Want Ian. Sadly don't own him or anything.
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I was sitting on the reception desk, oblivious to the chaos around me, working on a melody for one of my songs. It was getting frustrating, because I had been doing this for a while and I wasn't even done with the first verse. Every time I tried, it didn't sound right. I must've said so out loud, because a girl who had walked up to me said, "No, I think it sounded really good."
I was somewhat startled. She was American. "Thanks." She was pretty. I found myself liking her even though I had barely said one thing to her.
She stared at my guitar for a second. "Is that a Gibson J-200?" she asked, voice filled with awe.
"Yeah." This girl knew something about guitars. "Are you a musician?" I asked her. Well, how else would she know?
"No," she replied, "but I live with one back home."
I could feel my face fall slightly. "Oh." So she had a boyfriend, and was living with him. That's how else she could know.
"My mom," she added, smiling a little. I was tempted to laugh at falling for a girl whose name and origin (apart from country) I didn't know. I can be a bit ridiculous sometimes.
"Oh!" Now more cheerful (all because a pretty girl that I like is still single), I slid off the desk, and stuck a sign that said 'reception' on it. Okay, so I had been slacking off. So what. "So, you checking in?"
She grinned at me, almost laughing. "Day job?" She got it. She acted like she had a million back where she lived.
"Yeah, one of many." It was strange how easily I could talk to her. It was probably a mistake, but I couldn't think straight. "You know, life of a struggling musician."
"Ah."
In an ongoing game of 'Try to Catch Your Fellow Employee Off Guard', one of the guys threw a soft football at my head and yelled, "Ian, catch!" pronouncing my name incorrectly in the process. Leaving the reception desk, I offered to show her around. Being American, she probably didn't really know what to do with herself.
"So the kitchen's through there," I pointed, "Common room's down the hall." Forgetting that she wasn't from this country, I said rather quickly, "I should warn you the dog and bone's on the blink and we've no lift here."
She looked so confused I almost laughed. "Huh?"
"Phone," I put my hand on it for emphasis, "is broken. Elevator: none."
A girl walked out of the toilet and shouted, "Lou's free."
Her eyebrow creased. "Who's Lou?"
I grinned again. This was just a smile fest. "We better take this slowly." She grinned, but it kind of stayed pasted on her face when she heard the television. Something about Lord Dashwood giving up his seat in the House of Lords to actually run in the election. Whatever. I never pay attention to politics. Not after my grandparents.
She walked towards the screen, eyes never leaving it. "My dad." That, more than anything else, shocked me. This American girl, daughter of one of the oldest and richest families in England? And we had been getting along so nicely, too… I had no chance with her, not in a million years. My family was shunned by people like that, ever since my mother married beneath her 'station'.
"Lord Dashwood, who will marry his fiancé, Glynnis Payne, in the presence of the Queen at the end of the summer will also inherit a stepdaughter, the lovely Clarissa Payne." The reporter may have stopped talking if he had seen the smile slide slowly off her face. She looked so… sad.
I figured that I wouldn't be missed very much, so I said, "Fancy a walk?" When she nodded, I led the way to the door. The second we stepped outside, I remembered that I didn't even know her name. The only thing I knew about her was that she was a Dashwood, and her mother was a musician. And that she knows about day jobs. "Sorry, I'm Ian Wallace." I held out my hand, and she shook it.
"Daphne Reynolds." Okay, maybe not a Dashwood?
We walked for a while, and she told me that she had come here from New York to look for her dad, because she had lived without one for her whole life. She told me about how her mother, the musician, had raised her. I could tell that now she was having doubts about coming, and she voiced them soon afterward.
"I just don't know if I can do this anymore."
"Daphne, he's your father. You flew halfway around the world to see him." Since I had never been in a situation remotely like this in my life, all I could do was ensure her that a parent's love is constant, and it's almost obligatory. And she was such a lovable person. I should know. "You can't turn back now." I don't want you to. But she wouldn't stay for me. She'd have to be crazy to stay for a guy she barely knows.
"He has a family now. You saw them… They're so elegant and sophisticated. It's like…" she trailed off for a second. I waited for he to finish. "What would he want with me?" What wouldn't he want with you? You're his daughter. But instead of staying serious, I decided to paint the whole thing a brighter color.
"Yeah, well, you got a point there." I could joke and she could take it. We were both so natural around each other. No tenseness or awkwardness of having known each other for only twenty minutes at all. So maybe I did have a chance.
"Shut up." She smiled slightly, though. I felt that if she could have less of a solemn mood about all of it, she would see how it wasn't so bad. "It's just… not as simple as I thought." She paused. "Maybe I should just go home and let him get on with his life."
She looked up at me, hoping for more advice. I walked ahead of her, thinking No, no, NO!, but I couldn't help her anymore. The truth was, I barely knew her. She needed to figure it out on her own.
We continued to walk in silence. Neither of us said anything, but neither of us needed to talk. When we got onto the street, she said, "You're right. I'll see you around," and hopped on a bus. I waved before she disappeared from sight, hoping against hope that I would see her around. It was days before I saw her again.
So do you like? This is my second story like this. I figured that I was doing pretty well with my other one, so I'm going to attempt to tear open another male mind. Review!
-Arnold-