I sat and looked out of the restaurant window while I waited for Lena. It looked like a decent enough day out there, and I wondered if maybe Lena and I should go for a walk around the grounds after lunch. While it was nice to have her be nice to me, sometimes it was hard to remember what was real and what wasn’t and I figured a bit of time alone would remove the blurred lines and make me remember what I hated about her. Ok, hate was maybe a bit strong. Perhaps actively disliked was better.

Despite my dislike for Lena, I didn’t regret having sex with her the other night. Was that weird? Maybe it was. But the fact of the matter was that we were two consenting adults and like her or not, there is no denying that Lena was fucking hot. I don’t think I would be human if I didn’t want to have sex with her.

I pretended to think it was a mistake the morning after it because Lena seemed to feel like it was a mistake for her, and I figured it would make things less complicated if I said I regretted it too and we would keep things business like from now on than it would if I had spoken the truth instead and said that I didn’t regret it one bit and I would in fact be open to doing that again.

It was funny because before I saw her in that nightdress, I had never imagined myself having sex with her. Not really. I knew she was attractive, but in my mind, that didn’t excuse the way she was always so cold to me and the way she always spoke to me with a level of derision in her voice. Really it was beyond me how anyone liked her when she wasn’t acting.

Even now, she was disrespecting me, and I was paying her to do the opposite. I had had some work related calls to make this morning, so I had arranged to meet Lena for lunch here in the restaurant and she was meant to have been here five minutes ago. I knew it wasn’t that long, but it wasn’t like she had anything else to do and even if there was a genuine reason, would it have killed her to do the polite thing and let me know she was going to be late?

I could feel myself getting more and more annoyed the longer I sat there and I checked my watch again and saw that ten minutes had passed since the time we were due to meet. Fuck that. I got up and left the restaurant and headed back towards the elevators. I would go and get on with some more work and Lena did eventually decide to breeze into the restaurant, she wouldn’t find me there waiting for her like an idiot.

As I stormed down the hallway, I realized that I could hear Lena’s voice. I looked around in annoyance wondering where she was, but I couldn’t see her. For me to be able to hear her but not see her while I was in this spot, she had to be in the bar. That got my back even further up. She was sitting drinking instead of meeting me. Great.

I knew an argument in public wouldn’t be a good look for the façade I was presenting, but I couldn’t let Lena just take the piss out of me and not say anything. This was unacceptable and I intended to nip it in the bud right now. I approached the bar but as I go to the door, I saw that Lena wasn’t actually drinking. She was sitting with Sammy, the table in front of them empty except for Eve’s sippy cup.

Sammy was crying and Lena had an arm around her talking to her. I knew I should move away, but I stayed in place, wondering what was going on. I soon got the gist of the conversation. Sammy was upset about the wedding. It sounded like she was having cold feet. Lena was calming her down, making her see that she loved Bradley and she did want to be his wife, that it was perfectly normal to have a freak out so close to the wedding. At the same time, she moved her hand, making shadow ducks, rabbits and more on the wall keeping Eve amused.

Eve sat happily on Lena’s lap giggling in delight at the shadow creatures. Seeing Lena like that comforting my sister and entertaining my niece softened me slightly. Sammy being in floods of tears probably was more important than our lunch arrangements. I was still a bit pissed off that she hadn’t even bothered to let me know though.

I decided to still head up to the room and when Lena text to see where I was when she eventually went to the restaurant to find me, I would come back down and forgive her for being late but make it clear she was to communicate with me in the future if something came up.

I was half way to the elevator when my cell phone pinged in my pocket. Great. That was likely more work calls I would have to make. As much as I would have liked to switch the damned thing off, the world didn’t stop turning because of a wedding and that meant my business didn’t stop running and that in turn meant I needed to be available, although I did have a good manager in place who easily handled the day to day stuff and most of the other stuff too. I couldn’t complain really.

I frowned when I saw the ping sound hadn’t indicated a voice message from a client or the manager, but instead, my cell phone showed a text message from Lena. I opened it and read it. It was short and to the point.

“I’m so sorry. I’m running late. I’ll be as quick as I can. Feel free to eat without me and I’ll grab something later if you need to get going. L x”

I read the message and then I saw the time stamp. The message had been sent twenty minutes before Lena and I were due to meet. So not only was she consoling my sister and taking care of me niece, she had also done the right thing and my lack of signal was the problem rather than her supposed lack of manners.

Feeling somewhat sheepish, I turned around and went back to the restaurant. I went back to the same table. I had barely gotten seated when a rather flustered looking Lena burst in. She saw me and hurried over to the table and sat down.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“It’s ok,” I told her. “What happened? How come you’re late?”

Of course I already knew the answer to those questions, but in Lena’s mind I didn’t know where she had been and it would look weird not to ask.

“I was just helping Sammy with some wedding stuff,” Lena said. “Stuff that would likely bore you, and time just kind of ran away with me.”

I smiled and nodded, silently giving Lena another brownie point for not gossiping and protecting Sammy’s moment of weakness.

“Should we order? I’m so hungry,” Lena said, picking up a menu.

I nodded and picked up my menu too. Earlier, I had wondered why people liked Lena at all. I was starting to see why now. When she wasn’t around me, she seemed to shed that cold exterior and open up a little bit and it made sense that people would like that version of her. Hell, I probably would have liked that version of her.

We ordered our lunch – a tuna salad for me and a jacket potato with cheese for her – and we chatted while we waited for it to come.

“Sammy mentioned something last night about taking a year out and traveling around Europe,” Lena said. “Did you do that too?”

I shook my head.

“No,” I said. “Sammy is a graphic designer, which means she can work from pretty much anywhere with an internet connection. She did do a year’s travel, but she was building her business the whole time. Me, I chose a business selling sportswear wholesale, and well, I can’t really do that unless I’m on site, so I didn’t do the traveling thing.”

“Couldn’t your parents have hired a manager or something for a year if they wanted out before you were quite ready to take over?” she asked.

“It wasn’t my parents’ business,” I told her. “I built my company from the ground up.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Lena said. “I always thought you inherited your father’s business.”

I shook my head again and I was about to tell her about my father’s line of work when the waiter arrived with our food. We both thanked him, and we got tucked in to our food. We were chatting through the meal, not about anything in particular, just chit chat really. Lena told me she hadn’t had a gap year either, but she had gone to Thailand for six weeks over the summer holidays before starting college. She was telling me about some of the things she saw, some of the places she had been. Her face was alight with her memories, and she talked so passionately about the place.

I couldn’t help but smile at how enthusiastic she was, and for a moment there, it was hard to remember why I had always thought Lena was cold.