Rough Night ✓

iii. philotimo

iii.

p h i l o t i m o

(n.) "friend of honor"

I COULDN'T PLACE the feeling, but it was rather persistent. Not as potent as dread or as fleeting as joy, but it was still circumferential in nature, coming back for more even after it used up every possible fiber of my being.

If I were being dramatic, the only fitting description of it would be the beginning of the end, but there was a time and place for such delusions. No, the feeling that this was all over wouldn't creep upon me like that, it would've crashed into me like everything else, and I would've been tapping the ground for a reprieve because I knew I couldn't handle it.

Instead, I was checking in the mirror, running a brush through my hair. Before I let him use my shower, Aven reminded me that I should dress in something nice to go see Don Giovanni which led me to being concerned about my appearance for the first time in what felt like ages. Even Declan threw no fights against my lack of self-respect and didn't mind that I barely could operate my makeup or correctly pin up my long, raven-colored hair. I didn't even feel like a girl or a woman from Monday to Saturday, but a machine that exercised expertise in calling out drink orders and explaining company discounts.

But here was a runaway billionaire who shorted my circuit by suggesting that I looked pretty for the opera. I never expected as such - everything from this night had caught me off guard in all honesty - but maybe routines were built up to fall. I wouldn't call myself Rome already, but he'd taken the first brick and it was only a matter of time before he brought me all the way down.

I mused over the idea of that - that my small frame could hold cities and that maybe I was bigger than I seemed - when the door to my bathroom cracked open, Aven's head peeking out, his black hair slicked down from the water.

"You don't happen to have a towel, do you?" He asked and serving bitter coffee all day made nothing sound as sweet.

"Yeah," I said, turning away from him, "I'll go and get it."

∞ ∞ ∞

I COULD TASTE adventure in the air, that was the only sure thing I had. Because what else would you call it when the missing Aven Holiday who had the world on edge happened to be only wearing a towel as he ironed his rumpled suit in your bedroom?

A fantasy for some who got more provocative reactions from the sight of him - or any attractive man - wearing only a towel that was too small so it stopped at about the knees, but with the pacing of my life, I was more taken by the fact that he seemed to have made a place in my life just by talking to me. Especially when I was someone who would usually be elated by the thought that anyone was talking to me, the fact that it was someone so influential was even more groundbreaking. Of course, it didn't take a sleuth to know that he was grieving his mother's recent death when the internet exists, and that our chance meeting was laced with our personal pain, so i couldn't really think much of it.

"It's okay to look," Aven cracked dryly, turning to the windowsill where I sat to face me. "I've had it happen on countless occasions with countless women."

I rolled my eyes. Sure I was looking at him, and sure I found him attractive, but sexual thoughts were the last things I had. More so I was trying to see as much of the only new person who had stepped into my life as I could before he was gone.

"I'd see more looking at a brick wall," I commented dryly, my lips curled up slightly from amusement.

He feigned a look of shock, likely used to being insulted but trying to lead me on to believe I had hurt him. I was already taking him to the opera, I didn't even budge an inch.

"You sure are a tough pumpkin to carve," he said laughingly, his tone light and airy in a way I didn't imagine from him, especially when he had broken into Metro's and nearly strangled me to death.

"I generally avoid anyone or anything that tries to scoop my guts out," I said playfully. But funnily enough, that was true. I had run from college into Metro's, run from Metro's into Declan - I was running at full speed now and the only thing I could reach was Aven. Who knew, maybe he would become just another stab in the dark.

Hopefully not. Nobody liked to lose blood.

∞ ∞ ∞

"AND WHAT MAKES you think this will actually work," I hiss as Aven and I walk down the flight of stairs to the lobby, deciding that the elevator would likely be an easy place for him to be spotted. "Not criticizing," I add rather meekly, "just curious, that's all."

"Well," he started in a matter-of-factly tone of voice, "I've been hiding in this city for quite some time now with my beard grown in and only you found me. So the beard and my not-so-nice clothes must account for something. Or maybe people have stopped looking for me. Whatever it is, it's working."

I nod as we take the stairs down, my feet already sore from wearing heels for the first time in ages. Something about what he said struck a nerve, though. The world was frantic over his disappearance, in a way they haven't been over anyone else. People who cared so much about celebrities and the rich and famous were concerned about the appearances he would be missing out on at benefits where they would note his exemplary style. The people who were concerned about the poor would be throwing a fit because of the many jobs at Holiday Incorporated that were at risk under the new management. Maybe they were just looking for him in all the wrong places, congregating in one place so that the world tilted on its axis.

Here I was, on that slanted ground, trying to maneuver around all of them and take the person they're looking for who could set it all right again to - of all things - an opera. It felt completely selfish and yet if I cut him loose, I would never have another person come as close to me.

I looked at him from out of the corner of my eye. The craziest thing seemed to be how determined he was about this, that he was going to the opera no matter what and he was taking me with him. Who actually could say they were more-or-less kidnapped by a billionaire who wanted to take you to the opera? No one I knew, at least, and if I had friends then I would've bragged to them.

"What are you looking at now," he said with a knowing smirk pulling at his lips.

"I'm just thinking about how absurd all of this is," I said. "Like, I can't believe I'm going to see an opera with a billionaire, I don't even like opera."

Aven laughed almost, his humor verbalizing in strangled notes, a hacking sound that could've been interpreted as a cough. It sounded horrible and he was probably sick from being homeless and on the run for so long, and it made me wonder if I still knew how to laugh as well.

"I will make you like opera," he said, "mark my words - what's your name?"

And it hit me that I didn't even introduce myself, maybe because I already had him sized up from the beginning. "Effie, Effie Calder."

He nodded, looking at me with his blue eyes intensely and if I didn't recognize how it felt to stop breathing, then I sure knew now. "I like that," he said.

For reasons unknown to me, breathing came a lot more harder now.