Thursday, November 29, 2007

Love of Her Life

It was dark, gloomy, chilly morning in Chicago. According to meteorologist reports, the city could experience a bit of snowfall in the day. From the 33rd floor of Monterrey Heights, where his company's head offices were located, Ashton got a hawk's eye view of downtown Chicago.

However, this morning, as he stood by the massive glass panes, sipping his tea, he wasn't admiring his favorite city. His mind was pre-occupied with a several thousand things. In about 20 minutes, he was going to attend the most important meeting of the month. He was going to follow that up by a 2 hour presentation, which he had spent weeks to prepare. Then, there was going to be a business lunch with their partners from Japan; and then another 2 meetings before he would be done for the day. Ashton felt uneasy. He made sure no one was looking, and then quickly popped two pills in his mouth. "That should do it" he reassured himself, and started walking toward the conference room.

At half past seven, Ashton left Monterrey heights. Instead of making his way toward the parking structure, Ashton decided to take a walk around the block. It had been snowing for the most of the day, and the weather was in no way favorable for a stroll. But, that didn't stop Ashton. The day hadn't gone as well as he had hope, and he needed to clear his mind.As he walked, he went through the days proceedings a couple of thousand times in his head and finally decided that his performance had been overall very unsatisfactory! He was not pleased with himself at all.

Just then something in a store's display window caught his attention. It was a pretty delicate necklace. "Are those diamonds?" he wondered, as he looked at the pendant through the window. It would be perfect for Roo, he thought to himself, it's as beautiful as she is. But that thought was abruptly interrupted by his M.D.'s words, that had been ringing in his head all evening - "You're capable of so much better, Rogers!"

Ashton forgot all about the necklace and continued walking, trying hard to fight away feelings of lack of self-worth and confidence. He felt something vibrate in his pocket. It was his cell phone. He had forgotten to switch it back to the ringer mode, after he had left Monterrey Heights. "Hello, Ashton?" a sweet feminine voice asked. Her voice sounded like the tinkling of little bells. It was Emily Bucktree, or Bucktree as he called her.

Bucktree was a New Yorker, who Ashton had met during his days at the University of Chicago.They both had attended business school, and had interned together over both the summers there. Their relationship was strictly professional. But, that had not always been the case. Ashton had met Jamie during his final semester. Before that, he and Bucktree had an on-again off-again fling thing ... or so Jamie thought. What she was unaware of, was that Ashton and Emily Bucktree had something going on way before business school in Chicago. It had started back in the day, when he was working in NYC. It was then that he had first met Emily, at a friend's party. It was then, that their affair of sorts had first begun.

He had never loved Emily, and they had never officially been a couple. It was just random fooling around, according to him. Emily had never quite felt the same. Ashton was the love of her life, and even though she had temporarily accepted that they were mere colleagues (sometimes friends), she hoped that one day, the nature of their relationship would be quite different.

"Bucktree!" Ashton exclaimed, "How goes it?" He had planned to go to New york Monday morning, and spend the weekend taking care of stuff at the Chicago office. But he had worked hard last few days, and there wasn't much left to do anymore. " Looks like I'm going to get the weekend off!" he told her, in disbelief, and laughed. It felt good to laugh.

"Why don't you come here earlier then?" she said. "We can discover the city all over again!" They both laughed. Thereafter, the conversation comprised less talking, and more laughing. Ashton felt good.

"Alright, I'll see you soon then" Ashton said and hung up. "In a matter of a few hours" Emily thought and smiled.

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