The next day, I was smiling. Back in my bed, alone, I woke up smiling. The memory of last night was still fresh and it seemed like nothing in the world could ruin it. Except, things are never how they seem.
I was woken up by Jane, barging into my room and handing me a coffee cup.
"Have the gods finally noticed how beautiful I am? What did I ever do to deserve coffee, straight from the Hot Lounge in Bed!" I said, grinning like the cheshire cat.
"You got soup-ed. Drink that, we have to plan revenge."
"How did you-"
"I have my sources, Tetris. You should know that by now. Technically, they took a picture of your soup-soaked self very sneakily and mailed it to everyone you know. Classic High School prank, those idiots. We have to get revenge. You don't look so good in that picture."
"They what-"
"DRINK!"
I obeyed, speechless. The coffee was at the perfect temperature to be drunk. You gotta give it to Jane, she knew me too well.
"Get your butt into something not soup-stained. I have a date today."
"What? You have a date so why do I have to dress up-"
"TETRIS! That is not the important detail. Look at you. Always getting fixated on the wrong things. You need to dress up. That is the important thing here. Scram. Now!"
"But you are hoarding my bedroom. Shouldn't you be the one leaving me in here?" I said, staring at her, open-mouthed.
She just crossed her arms. "Go change in the kitchen."
And of course, I obeyed.
After changing into something which wasn't my underpants, I made my way back to Jane.
"So this is how it's gonna go. You are gonna go to work. I will show up there right at the moment you usually leave. I will grab your soup-er and then ask him on a date. You have to pretend not to know me, okay? Just scram and meet me at Milo's."
"You are gonna go on a date with that craphole at MILO'S? Jane, didn't you take something? Are you high? What happened to you? Are you feeling okay?"
"I am perfectly fine, thank you for your concern. You know me well by now, you should be able to tell Tetris. Now, all I need you to do is stay in the shadows at Milo's and when the big show happens, take pictures, okay?" She said.
"What big show?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.
"Look at you. Always asking questions. Just shut up and scram to work and remember the plan." She said.
"I still don't understand why you went through the effort of getting me coffee. You could have just called."
"If I had not offered, the great conceited self-proclaimed God and big time prick Tetris some coffee, would he have agreed to any crazy scheme I proposed?" She asked, nailing me down by her mere gaze.
"Noted." I said, sipping my coffee. She patted my back and looked straight into my eyes and told me very politely "Get your butt out of here!"
***********************
Ignoring Jane hadn't been easy. She looked like herself, my best friend, right there with the biggest douche in the world. Acting all kind and nice and happy - I couldn't take it.
It felt so genuine that I promptly hailed a cab and yeeted out of there as fast as I could. There was no way that she could like that douche - could she? I knew Jane and as far as I was aware, her taste in guys wasn't the borderline pin-cushions. Still the fear chipped away at my insides, a weird feeling settling in my stomach.
I made it to Milo's, laughing when the memories of my last date in a restaurant - the Lobster date - came back. Ah, that was fun.
I spotted Jane and Stephen sitting at a table right in the middle of the hotel. She was smiling, her bone-white teeth glimmering from far away. I resisted the urge to barf. The way the idiot looked at her, it looked like he was whipped already. I felt the urge to barf again, stronger this time. Him and Jane were just - the mere thought of them together felt illegal.
I tried not to dwell on it as I stealthily sat down at a table in the corner in the shadows and watched them from the corner of my eyes, over the tip of my menu.
Jane was smiling, leaning in towards him very slightly but not very conspicuous about it. Her hand brushed against his on the table and I wondered if she really did like him. She couldn't be this good at acting could she? Then, I remembered that this was Jane we were talking about, she'd rather show her affections by beating people to death than by brushing her hands ever so slightly against theirs. I relaxed in my seat.
The guy looked like he was totally buying this. The 'lovesick fool' look was all over his face, he was not being subtle at all.
