This

Chapter 12

“Why do all of your leather seats feel like sitting on marshmallows?” I asked as Mark slid into the driver's seat. He chuckled before shrugging his shoulders.

“I don't know, they just all are. I don't mind, squishy leather is more comfortable for fucking on,” he said, a smirk creeping upon his lips, which left me to wonder whether he was joking or not. As we drove down the road to a small Italian restaurant, I started to wonder idly about whether or not staying with Mark and his wife is such a good idea, seeing as he appeared to be the biggest sleaze in the northern hemisphere.

“Wine?” The waiter asked as we took our seats in the restaurant. I looked at him incredulously. Wine?! It's only one in the afternoon, what kind of fuck-wit drinks this early?

“Scotch,” Mark said, handing the drinks menu to the waiter. So apparently Mark was the kind of fuck-wit who drank at one in the afternoon. As the young waiter took my menu, I ordered myself a glass of wine.

“You can't drink, Elle,” Mark said as the waiter stared at me as if I were joking. Fuck, he's right. Back home I could drink when I turned eighteen. I forgot it the drinking age is still twenty-one here.

“Just ginger beer then,” I mumbled sulkily. I was quite pissed off because when I went out last night no-one questioned my age. Speaking of my age...

“How did you know how old I am?” I asked accusingly. Mark leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table and his chin on his fingers. The corners of his lips twitched upwards into that cheeky smirk of his.

“I'm your boss, Elle. I've seen your file. That what happens when you get hired by me. You're lucky I didn't run a full background check on you.” Mark's comment made me giggle at the thought of him running a background check on me and finding nothing of importance. He seemed like a control freak so not having anything on me would probably throw him a bit.

“I'm not an American so would you have been able to run a check?”

“Probably not. Why did you leave school?” Mark asked, quickly changing the subject and putting me on the spot.

“Because I was young-”

“I don't want 'because I was young and stupid', I want the real reason. I want to know the real story. You don't have a criminal record, so it can't have been because you were a little shit. You seem too intelligent to have failed, so I want to know why you didn't return for your last year of high school? Why didn't you go to college?” Mark's questions came one after another, leaving me in a bit of a head-spin.

“Alright, fuck! Calm down,” I said, laughing at his insistence for answers. The waiter arrived with our drinks, which Mark immediately slid his to the side, awaiting my answer.

“I was doing well in school for the first two years. Then I had one friend who began to label each of us in our group. We had the smart friend, the hot friend, the lesbian friend, et cetera, and since there was already one smart friend, that meant that any time any of the rest of us were smart that we were 'trying too hard' and stuff like that. So I don't know, I just stopped trying because every time I did, I would get a hard time from her about it. My grades fell, I started hanging out with boys, having sex, sneaking out all that kind of shit, and yeah, that's about it.” I said, breathing out at the end, trying to gage Mark's reaction. He was silent.

“Which friend were you?” he asked, before taking a mouthful of his drink.

“The hot friend. I had boys interested in me so therefore I was the hot friend, the slut friend, all those kind of names.” I frowned at the memory of my so-called 'friend.'

“I hate to be rude, because she may be lovely and she's your friend, but she sounds like a real bitch,” Mark whispered as he leaned forward, winking at me.

“She is. That's definitely one friendship I don't mind having sunk,” I said, laughing as Mark spat the mouthful of drink he had just taken back into his glass.

“Ship, sunk, I see what you did there,” he said, chuckling. Mark signalled at the waiter so that we could order our food, and I felt really weird for having said all of that to my boss of all people. I kind of wished I had simply said I had a friend who laughed at me if I was smart.

“How many boys?” Mark said as the waiter disappeared taking Mark's order for pasta a la Italy something and my order for good old spag bol with him.

“Excuse me?”

“High school. How many boys were you sneaking out to fuck?” The bluntness of Mark's question had me taken aback somewhat.