blood runs black

IV

'you're my best friend, i'll love you forever'

- the neighbourhood

dior

Sofi Reyes was Dior's best friend in the whole world. The two of them met when they were six years old, and they instantly clicked. Some boy pushed Sofi over, and the teachers tried to tell her it's only because he likes you, and Dior wasn't having it. She hated hearing that, especially because she had an older brother who'd never hurt a girl just because he liked her.

So Dior pushed the boy back, and told the teachers it was stupid to just dismiss what the boy was doing because he 'might've liked her'. She got in trouble for it, and Sofi called her an idiot for getting in trouble for her. Dior didn't really care.

And so, Sofi pushed the kid over too, and spent her breaktime in an unofficial detention with Dior. Because she didn't think it was fair that Dior was stuck being alone in time-out whilst doing something in Sofi's defence.

They clicked immediately, and from then on, they were best friends. Sofi and Dior went through every stage of school together, from elementary all the way to college. Dior had dreams of going far, far away from New York to pursue writing, like she'd always wanted to. But instead, her father made her go to NYU and study International Relations. 

And Sofi stayed with her at NYU, studying Psychology, which was Dior's second choice. 

Sofi was beautiful, in every way. With her originally long, wavy brown hair that she dyed blonde, fair yet slightly golden skin and brown doe-eyes, she was physically beautiful. Two inches shorter than Dior, but with a bite that made her seem taller and stronger. And her personality was just as beautiful as her looks. 

Sofi and Dior had been through everything together. And Dior became a part of Sofi's family, with Victoria and Mauro Reyes as her second parents (though Mauro was a better father than Fernandez Castillo ever was to Dior), and Sofi's little brother Carlos was like a little brother to Dior too. They were her Argentinian family.

Carlos was seven years younger than Dior, and he still claimed to be in love with Dior, flirting with her all the time. He'd been besotted with Dior since he was seven years old, claiming that Dior was the love of his life.

It was endearingly amusing.

What was even more heartwarming was that Sofi and her parents were completely aware of Dior's family, and her title, and her name, and everything that came along with it. But they saw how good of a person Dior was, and they didn't judge her for her family. They welcomed her in with open arms.

Dior would never stop loving the Reyes family for that.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Sofi asked whilst curling her hair. "I mean, sneaking into the Italian Mafia ball sounds a little stupid."

"It'll be fun." Dior smiled as she straightened her thick, bouncy curls to try and make herself less noticeable. "Besides, I'm straightening my hair, and it's a masquerade ball. They won't be able to recognise me."

"Really?" Sofi raised a brow, not bothering to hide how sceptical she was. "Sweetheart, you're quite easy to spot in a crowd."

"With my curls. With my straightened hair, I look just like incredibly unnoticeable."

"Ouch." Sofi said plainly. 

"You know what I mean." Dior rolled her eyes. "My hair makes me stand out. When it's straightened, I'm not as easily recognisable. Besides, I hardly doubt it'd be easy to spot us. There's at least a couple hundred people that'll attend the ball."

"You know, I'm not in the mafia shtick, but having a masquerade ball seems pretty stupid when you're all.. criminals. Like, isn't it so easy to have people sneak in and ruin the whole thing if everyone's masked?"

"It's kinda dumb." Dior shrugged. "But there'll be lots of security. It's just convenient that I'm ninety-five percent sure I know how to sneak past the security."

"Ninety-five?"

"Okay, ninety-six."

"You idiot, that's not any better." Sofi glared. "Look, the Italians are hot, but they're also dangerous. I'm not planning to die at twenty-two because my idiot of a best friend decided it'd be an adrenaline rush to sneak into her rival's masquerade ball."

"We'll be fine, Sof." Dior sighed. "Look, I've taught you how to throw a knife. We'll be armed, in case anything goes wrong. And you know I'd never put you in real danger. Besides, if you were so scared of shit going down, you wouldn't be curling your hair and getting all glammed up to attend, would you?"

Sofi huffed and mumbled something under her breath, putting the curler down to put hairspray on the curls before applying fake lashes to make her brown eyes pop. "Yeah shut up, Dior."

"You look gorgeous." Dior nudged her best friend once she was done applying the fake lashes. "You'll pull all my enemies."

"Not Moretti, though."

"Oh, god no."

Sofi laughed and did a brown-pink lip combo before standing up and taking off the dressing gown she wore. She wore a long, tight-fitting red dress with a slit that went all the way up her thigh. It accentuated her curves in all the best ways. "The only reason I like these stupid balls is because it means I can dress up all pretty like it's prom all over again."

"And you look damn good." Dior grinned, finally done with straightening her hair. "Is it good, or frizzy-looking?"

"No, it's straight-straight." 

"Good." 

Dior stood up, taking off her dressing grown, revealing her dark-red, figure-hugging dress. It was similar to Sofi's except Dior's was off-the-shoulder while Sofi's had spaghetti straps. Like Sofi's, Dior's dress had a slit too, that didn't go as high up. Beneath the slit, she had a knife strapped around her thigh, because she had to be prepared when sneaking into enemy territory.

"How do I look?" Dior asked, spinning around in her dress.

"Gorgeous as always, Di." 

"And you look amazing too." 

"Too late to back out?"

"Are you kidding?" Dior laughed, looking into the mirror. "We look way too good to back out now, Sof."

"Then here we fucking go."