Marissa found herself a job with a translation firm. There was, she found, an amazing amount of stuff she could do and was asked to do, and she dove into it whole heartedly. It meant her thoughts were hooked, thoroughly, on making the translations sound as naturally English as possible. It also meant that her thoughts were no where near Chris or how empty her life felt without his presence in it.
Her second week, she walked into a small shop near the middle of Vienna to get something to eat. It wasn't far from work, and she made sure to note where it was so she could find her way back. It was set up in a very typical fashion; wooden shelves lined the walls, with two making an aisle down the center from the door to the small deli in the back. A small refrigeration unit held milk in glass bottles much like the ones she remembered seeing in black and white movies at home. The music coming over the speakers was "Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays". Marissa grinned and sang along as she browsed in the magazines on her way to the front.
The girl behind the counter was young, with dark hair and a rather pretty face, and she smiled as Marissa moved into view, still singing softly. «Can I help you?» she asked.
Marissa stopped singing and grinned sheepishly. «Hi. Yes, please.» She considered, then gave her order.
The girl filled it, making the sandwich with sure hands. «Are you American?» she asked shyly as she turned around to wrap it.
Marissa flushed. «Is it that obvious?»
«Your accent...»
Marissa laughed. «Oh, that. Yes, I know. It's awful. My boss at work makes faces after I've said something. I'm hoping it'll get better the longer I'm here.»
«I'm sure it will,» the girl said shyly.
Marissa smiled. «I'm not so convinced, but thanks for the vote of confidence. I'm Marissa, by the way.»
«Gabrielle. Please call me Gabi.»
«It's good to meet you.» Marissa grinned suddenly. «Christmas isn't for a month and a half.»
Gabi blushed. «I know. But it's not usually busy right now, and Papa says I can't play the same cassette all the time.»
Marissa chuckled. «So you change it each day?»
Gabi nodded. «Yes. You like this music?»
«Oh, yes. It's very easy to dance to.» She checked her watch. «I have to go. It was nice to meet you, Gabi.»
Three weeks later, her schedule had solidified to include a later lunch with Gabi, often in the back of her father's store. That happened once she'd actually met Gabi's father, an older gentleman by the name of Franz, who seemed to approve of Marissa from the first. And a couple of weeks after that, Gabi found her concentrating so hard on an article about *N Sync that Marissa didn't even know her friend was there. She put the magazine down, turned, and nearly shrieked at the sight of her. Then her face flushed.
«Well, now you know about my guilty pleasure,» she said ruefully, and opened the magazine to the article again. «What do they mean by this?»
Gabi looked at it. «They're saying Justin was....» But Marissa didn't know the word she used, either. It must have shown on her face, because Gabi laughed. «He didn't pay attention to the interviewer or the photographer because he was paying attention to his girlfriend.»
«Huh. Thanks,» Marissa grinned. «Ready for lunch?» Girlfriend? her thoughts echoed. Justin has a girlfriend? Oh, wait, she did remember Chris saying Justin had a girlfriend in her last conversation with him. She wrenched her thoughts away with a physical movement as they moved through the small store to the back again.
Gabi's questions at lunch had always had a lot to do with American music, but once she found out Marissa knew of and liked *N Sync, she began to bombard her older friend with questions about the guys. Marissa tried to make sure the answers she gave the other woman were common knowledge, so it was a fair guess that Gabi didn't get as many questions answered at a time as she would have liked, simply because Marissa took so long in answering them.
It was amazing to Marissa how often Chris snuck into her thoughts, even before she'd met Gabi. She'd be on the bus on the way home, and she'd remember the time he apologized to her at the club the day after Joey had been hit in the head with Justin's surfboard (silly boy had still been worried about it when she left), or the night he'd showed up at her door with flowers and taken her to dinner. It was distracting when someone did something at work that reminded her of him; one of her co-workers had the same expressive face. Gabi laughed when she told her about it. And of course, once she started having lunch with Gabi, he and all of them were constantly in her mind.
