musesandlyrics | 6.27. Rascal Flatts lyrics
6.27. I'm not afraid to cry every once in a while even though
Goin' on with you gone still upsets me
There are days every now and again I pretend I'm okay
But that's not what gets me
What Hurts The Most - Rascal Flatts
It was one of those days. The sort where it felt like, from the minute you woke up, that you shouldn't have bothered getting out of bed. In fact, by the time Ethan got to brushing his teeth, he had already started the day with a niggling headache behind his eyes, tripped over the mat in the bedroom, got a notice of a lawsuit against his company in his email (which he forwarded directly to Tom for inspection without even barely skimming it), discovered the milk was off, had a small argument with Sophie about something he promised to do and didnt, and then nearly took his eyeball out with his toothbrush when he sneezed whilst brushing his teeth. It all really should have been a sign to check out on the day and just bugger off back to bed.
But he had a board meeting planned, and there were some new drug trials launching at the end of the month. He couldn't skive off work as much as he wanted to. He didn't trust anyone else to call the shots in his absence. Getting caught in traffic due to road work pissed him off enough to uncharacteristically swear at his driver, only just managing to bite back a retort about drivers being murderers. It wasn't his driver's fault that Tom's had been a fucking first degree murderer. It was that train of thought that really seemed to set Ethan off for some reason. Maybe he was just primed from the bad morning, but after that, it felt like it became almost impossible for him to function properly. He spilled his coffee on his desk, kept miss-spelling the same word over and over again in and important email to a business colleague, and then accidentally hung up on a very important associate in Japan only to fail to get back in touch with him before the guy boarded a flight, leaving a vital negotiation for a drug launch hanging. Maybe he was just pissed to be back at work after chilling out in Surrey, but the thing was, he hadn't really chilled there at all. He had managed a half-way decent impression of it, but he never quite unwound, and that was odd for him. Despite his extremely hectic working life, he usually always managed to turn off during his breaks.
Not this time. He returned to London with Sophie almost as coiled as he had been before they left, but there was no choice but to get back to the ground. Sophie was in the midst of a vital case with some kid clients who were relying on her, and Ethan had a handful of important deals needing to be finalised before March closed. He was almost counting the hours to the first week in April, when Sophie had managed to book the luxurious five-star cruise for the four of them. But with his bad day only just nudging lunch time, April suddenly felt like years away.
Normally, he was a shrewd businessman. He could lockdown his board in a board meeting all night until they reached the desired result. He had a reputation for being a good and approachable boss, but when it came to his company, he nurtured it in any way he could. Very, very rarely, though, would he walk out of a board meeting before it was over. But two hours in, and the niggle of a headache had increased to the Godzilla of all headaches, and he was starting to get those telltale flashes in the edge of his vision. Discreetly swallowing a couple of prescription pills about an hour into the meeting hadn't helped at all. He sat at the head of the large, sprawling conference table trying to listen to his Director of Finance report on profit flow for the last month, but the guy could have been talking in Mexican for all that Ethan was absorbing it. He didn't feel well and a sweat had pricked across his forehead and back of his neck. He took a long drink of water from his glass, sitting forward in his chair under the guise of skimming the report disturbed by the Director. Cursing inwardly, Ethan knew he wasn't going to last the duration of the meeting and he was promptly pissed off at himself because of it.
He abruptly cleared his throat, folding his papers over into his leather binder and standing up. He nodded to the Director in apology. "My apologies, Bill... ladies... gentleman," he glanced around the conference table, "I'm going to have to excuse myself to make an important call. Donald, have the minutes emailed to me before close of business," he requested of his Business Director. He didn't wait for any confirmation or acknowledgement and was already striding out of the room, failing to make contact with any of them. He didn't want to fucking deal with the questioning looks, nor did he want to see the dizzying high rise views of London from the floor to ceiling windows behind them. Reaching the wing of his offices, he handed over his notes to his secretary for typing. "Nina, hold my calls," he almost barked at her. She would get it. He had been in a strange mood all day and she was good at knowing when to keep her distance. She also knew that 'hold my calls' meant he would only take them from Sophie or Tom... and more recently, Stuart, as the copper had been a regular caller regarding Tom's condition.
Closing the office door behind him to shut himself off from the world, he almost ran across the large office, tossing the rest of his paperwork messily onto his desk before veering into the en suite bathroom. He didn't even attempt to make the toilet. He bent over the hand basin and threw up, giving into the migraine that had been threatening since the start of the board meeting. Sophie's Alpin and toast she had made him eat for breakfast, along with the coffee and Mars Bar he had stuffed down his throat before the meeting all came back to haunt him again, leaving him breathless and sweaty, and now more than a little bit aggravated at himself. One side of his head was feeling like someone had stabbed him in the brain and he covered his right eye with his hand, trying to get it to stop. He wasn't a stranger to migraines, but since he had gotten engaged to Sophie and subsequently married to her, they had been few and far between. Stress was usually the prime cause. She had always had a knack for keeping him chilled and relaxed. Only this time, there was much more at play.
