2: Elise

His eyebrows were doing a full-show now. Never mind he looked more forbidding and handsomer. I hated when he did this.

The epitome of professionalism here in the office which was a 45-storey building in the heart of BGC, Gian was seriously one of the most responsible persons I met or were known to me. His family, the Verrazzanos, were known for integrity, one of the buena familia in the country and in Southeast Asia and as respected by business families in other continents. The males in the family were in the forefront of business elites while Madam Soniah, Gian’s mother, was very active in large and long-term charity projects before and more so after she retired from the family business.

You know the one other reason why I fully trusted in them?

For so many of the rich families here in the country, the Verrazzanos were the only business partners to my paternal relatives, the Von Schillers, also a well-known family in Germany. Yes, I was a half-Filipina-half-European girl. And that partnership was rooted to bestfriends—mine and Gian’s great-grandmothers.

When they were young women, my paternal great-grandmother, Oma (grandma) Anja, and Gian’s great-grandmother, Lola (grandma) Adreana. Oma Anja’s family was one of the families that arrived in a boat of Jews escaping from the Nazis in war-torn Europe. When the Nazis fell, Oma went back to Germany because her German fiancé, Otto von Schiller, but they moved to England to marry and only went back home to Germany after it settled a decade after the world war. Even though far from each other geographically, Oma Anja and Lola Adreana remained in communication and continued their close friendship. 

Fast forward to about a third of a century, and here we were their grandchildren, Gian and I, together in one space. It felt a little surreal, really, to remember the background of our families’ connection, especially as it all came down to this.

Him heavily frowning down at my dress, and me fighting back with a poker-face.

Gian was strict. I swear, he was. If he didn’t like something, it was impossible for you not to know. His eyebrows would tell you. Clearly.  

“You look great, Elise. New dress?”

Oh great. Of course, he would go there. But he was still in mentor mode, subtly putting me in my place.  

“Your mother sent this to my house to wear for the party tonight, so I’m wearing it,” I said, cinching his mother to him. It was Madam Soniah who chose this dress for me and I was so grateful when I saw it. I couldn’t choose something this sexy, elegant, and classy. I grew up in the province and was raised by provincial parents. I still have yet to learn about sophistication.

When I opened the big pink box that arrived last night and saw the beautiful dress for the first time, I knew I was wearing it no matter what. 

It was a knee-length cocktail dress, with slits on both sides up to the middle of my thighs. The neckline on the front was conservative so there was no cleavage to expose, but it was backless without being too obvious when you were looking at the front or the side. It was cleverly designed to make it this way, and I wasn’t going to turn my back on him to help him see it. Not if I could help it, especially as he was already scowling like I was going to that party naked. My long hair was in an elegant twist. I was driven earlier to the salon to have my make-up and hair done by an attendant with specific instructions from the madam. 

I changed into this gown and everything else, too, before I was driven back here. I just had a shawl cover it when I got back up here. It was already past 5 pm then, anyway, so there weren’t many people in the hallways. I wore three-inched stilettos for this gown. The pair arrived with the gown. It took me a while to get used to high heels in the beginning but I had to because of the parties that I needed to attend with Gian or Madam Soniah. Mother and son were both tall and if I didn’t augment my height, I’d look like a dwarf as they towered over me. It didn’t do well for my self-confidence, believe me.

But this gown, I felt great wearing it. 

The transformation from the young adult me to a womanly me was so awesome that I almost couldn’t believe it the first look I took in the full-length mirror in the salon. When they oohed and aahed, I oohed and aahed with them. It felt liberating to look grown-up for a change.

I knew Gian wouldn’t see it the same way. 

Unfortunately for him, I only fought for a few things in my life - A) my favorite books, B) wearing canvas shoes with my school uniforms when I was twelve onwards, and C) was anything not included in A and B but should absolutely make sense to me. C was like an open season for anything.

This dress was a C category. It was open season tonight. And if he didn’t want me to wear this to the party, he had better be ready to take it off my body with his own hands. How could a man famous for being liberated be this old-school with me? I thought frustratedly.

Probably because of my family again.

Okay, so this was another part of that backstory. Elise Soler, as I was known here at work, was really Elise von Schiller, only daughter of the late Fritz von Schiller, a German inventor who passed away when I was four. My Itay Fritz was the youngest of two sons of my grandmother Beatrice von Schiller, widow of my grandfather Isaan von Schiller who’d died before I was born. Lolo (grandfather) Isaac was the founder of the Von Schiller Holdings of Munich. But the Von Schillers were more known this country as the family behind VS Automobiles, a German car manufacturing company operating internationally.

