Chapter 35
ELLA
Andrew slows the car as we near a local elementary school, and a relieved smile tugs at my lips despite the paparazzi following the car.
I’m excited for the breath of fresh air that today will be.
No office this morning, and if I play my cards right, I may not have to go in this afternoon either; I could start my weekend early.
I need a break from the office. It’s starting to become a weird reality that my job mostly involves planning Asher’s and my public images, and I’m not sure how I feel about it anymore.
My private and public lives have merged into this twisted amalgam of truth and lies, and they’re no longer separate.
My personal life is now part of my job, to be analyzed and dissected by my coworkers, and Asher and I have become a strange mix of couple, brand, and separate individuals.
The lines of my life are blurred and smudged, and it’s becoming much more complex to navigate than I thought it would be.
And worse, the lines between Asher and I are even murkier. I want to accept his proposal, but I’m terrified to do so. I also don’t think I have the willpower to say no, either. So, it seems like an inevitability. A potentially dangerous one.
And despite myself, I miss him. He’s still in London, and apparently things are not going as well as hoped, so his return date is now up in the air.
He’s been beyond busy, so we’ve hardly communicated in the last five days.
Normally that would be fine with me. I’ve never been a person to constantly need people around me, but this week, I haven’t been able to curb the hollow sting of loneliness.
Maybe it’s the fact that I’m on my period.
Or maybe it’s the fact that Matthew has been on vacation, so I don’t even have my work bestie to keep me company during the day.
Who knows? But Asher’s absence has hit me hard, and nothing has been able to fill that void.
I’ve been so bored I almost considered taking Declan up on his offer to contact him if I needed anything, but I haven’t dared to.
I don’t know him well enough to ask him to casually hang out with me in his brother’s penthouse because his brother is gone and I’m lonely.
Clearly, I’m a mess. So, I’m selfishly grateful to do charity work at the school this morning.
Not only is it a good cause, but it will help me get out of my head and forget my strange new world for a few hours.
“Ella!” a pap calls as I step out of the car.
“Ella, here!” another shouts.
Asher’s made some headlines over in London after being spotted at dinner with his cousins.
His cousins who are related directly to the British Monarchy on their other side of the family.
And that of course brought up the old headlines of the estranged nobles.
Of Harrington Langford, the billionaire who captured Catherine Rothschild’s heart and stole her away to America.
And of her three sons who were raised in New York instead of the UK.
Sterling was with them as well, and he tends to stir the headlines in the UK, since he lives in London.
The press over there calls him the Prodigal Langford Rothschild.
And many women in the upper crust of the UK are doing their best to land him.
He fits their noble status needs, he has more money than god, and he has that roguish American bad boy charm that they’re all pining for.
Asher and Sterling out together was yet another reminder of why the press has been obsessed with their dating lives for almost two decades now. The world is watching and waiting, to see who ends up a Mrs. Langford.
The headlines of course then focused on the fact that Asher is away in London while I’m at home in New York.
The articles tittered on about trouble in paradise, on Asher growing bored of a little nobody like me, and asserting that he’s in London looking for someone of his own caliber.
And so the paparazzi are back in full force.
They had been quieter this week with Asher away, but now that they scent blood in the water, now that there’s a question of whether Asher and I are still together, they’ve flocked to get the story.
Their camera flashes follow me as I climb the steps of the school, but today, the presence of the paparazzi doesn’t bother me.
We made no secret of the Langford car leaving Asher’s penthouse and heading on a new route, and the paps caught on quickly and followed.
As much as I’m not a fan of the paparazzi attention—that attention will help me today, so I welcome it.
Today, I’m helping with a local elementary school food pantry. It’s a service that’s near and dear to my heart, and I’ve volunteered one Friday morning a month for years. But it’s more than a little strange to have two security guards, a driver, and a slew of paps with me this time.
“We’re so glad you’re here,” Christine, the organizer of the pantry, says as I walk through the doors. “I haven’t seen you in a bit.”
“Yes, sorry. It’s been a crazy few weeks.”
She laughs lightly. “I’ll say. I had no idea you were dating Asher Langford. That’s like, completely insane!”
“Yes. We kept it quiet for as long as we could. But with his notoriety, that quiet didn’t last long.”
“Well, I can’t say I’m not grateful for some of that notoriety making its way here. A person named Matthew arranged for the press to be here, so we’ll get some good coverage. We need it.”
“I’m glad. Whatever I can do to help.”
We continue chatting as we make our way to an old classroom-turned storage room.
One wall is lined with shelves that hold non-perishable food items and hygiene kits for children in need to take home for the weekends, and another is lined with tables where volunteers will fill backpacks with those non-perishable items. Besides the twenty or so volunteers, at least ten different press outlets are crammed into the room.
The cameras begin to flash just after I enter, and I step aside so that Christine can take the floor.
She explains both to the new volunteers and to the press how the process goes.
In about thirty minutes, the children who need this service will be here, and we’ll stock their backpacks with food and supplies for the weekend before they leave for their Friday early dismissal schedule.
She also reminds the press that they don’t have prior permission from the children’s parents to film or photograph the children’s faces.
They’ll need to stick to documenting the process from behind so only the volunteers’ faces will be shown.
I set up my station then walk around to greet the press and answer questions.
“Ella, we’ve been told you’ve volunteered here for several years,” one of the local news reporters asks. “This is obviously a charitable endeavor near to your heart, why is that?”
“It is dear to me. My best friend struggled with food insecurity as a child. We became friends on the first day of second grade, and when we sat together for lunch, she didn’t have any food.
As a child, I didn’t understand how that could happen, and when I asked her about it, she quietly told me that her mother usually forgot. So, I shared my lunch.
“When I got home that day, I told my mom about my new friend, and my mom, being the amazing woman she is, took the situation into her own hands. From that day forward, my mom either packed me double lunches or put money into my best friend’s lunch account.
As time went on, I noticed that my friend was extra hungry on Mondays.
When I asked her about it, she told me there often wasn’t much food at home, so she spent nights and weekends hungry.
“This service wasn’t available to my friend at the time, so my mother took matters into her own hands again.
She not only sent me to school with double lunches, but she also sent me with a packed dinner for my friend each day, and on Fridays she sent me with an extra backpack filled with food for the weekends, until my mother could convince my friend’s mother to let her stay with us on weekends.
“Unfortunately, my friend was not just suffering from food insecurity, there were other issues at home that eventually involved DCFS, and her removal from the home at the age of thirteen.
She was placed with my family as her foster care providers, and a year later, my parents were able to legally adopt her, and so my best friend became my sister.
“I know that my sister’s situation involved DCFS and that is not necessarily the norm for children in need of this food pantry. But what I can say from experience, and what I can’t stress enough, is how much those meals meant to my sister as a young child.
“My sister is brilliant, but she had struggled academically in first grade due to chronic hunger and fatigue at school. Once she had adequate food, her academics soared. Those meals my mother provided were the difference between her barely surviving at school and her thriving. Those meals allowed her to focus on just being a kid, instead of worrying about where her next meal was going to come from. And I’ll always be so grateful to my mother for showing my friend, now my sister, that kindness.
My mother’s care changed the course of my sister’s life.
She went from a child struggling to read to a woman now studying at the top of her class at Oxford University, and I’m so proud of her.
And that is why this charity work is dear to me.
Our goal is to help children focus on being children, on learning and growing, and not on hunger. ”
The reporters break into questions, and I tell the press about Asher’s generous donation to the school lunch and weekend food pantry programs. He hasn’t actually agreed, but I know he will, so I’m not worried about making that claim prematurely.