Written and edited by Mahima Rathod

( Don't kill me. I decided to change the pattern in which the story was being posted because I didn't like it much. If you have read this episode already, please skip to the Episode number 4) 

Lead characters-

Brandon Wellington

Olivia Stanford

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An ignorant Girlfriend, a loving boyfriend and the dilemma

The same evening Joel and Brandon returned

"Open the door Olivia, I swear, I am going to kick it down", Brandon yelled, loud enough for the neighbours to poke their heads out, while banging on his own door. But no one opened the door.

He was now standing outside the door for ten minutes. He had texted and called Olivia, his girlfriend, to inform her about his arrival, but she didn't answer. Sometime their house doesn't give best network coverage, he thought, and let go of the fact that Olivia might just be ignoring him on purpose. He was tired and did not want to go through the pain of finding the keys to his house, which he had actually not bothered remembering where he had put in his bag. And being hungry was one of the most annoying factor which caused Brandon to not care about waking the neighbours up with his yelling.

Olivia's car was parked outside the house, in the lawn, so he had assumed that she was home. Home, it seemed like she was starting to think it was her own house and not Brandon's in which they had decided to move in. Not once before, Brandon had thought of the house as only his, he always considered the house as theirs. But for past few months Olivia had been acting as if the house was hers only. He did not mind in true sense, but it does bother him always when she throws parties without telling him, better yet asking, and he has to attend unwillingly. Few weeks back, she sold his father's antique spectacles, which may be not very precious to anyone else but it was his father's first purchase from his first pay-check, and Brandon always felt honoured to have that in his possession after his father's death. Obviously, he was angry and annoyed with Olivia, but she had managed to convince him with statement like, 'it was just an object, not worthy for someone to scold his future wife', the latter half of the statement shifted his focus entirely and he forgot about what she had done.

Brandon sighed and sat down on the stairs of the porch, finally deciding not to wait for Olivia and find the key. Just as he was about to open his suitcase, a lavish sports car stopped in front of his lawn. He knew whose car it was, it was Olivia's friend, Juno's, and it made Brandon to reach his limit of control.

Olivia stumbled out of the car nearly breaking her ankle over her heels. Brandon couldn't bring himself to stand up and help his drunk girlfriend since he was on the edge of losing his mind with anger. He watched as Juno came to her side and held her stand straight by her waist. Brandon's hands clutched into fists and nail nearly pierced the skin when Olivia slumped into his arms and Juno's hands wandered in places more than just her waist. Brandon's almost stood up when he saw Juno leaning towards her lips but he did not when Olivia laughed and pushed him away, then started making her way towards the house. They couldn't see Brandon yet, since there was no light outside the house. Olivia was blabbering some non-sense, which was last on his mind to comprehend, right now, it would be better if he shut his mouth before he would say or do something he would regret, he thought to himself.

He didn't bother standing up to help her walking straight, he was that angry with her. He had been gone for nearly a week, now when he had finally returned from his trip, he expected her to at least have courtesy to stay home and open the door for him. Not arrive looking almost naked in the silver dress she was wearing, on top of that getting out of a pervert b*st*rd's car, drunk.

When Olivia finally managed to come to the porch, she opened her silver clutch and tried to search for the key with her blazed vision. She regretted doing two things together, searching for key and at same time trying to climb the stairs on the porch without looking, next moment she her foot missed the step and she was falling down face first. Her dizzy mind registered some moments later that she was hanging just above the stair and giggle escaped her mouth since the idea of her being a magician popped into her drunk mind.

Her giggles turned into hiccups when Brandon pulled her in a straight position. Her every action was causing Brandon's anger to pile up. He almost felt bad for Olivia, because once she would be sober, he wasn't going to hold back. Once he was certain that Olivia wouldn't fall down, he took her clutch from her and found the key to open his house. While he opened the door, a thought crossed his mind, Olivia was so much drunk that she didn't even notice him sitting just next to her and even holding her.

Putting the key inside his pant pockets, he pushed his suitcase inside the door, before pulling Olivia into the house. Robotically, he turned on the lights before securing the door and guided Olivia to sit on the couch of their living room. Olivia closed her eyes and went into a slumber just after she was put down on the couch, not even bothering to straighten her position on the couch.

