"You can either pay for the new phone? Or let me buy you dinner? Once." His smile stayed put in its place.
"W-what?" She stared back at him, puzzled.
"Wire me the hefty amount of one dinner with me." He repeated. "I will be the one paying for the food."
"How are they both the same?" She was having a hard time believing her ears. The man was definitely up to something.
"They are both for me." He wiggled his brows. "Also, do let me tell you one thing, the new phone costs much more than the old one."
"Then I am only going to pay you for the old phone." Ayla shrugged as if it was only natural for her to do so.
"Don't forget to take the labor of transfering data into account." Claude spoke up in between.
"How much for it?" She sighed out in frustration as she began to log into the online banking app for her accoun
"I-I am so sorry." In between her loud huffs of breaths, she apologized to the man who was sitting in silence with his phone in his hand."Two hours? Really, Ayla?" He shook his head as a sigh of disbelief left his lips."I know, I am sorry. Why do you think that I am feeling bad here?" She covered the rest of the distance between them and settled on the chair across from him."You could have at least sent me a text to inform me that you were running late? I wouldn't have to sit here all alone, looking like a fool." Claude huffed out in annoyance as he pocketed his phone."I would have but I had no means of contacting you." She was genuinely feeling guilty about making him wait for so long. What bothered her the most was the fact that he was still waiting for her to arrive even after two hours."How so?" He narrowed his eyes. "Your phone was working
"It felt like you were missing a piece of your heart. A whole big chunk…" Claude finished for her, keeping his gaze focused on her.His words resonated enough within her that she finally looked up."Y-you…," finding herself at a loss for words, she didn't know how to respond. "How?"Claude smiled to himself as his eyes flicked down for the briefest of moments. "How do I know that?" He continued. "Because that's exactly how I felt about it. I felt like my life lost its lustre the minute you signed those papers, Ayla. The day you moved out for your good, it was the bleakest day of my entire life. I was at a loss without you—a lost cause. That's how I felt without you. That's how I still feel without you."The earnestly lying underneath his words, combined with the emotions that laced his voice were more than enough to bring forth her feelings. The feelings she had
"I would have lost you forever.""You are saying as if you have me in your life right now?" Ayla shook her head but her words didn't wipe off the downturned smile from Claude's face."You don't understand, Ayla." He sighed. "I would have lost you forever." He repeated his words from earlier again."What does that mean now?" She failed to see the gravity of the situation."I mean I would have lost you quite literally, as in the definition of the word lost." He leaned forward, burying his face in his hands. "You asked me why I couldn't risk exposing him to the police, no? It was because he used you to threaten me.""How exactly?" A frown made itself evident in between her brows. "How did he use me to threaten you, Claude?" She was somewhat able to connect the dots together now, but she refused to accept the truth. It was too heavy for her to bear.
"Claude… please…" Her head kept moving sideways, her eyes now filled with tears."Let me finish first." Claude didn't back out. He had already made up his mind, and nothing was going to make him stop. "After you ran into me the other day at the airport, my whole world stopped and shifted on its axis. I knew that I needed to meet you in person. That was why I came to see you at the hospital. The stupid broken phone was only an excuse." He laughed at himself in utter mockery."Seeing you there made me realize that I was still heads over heels in love with you. I-I mean… I knew it already, but looking at you in person made it more real. Asking you out for dinner might have been a stupid move after I promised myself that I was only going to meet you once. After all, it was your decision to go ahead with divorce and I respect it. But I got greedy…," he scoffed at how pathetic he was sounding. "I wanted more
The day before turned out to be a tiring one for Ayla. As if the physical strain of her never ending shifts wasn't enough, the emotional strain of last night's ordeal was taking its toll on her. "I am so done for the day." She mumbled to herself as she tried to stifle a yawn. "Scratch that! I am done for the rest of my life." "Why was it that we chose this career?" One of her shift mates asked her as she looked up at Ayla who was busy popping every single joint in her body. "Because we thought people were always exaggerating when they talked about how hard it is to be a doctor let alone a surgeon." Ayla replied to her as she stretched her arms out in the air. "You aren't wrong there." Her colleague replied. "Though for me, it was the novelty of the profession. There's this charm that comes only with the title Dr." She continued. "You do have a po
A smile was spread across her lips as she read through the letter once again. Was it the fifth time or the sixth time she was reading through it? She couldn't tell exactly since she had lost count. But every single time her eyes would skim along the ink, her heart bloomed with love. It wasn't probably the first time Claude had done something romantic and sweet for her. But this one surely topped the list.Ayla was never someone to get attached to things, but she surely knew how to appreciate a sincere action. Humming a low tone under her breath, she went on reading through the words one more time."Yours C—today, tomorrow and foreverYou know I love you…"She mumbled the last lines under her breath before she decided to put the note away for good now. Folding it in half, she placed it neatly in a small wooden box which held some other memories of a certain man. One in particu
"My, my… look, who is it?" Ayla looked up from her phone's screen only to find the man she was there to see. "Don't you look lovely. You have changed so much." Alex pulled her into a side hug and gave her arm a good, tight squeeze. "I wish I could say the same about you, but you don't look so lovely to me after making me wait for half an hour." Ayla rolled her eyes but returned the hug nonetheless. She didn't have the heart to yell at him when they were finally meeting after so long. Especially, given the history they shared. "I am sorry. I slept through the alarm. It was your phone calls which woke me up in the end." He replied as he pulled back. "You could have come downstairs right away." Ayla retorted. "I was stinking… bad." Alex spoke in his defence. "There was no way I was going to meet my best friend after so l
"Not really!" He spoke up in his defence. "He's no detective. I assure you of that. He has some weird kind of hobbies. That's all." "Alex!" She glared at him. "I will buy you bubble tea. However many you want." The man gave up before their argument could go any further. But he knew what exactly to bet on. Ayla accepted the offer straightaway. "Fine." As if right on time, two servers came in with their meals with a third one in tow who held onto their drink. The two began to continue making small talks in between the bites to keep up the liveliness of the table. They didn't care about the stares which were being thrown their way. Neither did they care about the ugly scowls coming their way from the surrounding tables. "What are you doing these days?" Alex brought back the topic to her. He wanted to catch on every