In her tiny apartment, she learned why the Austrians took walks daily, going stir crazy staring at the same four walls. She finally instituted a walk each evening after dinner. The best part was, not too far away from her was a pillar built for advertisements, and she kept up with the news that way, even found once that soulDecision was coming to Vienna and dragged Gabi to the concert. Most of the time, that walk ended up in a book store after she'd walked through the park, and she began to read in the evenings as well. After her second romance that didn't distract her at all because the situation was too like hers and she was reading to get her mind off of Chris, not keep it there, she gave up on anything but classics.
She wished, sometimes, that she could go out and get drunk, but her grasp on the language wasn't great already, and dealing with the dialect with a hang over would be lethal. Especially since the one time she'd stepped into a bar, she'd seen four of her co-workers. She'd decided not to do something so unprofessional as get drunk and lose her language skills in front of someone she had to see and work with the next day. So she bore with it with her walks in the near-by park in the evenings to give her body something to do while her mind picked everything apart - and the best homemade ice cream in Vienna, just across the park from her apartment.
The stereo was always on, and with a 10 disc changer, she listened to less 'N Sync, but never took the albums out. One night, she found herself looking at a tape she had made of songs off the radio just after she met Joey, and absently stuck it in. It was nice to hear BB Mac and a few others, until she heard the opening words to the song Mandy Moore had done for "Center Stage".
I've tried but I can't seem
To get myself to think of anything
But you.
Your breath on my face,
Your warm and gentle kiss I taste....
Her head shot up from the book and she stared at the radio, stricken. She couldn't move, not even remembering that she'd even taped the song, certainly she hadn't listened to the tape or the song in a very long time. Finally, she moved for the stereo, to turn it off, to throw the tape away or find something to tape over it, and stopped at the next words.
Oh, baby, I can't fight this feeling anymore
Drives me crazy when I try to....
She lunged for the machine and hit blindly at it until the music stopped, unable to see through her tears. She'd had to leave him, she did. Between being swallowed up in him and his distrust of what she was and her motives for staying with him like that, she'd had to get away, get her own head straight. But this was torture and it was uncalled for. And on top of that, she wasn't even sure she'd done the right thing. She'd been convinced of it when she'd made the decision, but she wasn't so sure now.
Finally, her tears eased up, and she stood up, needing to change how she was living. Again. She got out the disc changer, and began switching discs out. She pulled the 'N Sync cd's out of the disc changer, replacing them with Backstreet Boys and Hanson, and even one of the Metallica CDs. "Which would be more appalled, I wonder," she mumbled to herself, and decided it was time for bed.
She felt better the next morning, and that lasted all the way through lunch, until Gabi demanded to know if there was anything else Marissa could tell her about the group. Marissa's brain had pretty much been picked within the first couple of weeks Marissa had started eating there, but lunch always ended with more questions. «Did you know,» Gabi started as they walked back to the small store after they'd walked around the block, «they say something's wrong with Chris?»
Marissa only barely managed to keep from stumbling. «Really?» she asked, her throat suddenly dry.
«Yeah. One of my friends says that he's seemed really quiet in the last couple of interviews, and there's a rumor that his girlfriend left him, or something.»
«Oh.» She took a deep breath. «That's got to be tough on him.» What is this, judgement? First the song last night, then this? Something's wrong with Chris, something about his girlfriend. And Mandy Moore singing about "I Wanna be With You". She wished she'd never taped the song.
«Yeah. I'd never do that,» Gabi said indignantly.
Maybe you ought to know her situation before you make such a judgement, Marissa thought, Gabi's words distracting her from the last train of thought. Maybe, if you'd been in my position, you would have done the same thing.
«Didn't you say Chris was your favorite?» Gabi pursued.
Marissa chuckled. It sounded forced. «Yes. Those braids of his....» Never mind his eyes, or the way he kissed.... She forced her mind away from him before she drove herself to tears.
«Aren't you upset?»
«We don't know her story, Gabi,» Marissa reminded gently. «We don't know why she felt she had to leave him.»
«Probably jealousy.»
