L E O N I E
The rest of the week dragged on. Heath and I hadn't talked. It was making me feel like a right asshole. But leading him on would be worse. I told myself that this was for the best. That being friends with someone that is total husband material would never work. But I missed him. Damn it all.
On Saturday morning, I reluctantly get up at seven. Let me repeat. On a Saturday I got out of bed at seven. While I stood in the shower and attempted to wake up, I seriously considered consuming caffeine for a moment. But then I realised that I'd rather do a shot of horse jizz. I settled for a quick rub with my removeable shower head. I was feeling energetic after that.
It was hot out, I could tell from the sun beaming through the windows that it was going to be scorching. And I'd have to wear a protective get up at paintball. So I dressed in a pair of high waist shorts and a tank top. I pulled my hair into a bun and swiped on some mascara, figuring that I'd keep a fresh face so that I could do my makeup before Jade's tonight.
Bray's text message to let me know that he was downstairs came just as I was slipping an old pair of Doc Martens on. They were worn out. It wouldn't matter if I got paint on them.
"Later Freddie," I smiled at the sweet old man as he held the door open for me.
He tipped his hat. "Have a nice day, Miss Ashford."
The van was parked beside the curb. Bray was leaning out of the driver's window, Jess was sitting in the front and Alex was holding the sliding door open so that I could jump in. I sat beside him in the middle row and said hello to Ethan and Amy who were snuggled in the last row at the back.
"Your braid looks cute," I told Jess. It was a French braid and she ran her hand over it as she peered over her shoulder.
"Thanks."
"Yeah you can fucking wait," Bray mumbled as he indicated and pulled out from the curb. A cab behind him slammed his horn on. "Fuck off."
"So where are we going?" I asked. I hadn't taken care of any of the bookings. Alex and Bray organised where and when. I paid for it though.
"Matrix Tactical," Bray answered, his arm rested on the extended gear stick. "The one that we were going to go to, out of town, was booked up. This one looks good though. It's in Miami Dade. Oh and I'm gonna thrash the lot of you."
"Doubt it," Alex scoffed. "I have good aim."
I laughed, "is that what you tell girls so you can pull out and shoot your load all over them."
Bray didn't turn around but he held his fist out behind the front seats and I bumped his knuckles while Alex turned a rich deep red. Instant guilt. But I was still laughing.
Ethan shuffled a little further forward and leaned between the two of us and gave Alex a consoling pat on the shoulder. "You walked into that one, bro."
Alex nodded with a small smile but kept his head down. He'd live. It wasn't the worst that I could have done. Or have done in the past.
The banter continued as we drove and I recognised the turn off to Heath's neighbourhood as we got into Miami Dade. Bray peered back at me for a moment and then looked at the road again.
"Not to late, Lee," he said. "We could go and get Heath."
"He's busy."
"Bullshit," he scoffed. "Talked to him last night."
"Did you tell him what we were doing?!" I sat forward and gripped the cushion front seats with panic. I didn't want Heath to think I was a bitch.
"No. I just asked what he was doing today," he laughed at my outburst. "It was nothing by the way. Studying. Dude does that a lot."
"Yeah, well he's doing medicine," I mumbled and sat back again. Alex was watching me with puzzlement.
"What's this about?"
"Nothing."
The conversation was left there and before long, we were pulling into a gravel parking lot at the Matrix Tactical. We piled out of the car and made our way towards the open shed. It was long, made of tin and full of paintball guns, protective wear and ammo.
We'd booked the place out for our event and an older man with a big beard and a friendly smile greeted us.
Introductions were made and safety procedures were discussed. He kept it casual but expressed the importance of wearing the head gear. I looked out at the course. It was among tall thick forest and trees. There were little huts made up and places to hide. Single walls and mini obstacles.
After we'd geared up in red and black full bodied suits, we were given helmets and guns with a side pack of paintball refills. We were locked and loaded but the instructor, Jason, wanted to run through the basic main rules once more. A summary.
We stood in a circle and I faced Bray. He had his gun hanging at his side, focusing on Jason's instructions. So I subtly lifted mine, aimed at his leg and shot him right in the knee.
