Copyright © 2014 by roastedpiglet (of Wattpad)
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Piggy's Note:
Hey, baby doll! What's up?
Smile—because you're loveliest that way. [wink]
Thank you SO much for reading / voting / commenting / adding to your reading list(s) / following! "How to Fall in Love" has reached bold red [gasp] and I owe it all to you!
I hope you'll like this chapter! If you would look closely, you'd see that there are a lot of negations here, negations that pertain to whatever the two leads exchanged with each other last chapter.
To the right is "Bet on You," by The RockAteers.
See you again soon?
Cookies x muffins x cupcakes
Myka
❀❃❀❃❀
c h a p t e r t w e n t y - s i x
[ h o w t o b e s t r a n g e l y a d o r a b l e ]
Just one more.
Just one more bite, I told myself, and I'll talk to him.
Finn swirled his fork in an artful fashion, putting it inside his mouth.
Go.
"I have a lot of questions."
Finn looked up from his Pesto o' Cream. There was left-over cream on the upper left side of his lips, instantly making me laugh.
I pointed at it. It looked like left-over shaving cream! Did he forget to shave it off? I chuckled relentlessly. Better yet, he looked like Santa whose beard got chewed off by Rudolf!
This was my Christmas.
He furrowed his eyebrows, swallowing his forkful of pesto in an instant. He wiped his whole mouth with a tissue napkin and then looked down at it, revealing the left-over shaving cream, before putting it aside and proceeding to scowl at me. "Do you think that's funny?"
I stopped a short chuckle from coming out. "N—no."
"You don't have the liberty to ask me. I have a lot of questions."
The smile left my face. "No, I do."
"I do."
"I do!"
"No, I d—"
"Please stop?" I asked, stifling the urge to smack him on the back of his head. If he was going to act like this, I guess this was the end of this specific discussion. Heaps of questions? Perhaps for some other time. I shook my head at Finn in a reproachful manner. "You're behaving childishly."
"That's for you to say," he muttered bitterly. When I thought that was the end of it, quite surprised that he was up to no revenge, he decided to prove me wrong when a ghost of a smile appeared on his face. His voice transcended into a teasing tone. "You were bawling your eyes out earlier just because of a commercial. What are you, a crybaby?"
My ears rang at the familiar nickname. Crybaby.
I shook my head rigorously, panicking for reasons I couldn't identify. "You can't use that. That's what Miles calls me!"
My eyes widened at my name-slip. I looked over at Finn, whose expression was gradually mirroring mine: muddled and knocked for six.
"Who—who again?" he stuttered. He stuttered! The great CEO Finn Laurel stuttered!
"I—I—what are we talking about?" I stammered as well, closing my eyes shut for a brief second to berate myself for my moronic tendencies.
The uncomprehending look on Finn's face vanished as he, in an instant, narrowed his eyes, studied me, and said, with a voice that was staid and sombre: "Whose name did you say?"
The atmosphere suddenly changed.
There's no harm in saying it, right? I implored the heavens, looking up at the ceiling. A name's pretty harmless, right?
When I felt a sudden whiff of air that smelt of deluxe pizza blowing at the right side of my face, I took that as a yes.
Finn was still waiting for my answer. Rather impatiently, at that.
I breathed in and morphed my flustered expression into that of indifference, like I didn't give a rat's care or two.
"Miles Royal," I said in a casual manner, my voice even and I-really-couldn't-care-less. I then shrugged, every fibre of my body in absolute insouciance. Surprisingly, I found myself enjoying it. "According to him, he's the general manager of Royal Hotels."
"According to him," Finn repeated under his breath, his face scrunching in distaste. He scoffed in indignation. "You talk to that creep?"
"That creep?" I repeated in disbelief, finding myself jumping in his defence. "Miles is my crying shoulder, for your information!"
Finn's eyes widened at my raised tone, his voice dripping with hysterical incredulity. "Your crying shoulder?"
I chinned up. "Yes. He's my crying shoulder. And I would appreciate it if you don't insult him like that, thank you very much."
Before he had time to scrunch his face like an ogre whose booger he couldn't pick nor sneeze out, a sudden thought seemed to arrive in Finn's mind, making him look blank in one second and then enlightened in the next. And at the sight of curious guilt swimming across his eyes, I already knew what he was going to say before he said it: "What did you need a crying shoulder for, Mia? Did I—?"
