The Meeting

Chapter 18 - Double Dates

“Great, that’s all I need. You’re going crazy!” Aria rolls her eyes at me in the mirror of her bathroom, flat iron in hand.

“But it sounded so real, like he was in the room, and I could have sworn that I saw a shadow,” I say with exasperation, leaning against her doorframe. I knew she wouldn’t believe me, but I had to tell her.

“I seriously think that your mind was creating the scenario that you wanted. It was probably just a shadow. When I was young, there was a shadow in my closet, which looked like a person, and it scared the shit out of me.” Her long, blonde hair swishes before me as I stare at it in envy and longing. She doesn’t even really need to straighten it, where as mine would take forever to get to that stage. “Then, one night when I was older, my dad hid in my closet and jumped out yelling and screaming at me. And my parents wonder why I wanted to move out so bad. Losers…”

I smile as her in the mirror. Her dad has a fantastic sense of humor and would always play practical jokes on her every chance he got.

“Well, I think your parents are awesome. I would take that any day over my big mess of a family.”

“I say losers in a loving way, but of course I have to conform to societies view on parents. So, to everyone else, I think they’re embarrassing and weird.” She puts down her flat iron and starts to tackle her eye shadow, something she’s always been terrible at. She strokes some grey onto her lids and somehow manages to get it up by her eyebrow. “Ugh! Jesus Christ!”

“Let me do it. Sit,” I command gently, pointing to the toilet and taking the brush from her hand. She sits down, crosses her arms, and gives a loud huff. “You’re such a drama queen Aria. It’ll look fine. How many times have I done your make-up now?” I grin and pick up her eye shadow and start to sweep the silver-grey on her lid.

“Whatever,” she grumbles, sticking her bottom lip out in the biggest pout I’ve ever seen, which makes me laugh. She gives me a stern expression and then breaks out in a huge smile. “Geez, I can never keep a straight face around you. It’s not fair.”

I add in some black at the outer corners and smudge some right under her lower lash line, giving her a sexy, smoky eye look.

“How’s your mom?” I ask, carefully putting some mascara on her long lashes. She sighs softly and her face falls a little, the usual spark leaving her eyes.

“She’s doing okay, I guess. I’m going to go back to stay at my Dad’s tomorrow. He really doesn’t know what to do with himself when he’s alone. He doesn’t even know how to do his own laundry, Zoe!”

“Well, be sure to give them my love,” I say quietly. She nods her head minutely. “There, you’re all done.”

She jumps up and inspects her eyes in the mirror, giving none of her emotions away. She turns and throws her arms around my neck, squeezing the life out of me and beaming ear to ear.

“Thanks babe. So what’s the plan for today?” She walks out of her bathroom, pulling me with her. “I feel like going for coffee or something.”

“So hunting for me in other words,” I say, my eyes narrowing in suspicion.

“But all the men that go there are soooooo hot!”

I roll my eyes at her and grab my purse off the counter. “Maybe you’ll actually get up the courage to talk to one of them instead of going red and running away?”

She sticks her tongue out at me and slips her favorite leather jacket on. The whole effect is fantastic and she looks like a fashionable rock chick on the way to a show. I give her the thumbs up and we leave, arms linked together, striding down the hall to the elevator.