Masquerade ✔️

thirteen: noelle

Boys they like a little danger, we'll get em fallin for a stranger, a player

Listen to the song attached while you read.

My plan is working. Nate is totally hammered.

Because I'm an intelligent, independent woman with access to the Internet, I have formulated a three-step-plan.

1. Get Nate drunk. Completely drunk. Like, poking your eye when I say poke your nose drunk.

2. Take my mask off. If he recognizes me, Drew won't invite him anymore. If he doesn't, proceed to step three.

3. Hook up somewhere. Hot tub, bedroom, hell it could be a living room for all I care. Then leave promptly afterward and see him next month. I'd be okay making this a monthly thing.

So this is working. I'm sitting in a living room with Nate, Charlie, Drew and a bottle of Chardonnay, I'm not drinking but Nate is. For reasons unknown to me, Charlie isn't drinking, which is odd. Char isn't an alcoholic, but she's not exactly a nun.

"What time is it?" Drew asks, trying and failing to subtly grab Charlie's boob. He ends up a few inches south and Char bats his hand away, checking her phone.

"Midnight." She replies, swinging her legs onto his lap.

Nate cheers. "Happy New Year!" Drew whoops along loudly, spilling his drink onto his arm.

Char and I make eye contact. New Years isn't until next week, but apparently, drunk twenty-something-year-old men don't recognize dates.

"Nate, mignon, can you touch your nose for me?" I look up at him, switching on the charm just enough that he'll comply.

He nods and slaps his forehead, groping around for a moment before finally poking himself in the eye.

"Thank you." I look at Charlie again. She made me run my plan by her first, and thankfully she takes the hint.

"Sweetie, c'mon. Let's leave them alone." Char takes Andrew's hand and they depart, leaving Nate and I alone in the dimly lit living room. It's a nice living room, painted in pastel blue and decorated with navy couches. A massive TV covers one wall, and windows cover two more. The night is dark and lets no light in, the only source coming from lamps turned on around the room.

I sling my leg over Nate's lap and straddle him deliberately. His lips dance across my own and I grip his hair.

I know what turns a guy on. I know where exactly to touch him that'll send his hormone levels skyrocketing. I can make Nate want me, crave me, need me, piss-drunk or not. I know how to excite him, how to make him fall for me even if I don't want to fall for him.

A professional heartbreaker, my ex called me. You can make guys fall for you and destroy them in weeks. You can make or break a man. You can ruin someone.

I take pride in that title. It's strangely exhilarating to know that I can have the power, after over a decade and a half of abuse from my mom. I like the power. I don't like the attachment men form, how they don't take hints.

Power has always been key for me. I need to know that I can be the one who has the strength, the terrifying ability to destroy, to play, to totally and completely shatter.

And that's why I do it. Because I don't need another broken heart. It's so much easier to have the power, not to let anyone else have any say on the beautifully dangerous state of my heart. It's easier to put up the shield of perfect seductiveness, to not let anyone see my true self except me. No one in this entire world has ever seen the true me, not my mother, my father, my siblings, not even Charlie and Drew.