1ˁᵀ CHAPTER
“Hug the shore; let others try the deep”
When she comes home, she’s nothing but a wreck in an amount of old, wet, dirty clothes she desires with all her strength to rip off of her body and throw away into the night, so that a homeless person or maybe some animal can take it and just give it some end. She doesn’t do it, though.
Mostly because those same old, wet and dirty clothes had costed her way more than she would admit she can afford, and it’s not often she can really buy new clothes for herself, so. She restrains herself to simply take them off and throw them all into the sink on her way to the shower.
And she’s is gagging for it, sort of. Needs to take off the dust and sweat smell from her skin more than she can even think about it.
Before she can go mad, she’s under the water, not really bothering she hadn’t been able to pay the bills completely and having to face a cold shower every night for the last week or so. It’s actually refreshing, now, taking into account the feverish evening and how hot it is. Leesh is burning, even though she is wet still from the carwash she’d helped Edwin with, since the café was empty as usual, but even the moisture on her body had become hot. The parts where the water hadn’t just evaporated had the teardrops warm as sweat, and it isn’t a good feeling, if she may say.
Her head literally starts spinning with relief once she feels the cold against her skin in flames, nearly falling to the tiles under her feet with so much tiredness. Her legs are shaking with the need to sit down and just relax, the muscles aching so badly she thinks she might collapse right there, if she stands for too long. It had been such a long day. And even though that is her daily routine, she can’t get used to it; thought and acted the exact same every single end of every single day, and can’t bring herself to change her manners even if she wants to.
Studies aren’t even her problems, since she’d finished college long ago. The real issue is surviving, to be quite honest. Leesha doesn’t have a goal; right now, her life sums up to waking up early to go to an almost bankrupt café where she has breakfast – since she lives in nothing but a room with a bathroom – and also stay there most part of the day, hoping one will be better than the last one, that she’ll be able to actually take a customer’s request, if it actually happens to be more than ten throughout the whole entire day.
The paycheck is nowhere near what she needs to pay the totally bankrupt motel she lives in, which happened to turn into some kind of pension since visitors didn’t even bother to stop by that piece of trash. Nowadays, its occupants are basically broke people who have literally nowhere to live, being obligated to deal with one-falling-to-pieces room, which offers nothing but a useless and overly small fridge, a bed that smells mould and is barely able to provide enough space for one person to sleep, a bathroom with a pathetic shower, a small sink and a loo. And that is basically it.
There is also a window with access to the fire escape, but it is ridiculously small, like everything else, really, and Leesh doubts – if it ever happens to be a fire there – she will be able to escape at all. Until she gets to go through the window she will have probably been burnt already.
Well, that if she doesn’t burn right now, with that awful heat coming from literally everywhere. Even the air is hot; she can feel it burning her lungs, suffocating her. Leesha hates summer. Absolutely hates it.
If she was rich, had a house with a pool or money to travel and enjoy the sun, she would love it. But she doesn’t; she’s poor, lives in this stupid motel and the closest she can get to a pool is the way her bathroom stays every after her showers. Water pooled all over the tiles, soaking the whole entire bathroom and even a bit of the room, which she doesn’t even bother to decorate with carpets because, one: they would get soaked as well and she doesn’t have much space to let them dry; two: it’s too fucking hot to put warm objects into such a tiny space; and three: she can’t spend her limited money on idle things.
She probably as well hates her life at the moment, but has already gotten to the point where she doesn’t care. Much, anyway.
Her whole family is back in Leeds; she’s left her hometown to study journalism in London, and since then life hasn’t been the nicest to her. But then again, Leesh doesn’t care. Honestly, she has come to terms with it long ago. Studies are over, she doesn’t own any big dreams, has always been quite the average girl when it comes to that, and she has even had a few dates here and there, but getting into something serious isn’t really her style.
The most serious relationship she has been into was probably the one with PJ, and even though he still comes after her once in a while, they didn’t really work out. She’s sure she’s the issue, ‘cause PJ is certainly fit and good, and sometimes he might be childish, but that’s one of the things she still loves the most about him: the way he can take the weight off her shoulders when everything is just overwhelming. They’ve remained good friends.
And yet, that’s it. She can’t bring herself to make her life any more interesting than what it is at the moment. She can’t really complain, though. Despite her days not being exactly the most exciting one could wish for, she’s found great people here, and can’t imagine her life without them anymore. She’s not the most popular either, but she’s okay with it. It’s never good being too known, whatsoever.
By the time she makes it back to the room, she’s already sweaty again, clumps of dump hair stuck to her back and forehead, hot towel not being used for anything if not to try and fail at drying her, then being dismissed anyway because she can’t bear wrapping herself in it when the touch of every single material simply burns.
