Hope Begins to Fade

Shhh...quiet

"I can confirm that I am the hairdresser responsible for keeping your hair out of harm's way," he smirked.

My eyes flew to his and my mouth dropped open. "You have boys. How did you learn to braid?"

"I have younger sister and if you ever tell anyone that I learned to braid hair playing beauty parlour with her my retribution will be dire."

"I've seen the old pictures, is that where you learned to do make-up as well? I have to be honest if I went to your beauty parlour and walked out with some of those make-up looks I would not have been happy," I teased.

"Laugh all you want, my sister asked me to do her make-up for prom."

"Really?" My eyes opened wider than they had all morning.

"No, not really. But I could have and she would have slayed!"

My stomach turned over and I wasn't entirely sure it was just because of my hangover. Me getting a bigger crush on Matt? I was pretty sure that was a bad decision he couldn't help me with unless he suddenly morphed into a dickhead of the first order.

Fortunately for my defences that had been weakened by my hangover Matt left me to my own devices and promising to bring me back a cheeseburger he'd gone out for the afternoon.

I slept for a while and when I stretched out across my bed some time in the early afternoon. If I was disappointed that Matt wasn't beside me I managed to push that feeling deep down inside. I was however happy to admit that I was very grateful to him for leaving a bottle of Sprite for me on the bedside table.

I lay staring at the ceiling and wondering if I had the energy to cue something up on Netflix or if I'd just spend the rest of the day and evening wallowing in my physical infirmity. The decision was taken out of my hands by the sound of my phone ringing from where it lay beside the Sprite bottle. I considered ignoring it for a moment, the last thing I needed when I was recovering from what was likely the most epic hangover of my life was to talk to my sister. With a sigh I picked up the phone because regardless of how different we were as people, I loved my sister. Also I knew her far too well; if I didn't answer she'd keep calling until I did. I'd managed to successfully dodge her for weeks, since I'd taken the job with Matt in fact.

"Hi Kelly," I said wearily.

"Slut! What's wrong?" her cheery voice rang out. The background noise made me think she was in a bar or a restaurant, somewhere public at any rate.

"Nothing's wrong whore. I'm just hungover." My sister was the only person I swore around if I could help it. Any outsider listening to the levels of profanity we used and the way we addressed each other would have been horrified. Sometimes I was horrified. Tim had teased me mercilessly and always told me that under no circumstances should I answer a call from my sister at work.

"Holy shit slut! That's fucking awesome," Kelly enthused.

"No it's fucking not. I feel like I'm dying here. Where are you anyway? It sounds noisy there." My sister had spent years trying to corrupt me so her pleasure in my suffering was not unexpected.

"A boring as shit party of Sean's." Sean was her friend and boss, I'd never heard her describe one of his parties as boring before. I wondered what was going on with my sister.

"So you called me because you're fucking bored? Kelly, I'm serious. I'm fucking dying here. Can't you call back another time?" It was Saturday night in London, surely her party couldn't have been that boring?

"Suck it up bitch. You're partying with rock stars now." Kelly laughed down the line. There it was, the reason for her call. For some reason I'd been reluctant to discuss my new job with her. Maybe it was because out of the two of us Kelly was far more suited to be personal assistant to a musician. I wondered what Steph had told her. "So do you want to tell me about your night out?" Kelly asked.