Smoked Success

51.

"Christina Styles doesn't exist." I scoff, walking out. "Don't come tomorrow unless you're a person who exists."

"But Miss Styles-" she starts but I interrupt her.

"No buts, have a good evening." I look for Andrew, wondering if he'd escort me to the meeting as usual or not. Apparently not. Okay then.

"Good evening everyone." Andrew starts, glancing at me for a second. "I would like to announce that I, Andrew Joseph Haddad, am resigning my position of Managing Partner at Haddad and Co."

Everyone gasps, I'm just shocked that he's done it so soon. He's mentioned that he wants to paint and resign but I never thought he's that serious about it.

"I am offering my position to Miss Jessica Styles and promoting Daniel McMurphy as Marketing and Business Affairs manager." He looks at me. "Kindly turn on your laptops to see the email I just sent about the changes to be done."

I turn on mine but I am interrupted by a video, that seems like an advertisement. I abruptly see my parents on the screen, that's weird.

"Dear Jessica," they start and are followed by Tyler.

"Andrew's an amazing person."

"He makes you happy." Oscar and Hannah follow Tyler and then there's Angelina.

"Mommy, please marry Andy?"

I look around me, and everyone's seen the same video, oh my goodness. Andrew is next to me, holding a box.

"Jessica Ellen Styles," he starts, if I've not mentioned it, my middle name's Ellen. "Would you marry me?"

"Oh, my god! Yes!" I hug him and we kiss for a while. I don't know what to think or feel, this is amazing. Ten years ago, I wouldn't expect myself being loved, being wanted, ever getting engaged.

It's been two weeks since I became Managing Partner, it's a huge step in my career but Andrew thinks I'm the right person for this. He has a gallery opening in six months, so he's painting most of the time. At some point he can start a painting and not continue it. He can just go and paint other stuff. He sketches a lot, too.

I don't get art that much, but I think he's not so bad at painting. He prefers hyper-realism over impressionism. Painting a hyper-realist paining might take over a year, let alone a whole gallery of pictures. He's working all the time in a studio in Brooklyn and I'm glad he's happy at his job.

Some people still view me as Haddad's girlfriend, but I really hope that era ends soon. I'm not leaving that company hanging, ever. Andrew's trusting me with it and I'm trying to make the best out of it.

Tonight is also Angelina's birthday party. I have zero knowledge about its organization, as if it were my party or something. Angelina wants to surprise me so bad, and I'm letting her do so, after all, I'm ruining her birthday with her actual mom's fact. Jake decided to be the one to tell her and I'll approve it's true. I hope she deals with it well.

The girl claiming to be Christina hasn't reappeared since that day. Guess she didn't have any evidence of her 'identity'. I was relieved, though, when I knew she had nothing good to say. I know Christina's dead and nothing could change that.

Today at work, we'll have two interns for four months. I chose them and I don't know why, but I chose a Medicine major student. I mean it sort of does fit with what our firm does, I guess we'll see how that student does. I offered to introduce them to the firm myself, so this way they won't be way too intimidated to talk to me if they've got any issues. Especially that my workers gossip, a lot.

"Good morning, I suppose you are Melissa and Heather." I smile at the two girls I suppose are my interns as I walk into my office.

"I'm Melissa, she's Heather." They stand up and smile. I don't know if I've gone crazy, but Heather looks exactly like that woman who claimed to be Christina, except dressed formally.

"Heather, did you stop by my firm about two weeks ago?" I can't help but ask, I'm way too curious. She nods, oh my god. Why do I have to deal with this. "Okay, um, Melissa, would you kindly sit outside for a while, I'd like to hand out your rules individually."

"Sure thing, miss Styles." She walks out.

"Look, Miss Styles, I wasn't lying when I said my name's Christina styles." Heather states, very confident of herself.

"You think I'm going to talk about such thing? You must be kidding right?" I scoff, looking in my drawer for some papers.

"Then why'd you get Melissa out of here?" She asks me, "why don't you at least hear me out?"

"Because whoever you're claiming to be, died twenty three years ago." I tell her, pouring water in a glass. "Want some?"

"But you have to believe me." She begs, "please let me talk to you, tell you my point of view."

"Look, if you're expecting any talk from me, it better not be during work hours." I fake a smile at her. "Now let's talk about your work hours."

I'm almost done with reading the last report for the day and then I'll head home, for Angel's party. Employees have been taking their jobs a little less seriously since I'm just Haddad's girlfriend and won't do shit to them. It's starting to piss me off, and I think I'll find a way to handle it, soon enough.

"Miss Styles, can we please talk?" Heather knocks the door and gets in. Just what I needed.

"Make it quick." I sigh. I'll just pretend I care until she gives up. I'm pretty sure she'll stop talking about the whole

"Look, I'm enrolled at New York University as Heather Whitman. The parents I grew up with told me I'm adopted right after high school. I didn't believe them at first and went crazy, I thought they didn't want me. I went to London for a year, where I started university. They showed me my original birth certificate, where it said my mother was this woman called Darcy Williams and my father is this guy called Harry Styles. Darcy Williams doesn't live in the United States, Harry Styles is British. I then started looking for people with the family name Styles, and the closest matches were you and a certain Tyler Styles." She states, trying not to cry.

"Okay, so you got my mother's name right, and I am Harry Styles'daughter, so is Tyler." I look so confused at the moment, what the hell is going on? "Can you kindly cite one of your allergies?"

"I'll tell you the weirdest one, marshmallows." She laughs. That's weird, Tyler has the same fucking allergy. I don't know whether the information she's telling me is correct or not, but we're going to have to ask mom if she's real or not.

"If you are the real Christina Styles, who did we bury twenty three years ago?" I ask, heading to my laptop, as if that'll give me answers. I absolutely cannot find shit about Christina Styles, and of course, Heather Whitman isn't a celebrity or such thing to be known. "Heather, I mean Christina, would you like to attend a birthday party?"