[completed] Nova Carter knows exactly what the next few years of her life will look like: she will work harder than anyone else (as she didn't get into New York University to slack off); she'll be keeping her head down and prioritizing getting her a...
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Chapter Thirty-nine | Still Beating ♫Still Beating by Mac Demarco
I don't go places on my own.
It makes me too nervous. I worry about not being able to handle myself when there's nobody around I feel comfortable asking for help. I can have the greatest ideas and the craziest cravings, but if no-one's there to let me grab onto them, I tend to stay right where I am.
At least, that's how it used to be.
I don't want to be an adult who can't go places on her own. I'm about to be nineteen and wrap up my first year at college. There's so much I've already achieved. Now, I want to achieve knowing how to be by myself in public.
That is why I use Ramona Sinclair as an excuse to get out of my dorm and purchase a bucket of fried chicken.
It's a strange thing, carrying fried chicken into a skyscraper with its golden accents and black marble. I even consider taking the stairs, not having forgotten last week's fiasco, but then I remember my legs and step into the elevator, regardless. Halfway up, I realize I have to pee, which is a standard thing when I'm nervous.
It gets to a point where, by the time I'm all the way to Ramona's floor, I'm practically dancing my way to her front door.
She takes her time opening the door after I've knocked, her eyes widening when she sees me. "What are you doing here?"
I weakly lift the hand that's holding the to-go bag. "Chicken," I say. "I have to pee so bad. Can I please use your bathroom?"
Ramona clearly hesitates. She hasn't even opened the door all the way, she just kind of poked her head out.
"If you couldn't tell by my squirms— it's either your bathroom or your front door at this point."
She grimaces. "Fine," she says. She steps back, opens the door wide and holds out her hand. "Give me the chicken. Bathroom's first door to the left."
She doesn't have to tell me twice. I push the bag into her arms and half-run to her toilet, which looks like the type of bathroom celebrities film those Vogue makeup routine videos in. It doesn't even look lived in. A fluffy, white bathrobe hangs steamed on the wall, and the counter (in which her sink is dipped) is lined with branded skincare products. Dior, Chanel, Guerlain, Orogold. I'm sure she gets these for free, even.
It's strange looking at myself in her ginormous mirror, as lanky and spastic as I am and literally sitting on the toilet with my pants— Milo's jeans— at my ankles.
It's why I don't spend too much time in there and instead find Ramona in her kitchen, where she's busy plating the fried chicken on two crystal plates.
"Seriously?"
She looks up at me. "I told you I have class, didn't I?" She says calmly. "Eating from a bucket is for people who don't have exclusive Artemest crystal plates from the 1956 spring collection."