"Yes," I accused, not letting him finish his sentence. "You've bullied me. Of course I had to cry."
"I apologise profusely for making you cry," he said, throwing me off guard, but his dulcet undertones vanished in an instant when he prevailed with, "So you've met him after Attraction? Is that why you were suddenly gone? When Alex and I were searching everywhere for you, you were with that creep?"
I gnashed my teeth together, miffed now. "Please refrain from calling him 'that creep,'" I said, my voice shrill. "It's not nice."
Sardonic spills of laughter tumbled out of his lips. "Not nice?" He chuckled again, rolling his eyes in maximum petty mode. "I'll tell you what's not nice: him."
I was about to heave three deep breaths in order to calm myself and my ever-growing riled up nerves when all of a sudden a sharp idea flew smack to the centre of my head, making me smile with sly. I waggled my eyebrows at Finn, to my credit making him look just fractionally frightened. "Why do you say that?" I asked him, jaunting. "Have the two of you gone through a rough break-up in the past?"
Finn's jaw dropped to the ground, cracked once and split in the middle, and then rolled over to my feet. His cyan-grey eyes, which were once narrowed, now grew wide with irritation. "Let me educate you, Miss Lockheart. First of all, I'm straight as a cheque. Second, that creep is not nice. Third, I'd rather go bankrupt than be associated with the creepy ass creep."
"With all due respect, sir, now I think you're calling him 'the creep' just to get on my nerves."
"Oh, Miss Lockheart," he said, voice mocking, "learn to separate your expectations from reality."
For some reason, I felt insulted. It seemed like a backhanded comment that contained dire ire, made to get under my nerves, which it did. Considering I was a writer, having told to learn what was real and unreal was just like saying I didn't know what fiction and non-fiction meant: gravely insulting.
I ruminated over my options: I could fall prey to my fury and chug my glass of water right to his face to impale him with thawed pride and inevitable embarrassment, I could also blurt out heated things to hurt his feelings, or I could simply play the infamous guilt card, rubbing his conscience.
Of course, I went with Option Number Three.
"Please correct me if I'm wrong, Finn Laurel, but I so clearly remember that you told me I deserve your best," I told him, making him remember his promise to me back at Forge: that since I saw his worst side, it was high time I saw his best, because I deserved it. "With all due respect, I don't think this is your best."
He stopped in his tracks. "That is not fair."
I shook my head, stopping a smirk from forming on my lips from knowing that my Mission? Accomplished. "Calling him 'the creep' is not fair."
"With all due respect," he said, voice ironically condescending, "why are you defending the asshole?"
I scowled, not able to hide it anymore and not able to believe the word that just rolled off his tongue with such finesse you wouldn't expect would come with a strong swear word. Asshole. "The reason for that is because you're calling him things he's not."
Finn wasn't fazed. In fact, he seemed more determined. "How do you know that general manager is not a creep and an asshole?"
I almost sneered. That's it? "He was kind to me from the very beginning, despite an issue or two, and he's kind to me now."
"But I'm kind to you!"
"Not from the very beginning."
"You spilt hot coffee on me—"
"I thought we were over that, sir!"
"Why are you calling me 'sir'? Aren't we on first-name basis? Did you call that Royal guy by his first name from the very beginning as well?"
No, I called him Challuring. Charming and alluring. Just like him.
An inevitable blush rose on my cheeks at the thought, making me shake my head in a lame attempt to shake it off. "Err... no...," I lied.
"Why are you blushing?" Finn's eyes widened. "Did you have a nickname for him?!"
"Ahhh. My stomach!" I curled around in the best foetus position I could manage given the space I had and hid under the table, bumping it in the process but ignoring the sharp tingle of pain that travelled from my forehead to the back of my head. Not being able to handle my curiosity not two seconds later, I snuck a glance at Finn and discovered that he was looking over, concerned. I hid back again and groaned some more. "Ugh, my stomach!"
Not being able to help it again, I stuck my head out and snuck one last stolen glance at him and saw that his eyebrows were drawn in the centre, like a curled arch. For some reason, I felt a strange urge to run my fingers across them and straighten them up. I bit my lip and shook the thought away.
"Are you okay?" Finn asked, sounding as worried as he looked. He tried craning his neck to take a better look at me, but consequently I tried to hide even farther. "Is it gastric ulcer again?"
