Just Play Along

Twenty-Five & Twenty-Six

PART TWENTY FIVE

“What did he say to you?” I asked quickly. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes it does, if he’s got you this upset then surely it was something horrible!”

“You don’t want to hear it,” she said, blinking the tears out of her eyes and pasting the scowl back on her face.

“Yes I do, tell me!” I prompted her.

“Fine, he called me a gold digger,” she said, “And a fame whore.”

“Why?” Aston asked, “You’re neither of those things.”

“Clearly he was talking about us,” she said, “Why don’t we go get that drink?”

“Hang on,” I said, holding on to Jess’ arm as she went towards the bar. “Tell me what got you so upset. You’re a tough girl and you definitely know the score here.”

“Aston please stop,” Jess sighed.

“I will once you tell me!”

“I hate all this status stuff ok!” she said, “Why does it matter if someone’s family is the richest, or most famous?”

“George’s you mean?”

“Well not exactly,” she said, “But seriously, who cares if I want to work as someone’s Office Manager instead of being the Prime Minister? Who cares if I want to date a commoner or whatever? It shouldn’t matter! My father married a commoner and he’s only ever gotten shit for it from these people! And my brother’s deaf so apparently that’s the end of the family line according to them! Who actually gives a shit? Why can’t we just be a normal family? It’s like I have to defend all of them, for no real reason!”

“That’s how you feel, like you have to avenge your family name or something?”

“Yeah, I’ve already told you this…” she sighed. “But being around these morons just puts it all into perspective.”

“Is this why you hate these events?” I asked.

“Precisely,” Jess frowned. 

“Well,” I said carefully, “My mum told me I could be whoever I want and do whatever I want. And right now I say fuck them, let’s get hammered.”

And that is precisely what we did. Jess was almost at the point where she couldn’t stand, and I wasn’t much better. I’m sure we looked a state, but if this made her forget about the drama with George then it was what we were going to do. I’d managed to get the rest of her family involved, the five of us up in the stands with bottomless glasses of champagne being as rowdy as possible.

“Happy Feet!” Jess shouted as her horse was announced. I couldn’t help but crack up at this statement, cheering along with her.

“He’s going to lose!” I laughed.

“Shut up!!” Jess said with a laugh, jumping to her feet and clapping her hands. Clearly whatever I’d made her drink had done the trick, she had no recollection of her run in with George whatsoever.

We watched Happy Feet and all of our other horses lose dramatically. It was fun though, just shouting nonsense at horses and having a laugh with Jess’ family.

* Ring Ring *

“Hang on,” I said, pulling my phone out and staring at the screen. It looked important so I wandered up out of the stands near the toilets so I could take it.

“Hello?” I said into the phone.

“Car is going to be at yours in twenty minutes,” Marvin said. My eyes went wide at this statement.