"I think we need a private detective or something. Him confessing like that makes it seem unlikely he was the one who messed with the car, but then again, maybe he's a compulsive liar." Greta sits so close and whispers, even though our cab driver has no clue what we are talking about. He's not an OLO driver, as we booked this ourselves.
I came home in shock last night and recited everything to Greta after that insane encounter with Jyeon, and yet my mind is no more untangled than it was. Our kiss ended, and we didn't talk much when he drove me home. What could I say…? what could he? He confessed love to a woman who is oblivious to him as a man, as a person, as a memory. He couldn't ask me to reciprocate, given I don't know him and only apologised for springing it on me and acting like a jealous lover. I've had a headache ever since and now this.
"I don't want to think about it today. Just focus on this stupid appointment at this damn company. I don't even know why Bryant wanted me to come here for this. He could have come to the apartment for this legal consult over my inheritance and my reversal of death, assuming that's what this is." I sulk as we pull up in front of the very familiar OLO building and exhale heavily. I have mixed feelings about being here, and this all feels so heavy and exhausting today.
Eyeing it up and down, Greta's eyes nearly fall out of her face as she takes in the seventy-floor skyscraper with the giant logo hanging halfway up it. It was always an impressive part of the skyline, since as far back as I can remember. I don't blame her for almost swallowing her own tongue at seeing it for the first time.
"Yahh…. That's a building, all right..... How will they explain publicly replacing your body and offing you as heiress of OLO, then marching you in there two years later? That has to have a few hundred employees, right?" Greta keeps on blinking at it as I pay the fare and get out with her close on my heels. Pulling inside my head and turning a tad older Sohla in mood. Forcing calm and pulling my chin up to face this head one. Do it quick, like ripping off tape.
"I guess we find out. We pull it out and confront them with it, seeing as it was public. Anything we want answers for, I guess today's the day." I regret the whole amnesia pitch when it comes to this bullshit, as there are so many things I have churning inside. I spent this morning saving articles about my death and my public life to throw in front of them should I need fuel to get answers.
Jyeon has me fired up and confused. No surer about the point of all this or his motives. And now Bryant is marching me over here to show me off to the world.
"Come on, let me introduce you to the place I spent all my adult life. The place which ruined me." Wasting no time in crossing the wide concrete area where I once stood up to protesters, shoving that memory aside, and make my way in the glass-fronted, wide doors that are manned by staff. I lead the way and hook my arm in hers.
The first security guard does a double-take and gawps at me with wide eyes as we walk in through the revolving door, and the sudden crash and smash of crockery has both of us snap up to look left at where it came from. Two female employees seem to have dropped coffee mugs, making a huge mess and are staring at me with white complexions as though they have just seen a ghost. They both take a second too long to react to the hazard they made.
"So…. don't think they announced it yet. Or prewarned staff that they might get a shock." Greta chuckles at the stupid reactions as more people look my way, and one employee walks into a pillar because they're not looking where they're going. It would be funny if it weren't because of me. I hate the attention it's drawing, and I recoil inside, no longer that woman who used to love the admiring stares of my staff. Or their fear at my presence.
"I can't even act like I know where I'm going. This is so frustrating." I put my head down to hide my face and push Greta in front of me towards the main desk. The receptionists fumbling and nervous and seemingly aware of why I'm here. That's at least something.
"Mrs Park, ummmm…. Vice….uh. Mr Grey is waiting on you at the forty-fifth-floor elevator, ma'am. You've to go right up." She nods towards the bank of elevators, and I smile shyly and tug Greta with me, using her as a human shield.
Forty fifth is the floor for the meeting halls. Boardroom, some executive offices and the research and development department that dealt with Biochem. We all used to use it as a neutral meeting point for those outside the company. I am guessing Bryant now sits with the legal team in this building and uses that floor for appointments.
"This is awkward." I sigh in relief when we get an empty elevator quickly and push inside, the doors closing fast, and I can heave a sigh of relief at escaping that spectacle. My pulse is racing, and I'm mildly sweating from the stress of this place already. This is weirder than I thought it would be, and even after all this time, I've forgotten nothing about this building. It feels like a stuffy and suffocating glass box.
"That's ...strange." Greta points up at the wall, and I glance past her to see the old senior employee roster is still in use. Directors, managers, VP, and President are all on there with faces, names, and titles. And right up next to Jyeon….my face still sits. They never took it down. I don't know what to think of that as his words about never giving up on me flash through my mind. From that night in the diner, and I shake it away.
