Lucky For You

8 | Lucky & Lustful

Chapter Eight: Lucky & Lustful

"you know you can call
me if you need someone,"
~ justin bieber

━━━━༻❁༺━━━━

The basement smelt heavy with vanilla and lavender. But I embraced and welcomed it with open arms.

I was sitting in front of the folded table with most jars filled with wax. The table itself was pressed against the far right corner on the left side of the insulated basement, with two small windows above me.

We'd lived in this house for years, but my parents never got around to finishing the square-shaped room. Instead, we had an old, ratty brown couch across the stairs, and workout mats on the left side of my work station.

There were weights, a bench press and a yoga ball, with a box TV across from it. It barely worked at this point, but mom watched old workout DVDs.

Turning back to my two dozen jars, I quickly lifted the pot off of the portable stove and poured it into the last five jars before putting tape on either side of the candle wick, so it stayed upright.

      I'd finished the vanilla batch an hour ago, but was already eager to start a new scent, which was why I chose lavender. I figured I could bring one back to Tilly, since I knew it was her favourite.

Vanilla was mine, Clove. You remember that?

I stiffened against the black foldable chair and stared at the pink insulation in front of me. Just shut up. Making candles helped tune her out, but the second I stopped... it was free for her to return.

I loved it, but now I can never smell it again. Because of yo—

"Okay," I cleared my throat and shot up, beginning to clean up. I realized that the sun started setting and wasn't providing much light, so I took that opportunity to walk to the other side of the basement before flicking the light on.

Just then, the door above me, opened. In seconds, I met mom's dark, monolid eyes. They were narrowed in a glare, and my thoughts sped into anything I'd done in the last twenty four hours.

"Clover," she began, taking a step down, but still holding the handle of the door behind her. "Do you know what the time is?"

I peered over my shoulder, toward the window before turning back to mom. "No..." I'd left my phone in my room to avoid the outside world.

If possible, her glare hardened. "Almost seven! You need to shower and get dressed. Make sure you look good for pictures."

I could have rolled my eyes. Mom liked to suggest I'm not pretty unless I dressed up. Every time we had a holiday or event, she'd take pictures and wanted us to look our best.

"I'll come up in a few minutes, I just have to clean up," I explained, smiling to ease her.

Her brows rose in challenge. "O, sige pa." Oh, okay. Her tone was enough for me to cringe. "Ano?"

"Nothing. I'll be up in a minute," I smiled again before stepping back, releasing the railing to the stairs.

She nodded once, and I finally noticed her wearing a red, boat neck sheath dress, with a silver opera necklace. Her black hair was down and curled, ending by her collarbone and had a flawless layer of makeup on, which made her look ten years younger.

When she stepped out and closed the door behind her, I went back to my station and cleaned up, and within a few minutes, I was upstairs. Since the door opened next to the living room, I turned to my right and saw dad was sitting on the couch, a leg over the other while dressed in slacks and a white button up. Dax sat next to him, showing dad how he played on his switch.