I blew softly on the hot chocolate mom gave me and took a sip. My eyes staired into the ten pairs of eyes staring back at me, impatiently awaiting news about my whereabouts.
"Axe Inc" I said finally.
"Axe what?" They asked in unison.
"But it's hard to go there. No ordinary person can go there. You even need an appointment to even go to Axe City the city where Axe Inc is situated because the entire of the city belongs to the company" Elsa explained and I wasn't surprised where she got the info from.
"I'm not an ordinary person, Elsa!" I replied.
"Anyways, what did you go there to do?" mom asked and everyone's interest was piqued I could see.
"Oh Elsa's boyfriend sent the wrong flowers to her so I just went to make things right". I said flatly and waited for everyone's reaction.
Elsa fidgeted,then her face went hot red as her eyes darted about then opened them as wide as saucers on me. In those widened eyes of hers, I saw fear, shock and... betrayal?
"Wait...wait!" David began once recovering from the shock and analysing the entire situation.
"Even if Elsa had a boyfriend, why would he be in Axe Inc?" he asked.
"Is she dating an older employee?" David asked again as silence simply reigned.
"Let's hear it from the horses own mouth shall we?" I said but no one spoke.
"Why is no one talking about the fact that she's hidden the dating thing from us all when its her first time huh?" I asked louder than before.
Mom kept silent all along. Sonia too. Wait don't tell me they knew!
"Mom?" I called out to her but she just sighed.
"When were you guys going to think of telling me?" I asked standing up from my seat. I hated being left out in family issues! I was the sister of Elsa and if anyone should know first about things like this it ought to be me. So why did I have to find out from an outsider?
"Honey, we didn't want you to find out lit this!" mom said in an attempt to coax me.
"and we didn't know you'd make a big deal out of it because we didn't tell you" Sonia added.
"My sister told my best friend she's dating a whole son of the Hughes and not me and you don't think it's a big deal?"
"I found out only a month ago as well honey" mom said putting a hand to her forehead.
"I don't care when you found out. Why didn't I know?"
"Because.... because we...." Lisa began.
"Because you guys thought I would tell Dad right?" I asked looking at them all with hurt.
"Baby...." mom started
"Do not baby me now mom. If we're going to be keeping secrets away from each other like this then so be it! I am ready" I said and rushed upstairs.
This was not the first time they had done this. They kept secrets from me almost always because of my closeness with dad. But dad and I hardly spoke about stuffs like personal ones only and strictly business stuffs. I stayed in be to sell but then after five minutes of sulking, my phone dinged. I picked it up and grudgingly stared at the screen.
It was a text message from Lisa and then my notification panel started flooding with messages from personal chats, my manager, from Google, YouTube, insta and Twitter about one main thing. I opened Lisa's chat.
Lisa: "Have you checked the news?"
" Girl what are you doing?"
What did she mean by that?
Surprisingly all my personal chats had the same question, "Have you seen the news?"
I rushed downstairs leaving my phone behind to meet the TV on with the block words highlighted in red, "SARAH HOUSTON AND AXEL HUGHES ALLEGEDLY COURTING"
Who the heck was Axel Hughes?
''Well known, Sarah Houston has been allegedly reported and seen to be in a relationship with the prestigious CEO of Axe Incorporated, Axel Hughes. Evidence from sweet scenes caught of them as Sarah went over to the company to see her new found love with a bouquet of red roses and stayed there from morn to closing hours exactly 4:00pm where the two had some fun time in the rain before parting off to Sarah's multi-million house gifted to her by her ex boyfriend Arnold Chase. Stay tuned for more on celebrity gossip".
I turned to my family.
"Y'all don't think this is true do you?" I asked.
"No we don't as we can see you went there to send Elsa's boyfriend's flowers back" Sonia replied with sacasm.
"But it's true, I went there because of her stupid boyfriend!" I said.
"And why didn't you make it back home Immediately after returning the flowers?" mom asked.
"Because I didn't have a key card and his office was locked because he didn't have one either" I explained praying they believed me. After a pause mom said,
"You can tell us if you're loosing interest in Arnold".
"It's not like that" I tried explaining but nobody seed to but it so I stopped over to my room and grabbed my phone.
72 missed calls and not a single one was from Arnold. There was no doubt he must've heard the news by now. I scrolled through the frequent list for the number on the card and dialed it.
"Hey miss..."
"You caused all this!" I yelled once he answered.
"What?"
"If only your dumb head remembered to tell your brother about the flowers you wanted to get!" I said
"Calm down, it's just rumors"
"It's just rumors? I have a boyfriend Mister and I wouldn't be happy if he did this to me. More over it's everywhere that we're seeing each other! Oh gosh! Our company's reputation, dad! How can I unconvince them?"
"You're believing the rumors yourself then how can you convince others not to believe it? You know none of that cock and bull story is real right? So why worry? More over things like this are normal, baseless rumors about celebrity which turn out to be lies. Just calm down okay?" he asked in a calm tone.
"Yeah.. it's... it's actually not real!" I said as realization dawned upon me. Axel as I got to know was his name, was not dumb at all.
"But remember, I'll be here after your breakup just in case you need a shoulder to cry on" joked.
"You...!" I said sharply before we both crackled into laughter.
"Are we good now?" he asked.
"Yes"
"You're welcome" he said
"I don't remember thanking you"
"you don't have to" he replied
"Okay see you later"
"Good luck" he wished and I ended the call.
I liked the kind of person he was. Free hearted, laughable, teaser and a joker. Arnold was making me worried as to why he hadn't call. He deserved a proper apology than a phone call. For once I should do something for him and I knew what. I would fly to Spain.