Tale as Old as Time

epilogue II

Nicholas Williams was having a great time—scratch that—fantastic time at this social gathering. In fact, he was having such a good time that he didn't even notice Brooke Whittaker walk through the door. And he certainly didn't notice that she looked incredible in that red silk dress. And he definitely didn't notice that the tall, hunky LA model was notably absent.

The party was finally kicking into full gear and while Nicholas had assumed the only people here would be old friends from high school, he was pleasantly mistaken. There were damn near two hundred people crowding the venue and at least twenty-five girls he'd never seen before.

Good, he thought. Maybe they won't know about his past with Brooke and he could have a nice, carefree party hook-up, exactly what the doctor ordered. The doctor being Nicholas himself.

The venue has a big open space with two bars, one on either end, and a swarm of twenty-something year olds packing in between. Nicholas had already lost Nate and Liam in the crowd and he hadn't seen Sage yet. He began walking around searching for anyone he knew, or anyone who seemed slightly interesting.

Unfortunately, his traitorous eyes wandered over to a leggy blonde in a red dress, towering over the two girls she was talking to. So that was where Sage and Kate were. Before he had a chance to tear his eyes away, he felt a clap on his right shoulder.

"She's gorgeous isn't she?" Nicholas whipped around to find a guy, who looked to be around his age, that he'd never seen before.

"I'm sorry?" Nicholas asked.

"Brooke," the guy answered. "I know her from Brown. She's a stunner."

"Ok," Nicholas said, he didn't need some random guy that knew of Brooke from college to tell him that she was stunning, he had eyes and a brain.

"She's also what you call, not a chance in hell, man," the guy said before giving Nicholas another clap on the shoulder before removing his hand.

Nicholas wasn't exactly sure what to say to that. Half of him wanted to set this random guy in place and tell him he actually had had a chance with Brooke which was more than this guy was ever gonna have. But the other half of him, the sensible side, knew it wouldn't be worth it to rehash the past with some rando.

"Thanks for the advice." Was all Nicholas managed to say.

"Anytime, just don't want you to swing and miss," the guy said before walking away.

Dickhead, thought Nicholas.

Throughout that whole conversation, Nicholas had lost sight of Sage and Kate, and Brooke too. Shaking his head, he continued his search of anyone to get his mind away from the dangerous place it had just gone.

Nicholas finally set his sights on a short, cute brunette girl he'd never seen before. He could feel her eyes boring into him, the way most girls look at him. She was cute enough, he'd decided, and began to make his way over to her.

"Hey," she said warmly.

"Hi," Nicholas said. That sounded lame, he must've been out of practice. But, evidently it didn't matter, as the brunette made her way even closer to him. "What's your name."
"Kennedy."

"Pretty name," Nicholas said. He actually didn't like that name.

"Thanks." She blushed. "You must be Nicholas Williams."

"I must be."

"You're pretty recognizable," the girl, Kennedy, said as she forced herself even closer to him. He didn't think it was physically possible for her to move any closer as she was practically connected to him at this point.