Nora was always the talkative one, so she was chatting throughout the whole meal.
“Mr. Featherstone, since Sienna is here, and you’re in K City, are you guys living apart for now?” Nora suddenly brought up.
Anthony’s dark gaze fell on me, and he said, “No. I’ll go wherever she goes.”
“Aw! Now you’re just flexing your relationship to the rest of us,” Nora said with a shy squeal.
She turned to look at Rachel, who was starting to turn pale. “Ms. Zimmer, as Mr. Featherstone’s colleague, don’t you get tired of seeing them act all lovey-dovey every day?”
Rachel smiled and replied, “I’m usually in K City and rarely get to see Ms. Stanhope, so I wouldn’t get the chance to.”
Hearing that, Nora frowned slightly. “Oh, you guys don’t call her Mrs. Featherstone at the company? ‘Ms. Stanhope’ seems a bit too standoffish.”
“I rarely meet her after all, so it’s a bit hard to suddenly get used to that,” Rachel continued answering politely.
Nora pouted and glanced at me. I didn’t understand what she meant and just stared back at her in confusion.
At the sight of my indifference, Nora suddenly leaned slightly toward Rachel. Her motion caused a glass of water in front of her to topple over, spilling the contents all over Rachel. There wasn’t a lot of water left in the glass, but Rachel’s dress was expensive, and it was obvious that Nora wanted to get a reaction.
As she wiped the water off Rachel’s dress, Nora apologized, “I’m so sorry, Ms. Zimmer. Maybe you should go to the bathroom to clean that.”
Rachel was frowning at that point. She was obviously ruffled, but she was good at controlling her emotions and remained calm.
Once Rachel left, Nora ignored Anthony’s presence and said, “Ms. Stanhope, can’t you tell that that fine lady has her eyes on your man?”
I felt uncomfortable at her calling Anthony “my man” and looked at him instinctively. Despite that, he looked completely unfazed.
I pressed my lips together and said, “Don’t be crazy. Ms. Zimmer is a very talented woman.”
“What the h*ll?” Nora burst out. “Sienna, what’s gotten into you? What do you mean by that? Are you going to give your man up to her just because she’s a ‘very talented woman’?”
Anthony was still there, so I knew she was doing this on purpose. Thus, I decided to ignore her question.
She clucked her tongue at my silence and said, “Did you two have an argument or something?”
After a pause, she looked at Anthony and said without even blinking, “Did you cheat on Sienna?”
Anthony’s gaze darkened, and he looked at me. I thought he would get angry, but he seemed to calm down instead and replied, “I don’t sh*t where I eat.”
Simply put, he wouldn’t lay an eye on another woman.
Nora chuckled and nudged me with her elbow. “You better hang on tight to this guy. There aren’t many like him in this day and age.”
I was starting to feel awkward when the waiter jogged toward us and said, “Is the lady in the bathroom a friend of yours? She tripped and fell. It’s rather serious, so you should take a look.”
“She tripped?” Nora immediately went to the bathroom.
I fell silent since it was now just me and Anthony at the table. After a while, I looked at him and said, “You should go check on her.”
He frowned and looked at me. “Are you sure about that?”
I was taken aback by the sudden question before nodding. “Yeah. She might be in trouble.”
He scoffed coldly before suddenly getting up and walking toward the bathroom.
I followed him and spotted Nora helping Rachel out of the bathroom. It really did look rather serious.
Nora saw us and said, “I think she may have twisted or fractured something. She’ll probably need to go to the hospital.”
Rachel’s eyes looked red as if she were trying not to cry. I was surprised, but calmed down and said to Anthony, “You should send her to the hospital. Nora and I are busy, so we won’t be able to make it.”
Nora looked at me, obviously getting annoyed by my attitude. She then frowned and said, “It’s fine. I’ll send her to the hospital.”
“It’s okay. It’s not that bad. I can go on my own,” Rachel piped up. Her voice was quivering, and it sounded as if she were minutes away from sobbing.
Anthony looked at me, and I reached out to tug Nora’s sleeve. “You have to go to the office with me later, remember? Let Mr. Featherstone send her instead.”
Nora’s frown was slowly deepening. “Mr. Featherstone?” she asked as she glanced at Anthony.
Anthony looked away from me and carried Rachel before walking away wordlessly.
“Sh*t!” Nora cursed. She looked at me as if she were about to cry for my sake. “What’s wrong with you? That’s your husband! Why are you pushing him away?”
I didn’t know how to reply and simply said, “We have nothing to do with each other anymore. Come on. Let’s go to Murphy Corporation.”
“What do you mean? Are you blind? Didn’t you see how he looked at you? Why are you just pushing him away like that? If he did something wrong, just tell him! Stop doing this psychological cold-shoulder stuff. Sienna, I’m disappointed in you.”
After her angry rant, she walked off without even waiting for me.
I was surprised and finally realized that she was genuinely mad at me. Quickly, I caught up to her and tugged at her arm. “Nora, this is my own problem. You don’t have to worry so much about it.”
She stopped and turned to look at me. Her shiny eyes betrayed her disappointment. “Yes, it’s your problem. But do you know why I’m so mad? Since the first time we met in Venria and ran away together, I could tell you were incredibly smart.
“After that, while we lived in the forest together and you saved me from Abe, I realized you were kind and chivalrous too. I felt like we had similar values and was determined to become good friends with you once we returned to the country. I’m angry now because you’re so different from who I thought you were. I’m not even angry at you; I’m angry at myself. Have you ever treated me as a friend all this while?”
I shook my head. “That’s not the case!”
She scoffed. “Not the case? Sienna, you’ve never genuinely reached out to anyone. You’ve never loved Anthony, and you’ve never treated any of us as friends. To put it simply, you just treated us like minor characters in your journey of life.”
I was stunned by her rant, and she continued, “You don’t know what friendship means at all. To you, as long as you can hold a conversation with them, then they’re your friend. You even put Tessa at the same level as me, even though she’s despicable. As for Anthony, if you truly love him, there’s no way you could miss the way he’s always looking at you. It’s like he’s constantly tuned into you. Just now, he was silently declining to take responsibility for Rachel, but you forced him too anyway. He keeps stepping back to let you do whatever you want, yet you take it all for granted. Do you actually think what you’re doing is right?”
“Sienna, are you aware that other people can get hurt too? You’re not the only person who bleeds or cries, you know.”
I stayed silent in shock as I processed what she said. It was the first time anyone had ever said anything like that to me.
“I-” I tried to explain but scoffed at myself. I nodded and said, “You’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize how much I hurt other people.”
Since I couldn’t explain myself, I just hailed a taxi and went back to Murphy Corporation.
I felt like screaming. All this while, I had always been more of a cold person, and I didn’t know what to do now that someone had brought it up.
My bad mood continued even after I was back at the office. I looked through some of the documents that Armond wanted to be signed and felt even worse.
Linda saw that I was still in the office and knocked to come in. She frowned as she asked, “Are you okay?”
I noticed that everyone had left and replied mildly, “I’m fine. Might be PMS or something.”
She said a bit pitifully, “Oh, that’s too bad. The Magpie Festival is in two days. What a downer!”
The Magpie Festival?
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.
Leave a Reply