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he sun was out in New York City, the street was bustling with crowds, and she almost missed him; as she hurried down the hall and out of the apartment, she had a feeling that she was too late, and she had lost him in the crowd. But just as she was about to give up, she looked around, and suddenly, her eyes landed on a familiar figure across the street with the same leather jacket draped across his shoulders. She knew it was him right away.
As she approached him between the crowds of people, she looked ahead to notice that a cigarette was hanging from his lips. She scrunched her face up immediately at the sight. She didn't know why he was smoking; she had never seen him doing it before. As she walked up to him, she felt a new wave of anger rushing through her body. As soon as he noticed that she was there, the expression on David's face changed right away. He dropped the cigarette to the ground, but Angela didn't care. She began to speak just as she was a few feet away from him.
"Why won't you look at me or talk to me, David? Why are you making me feel like I did something wrong?"
She was staring at him, and now the tears had started to make their way down her eyes. David felt as if he had just been shot in the heart at the sight before him. The sudden realization hit him that he had been projecting all his fears onto the woman he loved. Seeing her hurt brought him back to the given moment suddenly, and the guilt just rushed through him right away.
He pulled himself away from the wall and looked over at her as he spoke.
"Look, I'm sorry, okay. I didn't mean to make you feel awful. The fear of hurting you because of the things I'm involved in just took over me; I didn't mean it; I swear I just allowed my worst fears to get the best of me. Can I at least make it up to you?"
She looked around and then back at him; she knew that she had nowhere to be, and she might have overreacted a little bit in the first place, and so she decided to give him a chance.
“Don’t you have to get back to work?”
He let out a laugh as he gestured for her to walk with him.
"Oh, come on, work is going to be there tomorrow and then the day after and so on. For now, I think you and I need to get some bagels."
She was still a little hesitant, but she agreed as they walked down the street; she watched him keep his head ducked low as he avoided the crowds of people walking by. She laughed to herself as she spoke.
“Huh, to think you would be the kind who loves attention, and yet, here you are hiding like a little kid.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
"You know, the whole young billionaire who always has eyes on him, the whole thing, it's great at first, but sooner or later it starts to wear you out. I just feel like, you know- never mind bagels. Actually, let's get bagels. I know a great place around the corner."
She saw the way the look in his eyes changed suddenly, but she decided not to say anything about it. So, they went on to get bagels for each other, and the whole time, they ended up walking around the streets of New York City watching the sun set as they talked about life and pretty much how they got to where they were. Just as the evening was coming to an end and the butterflies in Angela's stomach were starting to settle down, they heard the click of a camera.
David sighed as he tried to hide his face with the paparazzi approaching. This was the first time anything like this had happened to Angela. She had barely just gotten over the camera flashes at the ball, but at least she was prepared for that. It seemed more like an attack when she heard them again in the middle of the street, and so she froze up in the as the man approached them.
With a little distance from them, he began to yell with his camera flash driving the other people off the street they were standing on. It was hard to focus on anything with the flash on and the man screaming.
"DAVID, ARE YOU TWO DATING! IS THIS YOUR GIRLFRIEND!! COME ON, WAS THIS NOT THE WOMAN WHO SUED PEOPLE LIKE YOU?"
“DAVID!! DAVID!”
Angela turned around to face David to see that he had frozen in his position, too; she realized that he was actually thinking of a response to the man's question, and she couldn't see just how anxious he had gotten in front of the man. Suddenly, an idea popped up in her mind, and before she even knew what she was doing, she grabbed his hand; it was like a million little explosions went off in her stomach as she ignored the feeling overtaking her body and yelled to David.
“Come on, let’s run!!”
For a moment, he looked back at her, and when their eyes met, he didn't need any more persuasion; he clasped his hand in hers tighter, and off they went running into the distance as the sky turned purple and freedom overtook their bodies. At that moment, they felt infinite. Like nothing in the world could come near to what they had and the way they felt. To David, he had never been more alive. As the wind blew past him, he looked to his side, and his eyes caught a glimpse of Angela's face, her hair blowing backward as a smile was plastered across her face. He had never met anyone like her, so shy yet so unafraid to take the leap.
After almost an hour of running, they finally started to slow down. They needed to catch a breath, and soon, they found themselves on the ground. They couldn't stop laughing as they held onto their stomachs and they just laughed for a good minute. Angela looked over at David, who was now lying on the street with no idea where they were. She just looked over at him, and suddenly everything felt okay. All her worries started to melt away, and she could have sworn for a moment this was all she wanted out of life. He stared back at her, and he grinned.
“This is the best day of my life, Angela.”
David would have loved to stay there with her for as long as he could, but just then, he felt his phone vibrating in the back pocket of his trousers. He stepped away from Angela for a mere moment before he looked down at his phone screen.
The text message was glowing on the screen as David’s eyes went over it once.
“Mat: Tomorrow, we start planning; we’re getting rid of the Mafia once and for all...”
He knew instantly what this meant.
A war was about to go down, and he couldn’t have been more ready...
He turned towards Angela, and she knew that something had happened right away. He placed his hands on the sides of her face as he spoke to her gently.
“Angela, I need to go see May. I promise I will tell you all about it when I get back, okay?”
She knew by the look on his face that this was important to him, and so she simply gave him a nod. David placed a gentle kiss upon the girl's lips, and before she knew it, he was gone.
