song: mypet - pays to know
dedicated to nive1997. Thanks Nivedita for being so devoted to my works.
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"I think I'll probably write him a letter. I mean, he didn't specify everything when he said no contacting, right? Besides, he won't be in college until next week," Liv said, as they exited the store.
Crowd thronged the James Street, the blinding sunlight overhead causing them to squint their eyes. Three of them slipped inside the standby uber immediately.
Darien's initial thought was to ignore Liv's words. She had problems of her own. She clutched her cell phone tightly at that thought. But words were forming in her mind already.
"You do believe that you stink of desperation, don't you? Besides, what do you even see in George? He failed his Upper Sixth twice. He is so..." Dee couldn't find the right words.
"Old, you mean?" Julia filled in for her, smirking behind the pale Michael Kors gift bag.
Dee had purchased a Silver Metallic Leather Biker Jacket while Liv stuck to a Leather Cross body of soft pink; very feminine. Julia, however, chose to buy a mid size Camille Pavé Gold-Tone Watch. Of course, it was a morally flat world in which brands had value more than skin. It didn't matter that they didn't know Poppy Gupta's younger sister, the supposed birthday girl. This was how they had to set standards. Three gift bags lied on their laps.
"But I like older men." Liv's small, heart-shaped face contorted into a scowl. The fake lashes on her right eye twitched nastily in the process, causing her to close that eye. Taking it for a wink, the pretty old uber driver winked right back through the rearview mirror which she certainly didn't notice.
"We carry pepper sprays for the wandering eyes," Dee announced, her voice uncharacteristically loud, her eyes fixed on the roof of the car interior.
The uber driver straightened in his seat.
Liv frowned at Julia, "What are you smirking about, Julia?"
"Nothing." Julia's response was immediate while she wiped the smile right off her face to feign innocence.
Liv twirled a shiny, red curl around her finger and continued, "I suppose the Rolls Royce back there is rather old."
"Rolls...?" Darien leaned forward, to look at Liv who sat on the other side of Julia. Her brown eyes flashed with realization.
"She means my rescuer back at the Bishop's Avenue," Julia explained, her eyes on her French-manicured-nails. Fortunately enough, her iPhone beeped, followed by another beep from Dee's phone. Both of them shared a look before unlocking their patterns.
Dee felt her heart squeeze at the name on her screen.
Ibrahim.
He had texted her even after all the humiliation he had faced for doing just that. It struck her as an obsessive-compulsive behavior. She didn't even want to see what that man-whore wanted to say.
Liv already had her roaming eyes on Julia's screen. It was only a matter of time before she would be looking at her cell phone as well. Suddenly self-conscious, she struggled with her clutch.
"Who's it, Julia?" She tried to divert the attention. Julia waved the screen before her face.
It was Noah Clarke, asking why he couldn't find her in her father's auction. Most probably, he was there to join the dinner. There was no way they could ditch it now. Julia's mother would notice their absence. She still had no idea what caused Julia's parents to suddenly go from utter cool to this strict. If Julia had wanted to talk about it, she would have already.
"Who's texting you, Dee?" Liv's pale hand flew out of nowhere and seized her phone before she could slip it inside her clutch.
"Please don't click on it. I'm avoiding..."
"Already did," Liv grinned, wiggling her thin eyebrows at her. "It's Ibrahim. He says-" A pause. "Dee, when did you two kiss?"
Julia turned to her, almost instantly. "What did I miss?"
"He says." Liv was already jumping up and down on her seat, the fringes on her dress moving ruthlessly as she read out loud, "I'm not going to apologize. I'd rather kiss you again."
"Who writes his lines for him?" Dee rolled her eyes, snatching her phone out of Liv's grasp. "He sounds like a trashy romance novel."
Julia only chuckled, "We can't help you bitch about it unless you tell us what happened."
