Chapter 1

Considering how hard my heart was pounding in my chest, I wouldn’t be surprised if it leaped out of the cavity any moment now. To say I was having a mild panic attack would seem as though I was exaggerating, but only I knew how terrified I was of flying.

As we slowly ascended, the imbalance in my ear was beginning to grab my attention. I was too focused on minding my breathing to even bother grabbing a hold of my earplugs that were inside my purse.

I should’ve known better than to travel alone. Especially when I was well aware of my qualms when it came to flying in an airplane.

In a desperate attempt to keep my mind off things for a while, I closed my eyes and thought about my family.

Back in high school, I was always sure what I wanted to be and who I wanted to be with. But like all of my other plans, they were put to trial. I no longer wished for them now. These days, I just wished for small things to happen.

Coming home to my family and talking to them about my day, celebrating Christmas and Thanksgiving with close friends and family, accompanying my dad for his general medical check-ups - these were the few things that I knew I wished for the most at this point in my life.

I wished my job didn’t consume most of my time. I knew I wanted to be an actress ever since I was in high school. There was a small phase before I was sending out applications for college where I had doubts about my chosen career path. No matter how rewarding, being part of the entertainment industry is intense.

But again, isn’t that what I’d wanted in the first place? I wanted my life to be like this. I enjoyed being a workaholic and found true pleasure in pursuing my passion. But it came with the price of not finding enough time to spend with my dear ones.

It had been seven years since I last saw my friends together. I met them separately and mostly bumped into a few of them at parties but I could never attend any of the reunions they had planned for us. I had missed most of their weddings too because I didn’t want to see him.

It was seven years ago that I last saw the former love of my life. Ethan. He was my first love, of course. And also my only love. Whilst we were together, I shared a profound bond with him. Although we had both disappointed each other at times, we had managed to grow out of quarrels and emerge stronger than before.

When we had first split, we were just seventeen. Since we were relatively younger, I had imagined that it wouldn’t be as tough to move on from him. We loved each other so much despite the rivalry between him and my brother. I loved him so much that even now, seven years post my heartbreak, I couldn’t manage to lose my heart to another man.

The day of our graduation was probably the last time I ever looked at him directly. For the past seven years, I’ve kept myself away from him but seldom did that work well for me. No matter how hard I tried, I would always know about how he’s doing from various sources. My friends would randomly talk about him with me and how he’s coping with our breakup.

When I was young, so young to even remember my age, I lost my family in a separation my parents had. While the divorce built a permanent gap between my parents, it also separated my twin, Nick and me, who had to live with either of the parents. While I stayed behind with my mom, Nick chose my dad.

With passing years, our frequent visits came down as did our daily calls. Misunderstandings grew to a point where complete ignorance of each other seemed like a better option. We only met after my mother eloped with one of her lovers leaving me alone for my father to take in.

I moved to LA to be with my brother and father, in other words, the only family I had left. Things eventually started to get better between us and we finally were leading a comfortable life with each other. That was when I fell in love with Ethan Parker.

He was rude, notorious and also the biggest rival of my brother. His friends and my friends never got along. They had their rivalry going on since the longest time I could ever think of. Things turned different when we started off our relationship and soon enough, my friends fell in love with his, and I, with him.

When things turned great for all of us, and when everyone was ready to let go of their rivalry, something so terrible had to happen that separated Ethan and me forever. The gap that formed between us was so huge that we hadn’t met each other until now.

Although it had been seven years since we broke up, I couldn’t forgive him for doing what he did. I didn’t find it within myself to have the heart to let go of everything he did and be with him.

In these seven years, I grew to become an actress, the profession I had always dreamt of taking up. It was probably the only thing from my teenage years that remained concrete in my wish list.

I wanted to do the films that genuinely intrigued me and made me feel like it was a story that had to be told. It was perhaps this notion of mine that worked well for me at the box office.

My friends had always made plans for me to join them on their reunions but I never showed up because Ethan would be coming there too. He loved our friends and he would not just skip on the reunions because I was going there too. In that regard, he was very different from me. He didn’t give a shit about me anymore.

Ethan took over his father’s business when he was really young, right out of college. Now, he’s twenty-five and from what I knew, he was too good at his job. I had never doubted his abilities - I knew how versatile he was and given any circumstance, he is the kind of person that you can count on to bring a solution. He is the man in the storm. And all the appreciation he was subjected to since he took over the company was completely justified.

Being one of the eligible bachelors in the world, he was always seen hooking up with girls but he never had a serious relationship with anyone until recently. I didn’t particularly focus on him under the gossip section but I had somehow stumbled upon a rumor regarding his wedding.

Nobody knew who the girl was, but the reports claim that he had been dating her for a while now and soon had decided to put a ring on her finger.

After knowing it, I felt foolish to ever think he was stuck up on me like I was on him. He moved on and even agreed to a wedding with someone. It was almost heartbreaking for me to know that the only guy I ever loved was getting married to someone else.

I blocked every source that would make me aware of what was happening in his life. It was a desperate attempt to block him from my life although I wasn’t proud of my ways. I felt despicable being so affected by him and the news but at the same time, he was the love of my life. People take a lifetime to get over their love. How was I any different?