I looked at them, raising an amused eyebrow while the waiter stared at me.
"Sir, no one is going to quiz you on the menu, you can stop staring at it like you wanna burn it. Will you be ordering anything?" He asked, giving me a very disapproving look.
"A water, please." I replied, with not a single hint of irony in my voice.
The waiter looked at me like I was the greatest sinner on planet earth and deserved to be sent to hell as soon as possible.
"Seriously?" He asked. I nodded.
"In that case, I will have to ask you to leave, sir. Hogging a table while drinking the lowest priced item on our list is just freeloading on our air conditioning. I am going to ask you again, what is your order?" He said. I sighed. None of Jane's plans worked without me spending loads of money, did they?
"Spaghetti." I said, shooting the waiter an ice-cold stare. The corner of his mouth curved up, the bastard was smiling.
"Right away, sir." He said and left, making me realize the fact that he might have just tricked me into buying stuff. Why must they feed on innocent people like me? What did I do to deserve this?
Before I could lament the loss of a hundred dollars, a waiter walked up to the table occupied by Jane and her beau. The stench of something incredibly sour whiffed through the air and I resisted the urge to gag.
I wasn't even given time tio guess what it was, because at that very moment, Jane cracked open the lid covering the thing the waiter brought and threw the contents of the plate right in Stephen's face.
I was left gaping at her.
A surprised gasp escaped Stephen's throat but it turns out he chose a very bad moment to open his mouth because immediately whatever the spoiled food had been, made his mouth its home. He immediately tried to spit it out but Jane was not done. She clicked her fingers.
Only then did I notice that there were very few people present in the restaurant and the place was way too quieter than usual. With the coordination of a flash mob, everyone present in the restaurant rose up to their feet and threw the contents of their plates at a very badly panting and almost gagging Stephen.
Spoiled, stinky food was flung at him from each and every direction imaginable. He looked like how a dog would look when having had a good bath in dirty puddle water. Smelling like a manhole and looking like Pennywise, he looked extremely photogenic.
I tried to hold in my laughter as I stealthily took pictures of him.
"YOU TRICKED ME!" He told Jane, flaring his nostrils and still coughing up the remnants of Satan's insides which were all over him.
"You aren't exactly a catch, mister. I just wanted you to see what you deserve." She said.
"You- I will-"
"Sue me? Go ahead. What will you say? A girl didn't like me and organized a fling-food-at-me event in the middle of a restaurant. I would like to see if your lawyer can keep a straight face while you tell them this." She said, grinning.
"Why did you do this?" He asked, trying to wipe everything down with a napkin.
"Like I said, you got what you deserve a-hole. Now get out of here before I decide to empty the whole pantry on you." She said, glaring at him,
Stephen did believe her because he instantly ran out like his life depended on it. Once I was sure, he had driven off in his Porsche (Of course Jane would never go out with him) - I walked up to Jane.
"That was freaking amazing!" I told her, pulling her into a hug.
"Only the best for you." She said.
"How the hell did you manage to do this?" I said, gesturing at all the people in there.
"Money and connections. Some of them are friends from work, some are paid actors. The guy who owns this place, Charlie agreed to store up some spoiled food on the condition that I paid him some money and here we are. He cleared the restaurant for one hour just for this shindig." She said, grinning widely. I hugged her again.
"Have I ever told you how much I love?" I murmured.
"Trust me, I know." She told me, very modestly.You had to give it to Jane, she was the mastermind of evil plans. She never failed to impress, surprise and serve a dish of cold-cold revenge with ice.
"Now, onto the next part. Do onto others what they did to you. Send that picture to everyone you know that he knows and watch the fires burn." She told me as I dreaded the day I would be on her bad side.
After a few hours of a lot of forwarding the same pictures from an unknown number - I had to get a freaking private number for this - I watched the question marks come in and I sure as hell knew that Stephen's phone must be bursting to life with a million calls. I felt happy.