Hired | b.w.s

Eleven

I groan as I enter another nightclub with Brad. This one seems more somber and it is later at night so I can accept the drinking. There was a lot of paparazzi outside and my eyes are still stinging a little from the flashes. I reluctantly sit at the bar with Brad, who orders himself a drink before turning to me.

"Anything?" He asks.

"I don't drink." I decline politely.

"Why? It's fun?" He responds whilst taking a sip of the drink given to him.

"You don't need to know." I smile sarcastically.

"Fine." He chuckles.

"Are we just going to sit here and drink?" I ask him whilst observing my surroundings.

"That's the plan." He replies coolly. "Why don't we start off with you telling me why you don't drink?" He pushes. I watch him and stay silent for a while before deciding to answer.

"It changes people." I simply reply, watching him carefully.

He stares back at me with an unreadable expression, just very...intense. I snap my eyes away from his glare and look at my phone, hoping for a text. Unfortunately, dick boy is busy again and won't be texting me all day. I hate to admit it, but I do enjoy his messages.

"So...acting?" Brad asks me as he finishes his drink.

"Yeah." I awkwardly respond, I'm not used to him being somewhat polite to me.

"Is it tough?" He asks.

"Very. I guess it's like the music industry, impossible to get into at first and hard to make it to the top." I shrug.

"I suppose." He watches me again. "You must be doing alright for yourself though, considering you're surviving." He jokes, it's strange to hear him joke.

"Uh I wish." I chuckle. "I work part time at a coffee shop, it gets me by."

"A coffee shop?" He repeats my words with a questioning look.

"Yeah..." I trail off as I take in his strange stare. "What?"

"Nothing." He shakes his head and rests his elbows on the surface of the bar.

"Was it hard for you to get into music?" I try to continue the conversation.

"Fuck yeah. It took us almost three years to even get recognised." He shakes his head. "But we got there." He smiles.

"Would you take any of it back if you could?" I ask him, eyeing him intently.

"What do you mean?" He rests his chin in his hands as he looks at me, it's kind of intimidating.

"I mean, it's a hard lifestyle. People are constantly getting into your personal lives and treating you like an animal in a zoo. Would you go back to your normal life if you could?" I ask him.

He stays silent for a few minutes and just watches me with a frown.

"Sometimes I would love to just be able to walk down the street and not get shouted at or to do whatever I wanted with my own life. Everything is...controlled now." He sighs. "But I love singing and performing and I don't think I could lose that." He answers with way more honesty than I was expecting.

I'm almost kind of mesmerised by his answer. He sounded genuine for a change and not self obsessed.

"If only you could have both." I smile sympathetically.

"Yeah." He looks away from me. "If only I could have both." He sighs.

I watch the people around me, bodies dancing on each other in explicit ways, pale blue pills being placed on pale pink tongues, bottle ends meeting with open mouths. I never understood the enjoyment of nightclubs. Drinking to forget and never to remember, taking drugs until you feel nothing. It seems as though a room to dehumanise yourself, to strip all emotions and feelings that humans possess and to be someone else. To be something else.

I look back to Brad to see him on his phone again, I knew his polite behaviour was too good to be true. I sigh but notice my phone buzz on the surface of the bar. I notice Brad's eyes land on my phone as he raises his eyebrow. I pick up my phone and unlock it eagerly.

*Heyyyy;)*

I smile at my phone before typing my reply.

*Hey, dick boy. How are you?*

I sigh as I lock my phone again and meet Brad's eyes.

"What?" I ask him. He's staring at me strangely.

"Nothing." He says whilst biting his cheek.