The Probability Of Not Loving You

Chapter 17 ~ After

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After ~ 26 years old

Ava held on to her phone wondering what it was that Christian read that would have upset him. In response to her text message, Alex sent a picture of himself in a wedding dress. His muscular body looked all wrong in the delicate sweetheart neckline of an off-white wedding gown.

"What do you think of this one?" Alex asked in the text message. Ava couldn't help but blurt out laughing. "See, I take my duties very seriously. If you don't like this one, I might have to harass another shop assistant. Obviously, you'll have to cut it down for size."

Their text messages were innocent. She reread every single message wondering where she revealed her heart and found nothing. Their conversations varied from: How was your day? How was work? How are you? In text messages they were strangers. The most she found out about Alex was when she called him, otherwise he never revealed much about himself. He was most frustrating!

Ava felt terrible and confused. What had she done wrong to fill Christian with doubt? She hadn't said anything, that Ava was certain about. Sure, she had felt stuck between Alex and Christian but Ava made up her mind and let Alex go for all of their sakes. Any residual feelings were just that— she couldn't erase Alex and what he did to her life beyond all that she had tried. Perhaps one day when he was married and had children, her heart would grow tired and finally accept that she was never the one for him.

Every impulse said to call Alex and he would tell her what to do. But no, Ava understood how Christian felt because she had felt like that once.

Picking up her house keys, she followed him downstairs. Christian wouldn't have gone far. There was a bar three blocks down and that was the only place where he ever went to, unless he had reservations for them. Their lives were usually so planned out and to a schedule, except when he dragged her there a late night drink. That was when he wasn't so put together and Ava enjoyed that about him.

Entering into the busy bar, her eyes glued on him sat by  the stools with an entire bottle of whiskey in front of him. A woman exiting the bar glanced at her unmade up face and made a face. Ava saw the woman question herself. Had they met before? Ava, the socialite, would have never been caught dead in joggers, messy hair and no make-up.

Moving past the crowd, she stepped up to him and he looked up as she grabbed the chair. "Can I sit?"

Christian's eyes widened. Perhaps it was that she had followed him or that he had never seen a single hair out of place in the time that he had known her. But there she stood, no make-up and an untamed mane.

Ava was beautiful in a different sort of way that and the fact that he had never seen it before until now made his heartache.  She had never seemed like a woman who cared for appearances but hers had always been perfect. Hence the shock when he found out that she had been permanently straightening her hair. What else didn't he know about her that Alex knew?

Christian shrugged, downing what was left in his glass.

Ava sat down and took his glass from his hand. She poured herself alcohol from the bottle and downed the glass in a single breath. It reminded him of the night they met. He had been watching her girlfriends drink from their glasses of wine while she drank the hard stuff. She was all smiles then but he remembered eyes filled with so much sadness that he had wondered if he was the only one seeing it. Her friends certainly had no reaction to it. In the end, he had convinced himself that he was seeing things or had she led him to believe that?