Dee grunted, flopping back, her sleek, straight hair swatting on the leather upholstery of the car. She had been dreading this for weeks. She admitted she was many things. Arrogant, judgmental and selfish? Yes. Domineering and manipulative? Yes. But a hypocrite? Never.
"The Dean-twins came back from New York early," she sighed. "Wanted to share a couple of spliffs. I went over since none of you were in the city. There were a few girls from Quinceraven. Ibrahim also went."
She was clearly embarrassed. The pink hue on her skin was a telltale sign. Anyone who knew Darien well would know she rarely blushed.
"We played 'truth or dare'. I think the twins were deliberately asking Ibrahim to-"
"Kiss you?" Liv widened her green eyes.
"Not exactly." Dee pressed her lips together at the memory. "They asked him to kiss the prettiest girl in the room."
The problem for Dee wasn't the kiss. It was how the kiss made her feel. It wasn't like she hadn't been kissed before. There had been plenty of cute boys to keep her casually entertained over the summer. But none of their kisses had come even close to Ibrahim's. None of those kisses had removed her doubts, or put her fears to rest, or even frightened her with their intensity. It took Ibrahim to only place his lips on hers and all she ever wanted to do was let him kiss her.
And be the flavor of the month before he dumped her ass in front of the raging population of the Pristine Academy? No, thank you. She'd rather stay half-a-virgin forever. Then again, a lady simply didn't jump into something based on attraction alone. There had to be a stronger connection than that, a spiritual one, an emotional one; which couldn't happen with someone like Ibrahim Nizami, a walking-talking STD.
"Now, what's wrong with Nizami? He's perfectly fine." Julia had that smile on her face again while she typed something on her phone. Dee assumed she was responding to Noah's text. "He had been asking Noah for your number for almost three years. There has to be some reason, right?"
Did Julia have to point that out when she was trying not to think of that?
Liv groaned from the other side as her twitching fake lashes fell right on her lap. She picked it up, peeled off the other one and stacked them inside her purse, clearly defeated. Almost absentmindedly, she added, "That's very 'Perks of Being a Wallflower' of Ibrahim. I'm not wearing lashes without a professional's help anymore. I should've gotten a text from George. It's a sign from God."
"Nizami's another reason you shouldn't be texting Noah back. After all, they come from the same category." Dee crossed her arms defensively against her chest.
Julia, however, shook her head as if amused before showing her the screen again. "I was texting Skrein," she explained. To the uber driver, she added, "Could you pull up here?"
Julia would contact Frank Skrein for only one reason: when she needed a ride. So, she was indeed going back after all the trouble they went through. Dee was slightly pleased to have been right, but mostly pissed that Julia was ditching them.
"Pushed me up a wall for nothing," Liv groaned, to see the text before looking out the window when the uber came to a halt.
"Here's my gift. Tell Poppy I tried to sneak out-" Julia couldn't finish.
Liv snatched the bag from her and hissed, "Poppy knows full well you can always sneak out."
That was true. Poppy had parked her sleek red Jaguar XK150 in the leafy boulevard of Hampstead many times after decent hours, waiting for Julia to simply walk out of her father's mansion. There was no way she would believe it.
"Tell her I'm dehydrated," she sighed as she climbed out of the car, waved at her friends and closed the door.
Outside, it was undeniably warm, more so after staying inside the uber for so long. Julia fanned herself with her left hand as she stood on the sidewalk. It wouldn't be entirely true if she said she was going back for Noah. It had been Skrein, his father's assistant, who had texted her. Apparently, someone had told him to inform her father that she had snuck out even after her father had strictly forbid her to do so. If it hadn't been for Skrein, she would've been coming home to a raging storm.
Ditching the soiree was a purely impulsive act from her. Then again, who liked to remember all the guests' names and their dog's name (if they had one)? And there was the fact that her father was still mad at her for the incident with the cute lifeguard in the Manhattan beach. He had only wanted to cover her from full exposure. The poor lad lost his job because of Julia's malfunctioning bikini top. Her father had to pay a number of people before her tits were all over the tabloids.
