Sparkling Fear, page 4
"Finally," Paisley breathed out, her high-heeled shoes making a sound on the wooden floor as she walked to Charles.
He looked forbidden good, and it bothered me that my heart still made a little jump.
I felt his eyes on me, and in one motion, I grabbed my bag off the floor and ran towards my room.
"How does this shit work? Don't you have to be able to do this? You're a grown man," Paisley cursed as she tried to tie his black tie.
"Leni?"
"Huh?"
"Can you tie Charles' tie?" Paisley looked at me helplessly with a hopeful smile.
"Give it a rest, Pais," he said, visibly annoyed, and pulled it out of her grasp, so she would stop messing with his tie.
"Stop being such an ass and let her help you."
"I used to do my dad's," I said carefully.
I'd also done Charles' ties several times when he had some appointment in New York with his dad and was getting ready at my place.
"Perfect, then Charles finally has someone who can teach him how to do this. I'm going to the bathroom now and then you're ready to leave, Charles."
Paisley disappeared behind the door leading to the guest bathroom, and Charles stood in front of the large mirror and tried to tie his black tie.
Visible unsuccessful.
"Let me help you."
Charles turned away from the mirror, and I took a step towards him and untied the knot he had made.
I felt every tense muscle in my body. I held my breath as long as I stood in front of him and knotted his tie. His eyes were on me, and it felt so wrong. As soon as I finished tying, I took a step back to put distance between us.
That was too much and too wrong of me because, even though I didn't want to admit it to myself, I was still attracted to him. But I had to start learning to move on. The Charles I met in New York didn't exist here in Eastburgh. Who knows if he really existed or if it was all just a big, shitty lie.
Charles cleared his throat. "Thank you."
The next moment, Paisley emerged from the guest bathroom, grinning with obvious pleasure when she saw that his tie was done.
Now that they were standing next to each other, they didn't just look a bit alike, as siblings usually do, but very similar. As if they had the same face, only Paisley had slightly softer and more feminine features.
Maybe they were twins?
Charles reached for the car keys, but Paisley snatched them right out of his hand. "You're definitely not driving. You smell too much like alcohol and leave the fucking flask here or dad will kill you," she said in a strong tone.
Without hesitation, he took a small flask out of his trouser pocket, slammed the flask on the shelf, and left the apartment.
Paisley turned to face me again after putting on her dark coat. "I apologize for my brother in advance, but he's a pretty big asshole right now. Usually, just a small one, but now a big one. See you around. Nice to meet you," she smiled, showing her teeth and grabbing a jacket for Charles, which he had forgotten.
"Me too," I replied to her, and I waited until the door finally shut and I could breathe a sigh of relief for the first time.
Chapter Seven
Charles
My sister followed me with tinkering steps as she put the car keys in her pocket. We left the parking lot and came closer to the noble restaurant, which was located in the center of Eastburgh.
"Of all people, do you have to make friends with my roommate?" I ran along the path without taking up the slow pace of my sister. "I don’t have any other friends except you and Valerie," she said as she caught up with me.
"Then be friends with Luna or Aria, but not with her."
"What do you have against Leni? I like her."
"But I don't," I grumbled, holding the door to the restaurant open for her.
"Oh, sorry. Mr. Whitfield doesn't like his roommate, so I can't like her either," she said ironically, before waving at our parents, who were sitting at a table a little further back from the other guests.
"You know what? You do what you want anyway," I hissed softly between my lips before I hugged my mother.
We sat across from our parents. As if a waitress was just waiting for us to sit down, she came to us with the menu cards. "Do you already know what drink you like?" The slightly older waitress asked us. I looked at the menu where the drinks were listed and I felt my tongue begin to tingle as I read myself through the alcoholic drinks.
With a quick glance from the menu at my parents' drinks, I saw what they had chosen. My father, of course, was a whiskey drinker and ordered a whiskey.
As always.
Theodore Whitfield ordered whiskey everywhere.
My mother, on the other hand, had a sex on the beach.
In addition to their drinks, there was a wine glass filled with red wine.
"I'll have a martini, but no olives, please. And a glass of sparkling water for my brother," Paisley grinned at the waitress and handed her the menu card.
I looked at her in disbelief.
Was she fucking serious?
In front of our parents?
"Can't you order for yourself?" My dad asked, and looked almost as confused as I did.
"I just don't want to drive later, and one of us has to drive his car back to campus."
If there was one thing my sister could do, it was lying. With that talent, she was able to hide her drug problem for a long time until we realized it one night at a party. She was addicted to Ritalin. Anti-sleeping pills. At least one of us was doing well and wasn't an addict or suffering anymore.
"Now tell me, how are you? How's college doing?" My mother sipped on her cocktail glass and left a slight imprint of her dark red lipstick on the edge. Paisley started talking without a break, telling how well everything was going and that she had enrolled in the ESU volleyball team and hoped to receive the acceptance email soon. I was quite grateful to her for talking so much because I just had to sit next to her in silence and pretend to care. I knew my sister so well that I was sure some of it was just a lie to convince our parents that they didn't have to worry about her getting hooked on pills again.
