BLAKE

This time when Jade woke up with a horrible headache and blood shot eyes, there was no comforting smell of coffee wafting from the kitchen.

She was still wearing the dress from last night, which was completely ruined. All stained and crinkled.

Her heels were lying at the foot of her bed.

As the events of last night came flooding into her head, she just got a strong urge to bury herself under the bed covers again. And not wake up for the next 10 years.

But she still had to face the day, she put her feet on the cold floor and somehow dragged herself out.

Just as she was about to leave the room, dreaming about the coffee she would make, she spotted a piece of paper on her night table.

She picked it up.

Jade had to blink her eyes twice to remove the blurriness from it before she could read the words.

.

.

The smile that had been on her face while reading the note from Matt disappeared when she read the postscript.

Why had Alec come home? What did he have to say to her?

He had got the ring. He was going to marry Emma.

But a small voice in Jade's head kept repeating the words,

But he has not proposed as yet.

He has not told her about the ring.

She shook her head. If she kept thinking about Alec and Emma she would end up spending the whole day sitting on her bed.

He had got the ring. But she had only one chance now, and she could only hope and pray that he didn't propose to her.

....................

"Hi mom!" Jade said into the speaker of the phone while washing the utensils in the sink.

The mobile was wedged in between her ear and shoulder.

She had decided to do all the house work instead of sitting and thinking about Alec.

She had showered out the remnants of her hangover and then got down to work.

Just as she had started making some progress with the mobile had started ringing.

"Hello Jade! Good morning. How was last night? Was it good?"

Her dad coming back had had a good effect on her mom. She sounded cheerful and happy.

Peaceful in a way. Like her life was perfect for the first time.

"I can't say whether it was good or bad... All I can say is that it was quite eventful." Jade replied to her mom's question.

"Why does that sound like you had a terrible time?" Amanda asked.

Jade laughed and washed the soap of her hand, "No mom. It's okay. You tell me, what have you been up to?"

"Nothing much. I've been meeting up with Stuart everyday. Talking to him. Jade you know something....?"

Amanda's words intrigued her she propped her hip on the kitchen table and asked, "What?"

"I think I found my old Stuart."

"I'm glad mom... I'm happy for you."

And she really was. The way things were going she had a feeling that maybe she too would be able to forgive her dad.

"You're coming today evening for dinner right?"

"Yes I am."

She looked around the room. She had washed all the dishes, dusted the whole apartment, vacuumed and sorted out her cupboard.

She didn't have any other thing to do.

She had to do something to stop herself from stressing over Alec. And God knew she was not in the state of mind to write.

"Mom you know what? I'll get the dessert for tonight."

Jade very rarely cooked but when she did her dessert were to die for.

"There's no need..." Amanda started to say.

"Please mom." Jade whined, "Imagine my chocolate and coffee mousse! Imagine..."

"Okay okay... My mouth is watering. And your dad will love it."

Jade laughed.

The rest of the conversation went quickly and before long Jade kept the mobile down.

She would have to go to the store to get all the ingredients for her famous chocolate coffee mousse!

Alec loved her mousse. It had been a habit for her to always make it for him on his birthday without fail ever since she had learnt the recipe in middle school.

She shook her head. She was not going to think about Alec.

She went to get ready.

Jade put on a pair of khaki shorts and a light blue shirt.

While she was putting her hair into a braid the cell phone she had placed on her bed started ringing.

She picked it up and was surprised to see the name on the caller id.

"Hi Blake!"

"Don't you 'Hi Blake' me." Said Blake Hastings who was Jade's editor and also one of her best friends. "You were supposed to call me yesterday to give me the update on the new novel. I've been evading calls from the publishing house since yesterday."

Blake Hastings, was an otherwise care free and free spirited person, but she took her job as Jade's editor very seriously.

She made it a point to work hard at everything related to her job.

And her hard work and determination was one of the major contributing factors to Jade's quick climb up the ladder of fame.

"Blake you need to breathe." Jade said once she was done with her yelling.

She heard the other girl laugh slightly on the other line, but she quickly covered it, "Why didn't you call me yesterday?"