"It's—it's rumbling," I muttered, feeling the wooden texture of the table atop my head, welcoming the darkness of the space under the table but not the sight of Finn's suit—worn legs shaking in worry. From his face to his voice and now to his legs, he was worried. For me.
That was enough for me. Reluctantly, I stuck my head out from under the table, for real this time and not just to sneak a glance again, my props of a hand visibly creating circles over my stomach. "I—uh, I have to eat. Let's eat!"
His coalescing cyan and grey irises scrutinised me. After a while he said, "I'll order something warm for you." He put a hand up in the air, catching the attention of the same waiter, Konstantin, who approached us with a questioning look mixed with the right amount of concern.
"Is there something I can help you with, sir?"
Finn nodded at me. "Get her the best soup you have."
Konstantin suddenly sang the name of the best soup they had, surprising Finn and me, before shooting us the usual seller-to-customer smile and suavely exiting.
I sighed internally. Woo. Damn glad to get out of that one.
"Don't think you're getting out of this conversation."
I heaved a sigh, resisting the urge to click my tongue in annoyance. What was my genius shenanigan for if it didn't work? No, I whispered. It did work.
I stared at Finn, stoic. "I already did."
He stared right back, even more stoic if that even made sense. "No, you didn't."
"Yes, I did."
"No, you—"
"Okay," I snapped, shooting him one of my fiercest glowers. "I know Miles Royal. He's my friend. And he's nice. What else do you want to know?"
Finn remained undeterred, looking at me with a crabby look to boot. "Are you meeting him again?"
"Yes," I said nonchalantly. "I'm meeting him soon."
"Define 'soon.'"
"September 19 soon."
The corner under his left eye twitched, breaking his stoic composure. "2013?"
I nodded.
Whilst I was expecting him to freak out, we had a mini-staring contest instead, until he wrinkled his nose in disgust and merely shrugged, giving off an air of indifference, surprising me as this was the first reaction he had that showed he didn't give a damn.
When he spoke, it instantly cleared things up.
"You wouldn't be able to. You'll be stuck in Laurel-Tech working for the IT world."
Stunned, me. "W—what?"
He didn't look impressed. "I waited for four hours for you and not twenty-four hours later you've forgotten what my offer was?"
"I didn't forget," I corrected him for the sake of correcting him but also for the sake of letting him know that his waiting for four hours for me in Central Park didn't mean nothing to me. "But I haven't accepted it either."
His eyes grew as big as Jupiter. "You still haven't accepted?" he repeated, looking hideously incredulous. "Are you serious? You'll be a full-time employee, working from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m. in the Files Department, aiding the team leader with your talent in coding, Mondays to Fridays. Your salary will be fifteen hundred dollars a week, and my accountant writes a cheque to be delivered to your room on Fridays. My employees are highly educated people; they are formal, polite, and accommodating. My company's facilities are more than high-tech; they are high-end, the best you'll ever imagine. Laurel-Tech is the leading IT group, with millions and millions of followers. We improve the world. Surely this isn't something you'll just throw away!"
I cringed at the popping veins in his neck, a sign that he was more than just plainly frustrated. He was furious. "I'm not throwing it away," I tried to say as softly as I could, "but I need more time to ruminate over my choices."
"Ruminate over your choices? Ms. Lockheart, it's either gain or pain. Evidently, the latter is what you'll be showered with if you reject my offer."
"You don't understand," I countered. "Laurel-Tech is such a colossal empire! I'm not a college graduate!" My voice broke with bitterness, just a little bit. "The people I will be working with are IT graduates from the best universities in the country whilst you have me, one-year hermit who only finished high school with no fancy certificates and medals from the finest educational systems! That's intimidating! That's a lot of people! That's a lot to carry on a girl's shoulders!"
"Is that your only problem?" he asked, looking at me carefully, as though he hadn't just heard everything I'd said. "Are you certain it's not someone else?"
"It's not you," I directly said, shattering his way off-kilter suspicion. "I'm just scared I won't be able to do well and consequently disappoint a lot of people."
He clocked his face, studying me. "Failure," he finally said. "You're afraid of failure."
Yay, I said sarcastically. Thanks for putting it so lightly. I'm sorry I failed in assassinating you during your weakest moments. I might've done the world a huuuuge favour!
I shook my head, inwardly. Never mind that.