As a Von Schiller, I needed to learn to start successful businesses and be an excellent administrator. This was the reason behind my apprenticeship with Giancarlo, the eldest of the Verrazzanos. He was a seriously busy guy— he wouldn’t just do this for anyone. And that was why I had to take this role seriously. I couldn’t do mediocre work especially, as far as my Inay (mother) was concerned, I could stay in Puerto Galera and manage our resort hotel, The Fritzelise, if I wanted. I could live off my secret inheritance in total anonymity. My mother didn’t need me to prove anything to anyone because she said she’d already done that job for me.

But I also wanted to prove to my Oma Beatrice and my Onkel Karl, my Itay’s only sibling, that the legacy left behind by my father was very important to me. My Inay and Tatay (another term for father), my stepfather who was a second father to me in the true sense of the word, knew this that they didn’t try to dissuade me from my decision. As soon as the two families had agreed upon the details of my apprenticeship, I found that they had created a newly minted company as my apprenticeship ground. That’s VerraCom, housed by this 16-storey manned building who knew nothing about my background or that I owned it. I felt like I just blinked and opened my eyes to a playground. 

I know, right? Pimple-inducing pressure.     

It is Gian who’d helped me get through the awkwardness, nervousness and imposter syndrome symptoms in the beginning. His professionalism and kind of mentorship eliminated my initial misgivings about my acumen and skills for my initial job as his Executive Assistant. I had learned so much from him in the first year alone. There were even perks to the job—acquiring an adorably strict big brother in the form of the almost perfect Giancarlo Verrazzano.

Or, at least, he was adorable most of the time.

But obviously not right now. So I was drawing a line between professionalism and friendship because it needed to get drawn here. I liked this dress, and I truly disliked how he was looking at it. He was an extremely protective alpha male but a girl had to put her foot down and howl sometimes. I wanted this dress, so I was going to howl.

The Elise von Schiller way.  

 “Elise..?” Gian's voice trailed off. There was a mix of guilt there. He knew I loved the dress and that he really was being an unreasonable jerk, at least.

“You want me to change? What would you say to your mom?” I hated cinching his mother on him like this, but Madam Soniah was the truly powerful person in the Verrazzano family. Her eyes would turn a little red and the men in the family would grab the stars in the sky just so she would smile again.

He managed not to roll his eyes. I could see that. “May I know why she wanted you to wear that?” He said, as if my pretty dress was a wicked thing.

“The party’s theme is romantic and sexy, like a date night,” I replied, poker-faced, knowing he knew this already. “She knew I wouldn't know to choose on my own so she chose for me.” I looked down at the dress with all the indulgence of a princess. “And I’m happy she helped. I really like it!”

His scowl deepened. “That theme is for guests looking to hook up.”

I couldn’t believe I heard that from him. I gave him the look. “It’s a Valentine’s Day party. What did you expect?”

“If your pictures are posted on F*, your parents may want to have you sent back home. Do you remember when you just left to visit your friend without telling anybody? Jason was scolded for—”

“I craved for Lomi noodles at my friend's resto. It was my friend’s place!”

“Again, you left without a word.”

“Oh my god, we’re not done with that yet? I had meant to call but when I got there, my cell was drained. Gwen is a childhood friend from home and I hadn’t seen him for months, so we couldn’t stop talking as soon as he’d picked me up. How many more times are we going to go through this?” 

Gwen and I had become so busy in recent months because of my apprenticeship and his new business, so when he told me he had just opened a new branch of his successful noodle restaurant nearby, I had to go. That first hour passed by like nothing. But as soon as I turned my phone on after the battery had fully charged, messages came in one after another, including about almost 50 missed calls between Gian and Jason, a cousin who kind of bodyguards me since I started living here in Manila. They located me from the GPS and was there in what felt like five minutes.

Gwen preened when my cousin Jason, clad in all-black, manly jumpsuit (he was fixing something up in the apartment building where we lived and he caretake for Inay) entered the noodle house. He had a crush on him forever. But his jaw dropped when Giancarlo in his powerhouse suit himself followed in. Gwen cross-dressed only on occasions. That night, he looked more like a man than the adorable, sweet gay that he was. I could see on Gian’s sculptured face he was seeing a man. 

When Gwen realized the delicious, testosterone-induced eye candies that came in thought he’d kidnapped me, with one hunk looking like he was itching to beat him up, he fainted.