I Like Your Shoes | ✓

Chapter 34 | An Audience With the Dark Lord

"Hey, hey. Look, this can go two ways. Either you can act like nothing happened and forget about it, or you can go with the flow and see what happens. You'll be spending a week in Venice with him, Ambrosia, see where it goes with him."

See where it goes with him.

I can work with that.

"You're right. We're grown ups. I can take care of this."

"Good. Just don't think too much, okay? It never helps." I roll my eyes at her.

"Go sleep now. You need all your energy for tomorrow," She suggests, smirking at me.

"What do you mean 'need all your energy'?"

"Don't you see the pattern, Ambrosia? All of your adventures happen on a plane." She giggles, giving me a friendly shove in the direction of the stairs.

I smile back at her, thinking how true her words really were.

~•~

[Calum Achorn]

It's a truth universally acknowledged that a man in love is never allowed to have a good night's sleep.

But I wasn't in love, I couldn't be.

Or was I?

I sit upright in a flash, my eyes wide open and my arms flailing around me, as if I were drowning. I run a hand through my hair, which is messy and unkempt. Taking a deep breath, I slowly try to relax.

Love is not as easy as they make it seem, not at all. It's swords and daggers against your heart, hydrogen bombs in your stomach, a nuclear reaction in your brain.

I felt like a comet, hurtling towards earth.

What am I going to do?

When Mr Van Gough asked me to attend his charity ball in Venice, I didn't know what coaxed me to ask Ambrosia Bellemore to come.

What was I thinking?

A week with that infuriatingly addictive woman will drive me crazy, I might rip my head off, or worse, tear my heart out.

And what about the ten hour flight with her? Why didn't I think about that?

Sometimes, I prided myself for my quick analytical brain. But now, not so much.

I'm an utter and complete fool.

I'm moon walking on my own grave.

I'm stabbing myself with my own knife.

How am I supposed to spend ten hours with her? Hide in the bathroom to stay away from her? Like I did last time?

I couldn't even pretend to be someone else this time.

What if I swapped seats with someone else?

But did I want to?

No, of course not.

Why does everything have to be so damn confusing?!

I've never in my life felt so hopeless before. Everyone looked up to me for directions, I was supposed to be the level headed one. Then why was I feeling like I had no clue about what's happening to me right now?

"Ugh," I hit myself over the head for a few times, trying to keep the headache at bay.

"I don't like feeling this way. I hate this feeling." I mutter, groaning in despair.