Jessica's Fate

Chapter 104

I feel like I blinked, and all the sudden 6 weeks flew by.

The time after my break-up with Josh was full of classes and time spent with all my boys. My shifts at the diner were full of people stopping by and watching me decorate cakes or fill orders for my catering jobs. My time spent at school was crammed full of classes and time in the restaurant as usual and I still had my typical drop in's. Kota had lunch almost every day and I still saw Josh's teammates frequently because apparently, they'd become addicted to the food. The stuffing bread with roast turkey and cranberry chutney was again our most popular sandwich for all of November and December.

Amidst all the busy work, I had plenty of time to commune with the bread dough and beat the hell out of it as I worked out my frustrations at my last boyfriend. Raven was proud of me because I didn't spend all of our time together crying and wondering what had gone wrong because this time, yes, I was dumped but I had gathered the reasons behind it and I couldn't honestly fault him because we did indeed have an agreement.

I didn't mind that time had flown by. One minute, I'm getting my heart handed to me at a Halloween party and the next, I'm graduating with honors from the first part of my patisserie course at the Culinary Institute.

Which means, it's time to get the Christmas shopping done and actually buckle down and pack for Paris.

It's a little overwhelming.

The course I plotted for my life and education was a very smart decision. I've scrimped and saved my money from working at the Diner and from catering jobs. I have the money that Mom gave me at graduation, I'd had Owen and Victor invest it for me so it was worth more than the 30K it started at. But trying to figure out what I could live without in Paris for two years? Oh. My. God. Don't get me started on how difficult it was turning out to be.

I was pretty sure that most of my Christmas gifts were going to be cash. Or things that packed well into a carryon bag. It was a long 21 hour flight. I'd need a few things while in transit. But I'd amassed a pretty good life full of good clothes, shoes and accessories and while I knew that I couldn't take my cat, there were a whole lot of other things that I wasn't sure about leaving behind.

Let's not even get started on the fact that Paris was consistently a good 10 to 20 degrees cooler in temperature. That automatically meant I needed to scrounge up a winter coat for when we arrived. I finally gave up and called Sang. "I need help."

"Of course, you do."

"You say that like you knew I'd be calling." I arched an eyebrow at my phone, even though we weren't on facetime.

She laughed. "I figured eventually you'd want to borrow Gabriel." She teased.

"Oh, I do. And for so much more than how to efficiently squeeze everything I need into two suitcases."

"Anything you need. You know we're here for you."

"I know. I think I need to go shopping. I don't think I have anything good enough to not say I'm an out of place tourist in Paris in the middle of winter and I don't know how I got here."

She laughed again. "How about we go shopping tonight after dinner? Our place, everyone will be around."

"Sounds like a plan to me. Now I can forget all this for a while and go bake cookies. Christmas is just around the corner and neither Mom or I have managed to make nearly enough cookies to withstand a Luke invasion."

"That's very likely true." She chuckled softly before sighing. "Jess?"

"Yeah, Sang?"

"I'm going to miss you terribly, you know." My eyes filled up and I couldn't say anything before she went on. "You're the best little sister I could have ever possibly dreamed of being gifted someday. I love you." She sniffled.