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She skipped toward me, her arms outstretched and ready for a hug that I gladly returned.
“Girl, it feels like it’s been forever!”
“I know!” I said. “What are you doing here?”
“My dad and I flew over in support of your dad, of course!”
“Well, I’m so glad you’re here. I haven’t seen you since Turkey!”
“Well, you’ve understandably been busy—future…what would you be called? Second-daughter?”
I laughed. “Let’s not count our chickens before they’re hatched.”
“Your dad has this in a bag,” Eden said confidently, taking my hand as we both sat on the couch and turned to the television to continue watching the rally. Dad was now taking questions from the audience, explaining the ideas and policies he would like to someday see implemented in our government.
“So…” Eden said, a grin on her face, “the last time I saw you, you were in the company of a very handsome stranger. Anything ever become of that?”
I hung my head and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Yeah—a headache.”
Eden’s brow furrowed as if she hadn’t been expecting that response. “What do you mean?”
“Things didn’t work out.”
She pouted. “Are you sure?”
“Yes,” I said. “Would you believe he ended up on my dad’s security team?”
“Hmmm…” she said, and then grew quiet, clearly waiting for elaboration.
“Yeah…And uhm…Well…things started happening between us. My father ended up wanting him to be exclusively on my security detail. And we tried to keep things professional between us at first. But then, things grew into something more. Or at least I thought they did. I was wrong though. First, he claimed to have feelings for me and that he would basically be with me no matter what. But then, he abruptly changed his mind and said he wanted to keep things strictly professional between us.”
“He said that?”
“Yes. I…I was so angry. I thought that maybe he’d just been lying to me all along. Using me. That he was done with me after he managed to get what he wanted a couple times…I felt so used. So disgusted with myself for falling so hard for him. I should have known better. Guys like him are nothing but players and always will be. I don’t know why I expected him to be different. I made a fool of myself, Eden. I kept coming on to him, thinking that he privately must have felt the same way and that he was just resisting me to be noble. But now I see that he was resisting me because he was never serious about me to begin with. He just wanted to whisper sexy words in my ear until he was done with me.”
A silence stretched between us. My eyes had gone out of focus, clouded with tears, as I stared at the TV.
“Did you give him a chance to explain himself?”
“There’s nothing to explain,” I said with a sigh.
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Sometimes—like you said—you can’t count your chickens before they’re hatched.”
“I think those chickens hatched and ran away already,” I said. I thought I saw a secretive smirk on Eden’s face, but as I heard my father’s words drifting from the television, I didn’t have time to think any further about it. He had finished the question-and-answer segment, and was giving his final words. That meant it was time for me to report to the stage with him and put on my happy face to greet the crowd.
I stood from the couch. “Well—it’s about that time,” I said, turning toward Eden. “Hey, what are you doing tonight? Do you want to hang out?”
Again, as I looked at her, I got the feeling she was holding back on something. She tried to arrange her face back into a neutral expression, but I knew her well enough to know she was concealing a smile. I narrowed my eyes at her, confused.
“Let’s take a rain-check on that, all right? You never can know what will be going on tonight. I’ll be in town for a while though, so trust me—we will definitely get a chance to hang out again soon.”
“All right…” I said. “Text me.”
Wit
h that, I turned around and headed back toward the front, until I reached the curtain. I stood there for a moment, waiting for my cue to go out on stage. Once Dad and said his last words, music would start playing, and that would be when I went out on stage with him.
Approximately ten seconds later, that time came.
