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One

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"Alright, ladies keep it moving!" Hannah O'Brien yelled, pushing open the double oak doors that led to the beach house kitchen. "We have mouths to feed!"

April stood next to Amanda, watching her expertly chop a ball of white cabbage into strips, her hands moving like machines.

She wondered how on earth the knife hadn't sliced her friend's finger yet.

"Did you two hear me? It looks like we're gonna need more salad. How're the veggies coming?"

"Almost done with cabbage," Amanda announced, turning the chopping board over. "April's the jobless one."

Hannah placed her arms akimbo. "April, do something."

"You already banned me from chopping stuff," April objected with both hands up in surrender. "And Amanda won't let me taste anything so I can't do that, either."

Hannah placed a hand to her chin for a second, then snapped her fingers. "Fine, grab a tray. You'll be on serving duty with me. Paige, how's the salmon?"

Paige wailed from the other end of the kitchen.

Hannah wrung her hair and let out a frustrated groan that made April pity the pretty woman. She was about the same height as April, with shoulder length, California blonde hair and a face that could hide no emotion. Hannah was usually really sweet but that moment, it was obvious: she was about to crack.

She crossed the room to the other end, where Paige was—in every sense—battling with the salmon in the pan. She sighed, took the spatula and began correcting Paige's use of it.

"How many plates should I take?" April raised her voice, deciding to save Hannah the stress by taking on waitressing duty alone.

"Five!"

"Five," she muttered and set the green tray down, followed by the octagonal bowls, which she arranged in a pattern. Two at the top, one in the middle, and the last two at the end.

Chef April at your service!

"Mom, it wasn't even burning!" She heard Paige voice as she left the busy kitchen.

Their beach house was big and resembled one from a resort. It had been in their family for a long time, even though they had never thought to use it until now.

The area they were in was near the staircase in a huge, white and brown themed space that served as the lounge room. In the center of the room was a wide table and lining the edges were several plush leather sofas that one could easily sink into. The smell of spicy food escaped the fairly closed kitchen, filling the air.

Her father sat in the midst of his 'friends', easily distinguished by his head of grey hair. When April was younger, she used to believe he had that color because he was very old. It had taken some time to realise that not only old people had hair like that.

She set the tray down on the table before them as perfectly as she could.

"Thank you, princess," Patrick said with a small smile.

A relieved sigh passed her lips at his good mood. "You're welcome, dad."

"Move," A deep, male voice came from behind her. From the way he growled, she knew it could be none other than her brother, Nathan. At twenty three, he towered over most of the adults in the room. She took a step to the left to let the brunet skyscraper pass. If he was grumpy, she had no business with it.

Nathan sat beside their father, stretching his half bare legs in front of him. "Dad, I just spoke to Javier. Their jet landed about an hour ago. They're on their way here."

Patrick nodded. "Great."

No, definitely not great, April thought. She had the nagging urge to kick Nathan in the stomach for flushing her hopes for a diversion down the drain. Javier had crossed the hurdle and there was nothing else with the power to abort their mission.

"Are you alright?" Patrick asked, frowning at her. Nathan sent her a questioning look.

She snapped back to reality and nodded. "Yeah, of course I am."

Why wouldn't she be?

•. ✿ .•

No amount of deep breathing could calm April enough to stay still. The house was already full, and as the minutes passed, the courage she had built up to face Javier continued to wane. Now, her only saving grace would be to make sure she caught him off guard, not the other way around. With the amount of distractions, however, she could only pray for concentration.

"Hi, April," Mrs Greenwich, a blonde, petite woman who worked somewhere in finances smiled and waved at her. "You've grown so much!"

She smiled and hastily nodded, eager to escape the cage of pleasantries before it became too late.

"How are you? I heard you graduated when, last year? Are you in college yet?"

She cursed under her breath and spared one last glance toward the door before turning back to. Ms. Greenwich. "Yeah, I am." Lies.

"Attention everyone," she heard faintly from the other side, followed by what sounded like clinking of a fork against glass.

Welcoming the distraction with open arms, April turned around and walked back to the centre of the room.

"Are you okay?" Amanda asked as she stood beside her. "You look skittish."

Why did everyone keep asking her that? She was fine. More than fine, actually, she was—"I'm fine. There's just a lot of people here."

Amanda chuckled. "I know right? If I answer one more comment about how grown I am, I'm going to lose it." She gave April a skeptic look. "Since when are people a problem for you, though? Are you expecting someone?"

She shook her head quickly. "No! Are you?"

"No."

They joined the crowd around the centre, where Patrick, April's father stood with his wife, Hannah on his arm. They both had grins on their faces, Hannah's wider than his. April felt a tiny sliver of relief on seeing that Hannah was no longer as tensed as she had been.

"First of all, my wife and I would like to thank you all for showing up to celebrate one of our biggest achievements as a group so far," Patrick started, addressing the crowd. "As we all know, Family comes first, and when it comes to family, we all are, one way or another..."

April turned her attention back to the door, knowing exactly where his speech was going. She had heard it a thousand times at functions and other gatherings she had seen her father host.

