Bright Young Things (Miles Maitland X OFC)

Chapter 2 - Plans

Angry and hurt she walked briskly down the street. As it started to rain she cursed herself for not grabbing her coat, she put her hat on and tucked all her hair up into it so it would get so wet. She ducked into the first club she saw, it was one she had gone to before so she knew her way around.
She sat down in the corner and placed her head down into her arms. Her cheek stung and made her wanna cry now that the anger had worn off. After a few minutes of tears dripping onto the table a voice startled her.
"You look like you need a drink. What's your name?" She looked up to see a young man who also had a bit of red around his eyes, holding out a martini with one in his other hand for himself.
"Aidan." She said in a gravelly voice before clearing her throat. "Sorry, I'm Aidan." She said in her normal voice and he looked taken back.
"Oh goodness me, I thought you were a boy." It would've been rude to leave now and when he saw her teary eyes he felt bad for her so he sat down across the little table.
"I get that lot, don't worry." She laughed slightly as she dried her eyes on her sleeve. "Wait, you were coming over to give a drink to a guy?" She said, confused but when he looked away shyly, she realized it. "Oh I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that."
"So you're not disgusted?" He asked and she smiled.
"You being who you are, it's just as socially wrong as me wearing pants and playing sports."
"Im Miles." He smiled happily. He saw her pained smile faulter slightly as she tried to hold it. "All other motives aside, are you okay?" She looked down and shook her head.
"My mother is trying to marry me off to this man that I really hate. But I can't deny his proposal because I've denied every suitor in France." She took a sip of the drink he passed her.
"Sounds frightfully similar to my situation." Miles said before asking a passing barkeep to bring two more martinis.
"Really?" Aidan needed anything to get her mind off of this.
"I just moved here with my mother for the same reason I initially brought you this drink, my... lover left some letters from me out and when that got out we had to flee the country, they even put a warrant out for my arrest." His voice squeaked slightly as tears well in his eyes. "I don't even know why."
"Oh poor dear." Aidan looked at him sadly, "Why is the world so cruel to people like us? Why can't they just let us be us?"
"I don't know."
After a few more drinks they talked about how they both moved from England for different reasons and about the friends they had left behind. Aidan looked down at the table before turning to look into the crowd and unintentionally showing him the red welt on her cheek.
"Dear god what happened?" He pointed to her red cheek that she was hoping was fading.
"Oh..." her stomach twisted with embarrassment. "The guy my mother set me up with, he got a little mad this afternoon when I told him he was only marrying me for my money."
"He did this to you? Oh sweet thing, please tell me you're not going to marry him." Aidan figured it was his tipsy mind that was making him so concerned for a complete stranger.
"I have to, there's no one else, he is literally the last person who's shown interest in me, my parents will hold a shotgun to my back if they have to."
After a sad silence and another drink Miles got an idea.
"Marry me." He said and Aidan coughed up her drink.
"But I thought you said you were, ummm not interested in humans.. like me." She said, careful in case someone overheard and got him in trouble.
"Well we wouldn't actually, like you know, be together, but if our parents thought we were, if we were very secretive about it, we would have more time. I could find a nice someone and if you meet someone, then we could get divorced and live our lives without our families watching over us."
Aidan thought about this, she didn't want to live with someone who was going to try and change her and make her stop what she loves doing and it would please both their families.
"Are you sure you're not drunk?" She said not willing to agree to a crazy idea with a drunk man who wouldn't remember anything in the morning anyway.
"Oh dearest, you've yet to me drunk." He wiggled his brows at her and she laughed. "So, what do you say?"
"My parents are having a party at the end of the week, would you come and propose to me then?"
"On my honour, I shan't be a minute late."
"Speaking of late, I think I best be going home, it's dark out now." Aidan stood up.
"No lady should walk home by herself, let me escort you." He said standing up and paying for the drinks at the counter.
Aidan smiled as Miles held his arm up for her to hold onto as they walked to the door. Miles was a little taller than she was so she leaned on him knowing tomorrow this was probably going to sound like a very bad idea.
Once they got outside Aidan shivered. It was still raining. Miles took off his coat and put it over her, he was wearing a lot more clothes than she was anyway.
"Oh no, keep it, you'll catch a cold." She tried to take it off and he put it back on her.
"Nonsense, I'll be fine, I quite like the rain."
Aidan noticed how bouncey Miles was when he was happy and seeing that made her happy.
Aidan brought up racing and they chatted excitedly for a few minutes it took to walk to her house which wasn't more than a kilometre away from his own house.
Now they stood in front of her door.
"Would you come to lunch tomorrow so my mother can meet you?" She said and he nodded.
"If you'll come to dinner so my mother can meet you."
They stood there under the doorway quite close while they hid from the rain.
"Thank you... by the way." She said and he shook his tired head.
"I should be thanking you." He leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Thank you."
He turned and walked away down the street, the rain was coming to a halt and by the time Aidan realized that she was still wearing his coat he was already out of sight.

Miles smiled as he got home and went up to his room, changing out of his wet clothes and into dry ones. After 3 weeks of living here he had made a friend he was sure was going to be a grand one and with whom he had planned something big. He hoped he made the right choice by asking her. He had an overwhelming feeling that he could trust her with his life.

Aidan walked into her house to find her mother still up. Mrs. Reeves walked briskly over opening her mouth to speak but Aidan held up her hand halting her mother.
"I wanted to tell you something, I've made plans. I'm going to be proposed to at the party this week." Aidan said and a smile spread across her mother's lips.
"I knew you'd see good in him, but I thought he was going to propose to you tonight, then you both disappeared."
"Not Charlies mum." Aidan and her mother went pale. "Charles does not deserve my love, I have found a man who does. I believe you met his mother Mrs. Maitland?"
Her mother opened and closed her mouth like a fish, shocked, at both this sudden change and that her daughter was actually wanting to get married.
"Um yes. Her son, I heard rumours about him, I thought-"
"You're going to let rumours get in the way of me getting married?" Aidan said with fake amazement.
"But-"
"He's coming to lunch tomorrow, goodnight mum."
Aidan was amazed she just got away with talking to her mother like that. She figured she would still be scolded later for it but her mother was too much in shock at the moment.

The next morning Miles came down the stairs with a pep in his step surprising his mother at the breakfast table as she read the paper.
"Miles, I was worried, you left and didn't come home. What happened?"
Miles took a deep breath to calm himself so he could explain while the maid put a plate of bacon, eggs, and toast in front of him.
"I'm going to propose to someone, not to Louisiana."
His mother felt like she was having a heart attack at the prospect of her son marrying a man.
"Y-you will not!!"
"Mother, calm down, to a girl." He said and she calmed down a little. "She's from a high class family, the Reeves."
"The Reeves? I thought their girl had a suitor." Miles swallowed hard to keep himself from getting mad at the thought of that awful man hurting someone so kind as Aidan.
"They broke up, I was told, I plan to propose to her at the Reeves' party at the end of the week."
Shocked as his mother was, she accepted it rather well and was actually glad to see her son so happy and was willing to set up dinner for that evening.

Yeet, tell me what you think so far!

OXOXO
Angel