I spin on my heels in a big circle, a hand now pressed to my chest in an effort to stop myself from belching out loud.
“Miss, are you okay?” Someone addresses me from behind, but I don’t have time to turn around and ask for the restroom. Instead, my mouth opens and the most ungodly sound releases from the pits of my very soul, I swear.
There are gasps of shock all around me, but I could care less. The pressure in my chest is finally gone, and I can breathe without feeling like I might drop dead of a heart attack.
A few seconds in and once the relief has settled in, I realize what I just did. I look at the people at the nearby tables and smile nervously, wondering how weird it would be if I just ran out of here now. I mean, how much worse could I make this?
Then, like a knight in a shining armor, Alex appears at my side.
“Come with me,” he says.
I let him grab me by the hand, and I follow him through the tables until we reach a hallway that’s a bit out of the way. He stops walking when we reach an elegant door with a sign on it that I can’t focus enough to decipher.
“The restroom is right through there.” The gentle smile he gives me about cuts me at the knees. He pushes something into my hands. “Here’s your purse in case you want to freshen up.”
I am so grateful that I want to kiss him. That’s why, I don’t even think when I lift myself on the tips of my toes and press my lips against his cheek, one of my hands resting on his shoulder.
“Thank you.”
Worried that I might be giving him the wrong impression, I step back, and then turn around and walk into the restroom.
Rushing to the sink, I place the purse on the counter and turn the faucet on. I wet my hands with cold water before placing them on my overheated face.
“I can’t believe I did that,” I mumble to myself.
That applies to both me burping in the middle of the most elegant restaurant I have ever been in, and also sending some very mixed signals to Alex by kissing him just now.
“It was only on the cheek,” I tell myself. “A friendly peck. It doesn’t mean anything at all. And he knows that.”
I continue giving myself a pep talk as I use the toilet, grateful that there’s no one else in here. While my stomach is suddenly very noisy, I don’t clog the toilet, so there is a God after all.
I walk out of the stall, wash my hands again, then attempt to fix my makeup. I don’t have everything with me, but at least my mascara is not running, and the eyeliner is still in place.
“Better?” Alex, back to his cocky self, smirks at me when I walk out.
Rolling my eyes at him, I let him help me with my coat, which he obviously retrieved for me. A bag is dangling by his elegant fingers, and I’m assuming that’s our leftovers from the disastrous dinner we just had.
“We’re going to exit through the back door,” he tells me once I am ready to go.
“Oh…” I glance around us, expecting for someone to jump out and tells us we’re not allowed to do that.
“I didn’t think you’d want to walk back out into the restaurant and deal with all the stares.”
A small snort of embarrassment mixed with amusement escapes me.
“So thoughtful of you,” I say.
I follow his lead when he walks toward this back exit he mentioned, taking a deep breath in when the cool air from the outside finally hits my lungs.
“Thank God that it’s not summer and I can take a deep breath in without worrying that I’d be inhaling some toxic crap,” I murmur.
Alex shakes his head and takes my hand as he walks us down the dark alley until we make a right, then we’re finally out onto the busy street from which I entered the restaurant when I got here. That’s when I notice Alex’s shoulders shaking with laughter.
“What’s so funny?”
He stops in the middle of the sidewalk, people rushing all around us, a couple mumbling obscenities at us for blocking the way.
“I can’t believe you burped like that in the middle of a three Michelin star restaurant.”
I roll my eyes at him, but I can’t help the chuckle that comes out. “I did try to make it to the restroom.”
“It echoed all around the place,” he snorts. This time, he bends at the waist a little as he laughs, but he doesn’t let go of my hand. “It was fucking awesome.”
“I don’t know about awesome,” I laugh. “But as delicious as that steak had been, it about took me out. I am so full, I can barely breathe. And my dress feels too tight on me.”
He stops laughing. “You look beautiful.”
“Busting at the seams,” I retort.
He yanks me into him with such force, I have no choice but to rest my hands on his chest. His free arm is now wrapped around my waist while he’s holding the bag with the food in his other one.
“You are beautiful,” he repeats. “You’ve always been beautiful.”
He bends his head lower like he wants to kiss me, and I freeze. Memories flood me, making the blood in my veins to heat up as my body knows how good he can make me feel.
In that same respect, if I give in now, the last few months of me freezing him out have been in vain.
We could get back together only for him to push me away again within months.
And I can’t deal with that anymore. I don’t want to.
I’d rather live a lifetime of missing him than have my heart broken by him over and over again.
“I have to go now,” I whisper just as his lips get close enough where he could devour me.
My hands feel clammy, and I am dizzy with want and desire for him. I really need to get away from him. He is like a drug to me, and if I am not strong enough to say no, I will never break this cycle of destruction he’s put us through for four years.
I press against his chest until he lets go of me. Disappointment is clear on his features, almost changing my mind.
“Thank you for buying me dinner tonight.” I start walking backwards, in an effort to get away from him. “It doesn’t mean anything, though. You’re still blocked.”
With that, I turn around and almost take off in a run, rushing to get to the train station so I can make my way back home.
Tonight was nothing like I had expected. And I still don’t have a solid date for the Christmas party.
Damn.