Emma breathed a sigh of frustration, unable to keep herself from raising her voice. "Jeez, Avery, enough of the skepticism. He is the chairman. Maybe you will know if you spent more time reading insider news of the business world."
"But isn't he still too young?" Avery insisted. She herself had no idea why she was asking that, but her curiosity wouldn't let her rest if she let it go.
On the other hand, her older sister now had a glare in her eyes as she responded, "I will have to tape your mouth shut if you don't stop. He is 28, and from what I see, more than capable to run even that large Corporation all by himself."
Avery shrugged. "If you say so then; I have to go rest in preparation for tomorrow. You will be returning to the library to join Arthur and…Archie?"
"Yes, I will." Emma warned, "But don't call him Archie again, Vee. I called him that when we were first introduced but he asked to call him Arch instead."
"Why?" Avery frowned.
"He said it sounds childish. In short, he hated being addressed with that name," she replied.
Watching her sister walk back to the library, Avery muttered beneath her breath, "How the hell does 'Archie' sound childish? I think it's cute instead. Sorry, Mr Donovan, but I will forever call you that."
Forever…the word sounded strange even to Avery, as she retraced her steps back downstairs to look for her shoes. It was as if, for a moment there, she had hoped for a lifetime relationship with Archibald Donovan, with her siblings and family of course. Maybe they could even turn friends later on, she mused.
Few weeks later however, Avery was already feeling like that thought was a curse. She wanted no forever relationship with Archibald Donovan, no matter what kind of relationship it was. She would die if she had to live with her siblings having frayed nerves every second of the day, trying to find something to please Archie whom they said, never seemed pleased with whatever they did.
As she stood outside the LK Bar, waiting for Brian to return from his mysterious errand which he termed 'picking something up', while watching the night scene unfold before her, she turned over the events of the day in her mind.
She had been lounging in the private living room with her laptop on her thighs, while Arthur and Emma paced the length and breadth of the room, disrupting her attention every now and then.
"Will someone tell me what is going on please? Are we in trouble?" she had asked, slamming her laptop shut.
"Of course not!" Emma replied. "It's just…we were just racking our brains for ideas on how to please Arch."
"And why do you two have to please him?"
Emma slumped on the sofa in front of her. "I told you already, Avery. We have to maintain good relationship or friendship with him, but he doesn't seem to require our help with anything. The day you barged into the library was the only day we saw him smile, though it was slight."
"That's true. He relates with us like…how do I explain this?" Archie seconded. "Like we do with Roberts and Tina! We do not request anything of them and vice versa, though the respect is still there."
"And what help would you two be able to render that he can't find for himself? He's a Donovan, Arthur, and far, far above our stations but still—" she was interrupted by Arthur.
"Still, we need to be useful. It doesn't matter if they are things he can very well do for himself, we just want to be there."
"And doesn't that make you a slave, instead of a friend? Would you really like to be his friend, Arthur?" Avery questioned, earnestly waiting for an answer.
"Of course, that's what I want. Irrespective of whether grandfather wants it to be a business connection or not, I just want to be beside him, useful enough to be a friend, I guess."
"Then you don't have to bother trying to look for things that might please him. You could ask him, or better still, wait for him to unravel himself little by little. You two are twenty eight year olds for heaven's sake!" she added the last sentence in a tease, a small laugh accompanying her words.
"Unfortunately I am. And taking advice from an 18 year old is rather shameless, isn't it?" Arthur joked back.
Sticking her tongue out at him, a funny attempt at mockery, she hadn't bothered to reply him but had instead picked up her laptop instead to continue working. Now that she thought about it, his refusing to ask anything of her siblings might mean Archie had genuine intentions to befriend them.
"And what is Brian still doing in there? It's late already," she sighed nervously, lifting her wrist for a quick glance at her watch. It was past 11pm and she was sure everyone back at home would be worried about her.
She stepped back, slinking further into the darkness to avoid attracting attention to herself. From where she stood, she could make out a young couple kissing in front of the bar; a group of men standing in a corner and engrossed in deep conversation; a tattoed lady standing at one side, sniffing something off a piece of paper, and lot more activities that only took place in the confines of darkness. What kind of business could Brian have in this kind of place?! And why wasn't he out yet after an hour, could something have happened to him in there?
Deliberating in her mind on what decision to take—whether to go in and find Brian or leave here—her soul almost left her body when a hand slinked around her shoulders.
"Brian, why were you so lat—" she began to ask, her jaws dropping in shock when she turned and saw the face of the person standing beside her.