Living In The Shallows (UK Crush #1)

Chapter Thirty-Nine

AN: Living in the Shallows has made it to #350 in Teen Fiction, woohoo! I have to hit the "mature" switch soon (I think what happens on the plane, in all good conscience, would constitute a "mature scene"), which will render it ineligible for ranking, but we've had a good long run, I believe. But maybe we can break the top 300 before that happens, who knows? Thanks, everyone, for reading and voting!!

🌸🌿🌸🌿🌸

When the door of the car opened, the screaming of the people and the photographers was frightening. Wow, this was a serious party. The security guard at the door of the club greeted us with, "Hey, we were wondering when you guys were going to show up. Who's the bird?"

"Hey," Matty said, bristling slightly. "This is no bird, this is our translator, Tinker Bell; you've met her before. It's her birthday today, too."

"Sorry, miss," the security guard said, "I didn't recognize you, you look quite different tonight."

"Thanks," I said with a smile.

"And a happy birthday to you," he added as we entered.

"Matthew, you're going to have to relax a bit," Gethin said to him as we looked around the room.

"What do you mean?" Matty asked.

"Well, Tink looks seriously hot tonight," Gethin said. "Like, on fire hot. She's going to get a lot of attention, and a lot of those kinds of remarks like from the security guard. What are you going to do, Matty? Beat up everyone who notices?"

"If I have to," he said. "Look, just because she looks nice is no reason to let people talk shit about her."

"Don't be silly," I said. "He wasn't 'talking shit' about me; 'bird' just means 'girl', right? I mean, I'm not dressed slutty or anything, right?" I looked around. "I'm dressed more conservatively than ninety percent of the women here. So relax, go get a drink, this is supposed to be fun. Do what you'd regularly do. I've never been to a party like this before, so I'm just going to get a glass of wine and sit at a table and people watch for a while. If I need one of you, I'll come find you or text you or whatever, and if I need to leave, I can catch a cab, unlike you four. You guys don't need to babysit me, okay?" I looked around at their doubtful faces. "OKAY?" They nodded. "Now go! No wait. Ro, Geth, Matty, go. Teddy, get me a glass of wine first, then you go." I shooed them all away and sat down at a little table near the wall.

It was a huge room, with an area for dancing, an open bar with a bartender, a music station with a DJ, and a buffet with some amazing looking food. Only about half the people looked vaguely Asian, and honestly, the party could have been taking place anywhere in the world, from New York City to Santiago. It was gorgeous, sparkling, lit up from floor to ceiling, loud, a complete overload for all of the senses.

Every boy immediately had a cluster of girls around him, and Teddy had to fight to get back to me with my glass of wine; he was accompanied by five or six girls, or women, I should say. At least I assumed they were women. Even Japan had a legal drinking age of twenty, and someone, somewhere must have been enforcing it, right?

I think Teddy wanted to sit down next to me, but the ladies he was with were having none of it. They bore him off in their midst to "have a dance", as they put it, though "have an orgy" seemed to be more what they meant. I looked away after a few minutes because it was kind of sickening to see what they were doing to Teddy, and all the boys, frankly. It surprised me that I was that bothered, okay, jealous, about all the boys, even though by now I'd admitted to myself that Teddy was special to me and I felt things for him I'd never felt for anyone before.

From where I was sitting, even in the dim light, I swore I saw one girl grab Matty's crotch as they were dancing. I felt like I was watching an assault, which was crazy. Matty was a grown man, completely capable of defending himself in a public place from unwanted advances from a woman. Sure enough, within seconds, he had her by the wrist, and had returned her hand to her person, much to her dismay. He waved goodbye to her and turned away. He continued to dance with her friends, but he ignored her from that moment on. That boy could take care of himself.