«Well, it can't be easy, knowing your boyfriend is the object of millions of girls' lust. Even if he isn't the most popular, he's still famous.» But that wasn't it, Marissa's thoughts shouted at her, scornful. You were scared! Scared of him. Scared of what he expected.
Gabi was silent, her eyes focused on the sidewalk. «Well, okay, that's true.»
«What if it was him? She found out he was cheating on her?» Marissa pressed, and nearly choked at the unreality of that question.
«Would he?» Gabi asked.
Marissa shrugged. «I don't know, Gabi. He's a famous person, and that's really not something they cover in the magazine articles I've read about them.» Talk about skirting the issue; she didn't want to lie to her friend, but didn't want to tell her how close to Chris she'd actually been.
Marissa spent the rest of the afternoon distracted, and was even yelled at twice by her boss. That just made her day even better. She got home from work and sank down on her bed. This was so hard. She eyed her stereo, then got up, fast forwarded the tape past the song that had tormented her the night before, and hit play. She made dinner to the music, which paused long enough for the tape to turn over. It was nice to have neutral music, nothing that reminded her much about her life before moving here.
But she couldn't escape it that easily. She washed the dishes, picked up her book, and prepared to descend into it, only to find that she couldn't concentrate. After she'd read the first paragraph of the chapter four times and still didn't know what she'd read, she set the book down, and pulled out her journal.
She couldn't write, either, and finally threw the journal down and paced around the small apartment. That lasted three circuits, and she grabbed her keys, put her shoes on and left. It was only three blocks to the nearest park, and she headed that direction.
It didn't help, being out there, so she walked through the park to the other side for the ice cream stand she knew was there. Two scoops later of the best home-made chocolate ice cream in Vienna, she was in a much better mood, and she walked slowly home again. There were new posters up on the pillar as she passed it - probably had been there when she left, but she hadn't noticed anything - so she stopped to look at them.
Marissa's breath caught. Staring out at her, a silly grin on his face, was Chris. Next to him stood the rest of the group, and when she realized that, she found the words. «Wow,» she muttered softly, her hand straying up the touch the poster. Two months, they'd be there in Vienna. She wondered if Gabi had noticed, and if she wanted to go. «Do I really want to go?» she wondered out loud, and was surprised at how strongly she felt about it. Oh, yes, she wanted to go. It took her a while to drag herself away from the admittedly horrid picture of Chris and the others, and she went home with a weird feeling.
Running away hadn't helped. Had probably hurt. But she didn't....
Didn't what? Want that feeling of helplessness? Didn't want the feeling that anything she said would make him think she was a gold digger? Didn't like the total loss of control? Didn't like the feel of his lips on hers, the wonderful effect he had on her when he looked at her?
Marissa sighed and unlocked her door. She could not escape how much she missed him, but she hadn't really expected to. He'd become as much a part of her life as he could, and that missing part was hard to bear. Once again she wondered if she had actually done the right thing.
Back in her apartment, Marissa changed into her pajamas and crawled into bed. She couldn't sleep and lay there remembering the times she'd spent with Anika, meeting Clara, anything to avoid thoughts of Chris, and finally, she drifted off to sleep.
«Did you see?» Gabi demanded as soon as Marissa showed up for lunch. «Did you? Tickets go on sale on Saturday! Will you go with me? Father says I can go if you go with me.»
Marissa had to laugh. «Tickets for what?» she asked as soon as the other girl had calmed down.
Gabi stared at her like she'd grown a second head. «Tickets for *N Sync,» she said.
Marissa nodded. «Ah, that makes sense. Sure, I'll go.» Gabi's resulting cheer brought her father out of the back, and he scowled at them with good humor before going back.
The next two months were more of a torment, simply because Gabi kept the concert and thus her awareness of the guys in the forefront. And yet, as time went on, she found that she was less disturbed than she had thought she would be. The nervousness she felt as the concert drew closer was no different than the feeling she'd had the time she had dragged Gabi to soulDecision. Because, of course, she wouldn't actually be meeting any of them.