Brandon only bothered to remove her heels and put her legs on the couch, not more. He couldn't bear touching her without getting angry further and he did not want that. How much ever he would get annoyed or angry at her, he won't be able to bear if she would get hurt because of him, physically or emotionally.

So, to settle down his mind, he carried his suitcase upstairs to their bedroom, and had the much-needed hot shower. He missed hot showers when he was in India. The place where they were staying had no concept of hot showers. It was only cold showers, and he considered himself lucky that he even got time for shower. The place was always in chaos, at his friend, Manny's house. He had to share his room with Joel, and as much as he would have liked to stay in a hotel, Armaan's family insisted that they stayed with them. And, insisting level was up to no par since his family literally blocked the doors from the fear of them leaving. But it was a good experience, Brandon thought, as he washed the lathered soap from his hairs. At least Armaan had some people who were happy and almost ecstatic to accommodate his friends, who were strangers to them, unlike Olivia, he thought, who couldn't even bother staying sober the night her boyfriend was arriving.

He chuckled as he remembered his conversation with Joel at the airport. He was certain that Joel's wife had come to pick him up, rather happily, and Joel would now be having some romantic time with his wife, at his home. How he had wished that Olivia would have actually planned a surprise for him.

Shaking his head, he got out of the bathroom and got dressed in his casual attires, before climbing back down. His stomach was hungry, but he didn't want to eat, just because he wasn't feeling like it after whatever had turned out of the evening. He entered the living room, and saw that Olivia was drooling over the cushion he had placed below her head before walking to his bedroom.

Olivia was mumbling things in her drunken-sleeping state, not that Brandon cared what she was mumbling about. He walked over to her side, and stared at her now racoon-like makeup, and thought, 'how did it come to this?'.

Sighing he picked her up putting a hand below her knees and back and carried her slowly towards their bedroom. He put her on her side of the bed and turned her over so that he could undo the zipper of her strap-less silver dress. Olivia did not even stir once, even when he pulled out the dress from her body. He wondered, what would have happened if Juno or any other man would have tried to take advantage of her, she wouldn't even have realised that something wrong was happening to her.

Brandon put a break to his thoughts, which were causing him distress, and the actual culprit or victim, whatever his girlfriend was now, was oblivious to the fact that she was lying half naked on the bed, although it was her boyfriend, but still. He walked over to her closet and returned with a large pyjama button down top. He managed to pull the sleeves through her limp arms and buttoned up the top over her naked breasts. When he was done changing her clothes, he considered whether he should bother wiping her face, since he also thought next that, was it worth it?

But he did love her, and he knew if she woke up next day and saw her own face like that, she would bring down the whole roof with her whining. So, he sat down beside her and pulled out some wet-tissues from the side drawer before wiping her face, gently. While he traced her face with tissue, his thoughts bugged him to think, whether he was overthinking about the situation, or if he was being oblivious to the facts that maybe Olivia was taking advantage of him.

He wondered whether he had also changed so much in the past five years, because certainly the Olivia in front of him wasn't the same Olivia he had met during his struggling days. A memory of them both sitting on a lone bench in the park floated his mind, it was almost three years now that he had gotten a bit successful, and before that she always used to be by his side while he went from one audition to another. He remembered, that day he had no time for having lunch since he had auditions back to back, and Olivia had arrived with food in her hand and she had sat with him until he finished his lunch, in the park.

Brandon dropped the tissue aside and sat there looking at her beautiful face. She was truly beautiful, no wonder she had got so many modelling offers for the television advertisements. His fingers absent-mindedly grazed the skin of her cheekbones, while he leaned a bit towards her.

Before he would lose all his anger towards her behaviour, and kiss her, he abruptly stood up and left the bedroom.

Guess, he had not an option but to order a meal, and instead of romantic night with her girlfriend, he would have to or maybe right now he would like to spend night alone in the living room watching the Television.

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Next day-Sunday

Olivia woke up, but she didn't know why there was so much light flashing on her face. Squinting her eyes, while she covered them partially with her hand, she realised the light was from the window, and it was already past dawn. She wondered how she forget to close the curtains last night since she had not forgotten before. She knew from the moment she moved into this house, that the sun light enters their bedroom very early morning, so she always remembered to close the curtains. Now she couldn't remember why she didn't close it, in fact, when she sat up and looked down to herself, she couldn't remember why she changed into oversized shirt since she only wore her lingerie to sleep. Next her head started feeling blocked, and the constant hammering was the worst torture that she always experienced after drinking more than her limits.

