It started with arranged marriage

Chapter 12

- Eric William Miller  -

I was about to go to bed and a message came in which was from Lily. In her message, she mentioned me as a liar and a guy who did not stay on his own promise and plan. I couldn’t deny any of this because it’s true. But one unexpected thing was I was not mad or angry at her. I found her interesting and she was kinda amusing for me. Sometimes even I didn’t realize I found her attractive, the way she speaks, the way she behaves. Nevertheless she has a simple and elegant yet sexy look.  

After reading her message, I was left with mixed feelings. I knew I was definitely not over Sophia yet but still at the same time I was kinda interested or attracted to Lily. I wanted to know more about her and treated her nicely. If I would meet her in other circumstances, I wouldn’t treat her badly. I decided not to reply to her message and just left it like that.  I knew right now she felt miserable but I wouldn’t not back off from my plan too. The way Sophia left me was hurting my pride and ego. 

I was in a deep sleep and suddenly the phone ringing was disturbing my sleep. I tried to ignore the ringing but the phone kept ringing. “Who the hell is that in this early morning,” I mumbled to myself annoyingly. I took the phone from the side table and declined the call. I continued back to sleep. In a few seconds the phone rang again. 

I picked up the phone out of infuriation, it was from Lily. “hello,” I said. “Hello, it’s Lily,” said from the other line. I was really infuriated about the early morning call. I checked the time and it was just 7 in the morning. “Jesus, what do you want, in the early morning,” I said, getting up from my bed. I knew I could not sleep anymore again after the phone call so I got up to get coffee. 

“Sorry to call you in this hour but we need to talk,” she said. I knew what she was going to say next. She continued with “I think my mom misheard from your parents or I’m not sure maybe my mom was lying to me. She told me you agree about marriage”. “Your mom is not lying or misheard, she is right. I agree on this,” I replied, pouring coffee into the cup. I took a sip of coffee and then told her “let’s meet today evening, 6 at the same place from last time”. After she said “okay,” I hung up the phone. 

I send the text to Drew and Nick to have lunch together. Hereafter, I started preparing to go to work. At sharp 9 I arrived at my office. My secretary was already there waiting with my daily schedule. Jimmy used to work as my dad’s secretary but since after dad resigned he worked as my secretary. He was like my family too, he always got my back. “Jimmy, can you bring me a cup of coffee,” I ordered it to my secretary and entered my office. 

I started my day at the office with checking the files. It was one hour before lunch time, Jimmy came to inform me about the meeting and we went together to the conference room to attend the meeting. When I got back from the meeting, Drew and Nick were already at my office waiting for me to go to have lunch. “Sorry guys, my meeting took a bit longer today,” I said. “Don’t worry man, we just arrive here too,” Nick said. 

“Let’s go now, I’m starving. I reserved the restaurant already too,” Drew said and all of us headed to the restaurant. It was a short drive to reach the restaurant. The food was delivered to our table short after we arrived. All of us were starving and digging into the food. “Eric, Lily told me you agree to marry her, is that true?” Nick asked. I knew I needed to talk about that with Nick somehow. Also he knew all of my past relationship too. 

Drew was looking at me with a questioning look. “Yeah man, sorry I didn’t tell you first,” I said, taking a sip of water from the glass. I could tell from Nick's face, he was not so happy about that. Drew was just observing the tension between us. “No offense man, but I don’t like your decision. I thought you would be against it till the end. You are my best friend and I know you are a great person but I cannot trust you with my sister,” he said. It's true though, if it was my sister I would feel the same too. 

“No worries, I understand. I thought that I would do the same too, against till the end. But when I think about it again, I thought, `` It's not a bad proposition either,” I said, looking cautiously at Nick's face. “I know, I cannot change your decision and our families plan. Please just promise me one thing, take care of my sister,” he said, patting on my shoulder. “I’ll try my best, thanks for understanding me,” I said, finishing up the last remaining water from the glass. 

“Woohoo!phyuu! I thought something bad might happen and couldn’t breathe freely,” Drew said. We all laughed because of his comment. We called the waiter for the bill. While we were waiting for the bill, “Hey Eric, can I ask you about Sophia? Are you guys really done right for good?” he asked. “Yeah, don’t worry about that. This time we ended for good,” I lied, actually I couldn’t forget about her. But I couldn’t say it to him too, he couldn’t know the reasons behind my decision. 

We all went back to work after lunch. I was busy again with the meetings and reviewing the files. Managing this kind of big company was not an easy job. Many people just see from outside, being born from a rich family was fortunate. They thought that I didn’t need to work, and live a luxury life without any effort. That was all prejudice, I needed to work harder twice than other people. All of my fortune and wealth came from my own hard work. After finishing all my work, it was already half past five. I wrapped up everything quickly and rushed out to the coffee shop to meet Lily.