She talked to them for so long that the food was already served.
"And with you, Aaron? How's ice hockey going?"
It was clear that it was the first thing my dad asked.
"Don't call me that," I complained that he called me Aaron and not Charles. I hated my first name Aaron so much, but by now I thought it was hopeless to tell my parents not to call me that.
"Ice hockey is going well," I lied, hoping to tap into my sister's talent for lying for a brief moment.
"And if it's going so well, why don't you do your duty as a captain and show up at practice, let alone at the goddamn games? You're entering the National Hockey League after graduating. Keep that in mind." My father hissed the last words quietly to keep his anger out of the restaurant. I didn't want to be on the ice and play against other people in the National Hockey League. I wanted to coach and teach. If I told my dad, he'd kill me with his steak knife.
I had never tried to tell him before because everything was happening so fast. As soon as I played for USA in the World Cup for the first time, I got an offer from the New York Islanders saying they wanted me on the team after graduation.
In the beginning, there was nothing better for me. It was all I wished for. My dad was and will always be my role model, but with that little job in high school where I was a coach of a team, my perspective on my future changed.
"And just so we're clear, you're both bringing a date to the event."
I looked up from my plate in shock at my dad, who was staring at me with a serious look.
"We should what?" Hissed Paisley in disbelief, expressing my thoughts aloud.
Dad took a sip of his whiskey and let the waitress know by raising the glass that she should bring him a new glass.
"Have I not made myself clear?"
"Why should we bring someone? It's enough that we have to show up at all," I muttered the last sentence to myself, but still so loudly that my father could hear me.
"They talk about you," my mother intervened.
"And that would change if Paisley and I brought someone?"
If people are talking about me, they should continue. Apparently, I’m so interesting that they would rather talk about me than any other nonsense. A date won't change that.
"We only want the best for you," Mom said, trying to ease the tense mood at the table.
There's no way I'm bringing a date.
"Listen," Dad hummed in his grey beard. "You know how important the Isles" event is to your mother and especially to me. Bring someone with you, so people think your dates were a small distraction in your life. You," he pointed to Paisley, "are concentrating on your medical studies, and you," he looked at me, "on ice hockey."
He could ask as much as he wanted. There's no way I'm going to do that, and knowing my sister, she wouldn't do that either.
"I just want to protect you and avoid questions about why you were out of college for two months," he stressed about Paisley's withdrawal, "and you about Ethan."
"It sounds like bringing a date is an excuse for my best friend being dead," I growled angrily, and by now I didn't care if anyone at the next table heard us.
My mother shook her head. "Aaron!"
"What? That's what your words sound like, Dad. I'm going to show up, but I'm definitely not bringing a date."
"Then I ask you to show up there without the smell of alcohol. Can you at least manage that?"
Ouch. At least I had my sister on my side.
"Okay, Dad. We'll bring someone."
I looked at my sister in disbelief.
Traitor.
"Thank you."
"Who do you want to bring? Your ex-boyfriend from Easthill? Who was so great," I hissed ironically, hoping to get her back on my side. Paisley didn't say anything, but she knew I was right.
"You could bring one of Charles' friends," my mother suggested, putting a fork stabbed with beans into her mouth.
"No way," we both said.
Never in her life would my sister bring any of my friends to this event as a date. It's enough that she had something with the captain of the Easthill Gladiators, Noah Coldwell. That was humiliating enough, especially when we played against their team.
"Who?" I asked perplexed, hoping to find out what was going on in my parents' minds.
"Weston?" Dad suggested. "I heard he got a contract from the New Jersey Devils."
I ignored the fact about the contract. "Weston has a girlfriend."
"He does? That's great!" My mother said happily and pretended to be part of the back and forth, until Luna and Weston finally realized they had feelings for each other.
"What's your goalie's name? He's a Sinclair, isn't he?"
I nodded. "Henry."
"What about him?"
"He also has a girlfriend." or whatever you could call the current relationship between Aria and him, but my parents didn't need to know that the two only met to fuck.
"And what's the other one's name?"
"Spencer?"
My dad shook his head.
"Trevor?"
He also shook his head at the name.
I didn't force myself to say the name because I knew Dad had something against him. Carter was a good guy, but his dad, the sheriff, was a failure in my father's eyes. So he didn't really like him.
Why my friends, of all people?
"Carter!" My mother threw his name into the room.
For God's sake.
"No!" Paisley and I said at the same time.
I looked at my sister in amazement. "You don't know him at all," I snorted.
"He's such a sweetheart. He did an internship at Stephanie's flower shop during his freshman year in high school," Mom smiled. Carter did an internship at a goddamn flower shop? At the sight of him tying flowers, I tried to suppress my laughter. It only worked semi-well, but my mood improved a little.