Yet, she forces herself to put into the fresher clothes she manages to find, wishing more than ever she could have a working fan to at the very least blow her a bit of less-warm air, if that’s all she could get. And then again, the last fan she’d bought is thrown somewhere in that tiny room, waiting for repair but getting none it’s been a couple of years.
She hates herself for it; but what can she do?
Before falling to her bed, she dares to open the window – as the usual having to use more strength than she’s willing to, to get that damn glass to go up without falling back down and crashing her fingers against the sill (it’s happened more than she’d like) –, and soon enough is greeted with more heat and the sound of some pissed driver honking somewhere outside, nothing different from what she’s heard since she moved there.
And a second later, when she thinks that’s it, the moment she finally gets to drift off from living hell, her mobile rings on the bedside. It’s with a long sigh of annoyance that she allows her arm to reach for the phone, fingers finding their way easily to the cheap furniture because she’s been there long enough to do anything inside that room blindfolded. It’s not hard, whatsoever. It’s probably been mentioned already that everything is unnecessarily small, so.
“’lo?” Leesh chokes out, already standing to her feet again as she nearly crawls over to the trash-y thing she calls fridge, opening it quickly to grab the last bottle of cold water she has stocked there, muttering a ‘shit’ under her breath because she’s not even decent enough to put water into freaking bottles she’s been keeping empty on the little table next to the door instead.
“Leesh, love!” a high-pitched voice cheers on the phone. The girl has to hold back the urge to tell him to fuck off and just go on with whatever he wants now, but stays silent, because. Well, there’s no way he’s going straight to the point, she knows it. “How’ve you been doing in this lovely, lovely evening?”
“Bursting into flames sounds like a good definition to me,” is her response, and even though she tries not to sound too bitchy, she knows she doesn’t succeed. Heat is the spark she needs to be the most negligible she can, and no fresh water running down her throat can quite fix it.
Luckily, Patrick knows her enough to not take it the wrong way. “Cheerful as always, I see” he mutters thoughtfully, the amused slash fond tone in his voice still there. “I’ll take it you still haven’t fixed the fan, then?” Leesh hums in what should sound like disagreement and PJ doesn’t wait for a proper answer. She wouldn’t give it anyway. “Must sort it out, babe. You do look lovely sweaty, but you’re always grumpy so it’s not exactly a win-win situation.”
Leesha growls as her back hits the mattress with a cracking sound, the structure of the bed shifting dangerously close to a full breakdown. “PJ. Point, please.”
“Fine. So, I might actually save you from crumbling into sweat. If you’re willing to come here now to help me out?”
And. Okay. There it goes.
She thinks twice about what she’s about to answer, knowing neither her bones nor basically the rest of her body are able to handle any more work by now. On the other hand, PJ does have a fresh and comfy place, and she may actually be able to relax there before doing whatever it is he wants her to do, now. Moreover, he wouldn’t deny her water or food. And she kind of needs it.
“One condition, only,” she reasons with her eyes still trained on the ceiling, hears PJ’s smile even though he hasn’t said anything. She knows his silence way-to-well to assume she’s gotta keep talking, so “I’m stealing your fan and cold water bags for tonight.”
And at the sound of his chuckle, the deal is sealed.
“Anything you need, my darling.”
Leesh actually rolls her eyes at that.
--
The walking to his flat should be pleasant at the sight of the city lights mixing into a blur of colours, breeze blowing her face all the time whilst she walks down the streets, hears the sound of the cars slowly passing over the gravel, turning from one corner to other and disappearing like that. But it’s not.
Leesha loves London, is the thing. She really, really does. It’s probably one of the most stunning cities at night, would even risk it to say it’s the city of her dreams and everything, but she’s kind of getting sick of it. Because everything beautiful there is to see, to visit, to appreciate, she can’t afford. Geez, she can’t even afford rent properly. It’s always a variable in her life, whether she’ll be able to pay it in time or not, so it’s not like she can even think of admiring the epical places in London.
She still can admire the beauty of the foreign tourists, though. There’s always someone different to creepily stare at and memorize the different features, the different eye colours, the different hair styles, and, mostly, the several different ways to dress. She’s not quite the fashion girl, but it’s nice to see rich people wearing expensive things she won’t ever buy.
All in all, it’s getting her sick.
Being in such a known city and living in the hidden holes it offers is not exactly what she’s dreamed for herself. She wanted a camera and time to photograph every light of every corner in every empty street; wanted time to write about what each of those pictures meant, make a comment about the way people walked on the sidewalk, how some hurried, some others didn’t seem to know that time even existed. She wanted to explore and turn each paving stone into a patch of some story, make her living time memorable, at least for the ones she knows.
But it’s not like that.
She doesn’t get to write what she wants; doesn’t have a camera to keep registered the most beautiful moments she witnesses, and certainly, has given up on doing so a while ago, now. She has no goals except sticking to her priorities, and her priorities right now are all related to what she cares the most.
