Olivia’s POV My hand remained in Joshua’s grasp as he looked up at me pleadingly and requested me to stay with him that night. It was definitely not part of the plan I had constructed in my head when I first saw him on the sidewalk. We were not close, we were not lovers and we were barely friends, still, I couldn’t help but recall how he saved me and took care of me through the night. As a decent human being, I owed him to repay that favor and keep an eye on him through the night, but that was all. My loud sigh echoed through his bedroom that I had grown familiar with. “Fine.” “Thank you, Via.” His grip around my hand loosened and he patted the spot on the bed next to him. Holding up my finger, I pulled a chair close to the bed just like he did when it was me on the bed. Before I could sit on it, Joshua pouted his lips at me.

Olivia’s POV Walking back to my apartment from the subway with a skip in my step, I inhaled the pleasant morning breeze and occasionally twirled around happily. Something about that morning felt freeing and I hadn’t felt that happy in a while. Humming to myself, I walked down my street as I began imagining myself getting under a warm shower and ordering some takeaway food. My weekend had turned out nothing like I thought it would be, but I was glad that I still had a day for myself. After a crazy week, it was much needed. As I headed down the final steps leading to my front door, I looked down into my clutch and noticed that my phone had run out of battery. In fact, I believe it ran out of battery sometime last night since the last time I saw it was to look up directions to Joshua’s apartment and it was already down to 5 percent then. Since I was almost home, it didn’t bother me, so instead,

Olivia’s POV Crashing on my bed, I let out a long sigh and groan. I was exhausted and my brain was starting to glitch after returning from university. My final year didn’t have any exams, but my lecturer liked to have quizzes every now and then to keep us on our toes. That explained why I looked like a zombie since I spent the last couple of days studying like a madman. Just as my eyelids started fluttering slowly as I drifted off to sleep, my phone rang loudly in my otherwise quiet room. Picking it up from the bed, I saw Joshua’s name flash on the screen. “Noooooo……I want to sleeppppp!” I shouted out to myself followed by a groan. When my phone just kept ringing non-stop, I knew that there was no escaping him. Reluctantly, I slid my finger over the screen and placed the phone to my ear. However, before I could even say anything, J

Olivia’s POV   I stood there, absolutely stunned by the question that Joshua had just asked me. He had asked me to be his date for the wedding, totally out of the blue.   “Sorry, I didn’t mean to suddenly throw you off like that. It just popped into my mind, and I just blurted it out,” he quickly continued as he rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.   Sighing deeply, I looked away. “Yeah, that sure came as a surprise.”   Honestly, I wanted to say yes. I mean, thinking back to my teenage girl years, I had been waiting for this moment my entire life until Joshua started bullying me. All my favorable old feelings for him felt like it was bursting to come up again, but it was locked in with a big massive gate. The gate I built to avoid anything and everything to do with Joshua Taylor, because somehow, whenever I thought about him, what he did, and any

Olivia’s POV The train chugged forward, filled to the brim with the working class of New Yorkers as we headed in to work on Monday morning. Drumming my fingers on the file on my lap, I groaned nervously as I looked forward to my presentation. I can do this…I can do this…I can do this After the wedding, I declared to Joshua that I would take up his offer to go on a date, but it had to wait until the campaign launch was over. He was over the moon and was unwilling to let me leave his car, but I did anyway. Trust me, it was completely insane that I had agreed to go on a date with The Joshua Taylor after everything I had gone through. I knew that I agreed to push the past behind me and look forward to the future with the new Joshua, who was nothing like the one I used to know, nevertheless, work still came first. So, instead