It was just an accident, she told herself. An accident that caused her father to forbid her from leaving the house once back in London? Well...
Her phone beeped, dragging her out of her mile per second thoughts. It was yet another text from Noah.
Iron man: Is it just me or the bulgogi they are serving at the patio? I was better off staying in my cave.
Julia grinned. Noah wasn't anti-social but there were reasons he didn't like anything regarding family gatherings. Although, that was how Julia and he had met. They couldn't have been more than five or six.
She had fell in love with Noah Andrew Clarke the day he had ducked his head under the desk of his father's study to hide, clad in a tiny, navy-blue suit. His trimmed, golden hair shone under the table lamp. He even had a boutonniere.
"Did you see Mr. Shepherd and Mrs. Gupta in the..."
Julia had clamped her small hand over his lips to shut him up.
"Shh. Don't talk." She had moved further against the desk leg for some room. The tutu she had been wearing had made a rustling sound, causing her to halt.
Weird sounds combined with Mrs. Gupta calling her God had reached them. Once they had left, Julia had looked back at the golden-haired boy.
"Don't tell anyone what we saw," she had murmured.
"But why?" He had hit his forehead on the edge of the desk when he had tried to stand. Julia's hand had shot up to caress the swollen spot.
"We have to ask for some ice. I'm Julia."
"I'm Noah." Even through the pain, he had smiled.
"The joke you're smiling about has to be good or, is it a boy?" Skrein stood before her now, tall, the body he had built through years of competitive swimming clad in his regular, black suit, his brilliant, blue eyes covered by ray bans.
"Uh." She shook her head. "Both. That was fast."
Skrein opened the door to the passenger seat instinctively. Julia climbed in to the Audi, but in the front which earned her an audible groan from Skrein. But he didn't complain, not directly.
"Miss Julia, Sir would've wanted you to sit at the back," he said in a mild cockney accent, gaze kept ahead, doing his own seatbelt.
"Sir isn't here."
"Seatbelt?"
She groaned, obliging him. Skrein didn't hide his smile.
"Do they know I'm not there?" she asked once he started driving.
"They never know, do they?" he responded, pursing his lips as if tasted something sour. "Shouldn't have said that."
It was nothing she didn't know. Skrein almost had a 'Rubeus Hagrid' vibe in him, always spilling things he knew he shouldn't have. Although, there weren't much physical resemblances. Frank Skrein was in his late twenties. His looks were more complicated, even emotional: depending on the angle, the planes of his face morphed from poetic into something more dangerous. Handsome, nonetheless.
There had been times when girls in Pristine Academy had misunderstood her father's assistant as her boyfriend.
"Did you hear that accent? Where did you two meet?"
"Exactly how tall is he? Do you two practice aerobics?"
The last comment was followed by a knowing smirk. As if it hadn't been embarrassing enough for Julia to subtly explain this to Noah. She couldn't complain though.
Skrein moved to Norfolk from Derbyshire to practice Martial Arts and excel at diving, hoping he wouldn't have to be a street seller like his father one day. He had been a member of the national swimming squad, competing for England in the Commonwealth Games. The fame didn't stay forever. Fortunately, his skill at martial arts did. Which girl wouldn't want something unadulterated like this? Except for maybe Julia.
Her cell phone beeped again.
Iron man: I didn't know your mum collected nude paintings. I am trying to process this.
She bit her lip to stifle a giggle.
Noah, there are better things you should use your brains for. What's five forty five multiplied by eighty nine?"
The response came incredibly fast.
Iron man: Forty eight thousand five hundred and five. Next time, use a calculator.
She grinned at her screen as she typed back.
I don't need one. I have you.
Iron man: And you show it by choosing Poppy Gupta's shindig over me? Traitor.
She could see his smile from here, enough to comfort her, even eliminate the still remaining fluttering creatures in her stomach. As Skrein pulled the car into the driveway, she hoped not to feel those butterflies again.