The whole night, I sat up in my bed; thoughts swirling in my mind.  I couldn’t just make this easy, could I?  I knew I had hurt Jackson a lot, and that killed me.  Jackson was my partner in crime for awhile now, how could I just cut him off?  This part of my mind battled with the part that said I was doing this for the best.  Jackson would go back Erika; perfect, pretty, and poise.  I would stay with Kris and probably have to learn how to tie a tie.  We would both end up being happy, right?

When I picked Kris up from the airport, I actually felt relieved to see him.  I had been so focused on Jackson, it would appear that I had forgotten that my actual boyfriend was away, and I missed him.  I could feel myself sinking into his chest when he hugged me and I prayed he wouldn’t notice how distraught I was.  We decided to go eat some breakfast since it was still early in the morning.  I couldn’t shake my mind from the fight I had with Jackson.  I was staring at Kris, but I wasn’t listening to a word he was saying.

“Elizabeth?”  Kris asked which caught my attention.

“What did you call me?”  I said hearing the annoyed tone in my voice.  I really didn’t mean for it to sound mean, I just wasn’t used to being called that.

Kris laughed it off.  “Elizabeth, it is your name right?”  He cocked his head waiting for my answer.  I nodded back slowly trying to wrap my head around the idea of not being called Effie.  “I just thought you might want to go by your full name now.  Effie is what your childhood friends call you, but now you’re an adult and you’re going to be introducing yourself as such.  So you might as well go by your full name right?”  Kris explained.

“I’ve always been Effie though…” I voiced.

“I know but remember what I thought of when we first met?  That Effie sounds like an elf’s name.  No one will take you seriously if they keep thinking about little elves when they’re trying to talk to you.  And when you start making book deals, it’s very important that people take you seriously.”

I thought about what Kris had said for the rest of the day.  The more I thought about it, the more it made sense.  I knew nothing about business stuff and that’s all Kris knows, so he was probably right.  At lunch time I had gone back home, ready to take a nap when I noticed a bunch of boxes lying around the living room.  I yelled for Jackson and after a few minutes he appeared from his office.

“Hey Eff.”  He said giving me a small wave and then leaning on the door frame.

“Hey, what’s up with all the boxes?”  I questioned while pushing them to the side to create a walk way.

“Eff, I…”

“And it’s Elizabeth now.” I corrected him.

Jackson rolled his eyes at me. “Fine, Elizabeth.  I’m moving into the spare room down here so you can have the master bedroom and basically the whole upstairs.”

“What? No!”  I exclaimed.

“What do you mean no?”  Jackson walked towards me and was trying to figure out what I was talking about.

“Just stop, okay!”  I panicked and began shuffling backwards, tripping over a box.  Jackson came over to me and attempted to help me up but I pushed his hands away.  “Please just stop doing nice things for me.  I don’t deserve it from you…”  I could feel my tears start to build up.  It wasn’t just from Jackson though, it was from how stressed out I was.

Jackson sat next to me inside a box which made me laugh a little.  “Effie, it’s okay.”

“No it’s not.  You know what I’ve been thinking about all day?  The future!  And it’s ing scary and I can’t handle it.”  I looked up to see Jackson motioning for me to continue.  “Kris said that I should go by Elizabeth now to be taken seriously if I want to get anywhere in the publishing business.  It got me thinking of all the other things I’ll have to change about myself just to be successful.  Now I’m all stressed out and I just want to eat cotton candy and stay a kid forever.”

“Wow, and to think that I thought you were crying because you felt bad for turning me down.”  Jackson said while scratching the back of his head.

“Oh Jackson…”

“I’m just kidding!  Effie!”  He grabbed me and pulled me into the box so he could hug me.  “Effie, you are amazing just the way you are and if you ever change I’ll…” he looked around the room thinking of a punishment, “I’ll tell Key you accidentally broke his wedding present that he gave to us!”

I quickly pulled away from the hug, “that’s just evil.”

It had been so long since I had laughed with Jackson.  Just the simple act of having fun with one another soothed whatever anxiety I had and I was grateful to Jackson for that.