"I've been busy, Blake. Really!" Jade said guiltily. "I'm so sorry."

Ever since Alec had come back to town she was neglecting her writing, she had been ignoring calls from Blake and missing her appointments.

He was affecting her professional life as well as her personal life.

Blake had grown up with her father, in Chicago, after the death of her mother.

She knew what sadness and defeat sounded like. And that was exactly what she heard in Jade's voice.

"Is something up?" She asked.

Jade say down on the bed, "I've not written anything much in the past 5 days. With all that is going on in my life I'm not really in the mood to write ideal love stories for my heroine."

"Boy trouble?"

"Oh you could say that!"

Jade filled Blake in on all that was going on in her life.

As a rule, new and fresh authors were always appointed to experienced editors, who were capable enough to advice them about what was good and what was bad.

But unlike others Jade had got Blake as her editor. Fresh out of college both of them had barely any clue of how the industry worked.

Jade just knew that she wanted to do what she loved. Write. And Blake wanted to follow in her fathers footsteps and become a renowned editor like him.

Their friendship had bloomed over late, sleepless nights, scratching their heads over the stories and promotions and over a mutual love of coffee and chocolate.

Once Jade was done updating her editor on all the events of her life she sat back and waited for the reaction.

"Okay!" Blake breathed, "That's a lot to take in. Let me just say you're mad to be in love with him. Alec's a fool. A complete idiot. Why are you in love with him?"

"I've asked myself that question a 100 times already." Jade let out a breathy laugh, "I don't know."

"You know what? I'll call the publishing house and stall them. You sort out everything in your life first. There's no need to add the tension of writing into all this."

Blames words brought tears of gratitude to Jade's eyes.

The girl who never cried was now crying over stupid things. She sniffed and controlled the tears.

"You're the best Blake!" She said.

"Say that during my funeral while giving my eulogy. Martins is going to kill me. But I'll do it for you."

They laughed together.

Martins was the owner of the publishing house and he was known for two things, his short temper and ginger hair.

"I'm sure you'll survive."

"Jade, I hope you don't get more hurt." Blake said on a more serious tone once they had finished their usual anger filled rant on Martins.

"I think I've had my share of hurt. I guess it could only get better now." Jade said trying to cheerful.

How much more wrong could she be?

.....................

For a Saturday afternoon the supermarket was surprisingly empty. There were few people, idly walking through the aisles. Even the baggers standing at the billing counters seemed bored as they played video games on their cell phones and gossiped in whispers.

But the lack of crowd was a good thing for Jade as she walked past the shelves and picked up the stuff she would need to make dessert.

She didn't want to meet people. She didn't want to talk to anyone.

Her ear phones were stuffed into her ears and were belting out rock music as she dropped the packet of unsalted butter into her trolley.

One of the fondest memories Jade had of her grandmother, was that of Nana teaching her to make the mousse.

A recipe which had been passed on for generation in Amanda's family.

She had prepared it so many times over the years, Alec's birthdays, Amanda's birthdays and other special occasions, that she knew the recipe by heart.

She no longer needed a piece of paper to tell her how much dark chocolate she had to add.

As Jade was looking at the cartons of eggs kept on the shelve she felt someone tap her shoulder.

She turned around and was surprised to see a smiling Julia standing behind her.

She pulled out the earphones and smiled, "Hey Jules!"

"Hi Jade! How are you feeling today?"

"Much better than yesterday." Laughed Jade, "I think I had a little too much to drink last night. That's a lot of stuff in the cart."

Julia was carting her own trolley which was filled with loads of normal household stuff.

She glanced at the stuff and chuckled, "Mom needed some stuff so she sent me. By the way did you hear?"

"Hear about what?"

"Didn't Alec call you?" Julia asked, with a frown on her face.

Jade shook her head, "No."

"Well I'm sure he'll call you soon to tell you."

Now it was Jade's turn to frown.

"To tell me what exactly?"

All the hope she had managed to gather before getting out of the house that morning, hopes that Alec wouldn't propose to Emma, hopes that he would realise she loved him, all of them were broken into a million pieces by one small sentence.

"Alec proposed to Emma." Julia said.

................

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