The switch.

“I'm here.” Ivan called out in the darkness.

I tried moving in the direction of his voice but just then, the backup generator kicked in and light flooded the penthouse again.

Everything looked normal apart from the weird pounding in my head, and the slight pain my leg was feeling.

“Great!” Ivan rubbed his temple. “Now I have a migraine.”

I forgot about my pain temporarily and continued my feud with him. “It's just karma.”

He stared at me with eyes that had no feelings in them. “Go to sleep Ava.”

“Gladly.”

I marched dramatically towards the guest bedroom. To think that we were under the same roof was suffocating, but I had no choice.

Our families had insisted we live together, even before the wedding. They had no idea we were on separate beds though.

Halfway through the hallway, one of my heels snapped causing me to stumble forward.

“Damnit!” I screamed, feeling overwhelmed by what fate was playing out today.

Behind me I heard the sound of laughter, there were only two living souls in that space. Ivan and I.

I turned around slowly, to see the cold Ivan laughing out loud at me. “You think this is funny?”

“Just a little.”

“I knew it, you are really evil.”

Still smirking, he loosened his tie completely and held it in his hand. “Whatever we think of each other tonight, we will stand in front of five hundred people tomorrow and we will smile, because that is what this is. That is the arrangement, everything else is noise. Goodnight princess.”

“Goodnight tyrant.” I fired back, before taking off both heels and marching towards my room.

I could swear I still heard him chuckling, even when I slammed my room door shut.

I sat on the edge of the bed in the well lit room and pressed the heels against the bedstand and breathed through the pain that was still banging steadily on my leg.

The rain had not stopped yet. When I looked up, I could see it running down the windows.

I sat there for a while doing nothing. After a few minutes I picked up my phone and scrolled through my contact list, then stopped at that name.

Even if I had told myself I was done five different times in the past three months, I could not resist the urge to tap on it and call that number.

With shaky hands, I placed my phone close to my ear. It was ringing and then stopped, I called again.

When it got to the fourth time, I was ready to accept the mercy of leaving a message in the voicemail, when he answered.

"Ava." Chris Dylan's voice was warm and slightly rough, the way it always was after midnight and even now, after everything, the sound of it stirred something inside of me. "It's late."

"I know." I settled in on the bed and pulled my knees up to my chest. "I just needed to hear a familiar voice."

There was silence on the other side for a while. "How are you?"

"I'm sitting in Ivan Cross's guest bedroom the night before I marry him." I said. "How do you think I am?"

Chris exhaled slowly. "Ava…."

"I know."

"We talked about this."

"I know we did."

"You made a choice."

Something about the way he said it made me feel bad. It was almost like he was trying to maintain boundaries with me, as if once upon a time he had not loved me.

"Chris, I'm not calling to try anything silly." I said carefully. "I just wanted to talk to someone who actually knows me."

The silence from his end was killing me, but when he finally said something I already had a feeling it wouldn't be comforting.

"Is that what you think this is?"

I frowned. "What?"

"Ava, you're calling me the night before your wedding. I'm not sure what you want me to say."

"I don't want you to say anything specific, I just." I stopped talking feeling the weight of this whole wedding drama on my shoulders, then continued when I took a deep breath in. "I just didn't want to be alone with this tonight."

"You're not alone.” He said in a tone I found dismissive. "You're marrying a billionaire tomorrow, that's a big deal for you."

I laughed, but it was not a happy laughter. "Right."

"I mean it, you practically have people around you."

"That's an illusion, I don't have people who are around me, Chris. I just have people who are around this whole crazy arrangement. There's a difference between the two." I said that in one breath and almost choked.

“I'm seeing someone.” He finally told me the real reason why he was being cold to me.

‘What was I expecting after dumping him?’ I asked myself in my head.

But only one word left my mouth. “Oh.”

“I did not know how to bring it up to you, coupled with the fact that it's something that happened recently.” That was one thing I loved about Chris, he thought about me every single time whenever he was about to make a big decision.

To think that I crossed his heart before he made that choice, warmed my heart a bit. But reality was hitting me with cold bullets already.

“I just think you should know, Ava.” His warm voice on the other end of the phone, made me come back to earth.

“Right.” My voice came out steady, the exact way I had trained myself to sound. “That's really good news, Chris.”

"Ava."

Damnit! I forgot Chris was the one person who could see through all my pretense. "No, genuinely. I'm glad."

"I still care about you."

"Of course you do." I closed my eyes, as a tear escaped from it. "You're a good person."

"You are a good person too." He was trying hard to make me feel stronger now. "Go get some sleep, tomorrow's going to be a long day for you."

I almost laughed again. "Yeah, goodnight."

"Goodnight, Ava."

I hung up and sat with the phone in my hand, looking at my reflection in the mirror.

Life had a funny way of screwing me up, my parents scheduled my wedding like it was some business deal, the supposed husband thinks I'm just some decorative furniture who has no say in making decisions and now, Chris had someone new.

I sighed softly, laid back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. To think that I had always imagined having a bridal shower with friends all around, but there was no one with me today.

"Happy almost wedding day to me." I said to myself, as I hugged myself tighter and closed my eyes letting sleep take me away.

I woke up with a start, my leg was still hurting. Reaching out for my phone I couldn't find it, so I turned the light on with the switch on the bedstand in the room.

When I sat up with sleepy eyes, I noticed the guest room wasn't looking like it did when I fell asleep. “Urgghhh, where's my phone?”

My mind went into overdrive. ‘Who said that?’

I looked around frantically, but could not find anyone. Gosh! This wedding was driving me crazy for real.

I pulled the duvet off my body and saw that I was in pyjamas and my toes looked different.

“But I did not change into this.” That voice again!

I was certain I was hallucinating now, as I rolled my sleepy eyes and stood up to use the bathroom.

It was when I passed the dressing mirror and touched my chest, that I figured out something was wrong.

I touched my left and right breasts, but I could not find them. It was all a flat surface. “What happened to my boobs?”

Walking back to the dressing mirror, the reflection I saw was no where close to mine.

I saw short hair, broad shoulders, well sculpted face, when I lifted the shirt that I was on up, I saw a fitted body with abs staring back at me.

I was Ivan.

“Arrrrrrrghhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!”