As soon as he curled over, I ran like hell while Jason was hollering about shooting in the equipment shed. No bother. He'd get over it. It wasn't long before I heard Bray shouting after me.
"Game on, bitch!"
We were down to three. Bray, Jess and Alex we're sitting on the sidelines. The game had been going on for a while but now it was just Amy, Ethan and me out in the course.
I was ducked behind a small grey wall. I had the advantage of a mirror that was tucked up in the tree behind me. You couldn't see it until you were close. But I could see who was approaching me.
I heard Amy before I saw her. She crunched through the leaves and beelined straight for my wall. She didn't know that I was already here. I waited until she was right in front of the wall and then I stood up, screaming so that she got a fright before I unloaded a round of blue bullets straight at her chest.
"Ha!" I threw my hands up as her shoulders slumped with defeat.
That was when I got showered with red bullets. The tiny pelts were fucking painful and I groaned as Ethan jumped down from the tree that the mirror had been in and pulled off his helmet with triumph.
"Ha!" Amy mocked, pulling her helmet off as well. She looked at Ethan with pride oozing from her smile. He grinned and leaned down to meet her puckered lips.
It was such a cute and honest moment. A winner's kiss. The romance was so beautiful that I decided to make use of the last of my bullets and went Call of Duty on their asses. Both of them pulled apart and started running back towards the supplies shed while I ran after them and pelted them in the back.
After we arrived back in South Beach, we went back to my apartment and had pizza for dinner. I made one final attempt to convince Ethan to come to Jade's. But he wouldn't. He and Amy left first and I bid them a boring fucking goodnight as I shut the door behind them.
Bray and Alex left next, leaving Jess and I to get ready. One of our favourite parts of a night out. We listened to Avicii hits and drank Jack Daniels while we scattered clothes all over the bedroom.
I was twisting in front of the mirror after putting on my third outfit of the night, a simple romper with spaghetti straps and a low cut neckline.
It didn't work with a bra so I put a little bit of double sided tape on over my nipples to keep it from sliding off and exposing my tits. Not that it would have been a first.
"So are you and Bray like, official or what?" I asked Jess, deciding on what my outfit needed while I looked in the mirror. I wanted to keep it casual so I settled on a pair of white vans.
"Yeah," Jess smiled, curling her hair behind me. She had the height. So we could both see. "On Thursday. He was talking to his mom on the phone and he referred to me as his girlfriend."
I frowned. "Damn. I'm combusting at the romance in that gesture."
She waved me off and picked up a new piece of hair to curl. "He's just not big into all of that stuff. The cute little dates and flowers were surprising enough as it is. I don't think that he thought there needed to be some romantic gesture. We're together. It is what it is."
"As long as you're happy," I said. She looked happy. So I guess that was what mattered most.
We'd just finished doing our makeup when Bray sent us a text to let us know that he was downstairs. We took a few bathroom selfies before we went down. Jess looked gorgeous and tall and model like in a half up, half down ponytail and a leather skirt. Her loose band T-shirt was tucked in and her hoops were huge.
Smoke tinged the air. Cigarette and brazier smoke. It floated in from outside and tainted the living area. The couches were packed with stoners passing a bong around.
It was ten o'clock and the beer pong table had been flipped. The entire table was upside down and Curtis Corbett had been dragged out of here by Jade's boy toy for packing a world class tantrum because he lost to Zoe Sanders. Such a tool. I was going to remind him of it on Monday too.
If I remembered.
I'd stopped drinking an hour ago but I'd done enough damage in that time. I was mingling with a bunch of people from the college and school. I stopped for drunken banters and sloppy selfies with whoever asked. I would have appeared on so many Instagram and Snapchat stories tonight. The amount of times I'd been serenaded with horrible renditions of happy birthday was astounding.
I locked the bathroom door behind me when I slipped inside and started pulling my romper off. Fuck me, going to the bathroom in these things was damn near impossible.
I sat on the toilet, naked apart from some tape on my nipples and swayed, hoping that I'd locked the bathroom door because this would not be a pleasant sight to walk in on.
After I'd washed my hands and stared in the mirror, I laughed and slammed my hands against the glass.
