Perfectly Imperfect 1

84- Aiden Again

CAL:

This is ridiculous!

I stomp over to the sweeping staircase and head up, knocking into people as I do. I don’t care though. Stupid alumni! I don’t understand all this theatricality! God damn it! They can have hazing with the lights on!

Sighing to myself, I head to the second floor and up the last flight of rickety stairs to the attic. I remember playing here as a child. As chance would have it, I stumbled into the attic one day and found the fuse box. Naturally, like any little boy, I played with all the little switches and found out that the little toggles controlled the lights.

I open up the fuse box, feeling around for the toggles in the darkness. Before I manage to find any though, a hand firmly grips my wrist.

“What do you think you’re doing?” the feminine voice hisses. I can’t quite place it, but it definitely belongs to one of the alumni members.

“I’m switching the lights back on,” I mutter matter-of-factly.

She tightens her grip, her nails digging into my wrist.

“Don’t you dare ruin the hazing!” she snarls softly. “Why are you even up here?! How did you even know to come up here?!”

“Let go of me!” I hiss, pulling out of her grasp.

“Leave! Now! I’ll talk to the chairman! You will not get a place in our ranks. Leave!” she screeches.

“Oh, you’ll tell the chairman, will you?” I challenge softly, smirking. I grab her arm with my free hand and drag her down the stairs with me.

“What are you doing?!” she demands, her voice rising an octave.

“Taking you to the chairman so you can tell him about me,” I murmur, grinning openly now.

“Who are you kidding? You don’t know who the chairman is! Nobody but the alumni knows,” she mutters in a put-on bored tone.

I smile to myself, pulling her down the staircase to the first floor. I know exactly where my dad is; the old study. Where else would he be.

I throw the study door opens, obviously interrupting some hush-hush discussion.

“What’s the meaning of this?!” dad demands in his ‘official’ voice.

“This boy! He tried to switch the lights on! We must check up on quality control of who gets invited,” the lady mutters, snatching her hand out of my grasp.

“What’s your name, boy?” dad asks haughtily, walking over to me.

Smirking to myself, I pull off my mask, much to everyone’s astonishment.

“Callum!” dad exclaims, clapping me on the back, a smile on his face.

“Father, can we please cut out the theatricality?” I ask, rolling my eyes at him. “This is a joke! From the whole horrid choice of song to the switching off the lights; this is easily the worst party I’ve ever been to. It’s exclusive, yes, but also unbearably tiresome. I was told the Alumni Masquerade Ball is something to be remembered for a lifetime. I’m not going to remember this,” I shrug.

“Insolent child,” the lady I dragged down from the attic mutters.

“Mabelle, that’s my son you’re talking about! Watch your tone,” my father mutters under his breath.

Mabelle bows her head slightly but holds her tongue. I give her a smirk before turning back to my father. “Where’s Kay?”

“Hazing,” dad mutters absent mindedly back behind his table, looking over some papers. “Is the party so bad?” he asks in a sad voice.