Page 8 of Belle Amour

Snarling, he grabbed his keys and wallet and slammed out of the condo, determined to find her and get her to understand things.

Chapter Six: Plan B

In the year and a half between Bastian catching Ana cheating and Mirabelle getting serious with Eddie, they had gone on two vacations together, one to Hawaii, where they took surfing lessons, resulting in Mirabelle’s obsessive new hobby, despite her falling off her board and breaking her elbow on some rocks on their second to last day, and a trip to Lake Ontario in upstate New York for two weeks of camping and sightseeing along the shore. They had both fallen in love with the area, particularly around Southwick State Park and ended up buying a fixer-upper house near the Stoney Point Lighthouse.

It was almost entirely off the grid; the only utility they had hooked up was water, which they shut off in the winter since they didn’t use it between November and March. It was their place to go and decompress, utterly detached from the world. They would even turn off their phones for the majority of the time there and spend their days at the beach, hiking, doing DIY projects or catching up on their reading. Bastian spent more time there, going up alone when he needed a few days to himself after a particularly difficult court case or just needed space in general. Mirabelle preferred having Bastian with her when she went, not liking being alone at night surrounded by the woods and their nearest neighbours over a mile away.

But Mirabelle enjoyed being there with Bastian. When he first suggested going after serving Eddie with the no-contact order, she had been genuinely excited to go and very disappointed each of the four times he rescheduled. She had been holding on to the tiny hope that the cabin trip would be when something would finally happen between them, and she couldn’t help but wonder if Bastian knew and that the real reason he kept cancelling was because he didn’t want to be with her.

She hadn’t let the hope get too big. All Bastian’s time in therapy seemed to have done was solidify his thoughts on love and marriage that he had told her after his divorce from Ana, that love was something made up by Disney. Mirabelle had been more than a little insulted by his statement because one of her mother’s regulars was an older man who had lost his wife and daughter in a car accident, and one day, he had given her mother several boxes containing his daughter’s movie collection and DVD Player as payment. Her mother had given all of it to Mirabelle for her birthday, resulting in Disney being one of her favourite escapes from reality. When she asked if he loved her, he rolled his eyes and pulled her into a hug.

“Yes, Bunny, I love you.”

“But not really, though. Because love is made up by Disney.” She frowned, refusing to let him distract her with physical affection, a common tactic of his when he didn’t want her to be upset with him.

“It's not the same.” He kissed the top of her head, humming softly as he swayed her gently. She knew he really didn’t want to discuss this with her, but that only made her more determined.

“So only certain types of love are Disney manufactured?”

“Passionate, romantic love is a Disney manufacture.” He smiled at her and pulled her tighter against him, squeezing her before letting her go. “Our love is different.”

She hadn't been able to get him to elaborate on why or what made their love different; he just repeated that it was different and changed the subject. She knew he was struggling with his feelings and articulating them at the time, so she had let it go, but it was those words that made her finally give up on him. A few months later, Casey moved away, and she and Eddie became serious. Eddie was always open about expressing his love and made grand, romantic gestures that made Mirabelle feel appreciated and wanted. With Casey out of the picture, she had fallen hard for him. Bastian, on the other hand, threw himself into his work and only dated occasionally and never more than three or four dates.

As Mirabelle headed across the parking garage to her car, she knew Bastian was going to be upset that she had temporarily blocked him and would look for her, but it was necessary, both for herself because she wasn’t ready to forgive him for the last three months of blatant disrespect he had let slide, but also because it was part of the plan. Actually, it was part of Plan B. After Kelly berated Mirabelle in the lunchroom, then yelled at her when Mirabelle pointed out it was her mistake, the fact that Bastian hadn't stood up for Mirabelle had been the straw that brought down the whole camel herd. The support staff were livid. They mostly let John slide up until that point because while they didn’t like that John let Kelly get away with things, they were more understanding because she was his daughter. Bastian got no such pass.

They were fed up with the way he and John allowed Kelly to talk to not just Mirabelle but the rest of the support staff at the office. She was incredibly demeaning and made it clear thatshe thought she was better than all of them because she was a lawyer, and they were all expected to suck it up. When they took Mirabelle out for dinner and drinks that night, Renata jokingly suggested that they all resign and leave them scrambling. Everyone had a good chuckle at the idea, but Mirabelle leaned forward seriously.

“So why don’t we?” There had been a few nervous giggles, but Mirabelle quickly laid out the facts. “They treat us like they can do the job without us, and I’m telling you, as a lawyer, theycan’t.There are dozens of law firms in this city looking for good support staff, and I will happily provide every one of you with a letter of recommendation and reach out to my contacts at other firms to see who’s looking. And I’m pretty sure we all have vacation time we can use as a buffer if needed.”