"Stop moving," I slurred. I peeked again and I was still moving. But my makeup was on point.
Back out in the corridor, I waved at a little bit of a line that had grown while I was convincing my reflection to stop being such a wasted bitch. "Hello," I waved and stumbled. "Thank you for waiting. You're all blessed to be in my presence."
A couple of the girls laughed but then I saw Paris, who was really good friends with Harlin and I went straight for her, pointing a finger at her recent nose job. "She better not be here."
"She's not," Paris shifted uncomfortably. "She didn't want to come."
"Yeah she'd say that to save face," I laughed. "More like she didn't want to get her ass handed to her again. You shouldn't be here either. You're only as trash as the company you keep."
She scoffed. "Most of the losers here are trash. College trash that go to Miami Dade and drink with minors. Pathetic."
I raised a hand to my head with confusion and waved it about as I stammered. "Then what the fuck are you doing here. Leave."
I was up in her face and picking a fight for no real good reason but it seemed very reasonable at the time. I stepped back and forth, back and forth, nodding at her and pointing towards the front door while the rest of the girls watched with decided interest.
"Go on. Get. Go and bake in dorito powder with that fucking orange moron."
As I stepped back again, I bumped into a hard chest and assumed that Bray had decided to intervene. But when I turned around and found Heath, I smiled with surprise. "Oh. Hello."
"Should we go outside and get some air?"
"This is my friend," I gave the girls a smug smile because I could see the way they looked at him. Yes. He was fucking gorgeous and none of them were allowed to touch. "Don't even think about it Paris. I will put your brand new nose in a vice and squee—"
"Let's go," Heath gripped my bicep and lead me out of the hall and through the packed living area where people were dancing. The front door still had a hole in the bottom glass panel and now the cardboard was missing too.
We leaned against Bray's van and I watched the people in the house through the front window. Nothing was still. Not the cars on the road. Not the party going on inside. Not the houses that lined the street. I couldn't focus on one image. It was making my motion sick.
"What are you doing here?" I looked at Heath who was watching me with his arms folded. Fuck, he looked so good damn it. He was wearing a white fitted T-shirt. The sleeves were tight against his ridiculous biceps. His jeans were a light denim, distressed. He was mouthwatering.
"Jade sent me a text and said that she needed me," he explained and I looked over at the window where Jade, Bray and Jess were peeping out with their hands cupped around their eyes. As soon as I saw them, the three of them dropped. I saw them running towards the kitchen a moment later.
Rookies.
"She didn't need me. She was full of shit."
"Shocker," I grumbled and noticed a black smear on my white shoes. Ugh. I'd get a new pair I suppose. "It's my birthday celebration."
"I know," he nodded and stared out ahead of him.
"Sorry that I didn't invite you," I pushed off from the van and stood in front of him. My balance almost gave out and I swayed but Heath quickly held my waist and I jolted with heat. "It was just like, I dunno. It's compli—"
"Don't worry about it," he kept hold of me and stared down like he was seeing my freaking soul. He was so intense and I loved it. I did. Shit. "You hungry. I could take you to get something to eat?"
"You're so perfect," I whined and let my forehead fall on his chest. "Your damn words make me moist."
He laughed but I wasn't kidding. His voice was so masculine and soft at the same time. It killed me.
"Come on," I straightened up and almost fell backwards. He kept hold of me though. "Let's go inside. I need another drink."
"I don't know about that."
"I do!"
I slipped out of his hold and went back inside where the air was thick and warm. The bottle of tequila on the kitchen counter was shining and calling for me.
I pushed through the crowd of people and poured three shots. One for me, one for Heath and one for the dish cloth because I got tequila all over the floor.
I threw back the first one and then turned around to find Heath making his way towards me. "Here," I held it out but he shook his head. "Alright. More for me."
I downed it. Usually it might burn or taste a little bit shit because that's tequila for you. But it went down like honey. I smiled and threw the plastic shot glass at the overflowing trash can.
"Let's dance?" I grabbed for his hand but missed and stumbled forward.
Strong warm hands caught me around the middle and that was the last thing that I remember.