"Probably a sign of respect or to make him look less heartless about removing me." I shrug it off, and we depart on the forty-fifth floor, met immediately with a smiling and good old Bryant in a grey tailored suit, looking handsome and mature. Greta rolls her eyes and walks past him without a greeting.
"Welcome, Sohla. Miss Tarry. Always a pleasure. He turns and nods after her, and I smile his way, with a polite nod, and walk out to follow him.
"Why here?" I ask pushily and linger behind him as he shows us the way. "This building, I mean." Taking in the unchanged décor and the same old ambience that always was.
"We have some minor things to sign off and also the matter of agreement to a DNA test to satisfy the board of directors. I'm a busy man, and this was easier for me. It's a nothing thing, and we have a nurse coming to do it. It takes a minute. I didn't think you'd want your apartment invaded."
He points along at the board room for a goal to head towards, where I half expected him to take us, and he moves ahead to be the one to open the doors. Being the gentleman, he never used to be when we were kids. Bryant seems to have matured a lot these past two years.
Greta follows him at speed, and I wander up behind, looking around to take in this floor and reminisce about being back here, feeling odd about it. My eyes cast around of their own accord to land on random things when a pair of figures along the corridor catches my attention, and I do a double-take as my head jerks up. Realising I recognise them.
Jyeon is talking to a woman in a black pantsuit and high heels. In the style I used to wear, red shoulder-length hair is a little close and intimate in a posture that suggests she knows him well or is flirting. I strain to focus, shocked by that feeling of DeJa'Vu, and as she turns this way lightly, the breath catches in my lungs. It's undeniably Claire White.
My heart somersaults into my throat, and I almost walk into the back of Bryant because I am too busy staring and thump my hand against the door as I dodge him last minute.
"Ouch," I yelp and look at the stupid frame, rubbing my hand. I glance back again, but they have walked into the nearest office, and I can't see them anymore. Straining and trying to see where they went, I have an urge to walk over there. Suddenly tetchy and strung out and my head no longer on meetings at all.
I can't believe what I saw, and his words about cutting her off and not seeing her anymore swim in my head. I feel so stupid. She would only be here because of him, and she didn't look like a guest. They walked into the R&D department as though it was perfectly natural for her to be here. It's just another lie, another ruse, to mess me up and lead me by the nose. I guess a kiss and a love confession was also bullshit.
I move on autopilot into the board room and zone out the conversation between Greta and Bryant and the hovering secretary. My brain homed in on what I just saw and dissecting it. All kinds of horrid stomach-churning and anxiety-inducing emotions are wracking through me, and I genuinely feel like I might vomit. I wonder if all of this is one big lie and manipulation, yet I really cannot figure it out. Does he want OLO so badly that he's willing to shackle himself to me once more, in fake love, for the benefits I brought it?
It's déjà vu, being back here with this in my mind while sitting in the same room where I once outed his meeting with her. Where I missed half a review meeting while lost in thought about seeing them together. It feels like a mirror to the past, and I hate how much it's fucking me up just like it did back then. Unable to think of what we're doing and fully focused on how much this hurts. Two years, and it feels exactly the same as the first time he betrayed me with her.
The asshole kissed me and told me he loved me. Everything I longed for back then. For what reason? He told me she was not part of his life, and yet here she is, all cosy with him in the hall of his own building, and I stupidly fell for it. All over again. I'm right back to two years ago, and I'm seething mad. Not just at him, but myself for still holding feelings of love in my heart and being this fucking dumb about letting him back in.
"Sohla?" Bryant pulls me out of my head, bringing my attention to the fact he's sitting facing me across the table we're seated at, and Greta is frowning my way.
"What?" I snap in response, not caring about being polite when I'm this worked up. I can't conceal my agitation.
"I said,… do you want a drink, food? Anything before we start?" he eyes me up with a blatant show of concern. Frowning at my change in mood.
"No… just get on with it, I have a headache, and I want to leave." I sit back and cross my arms, feeling how Greta is trying to read me and gauge the change in my attitude of under three minutes while I'm on the verge of rage tears.
"Right, I'm here." Jyeon walks in, seeming innocent, charming, and flashy in a perfectly cut three-piece black suit over a black shirt, and tie in a tonal look that makes him appear expensive and pulled together. And I inwardly hiss. Hating on him.
Loving the matching black couples' outfit of the day. Not.
"So, we have to get your assets released as the first port of call. As they were put on a freeze while you're a missing person, and they can be reinstated once your DA test comes back positive." Bryant is explaining, and yet I'm staring at Jyeon as he walks around and sits beside him like he's a despicable monster. Angry at how low he can go as a human. Frowning and inwardly murmuring a hundred curse words.