It’s a well known fact that when you piss off your girlfriend’s father that the world just might come to an end. At least that’s how Nick and I feel about our situation with my family. My father is upset and I do mean very upset. My mother tried to talk to him and he isn’t responding to her. He’s mad because she kept it from him also. He’s mad with everybody, especially Nick and I.

We agreed that we would go into the meeting, standing strong for what we believe in – that we love one another. Whether my father believes us or not, we’ll do that. The only thing is, I don’t want Nick to ruin his future because of me. I don’t want the future of the company to suffer because I couldn’t keep my legs together. If Nick is fired, then it will ruin him and the company. That can not happen and I refuse to let it happen.

Someone once told me that if you believe in something, fight for it, and it will turn out the way you want it to. The only problem with that is I don’t know if I can fight that hard. All I do know is that I love Nick, I love my father, and I love this company and I don’t want to loose any of them – especially Nick.

I didn’t stay over last night, but I stayed over for a little while after my mother left to go track my father down. Nick and I sat there in shock that Katie called me “mama”. It was the first word she ever said and she called me “mama”. I don’t know what to say to that. I don’t know what to feel about that. I don’t know anything except that it touched me so much that I started to wonder just who I’ve become the past few weeks.

Am I seriously considering choosing a man and his child over my father and job?

“Erin, are you nervous?” Nick asked that morning as we rode up the elevator together, heading towards the main floor where the offices were. I shook my head and smiled, looking away. “I want you to know that whatever happens in there, well, I want you to know that I love you.”

I smiled, looking back at him. “I love you too,” I replied, leaning up to kiss him when the elevator opened. “Uh, not here.”

“Right,” he said, following me as we headed towards my father’s office. I felt eyes on us as we walked through the tunnels of cubicles in the office, making our way to the main office in the corner of the building.

Obviously someone had told them about Nick and I.

“Daddy,” I whispered, knocking on his door lightly. I cracked it open, looking inside to see him sitting at his desk. “We’re here.”

“Come on in,” he replied. Nick and I walked in, sitting down in the chairs across from his death. Nick looked deathly afraid as if he were about to be fried in the electric chair. “So did you decide on what you’re going to do?”

“Can I say something first?” I asked. He nodded his head. I sighed, thankful that he at least wanted to hear me out. “Daddy, okay, you always wanted me to be happy and Nick makes me happy. We work really good together and we want to stay in a relationship and we both want to stay here, working for you because we love this company and our jobs, especially me. I was raised around this. It’s all I really know. It’s not like when I fooled around with that other designer, Dad this is serious.”

He stared at me in return. He didn’t even give Nick a second glance.

“Daddy,” I said, deciding that I needed to add to the argument, “I don’t want Nick to leave this company and it’s not because I love him it’s because he’s a great designer and if you fire him in the middle of the season with everything that we’ve worked on flushed down the drain then we might as well kiss this company goodbye because it’s reputation will be completely ruined.”

“Then you quit,” my father said, staring at me. I stared back at him in response. “One of you will be walking out of here today with your personal belongings in a box.”

“Mr. Davidson, really, please do not fire Erin. She’s your daughter and this company is her birthright. She has more business being here than I do –“ Nick said. I replied, staring at him.

“Nick, you need this job more than I do and this company needs you more than it needs me.”

“But Erin, this company will be yours one day, your father told me that himself – you can’t be fired,” Nick said, looking me in the eyes. “I’m not going to let you do that.”

“Well I’m not going to let this business that my grandfather created flush down the drain in the middle of a season with nothing to show for at Fashion Week in New York City when we have our display. You’re staying and I’ll quit.”

“Erin, I’m not going to let you quit,” Nick said, standing up. “You belong here more than I do. I’m the new guy. I’m the outsider. This company is yours and you can’t quit.”

“Daddy, if you really must fire one of us then please consider this my resignation,” I said, standing up to look at him.

I didn’t know whether the look on my father’s face was a look of shock or sadness. It could have been both or hell, it could have been that he was enjoying this.

“Okay then Erin, you’re fired,” my father said, looking down at some papers at his desk. “Nickolas, go to your office and get to work. Erin, get your things and be out of the building by noon.”

“Erin,” Nick said, staring at me. He shook his head and walked away, almost wanting to slam my father’s office door. He was mad and he was upset, almost as much as my father was.

I looked down at my hands only to see that they were shaking. “Daddy, I’m sorry,” I whispered as I looked at him. He continued to look down and I knew that he was upset. “I’ll go pack my things now.”

I walked out of his office and shut the door behind me. Before I could ever make it to my office, my eyes were crying a river of tears and I couldn’t build a dam to stop them at all. I pulled a box out of the closet and started putting little pictures and souviners in it, anything that personally belonged to me.

“Erin,” Nick whispered, standing at our adjoining door. “I can’t believe you did that.”

“I did it for us,” I whispered, smiling at him. I leaned up to kiss him and he paused, stepping back. “What?”

“Erin, you can’t do that,” he whispered, staring me in the eyes. “You can not just leave this place. It’s your birthright. You were born into this company. From the time you were conceived, this company has been yours.”