Her consciousness returned with a sharp poke to her side from Amanda. When she glared, her best friend jerked her head toward Patrick and Hannah. "I think they're about to call you guys up."

Patrick was still talking. "The rest of my family, however, I must call on. My son, Nathan, and my two, beautiful daughters, April and Paige."

As the round of applause began, she whispered a 'thank you' to Amanda, then adjusted her skirt and walked to the middle of the circle.

She took the opportunity to look through the guests in search of him. If Javier was there, she wanted to see him get shocked to see her. It couldn't be any other way.

Patrick began his hypocritical 'I love my family' speech, giving her enough time to scout the area like a night guard. A part of her actually wanted this to play out while the other, bigger part wanted Javier to bail on showing up.

She wrung her fingers and slapped the model smile back on when she noticed Ms. Greenwich looking at her. The older woman averted her gaze to Patrick, then back to April, this time with a frown. Curious, April paid closer attention to her father's words.

"...But I'm confident that when she's ready, she actually will make it into a reputable college."

Her shoulders slumped as the betrayal sunk in. What wouldn't he do to make her look like a disappointment? Though she would never feel that way, her image mattered just as much.

Although it was the truth that she hadn't gotten into college the past year, she didn't think it was something that needed to be apologised for or announced, for that matter —especially since, secretly, getting rejected had been the plan all along. If Patrick wanted to make her sound like a failure, he had another thing coming.

"April has potential. She'll be fantastic in whatever she decides to study, it's just a matter of time for her to figure out what she really —"

"Not me," she quickly said, interrupting him.

"What was that?"

Her arm stung as Nathan pinched it and whispered 'shut up'. She shrugged him off, looking straight ahead, as she let her next words out. "I said not me. I don't plan on retrying for college anytime soon." Or ever, but she didn't have to add that part. "It's true what you said about timing but not everyone has the same plan to begin with. I personally don't think college degrees make for better people...I think we're focusing on the wrong definition of accomplishment."

Hannah turned red as silence enveloped the entire gathering. She couldn't hear it out loud, but when you're standing in front of a crowd of millionaire business moguls with firm beliefs in education and the 'right way' of life, announcing your phobia for college and everything they stand for is probably not the best idea. To save from the awkward moment, April chuckled. "I'm kidding," she lied. "You should all see your faces."

Amanda joined in the laughter and soon, everyone else was laughing at the 'joke'.

"Ever the comedian," Patrick said with a small laugh of his own.

"Alright, give it up for family!" Nathan hollered, raising another applause as they returned to their spots.

"What was that?" Amanda whispered with wide eyes. "Nice save but you and I know you weren't kidding. Why would you make such a statement now?"

April shook her head. Even she didn't know the method to her own thoughts tonight. "He was going off track and I don't know...it slipped out?"

"You're lucky you had that silly excuse to fall on."

April chuckled and patted her friend on the shoulder. "Yep."

Everyone began cheering again at something Hannah announced, holding up a champagne glass. April didn't hear this announcement thanks to Amanda's distraction but she passed it off as their anniversary. It was in June, after all.

The next few announcements went by, and April found herself calming down. Despite the failure of her little speech, she felt a hint of pride in herself for actually speaking about college—even if she'd had to convert it to stand up comedy. Maybe next time, she could do it again and leave the lie behind.

She had her own passion, one she wanted to follow till forever. One that involved just as much dedication as any college major out there. Even though people often underestimated dancers everywhere, there was nothing more she would rather spend her life doing. Her biggest obstacle stood in the six foot something form of Patrick, but she could handle it. No matter how long it took, she would stand her ground until she got what she wanted. Amanda once suggested she combined both hers and her father's plans by going to college to major in dance but it wasn't that type of dance that April fancied.

She could make her own way.

It was a shame that even her own brother didn't understand, but then again butting heads had always been the norm between them. A sigh escaped her lips as she spotted him walking out the back door.

Great idea, she needed fresh air too.

***

As she closed the door behind her, the smell of fresh ocean breeze hit her face in a refreshing blast, reminding her of the one of the reasons she had to smile. She leaned on the railing and interlocked her fingers, staring into the dark distance. As her thoughts sorted and collected themselves, she remembered the reason she was on the beach in the first place. Not that she'd tell Amanda, but she was incredibly grateful to he here, despite certain threats that may or may not show up.

It didn't matter, though. She would calmly cross that bridge when she got to it. She had gotten through Javier before and she could definitely do it again. She was April. She had this!

"I can do this," she said to herself. "I got this under —" She heard a shuffle and bolted upright, listening closely for any signs of movement as she searched her surroundings.

"Nate?" She called, remembering that she'd seen him come out here. "Look, I don't really care if you're spying on me. If you are, at least have the balls to—"

As she lifted her head from the ground, she espied a flash of light brown hair and stopped talking. It wasn't Nate.

"Don't let me stop you from finishing that," a different voice said as the owner stepped under the light from the balcony.

April's entire body froze to the extent that she stopped breathing when his eyes met hers.

So much for crossing the bridge when she got to it.

Breathe in, breathe out, She instructed her lungs as her heart began to pound against her chest.

Javier Klein was standing right in front of her for the first time in two years.