"I should've murdered you!" I blurted out, my eyes widening at the blatant showcasing of my finest moronic tendencies. I shook my head, not inwardly this time, with a bit of severity. "I mean, I should've... I should've..." I clocked my tongue. Come on, think of something! Hurry...
"I get it," said Finn, interrupting my pain-inducing internal monologue. "You're clearly not good at making decisions."
My jaw dropped open, not able to believe that he could just insult me like that. Well, after telling him that it was best to have him murdered, he just might have the right... Nevertheless, my voice was wry when I said, "Thank you, you're very—"
"You wouldn't be a failure," he said, cutting my comeback off and negating my belief about myself and what I could solely do. "You wouldn't fail. And even if you do, isn't that normal? Don't people learn best after they fail? The IT business isn't rid of mistakes either. What are bugs for then, if not to make us learn from them and keep innovating?" He must've seen me slowly but surely being convinced as he lowered his voice, making it even, looking straight at me, "As long as you learn to fix your mistake, there's nothing wrong in making one."
I couldn't help it—I smiled. And it wasn't a small one, something that consisted of me puckering up a corner of my lips in the smallest fraction—but a herculean one, something that made me look like I had the largest set of lips and something that reached my eyes.
"Wow," I blurted out, grinning full-blast. "Who knew you could be such a sweetheart?"
He laughed, but looked revolted right at the next second. "For future reference, you'll lose all fortune when you call me that again."
I wrinkled my nose at him. "Okay. Miles is the sweetheart."
His expression darkened, revolted look turning into dark glower. "If you're into creeps so much then I suppose it's such a wise decision to go to him on September nineteenth year twenty-thirteen."
"Sure thing. Watch me do it."
"And see that creep at your expense? No deal."
I raised an eyebrow at him. "Is that a challenge?"
A short chuckle left his lips. "It's rejection."
"Then I guess you're not invited—"
"That grieves me—"
"To the Royal Hotels Ball," I continued, as though he hadn't interrupted. "I'm sure the food there is more beautiful than this Lemon Pepperoni, although this fix tastes delicious."
"'The food there is more beautiful'? Fine choice of words."
I scowled at him. "You're such a dick."
"Finest."
I laughed, and he laughed as well; and we prevailed with our dinner with no more setbacks and call-backs and disputes. Finn then billed out half an hour later, answered the survey sheet that came along with the bill, and now we were walking towards his car in the front parking lot, swaying our arms with the wind as we went.
It was a cool Thursday night, at nine in the evening as the digital clock in the form of a circular pizza meal formed as the first letter 'a' in Via's Pizzas said. I turned around and swayed back, matching Finn's casual, almost lazy, pace of striding. I felt like it had been so long since I'd last felt this way—open, but all right. Light, and all right. Like I'd let go of a lot of things to someone who wouldn't let go of them to other people, sealing it with a non-spoken word of promise.
It was comforting.
When we reached Finn's slick blue car and he opened his car door without opening the passenger door for me, I cracked a smile to see how habits stay unchanged. Sure, maybe he wasn't one of those guys who opened passenger doors for girls—but maybe he was the guy who knew those girls, understood those girls, and learnt way back perhaps from experience how to handle their insecurities and make them feel good about themselves. For once. For a change.
And as I opened the passenger door and got in myself, before Finn even had the chance to curb out of the parking lot, I paid heed to my urge to say something, what I'd been meaning to since I'd reached Central Park.
"Hello, Finn," I said, turning to my left and meeting his surprised gaze.
He looked at me like I was a fine specimen, like a world-renowned fossil superhero. His hand that held his car key drew back from the keyhole. "For some reason, that just gave me chills."
I laughed, finding it ridiculous, but strangely adorable.
Adorable? Where the heck did you get that?
I shook my head, smiling instead. "I have an answer now, concerning your offer to me."
"Ah," he said, raising an eyebrow at me. "So? Should I cover my ears just in case I don't like your answer?"
I shook my head again, my smile growing. "No need for that. My answer is..." I stopped, thinking silently, just like what it was when you promised me your best, "yes."
Finn then cracked a smile, eyes softening. "I knew it, Mia."
I furrowed my eyebrows. "Knew what?"
He cast me somewhat of a dizzying grin, what with his set of seemingly imperfection-ridden teeth, but in reality the glaze over his eyes that spoke volumes I couldn't hear was what made me feel rooted to my spot, unable to move.
"That you were just playing hard-to-get this whole time. And that I find it strangely adorable."