He looked at himself in the mirror, finding a pale and somewhat drawn face looking back at him tiredly. He shook his head and rinsed his mouth, resting his elbows tiredly on the edge of the sink. He hadn't slept properly in weeks now... since Tom's accident, maybe even since that call came through where Tom had quietly and politely requested his help finding a lawyer because Stuart and Gabrielle had been in his office at the time. Ethan had heard the strain in his best friend's tone, and that really had been the start of the avalanche of shit. Ethan had bottled it all up, kept his emotions mostly in check, and dealt with it via a stoic and brooding numbness.
He quickly wiped the excess moisture from his face and then went back to his office, dropping down into his leather chair. He sat there for a long few moments, just staring at the glass top of his desk. There was no expecting the onslaught of feelings and emotions that suddenly hit him out of the blue, much akin to a metaphoric sledgehammer catching him in the back of the head. He dropped his face into his hands with a sob as the flood gates opened and he gave into it for the first time since he was told Tom had been seriously injured. Ethan didn't cry often, being raised to believe that a man should deal with his emotions in private, a very old and traditional view point instilled in his family for generations. His father was the same, but Ethan wasn't as strong as his father, not really. Nothing in his life had ever affected him the way hearing that Tom had nearly died did, and at the time, it had been such a shock, it felt like someone had torn the ground out from under him. The only thing was, it took this long - this many weeks - for it all to catch up with him.
The tears streaked rapidly down his cheeks and dripped down his wrists beneath the cuffs of his expensive shirt. He really fucking hoped he could manage to stop now he had started, but right at that minute, the only thing he could tolerate infiltrating his sore mind was grief for his best friend, the closest thing Ethan ever had to a brother. And maybe, if he managed to not asphyxiate himself on snot, Ethan Williamson might actually do something he hadn't done since he was twenty... skive off work and go home sick. In fact, he might go the whole hog and bury himself in that Snuggie thing his mum bought him and watch old Corrie repeats followed by Dr Phil.
God knew, right now, he probably needed the free therapy.
Word Count | 1,588
Goin' on with you gone still upsets me
There are days every now and again I pretend I'm okay
But that's not what gets me
What Hurts The Most - Rascal Flatts
It was one of those days. The sort where it felt like, from the minute you woke up, that you shouldn't have bothered getting out of bed. In fact, by the time Ethan got to brushing his teeth, he had already started the day with a niggling headache behind his eyes, tripped over the mat in the bedroom, got a notice of a lawsuit against his company in his email (which he forwarded directly to Tom for inspection without even barely skimming it), discovered the milk was off, had a small argument with Sophie about something he promised to do and didnt, and then nearly took his eyeball out with his toothbrush when he sneezed whilst brushing his teeth. It all really should have been a sign to check out on the day and just bugger off back to bed.
But he had a board meeting planned, and there were some new drug trials launching at the end of the month. He couldn't skive off work as much as he wanted to. He didn't trust anyone else to call the shots in his absence. Getting caught in traffic due to road work pissed him off enough to uncharacteristically swear at his driver, only just managing to bite back a retort about drivers being murderers. It wasn't his driver's fault that Tom's had been a fucking first degree murderer. It was that train of thought that really seemed to set Ethan off for some reason. Maybe he was just primed from the bad morning, but after that, it felt like it became almost impossible for him to function properly. He spilled his coffee on his desk, kept miss-spelling the same word over and over again in and important email to a business colleague, and then accidentally hung up on a very important associate in Japan only to fail to get back in touch with him before the guy boarded a flight, leaving a vital negotiation for a drug launch hanging. Maybe he was just pissed to be back at work after chilling out in Surrey, but the thing was, he hadn't really chilled there at all. He had managed a half-way decent impression of it, but he never quite unwound, and that was odd for him. Despite his extremely hectic working life, he usually always managed to turn off during his breaks.
Not this time. He returned to London with Sophie almost as coiled as he had been before they left, but there was no choice but to get back to the ground. Sophie was in the midst of a vital case with some kid clients who were relying on her, and Ethan had a handful of important deals needing to be finalised before March closed. He was almost counting the hours to the first week in April, when Sophie had managed to book the luxurious five-star cruise for the four of them. But with his bad day only just nudging lunch time, April suddenly felt like years away.
