Got You

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A week later, Olivia flipped through her mail as she walked into her apartment, absentmindedly kicking her shoes off. Her article deadline had her at the office later than usual— the clock read 8:30 as she dropped her things and prepared to heat up leftovers.

Her phone ringing disrupted the quiet. She pulled it out of her pants pocket, her heart racing at the sight of Spencer's name. She let it ring once more before picking up, afraid it would stop.

"Hello?" She said slowly.

"What, you not gone ask me if you're my one phone call from jail or something?"

She snorted and tried to hide her smile at the sound of his voice, as though he was in front of her to see it. "Well then. Am I?" She teased and heard him chuckle in return. "Nah. Is now a bad time?"

"Oh no, all good. Just heating up dinner. Everything okay?"

"Yeah, yeah. Just now eating dinner?"

"Yeah, late day at work. I literally just walked in my apartment."

"Oh I'm sure you're tired, I can—"

"Spencer," Olivia cut him off, a little amused at a usually self-assured Spencer being so flustered. "It's all good, I promise. What's up?"

"Well uh, I thought it might be a good time to start planning Jordan and Simone's joint bachelor and bachelorette. Don't want to risk his wrath."

"Oh please, no one is scared of Jordan," Olivia scoffed while plopping on her couch with her food. "But they have never had a proper pre-wedding party so I guess it is important. You haven't come up with anything?"

"Nope. I was thinking it could be fun to go somewhere but that's as far as I got."

Olivia hummed and chewed for a moment. "Oh duh! There's only one place it could be. Any guesses?" She knew he hated guessing games but wanted to see if she could press her luck. Nostalgia and all.

"Liv." Apparently not.

"Fine, you're no fun. Vegas."

Spencer was quiet for a moment. "Is that too cliche?" He said gently like he was trying not to offend her. Olivia smirked even though he couldn't see.

"Definitely, and that's sort of the point. They did the cliche thing and eloped in Vegas while in high school. Might as well do the cliche thing and celebrate in Vegas before their real wedding as adults. Hey, remember how all you two did was talk with strippers for his bachelor party back then?"

"I remember everything about Vegas, Liv."

Olivia had to catch her breath at his low, serious voice. She knew what he meant. What he wanted her to hear.

And she did exactly what he maybe hoped she would do, and flashed back in her mind to the first time that the man on the other end of the phone told her that he loved her. Told her that he was in love with her.

He spoke again and saved her from having to respond. "Okay, Vegas as adults it is. I can work on finding somewhere for all of us to stay. What should we do?"

She had finally recovered from his comment. "Uh, maybe a casino night. And go see whatever performer is there for a residency. I think I saw Usher is there for a bit."

"Hmm, and maybe we have an outing just for the guys and one just for the ladies?" Spencer added.

"Yeah, I love that," Olivia smiled. "Well this is a good start and we've got plenty of time to plan. So I think you'll be safe from the wrath of groomzilla," she teased.

"Hey, don't act like he didn't get on your nerves when planning the last wedding," Spencer laughed. "I remember when they called it off, I brought you at least two slices of that cake before Mrs. Hicks destroyed it so you could stress eat."

Olivia laughed, "To be fair, apparently stress eating is just what I do. Haven't quite kicked that habit. It's usually not wedding cake though."

"Hmm, what is it then?"

"Oh, well um there's a bakery about two blocks from my office that just opened a year ago. They have addictive cinnamon sugar doughnuts."

They both sat in comfortable silence for a minute. It felt so familiar to Olivia, making her feel sadness in her chest. She knew she needed to get off the phone. "Well I should probably go. I'll start looking into things to do in Vegas and will send you stuff, okay?"

He was quiet for a minute, making her feel worried that he had somehow heard her sadness in her voice.

"Aight, sounds good. Talk to you soon.... Night, Liv."

"Night," she said softly as she hung up her phone and stared at it for a moment.

She hated this. She didn't regret it, but still she hated it. Olivia honestly loved her job and felt like she had found her purpose but hated that it came with such a high cost.

If Olivia closed her eyes, she could live her dream. She and Spencer would have the careers of their dreams and each other.

Olivia opened her eyes, alone in her apartment.

Spencer had been the one to push her to take this job, not at all comfortable with her sacrificing it to follow him wherever he was drafted. And she really had wanted to make the distance work. Thought they could.

But then the unanswered and missed calls started. And then the rescheduled visits because of things popping up. And then the snapping at each other. And then they couldn't use physical touch to fix it like they usually could.

They had both contributed and were equally guilty. Olivia had felt like on the path they were on, they would eventually cross a line there would be no coming back from. And she didn't ever want that.

She had always hoped that some day,  things would work out. He'd be signed by a team near her or she'd find a good opportunity close to him. With some good journalism experience, she knew she'd eventually be able to do the work she loved from anywhere.

But over the years it felt like the rift between them grew the longer they were apart. She began to prepare herself for the possibility that he'd moved on.

The thought still hurt, even though it had been years.

And then last weekend had happened. Tonight had happened. It was like no time had passed between them at all.

Were his feelings for her really still there? And what if they were and the two of them still couldn't figure things out? What if the only solution was still for one of them to give something up? That wasn't any more fair than it had been years ago.

Olivia sighed. All she knew was that she missed him. And that she was alone.

The next morning, Olivia strode into work a few minutes late. She had overslept after a night of poor sleep.

"Rough night?" Dawn, another reporter, asked from the cube next to her. "You could say that," Olivia huffed.

Olivia was interrupted by a call to her desk phone about a delivery for her at the front desk.

She arrived at the desk to find a courier with a large and small box piled in his hands, a card on top. Olivia took the pile and returned to her desk. She set the card aside for a minute, her attention caught on the large box first. It was a dozen cinnamon sugar doughnuts from the bakery up the street.

It couldn't be?

Olivia frowned and opened the smaller box. It was a few of her favorite teas from her favorite tea shop in the city. She had taken Spencer there once.

Shocked, Olivia finally opened the note.

Just in case you need to stress eat, I still got you.
                     — SJ

Olivia bit her lip and grinned. Damn.

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A/N: Thank you for all the likes and kind comments! 🤎

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