"Carter. Aha." Dad wrinkled his forehead and scratched his chin. "He's a Rhodes. Even if it's just for one night, I don't want to see a Rhodes next to my daughter."
"Dad," breathed Paisley. "You can't say that about him. It's unfair."
The name Rhodes wasn't popular in town, although Carter's dad was the sheriff of Eastburgh. Carter was the opposite of his father and his mother, if she ever showed up. He didn't talk much about himself and his family, but I went to his house one time, and that explained his silence about his family. This boy deserved so much more than that home in a trailer park on the outskirts of Eastburgh.
I was glad when he and Weston told me about the deal with the New Jersey Devils. I was hoping he wouldn't screw it up.
"What? I just want what's best for my beautiful daughter," he snorted.
"You'll manage it somehow. I trust you."
Trust in the Whitfield family has never been a great thing, but we all pretended as if it were the golden quality of this family. Lies, ambition, and success were more likely to hit it. Just like the fact that we didn't lose. We won or learned from it, and grew out of our mistakes.
Chapter Eight
Leni
My first shift at the glamor château had begun and I had never felt as uncomfortable as I did now, but there was nothing I could do about it. I had applied for all the vacancies in Eastburgh that I could manage in terms of time, and had only received three responses out of five applications.
Two rejections and one acceptance from the glamor château.
It was a bar, a bit off Eastburgh, in a street where there were several bars and clubs. The only difference being that in this bar, women in glittery, skimpy clothes danced and men slipped money into their thongs.
I did dance on the barre at the ballet, but not on one that was attached to the floor and ceiling. The job ad said 'waitress for a cozy bar.'
Cozy Bar?
I thought I had landed in a bad porn when I walked in here for the first time and saw what a cozy bar it really was. There was a stuffy, stale air in the bar, and after looking around when I came in, I didn't see a single window. There was an air conditioning unit, but it had a piece of paper stuck to it saying that it was out of order.
I felt somehow out of place.
What was I doing here?
After all the jobs, of all places, the acceptance had to come from the strip club?
Someone up in heaven was trying to play a really nasty trick on me, or my mother was secretly a witch and was trying to get me back home. The glamor château had the best pay out of all five job offers, but if I had known what the owner of the cozy bar meant, I probably would have reconsidered.
I just tried to push through those crappy hours and think about the money because that's what I needed.
I stayed outside for the break and stood next to the emergency exit and the big garbage cans. The cool January air spread across my naked legs and arms. Just because the dancers on the poles were hardly wearing anything didn't mean that the waiters were allowed to wear more.
Quite the opposite.
My tight white shirt showed off my pushed-up breasts perfectly. I had braided my hair with three strands. The skirt was tight and short and I was just waiting for the moment when it would ride up. I talked myself into this job by thinking that the money would keep me at the university. Because with the salary, I could pay the rent for the apartment for now and add something to the groceries.
But I still had no idea how that would work. Especially not how it would work with Charles as my roommate. We've hardly spoken to each other since I moved in a week ago. I haven't even seen him in the last two days.
Over the week, I could also see the two bottles of vodka in the fridge getting emptier and emptier; then one was missing, and when I came home from class in the evening, it had been replaced with a new one.
During the week, I often went to the college café because I could study better there than in my apartment.
"One day, I'll burn down this strip club with all the disgusting men inside," Olivia said, pulling me out of my thoughts as she came outside.
"What happened?"
Olivia took out a cigarette and lit it with her lighter. „There's a table with three men and they're… well… a bit touchy."
"Why don't you tell the boss about it? He said that he would kick them out when—"
She interrupted me, blowing out the smoke from her cigarette. "Not when they're his friends."
I don't know if you can call them men. I already hated it here and I said that with full conviction while having my first shift. The only thing I'm not hating here is Olivia. She seemed nice.
"Leni?"
I looked at her. "Hm?"
Olivia crushed the cigarette with the sole of her shoe. "What are you doing here?"
I looked at her confused. Isn't that obvious?
"What do you mean? I'm working here."
"No, I mean, what are you doing here?"
Oh. "Well, if you really want to know, my mom is a witch and my dad is dead, and through a coincidence I found out that he had a bank account for my nineteenth birthday. With that money, I left my personal hell, with my mom as the devil, and started studying at the ESU. And well, I need money because the money from my dad won't be enough to stay here," I explained.
"You're nineteen?" She whispered, making a step toward me. That made an age difference of eleven years between the two of us.
Damn it.
I didn't know that the cozy bar turned out to be a strip club, let alone that you had to be at least twenty-one to enter. Which is why I was planning on showing a fake ID, but when my boss Kevin didn't even ask for it, I didn't see the need to tell him the truth.
"Could be?" I smiled nervously. "Please don't tell anyone. Especially not Kevin," I begged.
She sighed. "I won't."
A sign of relief made its way through my body. "Thank you."