It’s not her career.
So she simply sighs heavily as she knocks at PJ’s door, heat still killing her inside out, and ignores the beauty around her, because in the world she lives all of her beauties are not exactly visible. She’s used to that. Even thinks it’s better, sometimes.
Not even seconds after she’s knocked, a tall, fit frame – not dressed in anything but a tank top and freaking sleeping shorts (she still has a thing for those arms and legs, and abs and, well, everything about his gorgeous body, sue her) – is standing right in front of her, fingers messing up his hair and tossing it to the side, blue piercing eyes looking down at her fondly, that same amused smile showing up.
She doesn’t really swoon like when she did the first time they talked to each other, but she still has a hard time breathing near him. He knows that, it still amuses him.
And she still can’t understand how she even got to be with him once, but, whatever. That’s not the point.
“Leesh! You’re alive.”
“I’m alive,” she replies with a smile, dodging away from his arms when he tries to hug her, because “M’sweaty,” is the justification. Leesha hasn’t even bothered to put up fancier clothes – doesn’t have many –, considering PJ was no one special, really, and she wasn’t going on a date. They are friends, have known each other for a few years, have become close enough so she’d feel comfortable in just old jeans shorts and a white tank top that reveals her sweaty pores too much.
She feels comfortable. But still aware she’s disgusting.
“Okay, come in. I’ve got some good news.”
And her first reaction is to ask him about the favour he needed, but he knows her too well and just points a shushing finger at her, going for the lemonade pitcher on the coffee table. She mentally thanks all the probable existent Gods above and takes a sit on the floor, the cold tile beneath her thighs making her sigh in relief.
“As you’re an impatient one, I’m gonna go straight to the point: I got an offer and I might be hired as a permanent photojournalist, but I’m into a pile of other people who’re also getting this offer and I need to stand out. Must choose some nature-related topic – anything, really – and write an article about it, with the best pictures and everything.” PJ makes a pause to analyse Leesh’s reaction, but her face is basically blank, just showing a tad bit of curiousness as she sips her second glass of lemonade. “Okay, so. You’ve always been the most creative in class. I need your help, Leesh. Please? Nature has never been my focus, but if I do get this job it’s a huge opportunity and as you’re trying nothing now, I thought you’d maybe help me out with your brilliant ideas?”
Leesh huffs out a laugh along with a ‘sucker’, but nods anyway. He’d always told her during college that her ideas were brilliant (was the comment that led to the whole dating thing later, actually), and she quite loved him for that. Patrick had always been a gentleman, had also always shared the same passions as hers – they were studying the same freaking thing, for God’s sake. How d’you think they met? – so she wasn’t worried he was flattering her for the sake of getting what he wanted.
And it is true. She isn’t trying anything, so why not?
“Plus, with the money I’ll make, I can help the café out?” he adds uncertainly, looking at her with hope filling his eyes. “Might indicate the place to the people I work with, make it presentable, so it won’t bankrupt. We can kind of work on this together.”
And, well. The café. Is the thing.
The reason why Leesh isn’t trying anything at journalism. The café. It isn’t particularly a family business, her family isn’t even here, but she loves that place deeply and has been endeared by it – and the owner – since she came to London six years ago.
It belongs to an old, lovely woman that helped her as soon as she arrived, made her feel home, introduced her to basically everyone she knows now, had made her own family in the new city. It was nothing material, really, but it had made Leesha feel loved and there’s nothing in life more important than love. She knows it. She reckons it.
And that’s why she’d offered to work at the café at first place, that back then wasn’t the most popular café, either. But it was never so close to failure as it is now, and she doesn’t want it to turn into ruins. Doesn’t want some company to buy it and put the place down to build new companies, bigger and more important ones, and doesn’t want to see the person she considers her grandma without the only thing that brings her happiness and the rest of the money she can make.
That’s Leesha’s priority. And now there’s one more reason for her to help PJ.
She doesn’t really need to go any deeper in life; she’s happy with hugging the shore, as long as the café is still there for when she decides to leave the water.
--
Author's Mind (?)
Comments: 1. Happy new year! I'm so excited to start 2014 with this new fic; so many ideas. Really hope you'll enjoy it as much as I hope you will. 2. You can see how I picture Elisha/Leesh/Leesha on the multimedia
Dedication (to the best comment): {@Bosandra} Because, my dear, you're constantly supporting me. I appreciate it so f-cking much (you know it already, I've already talked to you), and this time it couldn't be different. I'm so glad I made you feel as if you were in the scene, just by reading the prologue, and I'm even gladder that you're still here, head over heels about a story I haven't even properly started yet. Readers like you make every single second I spend writing worth it. Thanks xx
Next Update: Wednesday; January 8th
Early Update: 500 votes