Her Billionaire Toy Boy

Plodding to work the next day felt like a regression. The last few weeks with Sam had been magical partly because of the rut, the ennui, in which Mira found herself stuck and seeped. He had seemed like an escape—like a breath of fresh air—like a new start. A needed one. An adventure which she knew she needed.

Something about that last phrase – a needed adventure! – struck her, and she spent the rest of her day half-absorbing legal briefs and vaguely paying attention to the updates the partners were giving her. She looked up over an afternoon cup of coffee and realized that her day had left her.

Mira put down her mug.

She didn’t like that.

One of the things which she had enjoyed the very most about being with Sam—about the last few weeks—was the way in which the new adventures she had been enjoying had slowed downtime. She had been blanking out less. She’d been forming more memories. She’d been—it felt—younger and happier than she’d been in years.

Whereas, here—in her normal, regular life—well—now she felt as if she were doing nothing but sleepwalking.

Mira put down the legal brief and stood.

She had to get out of here. She picked up her purse and put on her coat, fully intending to leave the building. To call her boss on the way home, claiming sickness or anything—personal day, most likely—just knowing that she needed to get out from the stifling conditioned air into the open outdoors and live, and breathe, and move.

She made it down to the lobby when she realized something.

Mira immediately turned around and headed back upstairs. She walked to her boss’s office. She knocked on the door.

“Hello?”

“Yes, Mira—hello—can I help you?” Mira’s boss, a woman whose name was Cincy, was hunched over her desk staring at her computer screen. She did not look up.

“Cindy, hello,” said Mira. She felt a little bit breathless. “I have some vacation built up, don’t I?”

Cindy now raised an eyebrow. “Um. Yes, you do,” she said. Mira could hear clicking as Cindy pulled up Mira’s file. Cindy’s eyes widened. “Some twenty days, actually…”

“Great,” said Mira. “I’d like to take them now.”

“Now?”

“Yes. For the next twenty business days. A personal situation has come up.”

Cindy fixed her with an eagle stare. “This is weird, Mira. I mean, it’s fine, it’s your time—but is everything okay?”
“It’s going to be,” said Mira. And as she walked out of Cindy’s office, she said to herself, “It’s got to be.”

*****

Sam had stood in the hallway, absolutely horrified, for what seemed like hours. Damien and Lisa had soon shrugged off the encounter and gone back in their room, then gone out and made food and gone about their day. Sam did not know what to do.

He did know one thing, though. He was furious. He’d known something like this was going to happen—and he’d let it happen anyway. Correction: He’d known that Damien was going to mess things up sooner or later, and he hadn’t done anything at all to make sure that that wouldn’t happen.

Sam felt like punching something. He resisted this impulse, but only barely.

He should have known when Damien had set up the worst double date, the most presumptuous and too-soon weekend away in all of history—he knew he should have done something then.

When he had gathered his thoughts, he looked over and stalked up to Mira’s room. He knew she was gone. He had heard her leave, shortly after the explosive encounter, without saying a single word to any of them. But he looked at the master bedroom where she had stayed and he felt such a sense of loss that he was not sure whether he could stay at the cabin any longer. He knew that all he would be thinking of was Mira and the fact that she was gone.

Once this thought entered his head he couldn’t think of anything else. He raced back to his small room and packed his rucksack, swung it on his back, and went back out to the great room to confront Damien.

“That was horrible,” he said coldly when he found his friend—his former friend—laying laconically on the couch. “That was a despicable thing you did, Damien.”

“Was it, though?” Damien sat up and peered up at Sam. Lisa, who was napping nearby, fluttered her eyelashes, but otherwise did not acknowledge that anything was happening. “I rather think that I just saved you from being a day longer in a relationship that couldn’t go anywhere, Sam. I mean, think about it—were you planning on lying to her for the rest of your lives? If you stayed together, permanently, I mean? Nah, man, that wasn’t going to happen. She was going to find out at some point, and she was just going to dump you then. I’ve saved you years of wasting your time. You should be thanking me, honestly.”

“I’m not thanking you,” Sam said, tersely. “I’m here to say—I’m out.”

“Out of what? Because now that you mention it, I think that we are out of coffee,” Damien said. “If you’re going into town—“

“No, Damien,” said Sam, and his voice was deadly quiet. “I’m out. I’ll be leaving shortly. You and Lisa may stay as long as you like. I’d recommend staying a bit, actually. Say goodbye to the place, because it’s the last time you’ll be coming here.”

Damien looked up at Sam. “You’re not dumping me over her.”

“What a way to put it,” said Sam. “Your girlfriend is right there. No, Damien, I’m simply choosing to choose someone else, and you’ve been a caustic influence in my life for too long. The game—I’m over it. And as long as you remain as childish as we were when we came up with it—I’m not sure that I’ll be seeing you much, either. This is goodbye.”

Sam walked out without looking back.