It only took another round of drinks for everyone to agree on the plan and backup plan to be laid out. Both plans had them all resigning this Monday, but one was tailored to Bastian actually going on the cabin trip, and one had been tailored to him rescheduling or not being ready. Back in her car, Mirabelle sadly sent a text to the support staff group telling them Plan B was a go; then she put the car in gear and headed to the airport as messages began pouring in, and the plan was set into motion.

Monday morning, John, Bastian, and Kelly would get in to find out that all the support staff were taking their vacation owed to them and resigning, and their interns had applied for transfers to other law firms. They also reached out to the support staff network and blacklisted Henderson Law Firm. No one with any experience or credibility would want to work there going forward if Kelly was working there. John was also going to get a double whammy; Mirabelle had gone for coffee with his wife, and she was set on divorcing him now. John had been complaining about the cost of having to put Kelly’s son indaycare and was trying to convince Marie to give up her job and stay home with the kid. Marie was a senior publishing manager for an international publishing company and had laughed him out of the kitchen the first time he brought it up, shut him down firmly the second time, and told him she would stay with her mother and reconsider their marriage if he brought it again the third time. He brought it up again, and now she was staying with her mom and divorce lawyer hunting.

Mirabelle pulled up at the airport and parked in long-term parking. She read through the messages in the support staff group as she walked over to rent a car for the week. They were all very supportive, most of them saying how sorry they were that she had to do Plan B. Barb offered to “bump into him” and “accidentally” spill her coffee on his leather shoes, making her chuckle but decline the offer. Bastian’s shoes would probably cost her entire paycheck to replace.

She was going to a beach house she had rented on Chincoteague Island. It was five hours south of New York City, and she knew Bastian would go to her apartment first and then to their place up north, which would put a lot of distance between them and when she blocked him, she had also turned off her location sharing. Even if he somehow found her car, he would think she got a plane and flew somewhere.

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She reached Chincoteague just after dinner and got takeout on her way to the beach house, knowing she would have to get groceries the next morning. After she ate and got all her things inside the place, which was less a house and more a one-room beach hut with the bed separated from the rest of it by curtains, she checked her missed messages in the group chat.

Renata:Went to the office and put my resignation on John's desk! Made sure to let him know it was because of Kelly!Start my new job with Clark, Kent, and Olsen next Monday. Woot! Woot!

Christine:Emailed mine to John and Bastian. Start with Tulk and Associates in two weeks??

Darla:Went in and left mine on Kelly's desk! Also going to Tulk and Associates! Wish me luck!

Barb:Left mine taped to the Receptionist's Desk. Got a job at the New York Civil Court. Thanks for the references, Mira! They want me to start on Monday!

Christine:I just heard from Frank. All the interns except one have new placements, too, and they’re working on his.

Mira:Oh, that's just perfect! I just reached my beach house. Gonna enjoy the rest of this week and see where I end up. Congrats Ladies!

She turned her phone off and went to sit out on the small porch to watch the ocean for a bit before bed and debate her next steps. Mirabelle was incredibly hurt by Bastian's behaviour over the last three months. He had rescheduled the cabin trip four times, allowed Kelly to insult and degrade her and the other support staff, and every time Kelly needed help with something, he would agree and invariably pass the extra work on to her. When she would bring it up, he would look guilty, apologize and promise it would be “Just a little longer.” But he never offered any explanations, and “just a little longer” kept getting longer and longer until she didn’t really believe Bastian was going to leave. She was hoping that all the support staff quitting would make them realize Kelly was a problem that needed to be dealt with.

Mostly, she was disappointed because Bastian had always been her safe place, the guy she held other guys up to, theone who had never let her down, and who she could rely on for anything. She felt he had stopped being that person when Kelly joined the office and seemed to forget that Mirabelle was also a lawyer who was licensed in several states along the Eastern seaboard. She had chosen to be his PA when he went to Henderson because they weren't looking for another lawyer, and she preferred to do prenups, research, contracts, and wills and estates instead of arguing in court anyway. To be fair, he hadn’t asked her to do that; he’d actually told her not to, but he hadn’t argued against it and said it was ultimately up to her.

Mirabelle knew she could rent out her condo fully furnished, find a place in another city or town and open her own office or join another firm, but she liked New York; she liked living in Sunnyside, being a fifteen-minute walk from Bastian and didn’t want to move away. She didn’t know what she wanted from Bastian at this point, but she did know she didn't want to lose him or cut him out of her life. After her divorce, it was the first time they had both been single at the same time since university, and they were much more relaxed and affectionate with each other, somehow more so than before Bastian met and married Ana.

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