“No it wasn’t because when I was conceived, I was a bastard child that was never wanted,” I replied, putting a picture of Lily and I in the box. “I’ll get a job somewhere else. I mean, I have a small reputation in this business around town. I’m sure that I can get something.”

“I don’t know if I can be with you if you do this,” Nick said bluntly. I turned around, staring at him intently. What did he mean he couldn’t be with me? “Erin, I can not have this weighed on my conscience that your father fired you because of me. This company is yours.”

“I’ll get over it.”

“No you won’t and I won’t let you.”

“What’s that mean?” I asked, practically shoving a book into my box.

“I can’t let you give up your future for me,” he said, staring at me. “I already made Katie give up hers when I got her pregnant and she died and I can’t just sit by and let you do the same damn thing, only a little different. This company is your future and I can’t let you give that up Erin.”

“If that’s what you want.”

“Of course it’s not what I want. I want you, but I can’t sit by and watch you do this.”

“Then get out of here Nick and go to work. I’ve gotta finish packing and figure out what I’m going to do,” I said, turning my back to him again. I heard him take a deep breath and I smiled slightly. “I’ll come by tonight when I know Jay is at work.”

“Erin, if you leave here with your stuff and without getting your job back, then don’t bother stopping by and I don’t mean just tonight.”

Just as he said the word “tonight”, I heard his adjoining door shut. I looked over my shoulder to see that he was gone.

I closed my eyes and began to wonder what the hell I was doing. I could understand the fact that he doesn’t want me to give up my job but what does that have to do with dropping by tonight?

Then it hit me.

He’s breaking it off because I quit to save his career. He’s mad at me because I did something for him, something that he can’t repay me for. He’s mad because I gave up something, like he said, I was born into, for him.

“I can’t believe you actually quit for him,” Lily said that afternoon as we sat at a local café down the street from my apartment. “And he’s mad at you because of that?”

“Yeah,” I replied, looking down at my cappuccino. “Katie called me Mama last night.”

“Do what? Erin, what the hell is happening to you?” Lily asked. I stared at her in return. What did she mean by that comment? “Erin, you’re not acting like yourself lately and it’ all because of Nick and granted, the way you’ve been is a little better, I’m just not sure if it’s who you really are.”

“I don’t know who I am really,” I replied, looking out the window. “Ever since I found out about how I was conceived, I’ve been questioning it and I guess Nick was just a way I could explore another side of life.”

“You mean, not enjoying your life around parties, clubs, and that stuff? Do you mean with Katie?” Lily asked. I sighed, nodding my head. “You like the little girl, don’t you?”

“I just feel bad for her, you know? She’s going to be like me. She’s going to grow up never knowing who her real mother was, even if Nick tells her about Katie, the mother, Katie the baby will never really know her. I grew up never knowing my real birth mother,” I said. “She’s so cute and for the love of God, she called me her mother.”

“Maybe she sees you as that role, you know? Even though I don’t know how much contact you’ve had with her.”

“Not very much but a little,” I said, leaning back in my chair. “Lily, we told one another ‘I love you’ in Miami and I do love him and I’ve never felt like this before.”

“Then why don’t you go talk to him about quitting?” she asked. “Go and talk to him. Erin, I agree with you that you can find a new job, but that company is going to be yours one day and I think quitting was really stupid.”

“I can’t help it. I stand up for what I believe in.”

Lily rolled her eyes at that and of course, I never expected her to understand. That’s where we were always different. I was the one that stood up for what I believed in and was loud and blunt. She was the girl that was quiet, doing everything that everybody told her to.

I sat on my sofa later that night, staring at my phone. I wanted to call Nick so badly. I would give anything for him to just stop by or to kiss me and tell me that he wasn’t mad at me. Maybe if I call him, he’ll tell me that he still loves me and he’s not mad at me.

I sat there, dialing his number and then heard the answering machine pick up. Great, that’s perfect.

“Nick, it’s Erin,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I know that you’re upset with me about today but I just want you to know why I did it. I did it because I love you and I know that my father will let me come back eventually. They need you right now and that’s what I’m thinking about. I’m thinking about my future, your future, my family’s future and what my grandfather worked so hard to build. They need you more right now than they need me –“

“Erin,” Nick said, picking up the phone. I smiled, hoping to God he would come right over. “Erin, listen, I love you too but you shouldn’t have done that.”

“I told you why I did it. I’m thinking about your future, my future, all of that. I’m thinking of Katie’s future.”

“Still, I don’t appreciate the fact that you did that.”

“Nick, I did it –“

“I know why you did it, but Erin, I hate the fact that you gave up something so important to you and your family for me. What am I suppose to give you in return?” he asked. I knew that was the reason he was so upset.

“You don’t have to give me anything Nick.”

“Erin, no.”

“Nick, what is the big deal? God, you’re taking this way too seriously.”

“Erin, just, I think we need to take a break while your father digests our relationship, alright?” he said. I held myself back from bursting out in tears.

“Fine, Nick. Whatever you want. I’m here to please but I guess that’s all I do. Just do your job okay?” I said, hanging up the phone.

A break? What the hell did we need to take a break for? We were not Ross and Rachel and this was not an episode of Friends. Screw him and a break. We needed to show our unity to prove to my father that we wanted to be together and taking a break would not do that.

If we were on a break, then I was going to act like I’m on a break.