I woke up at noon with the light hitting my face, it was one of the hottest and brightest days, the taste of the wine we drank the previous night and well into this morning was still in my mouth. I stood up turning around looking for Elliot, the house was so peaceful and silence , there was no sing of any of the dancing and talking in the most appropriate way that had taken place in that house. I walked to the kitchen, my beautiful kitchen which had become my refuge many morning and afternoons and evenings and today was no different. I reached for the biggest cup I had, it was a plastic cup from one of those theme parks in which a ridicules amount of beverage is serve and an even more ridiculous amount of money is pay for it, but as most of my thing it was a keepsake given to me so it was my favorite cup in the world, I waked to the fridge and filled the cup half way with crushed ice, open the fridge door and took out a two littler bottle of diet coke, nothing cured a hang over like coke and a burger, I has my coke but I was too tired to get a burger so I walked towards the living room again, this seemed like a perfect day to have an Austen fest, but this time I wasn't sure which movie to watch, I didn'twanted to think about Elliot and Mr. Darcy, so persuasion and pride and prejudice were out of the picture, I needed something to give me hope and not for love but for me, so the perfect choice was Miss Austen’s regrets which contrary to the somber title manage to give me hope that we can be successful, loved and most importantly happy without a man or a high power job to my name, or at least that’s what I told myself .

I was all comfortable in the couch with a small table in front of me keeping my bug cup as close as possible to my had, I had my blanked wrapped around me in a perfect way, the pillows lay form me in such a way that I felt like my body melted into the couch, I was about to press play when there was a knock my door, I didn't answer at first at the risk of loosing my perfect placement on the couch but the knocking was so persistent and loud that even of my body didn't want to move my head was screaming for me to get up and stop the noise, so I stood up ready to scream at the person at the door about how annoyed I was to be bother so early on a Saturday, I waked with my scariest face on, opened the door, and stop dead in my tracks, it was Kenny, Elliot’s youngest co-worker , he was at the shop on the weekend, did every single errand the guys asked him to do and in exchange he could pick anything he wanted that day . Kenny had the sweetest face, his big brown eyes made it impossible to be annoyed at him, and believe me this not being the first time e saw me with a hang over and an annoyed face, he was a little version of Elliot and his friends, since he got to pick anything from the store he was a walking billboard for every surfer and skater brand, but his mature language separated him from all the kids his age, talking to him was like talking to someone form the discovery channel.”hey Fanny”, I gave him a hugged, “why must you torture me today Kenny?”, I said sarcastically, “I’m actually here with something you’ll like”, he opened his back pack and took out a big bag from Roger’s burgers, my favorite burger joint in town, I could help but forget that loud knocking and smile, “oh , you are my hero,  do you want to say a while?”, I asked, “na, I got to go , see ya Fanny”, “bye Kenny, thank Elliot for me”, “oh his not at the store, he just called me and asked me to bring you this”, that was strange, where could he be?, I bet his with that Phoebe, I though, my mind started to wonder as my rage came back, I turned around to ask Kenny of he new where Elliot was, but he was long gone, I closed the door of the house and walked back to my now imperfect couch, the pillows were no longer comfortable, the blanket got tangled on my feet and I was getting annoyed really quickly, I press play and remember, “I am a strong woman that can be happy without a guy or a high power job, I just need to be well rounded” I told myself to calm down, I took a big bite out of the burger and all my emotions went to that beautiful meat between two perfectly warm pieces of bread and all the servings, I was happy again and so without noticing I melted again to my couch as I saw Miss Austen on the small TV.

The week had gone so fast, my nervousness around Elliot had me on edge I kept trying to tell myself that this was all part of the fantasy, but to make sure I tried to avoid him as much as possible until I could see him as a regular guy. Every morning I would wake up make him his breakfast and packed his lunch and hoped in the shower before he came downstairs, so a loud “see ya later” was all I hear from him. Dinner time was tricky , I would prepared something eat as fast as I could and excuse myself to go to my room and work on the regency workshops I was planning, the truth was that the boundaries of propriety prohibit me to talk to him about any feeling so I would consume my thought in letter I write to Christine, my only relief of the day, of curse this were not actual letter, the emergency of the matter called for me to mix the classic for of expression with a more modern and effective delivery method, I had to send email.

The night before the first regency meeting I hear a knock in my room about an hour after dinner, “come in “I said, “hey Fanny could I talk to you?”, “Yes” I said, I knew it was a matter of time before he came to ask what the hell was wrong with me, “I was wondering if you ok?’, he asked me, “yes, why?”I knew why, but I thought better if I pretended I didn’t know what he was talking about, “well you seem to be acting a little strange around me, are you not happy with be being at your house? Or did I do something that bugged you?”, I knew he was starting to worry, he didn’t like confrontation so the fact that he had come and talked to me made let me know that he was feeling uncomfortable, “everything’s fine, I just have been going crazy with this whole regency workshops and I don’t want to drag you into it”  he looked at me smiling, “what are you talking about I wore a weir short pants suit and learned all those crazy dances for the ball, I moved in, I think its too late to try to avoid me being involved”. Elliot had been my friend for ages and I was pushing him away by being into him a little, all my friend told me it was bound to happened, how can two people of the opposite sex spend all that time together and never have any feeling for each other. I looked at him sitting in my bed and I was sure that I had dealt with this the wring way, I didn't needed to spend time away from him, I needed to spend time with him to realize that this small crush could not over power our great friendship and most importantly it could destroy it.”Do you what to hear about the workshops?”I asked him, he took a big breath as a sign of relief “yes , what have you been working on cousin?”, if there was ever a moment to kill the crush it was this one, hearing him call me cousin, it was obvious that he only saw me as a friend, my fears and doubts had gone away.”Come sit by me, he came to the other side of my bed, we both took a pillow and place it in our back for support, my bed was filled with papers, “well, by description of Miss Bingley and Mr. Darcy an accomplished woman must know how to draw, paint, play the piano, embroider, read , know the languages and have an certain air, so that what I've done”, he looked at me as if he was interested, as if he would ever care about this thing, but as always he was amusing me and I had not the will to take out of his misery, “after all I have learned from Jane there’s a couple of workshops I can take care of myself”, “which ones”, he asked, “well Mr. Foley I find myself perfectly capable to form a reading circle, teach French, drawing and painting”, “what about the pianoforte Miss Ada, who will take care of that? And embroidering, for no accomplish girl deserved the word without knowing how to embroider a pillow”, he could hardly say the sentence without laughing, I didn't let him bother me and I answer as a proper lady, “you are right Mr. Foley, I have arrange for Mrs. James the piano teacher at the theater to give us private lesions as for the embroidering, well, I have found great talent in Miss Izzie”, “so you have it all set”, “I do”.