Honey Lips | ✓

Chapter One

“Do you think eyes can dance?”

Ivy scrunched her nose and paused. She raised her head and met the playful eyes of her colleague,“Dance?” She continued with her task of sweeping the floor while she thought over the question. At last she said,“I'm not sure but I guess.”

“Come on, hear me out.” Claire argued as though she still had to convince Ivy, her mouth twisted in a mischievous smile,“When you listen to music and you move your eyes side to side and up and down then they're dancing!”

“Whatever you say,” Ivy hid her smile and shook her head. She left Claire standing by the counter and walked to the storage room to put the broom away.

As she returned from the dark little room, Ivy heard loud music coming from the front of the store and she rolled her eyes. What was her best friend up to now?

Crossed arms and raised eyebrows, Ivy stopped at the counter and silently criticised a dancing Claire despite her better judgement. A quick glance around the room told her that there weren't any customers in the store and she was safe from humiliation for the time being. Ivy knew well that her friend's eccentric dancing would be the only source of gossip between the older ladies at their afternoon tea if someone were to witness the spectacle.

Noting that she had nothing to worry about, Ivy took a breath to relax herself. She tried to stifle her laughter as she watched Claire roll her eyes repeatedly while moving her body to the rhythm of some pop song,“You're gonna make yourself dizzy if you keep at that!”

“I'm proving a point!” Claire defended, slightly winded. She stood with her hands on her hips and tried to catch her breath when the song ended. The counter offered support as she leaned on it and blinked rapidly, holding a hand to her forehead,“Don't you dare say it.”

“What?” Ivy feigned innocence, her eyebrows furrowed in what was supposed to be fake confusion though she knew she didn't have the acting skills required for the task,“It's not like I didn't warn you.”

“Shut up,”Claire groaned and took a few more seconds to regain her composure before she grabbed a magazine she brought from home and sat down, flipping through the pages.

When Ivy noticed that her friend's attention was on the latest fashion printed on silky paper, she knew she lost her. Her job at the local music store got boring quickly but with a colleague like Claire, hours often flew by. That is until her friend invested herself into the flashy trends.

There wasn't much left for Ivy to do, if she had to sweep the floor again she'd go mad. Instead she settled with inspecting the store, bright red walls accompanied the mahogany furniture. Vinyls hung proudly on the wall behind her where else the wall to her right displayed musical instruments, most of them were guitars.

Stands dotted around the room with various CDs from every type of genre along with magazines although most of them were stacked in a neat pile on the counter which was on the far left. A small radio was just behind the counter against the wall and there was never a time where Ivy didn't have the little box playing.

“—and that was yet another chart topping tune from the one and only Luke Darrow!” The radio host announced.

Ivy jumped when her friend started squealing, hitting her feet on the floor repeatedly as she kicked her legs up and down. Claire was unfazed by the glare sent her way and her attention remained on her phone.

“What in the world is the matter with you?” Ivy demanded, she hoped that her voice only held irritation and that her prior panicked state wasn't as obvious as she thought it was.

Another night of barely sleeping a wink caught up with Ivy and she practically threw herself down on a nearby chair, convinced her wobbly legs were about to give out any second. She held her head with her hand as though she was too exhausted to keep it up right otherwise.