Normally, he was a shrewd businessman. He could lockdown his board in a board meeting all night until they reached the desired result. He had a reputation for being a good and approachable boss, but when it came to his company, he nurtured it in any way he could. Very, very rarely, though, would he walk out of a board meeting before it was over. But two hours in, and the niggle of a headache had increased to the Godzilla of all headaches, and he was starting to get those telltale flashes in the edge of his vision. Discreetly swallowing a couple of prescription pills about an hour into the meeting hadn't helped at all. He sat at the head of the large, sprawling conference table trying to listen to his Director of Finance report on profit flow for the last month, but the guy could have been talking in Mexican for all that Ethan was absorbing it. He didn't feel well and a sweat had pricked across his forehead and back of his neck. He took a long drink of water from his glass, sitting forward in his chair under the guise of skimming the report disturbed by the Director. Cursing inwardly, Ethan knew he wasn't going to last the duration of the meeting and he was promptly pissed off at himself because of it.
He abruptly cleared his throat, folding his papers over into his leather binder and standing up. He nodded to the Director in apology. "My apologies, Bill... ladies... gentleman," he glanced around the conference table, "I'm going to have to excuse myself to make an important call. Donald, have the minutes emailed to me before close of business," he requested of his Business Director. He didn't wait for any confirmation or acknowledgement and was already striding out of the room, failing to make contact with any of them. He didn't want to fucking deal with the questioning looks, nor did he want to see the dizzying high rise views of London from the floor to ceiling windows behind them. Reaching the wing of his offices, he handed over his notes to his secretary for typing. "Nina, hold my calls," he almost barked at her. She would get it. He had been in a strange mood all day and she was good at knowing when to keep her distance. She also knew that 'hold my calls' meant he would only take them from Sophie or Tom... and more recently, Stuart, as the copper had been a regular caller regarding Tom's condition.
Closing the office door behind him to shut himself off from the world, he almost ran across the large office, tossing the rest of his paperwork messily onto his desk before veering into the en suite bathroom. He didn't even attempt to make the toilet. He bent over the hand basin and threw up, giving into the migraine that had been threatening since the start of the board meeting. Sophie's Alpin and toast she had made him eat for breakfast, along with the coffee and Mars Bar he had stuffed down his throat before the meeting all came back to haunt him again, leaving him breathless and sweaty, and now more than a little bit aggravated at himself. One side of his head was feeling like someone had stabbed him in the brain and he covered his right eye with his hand, trying to get it to stop. He wasn't a stranger to migraines, but since he had gotten engaged to Sophie and subsequently married to her, they had been few and far between. Stress was usually the prime cause. She had always had a knack for keeping him chilled and relaxed. Only this time, there was much more at play.
He looked at himself in the mirror, finding a pale and somewhat drawn face looking back at him tiredly. He shook his head and rinsed his mouth, resting his elbows tiredly on the edge of the sink. He hadn't slept properly in weeks now... since Tom's accident, maybe even since that call came through where Tom had quietly and politely requested his help finding a lawyer because Stuart and Gabrielle had been in his office at the time. Ethan had heard the strain in his best friend's tone, and that really had been the start of the avalanche of shit. Ethan had bottled it all up, kept his emotions mostly in check, and dealt with it via a stoic and brooding numbness.
He quickly wiped the excess moisture from his face and then went back to his office, dropping down into his leather chair. He sat there for a long few moments, just staring at the glass top of his desk. There was no expecting the onslaught of feelings and emotions that suddenly hit him out of the blue, much akin to a metaphoric sledgehammer catching him in the back of the head. He dropped his face into his hands with a sob as the flood gates opened and he gave into it for the first time since he was told Tom had been seriously injured. Ethan didn't cry often, being raised to believe that a man should deal with his emotions in private, a very old and traditional view point instilled in his family for generations. His father was the same, but Ethan wasn't as strong as his father, not really. Nothing in his life had ever affected him the way hearing that Tom had nearly died did, and at the time, it had been such a shock, it felt like someone had torn the ground out from under him. The only thing was, it took this long - this many weeks - for it all to catch up with him.
The tears streaked rapidly down his cheeks and dripped down his wrists beneath the cuffs of his expensive shirt. He really fucking hoped he could manage to stop now he had started, but right at that minute, the only thing he could tolerate infiltrating his sore mind was grief for his best friend, the closest thing Ethan ever had to a brother. And maybe, if he managed to not asphyxiate himself on snot, Ethan Williamson might actually do something he hadn't done since he was twenty... skive off work and go home sick. In fact, he might go the whole hog and bury himself in that Snuggie thing his mum bought him and watch old Corrie repeats followed by Dr Phil.
God knew, right now, he probably needed the free therapy.
Word Count | 1,588