Chapter Eighty Seven: Mark

Chapter Eighty-seven

"Now, I don’t blame you so much for falling that hard for him.”

“Don’t make this about me, leave me out of it,” Amanda said loudly.

"I honestly totally understand you now," Lang said. 

Amanda sighed, putting her palm on her forehead and resting on it. 

"You really have to remind me of him?" Amanda asked finally looking up at her again.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Lang said reaching and caressing her face.

The entrance to Raymond's office had opened, as Raymond made his way out. And behind him was Laura who had her purse and looked like she was set to leave.

"Hey, Ladies," Laura said."oh," Lang let out in an honest surprise.

She was surprised to see Laura. Amanda bet it was her first time meeting her. 

"Hey, miss Laura," Lang said after snapping out of her shock.

Miss Laura responded to Lang's jovial reaction with a smile.

"You look so beautiful, I'm very honored to meet you," Lang said smiling cheek to cheek, and Amanda couldn't help but think it random that Lang would suddenly just become a fan girl.

"Oh, thank you, and you look beautiful yourself," Laura said.

Amanda just stared at the two women, one of them she didn't know if she knew anymore.

She took her gaze away from these two women as all that friendly pleasantries were beginning to make her sick, especially because she thought one was her friend and would see this to be uncomfortable on her side.

Her gaze was now away from them as it hovered around, only to now jam Raymond's gaze which might have been on her for a while.

'i hope you are enjoying these situations you put me in every time,' her mind voice said.

She gradually took her gaze off him, for some reason she didn't feel that usual sparkle that Ray's gaze used to stir up inside her.

She just felt humiliated and pity for herself.

"Some other time, I guess," Laura said to Lang as it appeared they were done with their little chit-chat.

"Yea, sure," Lang said, making a little wave.

"Miss Amanda, it was also nice seeing you," Laura said and she knew it was just so it won't be like she was excluded.

Amanda let out a faint smile and also waved her goodbye.

'see I can pretend too,' her inner mind said.

Both Ray and Laura were now out of view as the place fell silent because she just didn't know how to feel or how to react.

She bulged her eyes briefly trying to get the whole scene out of her mind.

"What?" Lang questioned her with a tone that seemed and sounded clueless but she knew that Lang was smart enough to know why she was now awkwardly silent.

"I didn't say a word, what, what?" Amanda asked bulging her eyes and tilting her head to the side.

"Why are you suddenly acting awkward?"

"Why didn't you just ask her for a picture together and maybe even beg her for an author graph?"  Amanda was just tired of it, tired of everything, so tired of all these ill feelings, so she wanted to let it out.

"What did you want me to do?" Lang asked.

"Hey, miss Lang I can't talk to you because my friend thinks you want to take her man?" Lang asked in pure mockery.

Amanda sighed as she rolled her eyes.

"She probably doesn't even know the two of you had something, and besides, Ray is with her because he wants to, he is an adult whose every decision is because he personally decided to take that road." She continued.

"You upset at everyone except Raymond. Make it make sense! Because at this point, it doesn't." Lang added in an almost pissed tone, giving an agitated expression.

"This has nothing to do with Raymond or even Laura, it's the fact that you seemed like you switched sides," Amanda said with a pitched tone before she now bent, resting her forehead on her palm which was held up because her elbows were rested on the table before her.

The place was quiet now quiet and awkwardly silent.

"Look, you know I would always take your side, always! 

I can't and won't let anyone put you down in my presence.

But it didn't look like she was putting you down, and I can't attack or release negative energy just because she is going out with your ex." Lang said as she moved closer to Amanda.

"This isn't high school, we are adults and I can't just go about hating everyone because they are going out with your ex."

Amanda still didn't say anything, but she raised her head, now reaching for the computer before her.

"Understood," she said trying to get back to work,"

"I know you don't feel very alright now, so, I will let you have your moment, then I will be back."

Raymond was going to have lunch with Laura, because why shouldn't he? Since Amanda had made it clear that she now belonged to someone else.

Laura had visited him that morning, after her almost purposeless visit, she had asked that they go for lunch. He was hungry, so why not?

At this point, he didn't care much about the press.

There was nothing there to debunk anymore. What could possibly debunk the fact that they were caught on a private island alone?

They settled in one of the five star restaurants in the city. The higher the restaurant the less attention they would draw. 

They had their lunch. Ray was mostly on his phone the whole time.

He noticed how Laura had tried to engage him in several conversations which he honestly wasn't interested in.

He wished he could pretend any further about being interested in those conversations. He was glad he had already told her how he felt, so, he was sorry, but not sorry about the turnout of their outing. He only wished her luck with trying to change his feelings towards her "with time." He needed that too because he didn't particularly feel good about the fact that he felt entrapped in the emotions that came with the thought of Amanda.

Their lunch was soon over and they made their way out.

Laura had crossed her hands in his elbow, also clinging unto him. 

They made their way out as he took her to 

her SUV.

Won't you open the door for me? " He heard Laura say. 

He sighed even though he knew it was rude to. He opens the door and imagined himself being a perfect gentleman.

He found it amusing attaching himself with the word "gentleman".

It was only true when Amanda was involved, all these other women might never experience his gentle side because he just didn't know how to be except for a woman like Amanda.

"Thank you," Laura said with a smile and he returned her gesture with a smile back.

Laura now stretched her neck and gave him a kiss on the cheek before hooping into the SUV.

"Thank you Mr gentleman," she said.

'blindness sometimes has nothing to do with vision,' he thought. 

If he could be called a gentleman, then his message is obviously not clearly passed.

Ray had bid goodbye to her and now made his way back to Blazzers.

Amanda was done with the day's activities, she just sat in her office thinking about her life. Her very complicated life, She had thought about the incident with Lang earlier and thought it was a little unfair if she expected Lang to abruptly have a problem with every woman she saw Ray with, especially not the prime ministers' daughter. 

The prime minister could open almost every door for anyone within the Canadian border, so, there was no need to cause an unwarranted rift with his daughter.

Speaking of the devil! Or maybe in this case it was 'thinking of the devil." Lang was back in her office, this time with a box of cookies.

"Hey, I got you this," she said stretching her hands to hand it over to her.

"I do hope you reject it because this act of kindness is only because I felt like I maybe did too much earlier."

Amanda let out a laugh and grabbed the cookies off her hand.

"With this, I will still need about seven working days to consider forgetting the whole thing."

"I don't mind 14 or 40 working days, with the cookies back," Lang said sarcastically.

Amanda even laughed harder as she opened the paper box the cookies were packaged in.

She then reached for the plastic one and tore it apart.

Amanda's phone had rung.

It happened to be close to the Lang too because she peeped into it, seeing that it was Mark. Her face lit up as she urged her to pick it up.

They have spoken for almost 3 minutes and she figured the call was about the end, but Mark seemed to have a request to make.

" I will be leaving first thing tomorrow, maybe you can come around tonight so we can have our last good time together. Even though I will put an effort to make sure it wasn't our last.

"Umm...."

Lang was faintly hearing the conversation, she murmured and gave her, urging her to accept it.

"Ok, I will be with you after work."

Mark had said "bye." 

And she responded "bye Mark," before Ray had somehow shown up in their view.

He was back and he heard the ending part of that conversation.