Then she realized, and her hazy mind let faint memory of last night to surface, she remembered she was with a Juno, her friend, and they were in his friend's party. But then she didn't remember driving back to her house, and not even how she reached the bedroom, which she realised was her own when she looked around, and not even who changed her clothes.

She scratched her head, careful not to break her new acrylic nails. She assumed that she must have done all that and forgotten how she managed that. She looked around and didn't find her purse or mobile phone, and she wondered whether she dropped it somewhere or left it at the house she went last night.

All the wondering made her head pound more than before, a groan escaped her mouth and she let her head drop on her lap.

She needed coffee, she thought, and she unwillingly got out of the bed to wash her face. With half closed eyes, she stumbled her way into the bathroom and glanced at her face in the mirror on the way to the basin, and she did a double take at her reflection. She didn't expect her face to look so clear of make-up, which she was almost sure would have made her face look like panda. She frowned since she didn't believe she was in such state to wipe her face before sleeping.

She refrained herself from thinking any further for it made her headache increase. She quickly brushed her teeth and made her way down the kitchen, without bothering to change the shirt she was wearing. On her way down the stairs she remembered, today she had to go to an audition for a photoshoot, and before that she had to go to the salon to have her face-cleansing session.

In her trance, she didn't notice him initially. There he was, sleeping on the small sized couch, his legs dangled from the edge of it. Olivia wouldn't have noticed him at all if he wouldn't have suddenly snored louder than a dog growling, and she jumped screaming on top of her vocals. As she pressed herself towards a corner, shouting 'oh-ma-god-o-ma-god-o-ma...', Brandon woke up startled, as if Olivia's scream caused electricity to jolt through his body and he tried to sit up hastily which caused him to fall down not so gently.

"Owww...bl**dy h*ell...", he groaned loudly, holding his back with his hand and sat up on the ground, looking for the source of non-electrical alarm.

By the time he sat up with his back leaning against the foot of couch, Olivia had stopped screaming, and now instead, she was standing still against the wall, staring at the face of person who did not look anything like a dog, or any animal for that.

"Brandon?!", Olivia exclaimed.

"Yes, I know I am Brandon Olivia", Brandon said with a flat tone and stood up, yawning after that. He stretched his back and twisted his torso in opposite directions to check whether there was still pain but there was none.

He didn't look up, or the right term would be that he didn't bother, instead he scratched his head and started picking up the pillows that had fallen on the ground along with him. He picked up the leftover boxes of the food he had eaten last night and started making his way towards the kitchen when he heard Olivia shriek, "Oh my god Brandon! You are back!!".

Brandon chuckled sarcastically, 'Great! She didn't even remember I was coming back', he thought, but didn't stop to reply.

Just after he threw the boxes in the dustbin, he stumbled forward managing to catch himself with the help of counter in front of him, Olivia had jumped on his back, laughing without any realisation of Brandon's mood.

On an instinct, Brandon held her hands on his shoulders with one hand and one hand under her leg. Olivia continued to shriek and Brandon let her, given that he knew stopping her wouldn't do any good. Brandon walked them both to the living room and let Olivia drop on the couch. He glanced at the wall-clock and realised it was still early in the morning to wake up, and certainly not a time to talk to Olivia about last night. He decided that he should go back to sleep in the bedroom, obviously he didn't get any comfortable rest last night on the couch.

"-anyway, you should have told me you were coming-", Brandon heard Olivia's statement partially and replied, "I had already told you that I was coming back last night Olivia", knowing that she was about to ask the same of him.

Olivia frowned and stood up, "Wha-", she started to speak but Brandon turned around and started to walk towards the stairs. Her frown deepened and she held Brandon back by his arm, "Where are you going? And what do mean, you never told me you were coming back yesterday!".

Brandon sighed and turned to her, "Olivia, please, it's really early, and I want to rest more. We can talk later about this", he said and removed her hand from his.