Two weeks before the concert, Marissa got back from lunch and found a memo on her desk about a required meeting the same night as the concert. She read it over, then waiting until she knew her boss was alone, she went to explain that she wouldn't be there. She was in the middle of telling him why, watching him grow angrier with every word, when there was a knock on the door and an elderly man stepped in. Her boss stood up, and so did Marissa, not sure of the protocol and willing to follow her boss on this.
The conversation between the two men went quickly. By now, Marissa was able to follow most of the conversation she was part of, but almost everything between two Austrians was still beyond her. So she was surprised when the elderly gentleman looked at her expectantly in a sudden silence, his eyes intense and reminding her, rather uncomfortably, of Chris.
«I'm sorry?» she said, partially to clear her head, and he inquired again why she wasn't going. Taking a deep breath, she explained again that she was taking a friend to a concert and couldn't get out of it because her friend's father didn't want her to go alone. The elderly gentleman's face grew grimmer as well, and Marissa was almost certain she'd just lost her job. Well, that wasn't that big a tragedy, really.
«What is the name of this girl, and what is her phone number? I wish to explain to her the trouble she is causing,» he said sternly.
Marissa hesitated, and he glared at her. Lifting her chin a little, she met his eyes. «Gabrielle Bauer,» she told him steadily, refusing to be intimidated, then recited the number she had memorized by now.
She was halfway through it when the man suddenly smiled, his face transformed by it, looking years younger. «Gabi?» he questioned. «Her father owns a store in the Meyergasse?»
Marissa stared at him, surprised, but managed a nod. «Yes, sir,» she stammered.
«Return to your desk,» he told her, and with an inquiring glance at her boss, she went.
Ten minutes later, she was called back into her boss' office. Ignoring the smirks from her co-workers, she walked swiftly in and was told that she had been excused from the meeting, but with penalties. «You will still have your half day off,» her boss told her, «beginning at your regular lunch time, but you will not be compensated for the time you took off or for the time the meeting will be taking place. Is that understood?»
Marissa stammered her thanks and went to sit back at her desk, utterly confused. She didn't mind not getting paid for the two and a half hours or so she'd miss of work, and she hadn't known she'd be paid for the time during the meeting. A smile spread over her face, confusing the people around her, and she went back to work, trying hard not to hum. And it was hard, considering "It's Gonna be Me" was running rampant through her head and she wanted to sing it out loud.
Gabi met her at the door to her father's store when Marissa showed up for lunch. «You met Opa today!» she exclaimed cheerfully, her dark eyes dancing in excitement.
Marissa stared at her blankly. «I met your Grandfather?» she repeated, stunned.
«He called Papa with your name and asked if you were the one going with me to the concert. I got to talk to him, too,» she added, real pleasure on her face.
Marissa looked even more mystified. «He knows you're going?»
Gabi giggled. «He got the tickets.»
This was making less and less sense. Marissa rubbed her head gently, wondering if this was how JC felt sometimes, dealing with Chris. Then she realized where her thoughts had gone and jerked them back to the visibly excited young woman next to her. «What?»
Gabi hadn't stopped smiling the whole time. «For Christmas, Opa tells us he'll give us one thing we really want the next year. Last year - not last Christmas, the one before - I told him I wanted to go to the *N Sync concert. Papa said I couldn't unless someone went with me, and then you came along, and it was all settled. So I get the concert this year - the tickets were last years gift - plus something else. I haven't decided what I want for this year, maybe a trip to America.» She gave her friend a significant glance.
Marissa was still confused, and so didn't notice her look. «So.... Where did I meet your Grandfather?»
Gabi laughed. «At work. He said something about a meeting you had to go to.»
Marissa's eyes widened. «That was your Grandfather? Holy cow!» She took a deep breath. «Well. Cool, then. I've already arranged to have the afternoon off.»
Gabi grinned conspiratorially. «Good. Come have lunch with me like always, then go change and meet me back here. Okay?»
Marissa grinned, still a little confused but willing to forget about it. «Great idea.»
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