“Olivia, I have lived the playboy lifestyle till my parents were alive,” Charles said as he started to explain the reason for which he gave me the option of staying at his house.
“It was after I lost my family, the load of managing the full business of my dad came on me. During the time that he was alive, he never let me take the burden of managing any of the businesses. I would go to the office at times, but then I did my own thing because the money flow would always be there for me,” he stated.
“When I started managing the businesses, it became very difficult for me to balance it with the work which I had to do along with the lifestyle which I was living at that time. But still, for a very long time I continued to be that way.”
“It was two summers ago when I got the news that the girl who I loved very much in school killed herself because a guy who was a playboy like me ended up betraying her. Apparently, she didn’t know that he was of that kind, and she loved him very much. But he left her for another girl who is the sexiest model even now, and they are in an open marriage from what I see on media channels.”
“That incident deeply affected me and changed me as a person because I definitely didn’t want to be such a person. And after that incident I stopped doing shit in life. I had proper relationships since then, but that was too much for me to handle,” he confessed.
“Which is why I have been single for some months now, and I was planning to stay that way,” he mentioned and stopped abruptly.
“I was?” I repeated it to question if he wasn’t single anymore.
“Ah.. Never mind,” he said.
“No, no, tell me, please, Sir,” I begged.
“We are not at work now. Call me Charles.”
“Actually, no, let’s keep it that way. It is sexy to take my secretary home with me,” he added and raised his eyebrows.
I couldn’t help but blush because Charles saying something like that was not expected at all. He did flirt with me when we started talking after his visit to the museum, but that gradually stopped after I moved in with him. At first, I couldn’t understand why he stopped flirting with me, but then, I realized I wasn’t his type since I didn’t know the story of his past.
Everyone has different experiences, and each one of them learns differently from what they experience. Some people do not learn anything from what life throws at them, and they continue to be how they are. They don't realize that life will continue to put them in similar conditions until and unless they change their ways. They will not only end up in the same circumstance but also, they will meet the same person in different bodies.
A feeling of happiness took over me when I got to know that Charles was not like what James told me that he had been before and also how I imagined him to be. It gave me a little hope to continue fantasizing the things that I had been thinking about him all the time.
Never could I have possibly thought of Charles having had such emotions in his life. The death of someone who he had a crush on when he was in school being the reason that changed him for good. It was very sensitive of him to relate himself to the man who his crush was with at that time; the one who was responsible for such extreme action that she took.
“Tell me, please,” I requested as the waiter was serving us the dessert which was ordered by Charles. The full dinner passed as I listened to him telling me the reason that he wasn’t a playboy now. But I was stuck on that one thing he said about that he was planning to stay single. Something must have happened which must have changed his plan of staying single, is what I inferred from his sentence, and I wanted him to talk about that.
“Olivia, I told you to chuck it,” he reminded.
“P-P-P-Please.”
“Okay, what would you do when you start loving someone?” He questioned.
It was weird to be put in a place by him asking me that question when he was the answer to it. He was the one I started to love soon after I moved in with him. I liked him from the very start, but then it had to be pure love when I was affected by every little thing that he did. It happened in a way that nothing had ever done to me in the past.
But because I had to answer his question, I hesitantly replied, “I would convey my feelings, of course. Why do you ask?”
“There is one girl I feel for very strongly. It happened all of a sudden, and I didn’t even realize it when I started to love her, but I am not sure if she feels the same way for me,” he explained.
His scenario was very much like mine. I felt I was talking to the male version of me. I couldn’t even hope for the girl to be me because I knew I nowhere stood a chance. But as a friend to him, it was important for me to give the right advice to him. So, I crushed the feelings in my heart for him, and I said, “You must take a chance. I doubt if any girl can ever not want to be with you. You are Mr. Perfect.”
“Well, thank you,” he praised as he signed the check that he was returning to the waiter. It was different to be with him. Every-freaking-one in the city knew him, and he had postpaid benefits anywhere that he went to. Anywhere he went, he was allowed inside without purchasing any tickets and allowed to exit the place without settling the bills. Everything would directly come to his office where Edward would settle all company bills.
As we got into the car to head home, it was surprising when he asked, “Do you think I should convey my feelings to the girl I have started loving?”
A little something tingled in me as he was looking at me differently this time.