He saw her eyes glancing at the loss of contact, and the questions too were visible on her face. He didn't want to do anything like this, but she would be pushing him to answer her. And even if he would answer her questions, it was her who would be hurt.

"Something has happened, what happened baby? You...you called me Olivia, twice. And you haven't even looked at me until now", she said in slow voice, hurt clearly evident, when she next, "let alone, kissed me".

Brandon did realise this before her, and maybe somewhere around the situation he had done it deliberately. He didn't kiss her, he didn't call her Olie, like he always does, and neither did he try to make her, her favourite coffee, like he always did in the morning.

Either he didn't have it in him to do all the things after all that happened last night, or simply because he may have wanted her to realise that he wasn't happy right now with her.

"Yes, I didn't call you Olie, or kiss you like every morning. But it's not a big deal", Brandon said averting his eyes.

Olivia's mind trailed all the possibilities, from Brandon not feeling well to him having an affair to him wanting to break up with her. She didn't want to show the hurt she felt when he said it wasn't a big deal, but she couldn't stop her eyes from watering.

"and why isn't it a big deal?", she started in a low voice, "Brandon, what has happened? Are you angry with me? Have I done something to upset you? Or maybe you just don't want to do this anymore!?", her voice got louder and louder with each question.

Brandon's eyes narrowed on her, all the thoughts of having some more sleep fled out of him, "I said it is not big deal, because it isn't. I am tired from sleeping on the couch whole night and I want to rest; can you not spare me the morning kiss part for later? And what are you talking about Olivia? what do I not want to do anymore?", Brandon asked her taking a step forward.

Olivia chuckled, and folded her hands on her chest, "right. It's not a big deal. Sure. You know what Brandon, I just don't want to talk right now", and I don't want you to confirm my fears right now, she refrained from saying that.

Brandon scoffed and let Olivia see the anger rising in his eyes, "You don't want to talk! Okay, fine! You don't want to talk then we won't talk, that's what we are doing for past three months, aren't we? We do whatever you want, I do whatever you want, okay! You-you...", Brandon huffed and decided not to complete his statement.

It's not worth it, he thought and regretted immediately.

Olivia's tears started flowing freely, and Brandon felt his anger subsidizing. That's what always happens, whenever they have an argument, she would start crying and then Brandon would console her and apologise. He always felt coward afterward, but then he convinced himself by saying that he loves her and would do anything for her.

Brandon stepped forward and reached for her, sighing he said, "Olivia, stop crying please", he held her by her shoulder, and stepped ahead to hug her, "I am sorry, okay, please stop crying", he said against her head and kissed her visible skin on her shoulder.

Olivia let her tears soak into Brandon's shirt, and mumbled against his shoulder, "I don't even know why you are angry! You think I forgot, don't you? I don't remember you telling me about coming home yesterday...I am sorry if you think I forgot Brandon".

Brandon sighed but did not confront her, he still had the message in his phone that he had sent her informing her about time of his arrival. But he decided to let it go, it was no worth stretching the argument on silly matters, and definitely not worth if it made her cry, he thought.

"It's okay, Olie. Let's forget about this now. And I am sorry for making you cry, yeah?", Brandon said pulling away from Olivia, holding her by her shoulders.

Olivia nodded and wiped her eyes, before looking at him. She smiled at him, and managed to return a light one. Olivia leaned forward bit, and Brandon leaned too, and kissed her forehead, before turning away and walking towards the staircase.

"I am going to rest in bedroom", Brandon said over his shoulder, but never looked back again or he would have seen Olivia's hurtful face.

He knew what she was waiting for, but he was still not ready to forgive her. He might have said that it didn't matter anymore, but he was still disappointed and angry with her behaviour. And Kissing her at time like this, didn't fit well with his conscience.

Olivia stood there feeling hurt and embarrassed that Brandon had left her in the middle of living room, without giving her the physical assurance she was waiting for. She had not seen him for a week. She didn't remember him telling her anything about his arrival the last night or she wouldn't have gone to some stupid party. She knew there was something else that was bugging Brandon, and her insecurities resurfaced once again. She watched as Brandon disappeared climbing up, and once more she was disappointed when he didn't turn back as she wished to happen.

A tear fell on her cheek which she wiped on her way to kitchen.

All the while she drank her coffee, she wondered where she was going wrong. 

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