stolen smile - a mason mount story

t h r e e

The weather was gloomy, rain pouring heavily. The day was a rough time for her. She had been dreading this day for a while. Florence grabbed her phone and rang Declan's number. It rang for a few seconds and she was met with her client's voice "Floz! What can I do for you?"

"Hi! Sorry to disturb, the rain is awful, would it be alright if I took my car and parked on your drive today? It's no worries if not!"

"Yeah, course it's alright! Didn't even need to ask!"

"Thank you so much! I'll see you later."

The drive was pleasant with minimal traffic but it meant taking a longer route than she would've liked. The rain felt like it was getting heavier with every in minute that passed. Florence found herself in her thoughts. She had been working for Declan Rice for a few months now, she enjoyed her job but often struggled with the awkwardness that would occur when Mason arrived. He had been making it obvious of his uncertainty about her. The tension, when Mason was around, felt suffocating. She found herself sitting in the garden during breaks just to avoid the awkwardness, no matter what the weather was. She had thought that when they returned to their respective training schedules that Mason would be around a lot less but unfortunately, she thought wrong. Aimee found herself growing tired of Florence complaints.

"Just ask him if he's paying Declan rent since he practically lives there."

"I would, like, but I don't want Dec to hate me. He's actually a decent lad."

"I think you just wanna sleep with Mason, that's why you want him to acknowledge you so badly."

"Fuck off, in the months I've been working for Dec, he's spoken to me once and it was that time a contact fell out. That was in June."

"God, he's so disgustingly in love with you."

When she arrived at Declan's house, Mason was already there, sitting at the breakfast bar that Florence had called her second home. He looked up at her and immediately diverted his attention back to his phone.

"How are we, Flossie? Don't forget, you're working from home this afternoon."

"Good, thanks. Thank you so much for that again!"

Mason scoffed at her. "Sounds like a pathetic excuse to skive off work." Mason's eyes widened as he realised his mistake. He looked over to Declan who just shrugged at him. He knew he had fucked up massively.

Florence's head snapped to look at him. Her blood running hot. She hoped for his sake that she had misheard him and that he didn't actually say that aloud. The room fell silent, Declan looking over at his friend disapprovingly.

"Nah, this doesn't involve you. Be quiet." Florence glared at him. "You sit there, every time I'm here working, with a face like a smacked arse. I go outside on my breaks, even in the pissing rain, just to avoid your attitude. I've done fuck all to you. Me leaving early today has nothing to do with you. It is between me and Declan and he was the one who told me to do it so if you could go back to sitting there, acting like I don't exist, and never acknowledging me, my life would be significantly better."

Mason sat with his head low, not saying a word. He got up and left the room. She felt bad for snapping at him. Under different circumstances, she would've just laughed at the comment but not today. She looked at Declan and gave him an apologetic smile. "I'm so sorry! I don't know what came over me."

"I know, don't apologise! It was out of order snapping at him like that but it's just one of those days, eh? Just try to co-exist with him. He's not malicious, just stupid. I'll go talk to him."

Mason was pulled out of his thoughts by the sound of a door closing. He kept his gaze down, not looking up. He felt bad but he wasn't sure as to why he felt that way. He knew he had been giving her the cold shoulder since he first met her, if he asked he wouldn't know the reason behind his actions. She hadn't done anything that he could remember, she simply just worked with Declan and made sure everything was up to standards. She was just an innocent party in his stupid game.

"Listen bro, she was out of order for snapping at you but she is right, it is between me and her. It's a tough day for her. To be honest, if it were me I wouldn't even be working at all." Mason looked at Declan confused. He stayed quiet, not wanting to disrupt him. "She wasn't even the one to tell me. Sasha sent me a text from Jack's number telling me to look out for her."

"What do you mean?"

"Dunno the full details, just know her mum and her sister died in some freak accident a year ago today. Think they were coming to see her to have a girly weekend together. Can't even imagine how she's feeling right now."

"Oh. I didn't know. I feel awful now."

He wasn't lying. He had already felt bad prior to Declan telling him about the reason for her snappy behaviour. He would never be able to look her in the eye again, he'd always be ashamed of his actions.
---
The night was slow, his mind clouded with thoughts he had hoped to drown out with blaring music and random games. He was wrong. He found himself scrolling through Instagram, her name appearing at the beginning of the lists of stories. He fought the urge to click on it, wanting to remove her from his thoughts. He had embarrassed himself enough. Mason didn't want her thinking he was stalking her. He locked his phone and jumped out of bed.

"What are you doing, Mason?" He said to himself.

Mason reached for his phone and immediately unlocked it. Almost as if it were instinct, he typed her name into the search bar. He hesitated clicking on her profile before doing it anyway. He contemplated making a different account just to view her story; he pushed the thought away immediately, deeming it ridiculous. He clicked on her most recent post and checked the tags. Curiousity got the best of him and he found himself watching one of her friend's stories. He was greeted with a video of Florence with a child watching her intensely whilst she was doing a dance and singing along to the song Naughty from the Matilda musical, captioned 'matilda era with our own crying mathilde'. It was obvious that the child had been crying. He let out a smile. Mason realised the reason why everyone sung their praises about her, she always attempted to make people smile and she never failed to do so. He only had himself to blame for never seeing her personality the way other people did.

"Mason Mount viewed my story! What the fuck?"

"Aimee, language." Florence scolded.

"Sorry Tilly! But Flossie, you can't ignore the fact Mason Mount viewed my story."

"I absolutely can and I am. I do not care what that man does."

Florence couldn't think of a scenario where he would possibly need to be watching her roommate's story. She knew that dwelling on it would put her in an even more foul mood. There was one thing for certain and it was that he had no reason to be watching her friend's story.
---
"Have you ever thought about how handsome Mason Mount is?" Sasha asked, poking Jack in his side to get his attention. "Don't you think so, babe?"

Jack turned to look at his girlfriend's phone screen and nodded to Florence. "Yeah, yeah, proper good looking lad! Nice too."

"I don't really want to talk about him, Sash, but to answer your question, yes he is very handsome but I've had such a mare with him the other day, and I can't stand him! He's a twat!"

Jack looked over at Sasha, who shrugged. The couple just sat silent as Florence looked at them through the screen. Florence and Sasha often found themselves doing this on their calls, they don't say a word for a while, just simply co-existing alongside each other. They would occasionally send each other a post or video and discuss it before going about back to their own activity. During this particular call, Florence had been cooking and paid very minimal attention to Sasha and Jack.

"Hey, Floss! Since you fancy Mase, now would be the most amazing time to let you know, he's single."

"Jack, please kindly fuck off. I love you!"