Devil's Due [h.s.]

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Despite having worked in the same place now for the last three years, it always felt like a dream whenever I walked through the front doors and into the small, hole-in-the-wall art gallery that I was so thankful to be able to call my job.

But just like every dream, sometimes they didn't exactly turn out how you pictured or how you wanted.

Today was one of those days.

Olivia's dad had bought this shop for her when she dropped out of University, claiming that she no longer wanted nor did she need a degree. She'd always come from wealth, so it was no surprise that her father barely batted an eye at what she'd done and merely asked what she then wanted to do next.

My dear friend Olivia loved simplicity. Loved all things that came easy. Things that she didn't have to work very hard for. And I didn't blame her. If I came from the same circumstances, I doubted I would work very hard either.

It was why, instead of having her father invest in something that Olivia would have to work on herself, she got him to buy an art gallery – specifically knowing that her best friend, who at the time had been working three jobs to make ends meet, had quite an affinity for painting.

I hadn't believed it when she first told me. That I was going to be in charge of collecting, distributing and creating the art for the shop. It was another instance where I had felt I was dreaming. She promised that she would deal with all of the back-end business stuff and I could just deal with the front end.

And it had worked... for a bit. Until Olivia got bored and no longer wanted to work at the shop. Until it became more of a chore than anything to drag her in and just got easier to deal with all of the business and paperwork driven part of the shop myself.

Still, I didn't mind. It was my dream job. I got to curate, create and sell art for a living and teach painting classes every Wednesday. It was all that I'd ever hoped to achieve, considering I hadn't gone to University myself.

It was also why I didn't blame Olivia when she started not to show up. I'd learned how to deal with everything myself and loved to do it. Today, however, was month-end. It happened to be a particularly busy day and I had asked if Olivia could come in just for a bit to manage up front while I dealt with all of our invoices and payments in the back, but she'd been too hungover from Zayn's and said she was too sick.

I left fairly early last night, before I got too drunk, knowing that I had to come into work today, so I hadn't exactly known how all of my friends had fared until this morning when I sent a text in our group chat asking if they were all alive. Zoe sent me a picture of her and a passed-out Olivia on the couch with a thumbs up and I had to hold back a laugh at the photo Raven sent of her and Angel – in bed together with a very sleepy and thoroughly sexed looking Niall.

At least they'd had fun.

The night overall, after we left the shop, had been good. Weird, but good.

Though as much as I'd tried to have fun, my mind had been elsewhere the majority of the time. Thinking about work, trying to remember if I'd paid my rent for this month, and wondering why the fuck a certain green-eyed tattoo artist had been so fucking rude to me.

It made me mad. It made me so mad that I just wanted to get drunk with my friends but for some reason couldn't shake the image of him out of my head – looking at me like I was beneath him.

I knew that it was probably because I'd pissed him off, having come in and expected a free tattoo only to barely even know what I wanted. I'd feel the same way if I was in his position. If somebody came in after hours demanding that I paint them something, only to be annoying and not pay me, I'd probably react along the same lines as him.