A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing

Chapter 1

I'm going to end up alone. There is no possible way that I, soon to be thirty in three weeks, working as an executive assistant in a corporate office, will find a somewhat decent man. Every relationship I have had since I left college has failed. God how I miss college. Lounging around in those UPenn dorms, eating half my bodyweight in dining hall food, and going to parties and waking up the next day in some rando's room. Those were the good ol' days, when the name Saffron McCarthy was known and appreciated by all the Quakers. Now you only hear my name when the coffee machine is out of order, or the files aren't organized. Speaking of unorganized files, that's the task at hand currently. Sitting in this wooden chair, fit for a prison torture room, I'm alphabetizing these sales forms for Napa Inc. Working for an insurance company in the Big Apple is just as boring as it sounds. You would think that being two weeks into 2017, life would still have that fresh false hopefulness for change people tend to get every New Years. "This year I'll actually stick to that diet I so desperately need," says every woman I know. People can be so delusional.

It's six o'clock, work is finally over. "Bye, see you tomorrow boo," I say to Deborah, from HR, as I walk out the building. She's been my only trustable co-worker since she started working here a week after me. We've gone out every friday since she brought me a cup of coffee on her first day working here. In a office full of nimrods, you got to latch onto the good people you find.

Winters in New York are the worst. It gets dark before five, and all the basic couples are out taking basic coupley pictures in their basic couple scarves. Now look, I'm not bitter, I love love, but when all your attempts of finding and keeping happiness have failed, you begin to lose hope. My options at this point are scant. I have this rule, don't date any guy with the name of any serious ex. There may be many fish in the sea but I don't want any with the name, Roger, Ron, Mike, Jake, Jacob, Michael, Kelly, Jack, Eric, Tristan or Phillip.
           As I walk down 14th Street, I stop at Cafe One, my favorite cafe in the city. The smell of hot chocolate and biscotti fill the air as soon as I step in. I scope out the cafe, only about 7 other people sitting sporadically around the room. Its surprising that even with the beige walls and comfy brown chairs, they don't get a lot of customers. I order the usual iced caramel latte and chocolate chip cookie. I've been here every day since I moved here from Pennsylvania nine years ago, and the one thing I can always count on is the workers spelling my name wrong. I grab my cold cup with the name "Safrun" written on it, and my hot cookie and decide it's better to stay in this heat for a couple minutes as I finish my drink. I sit on the corner stool of the long bar at the window facing outside.
           I am interrupted in the middle of my people-watching by a tap on my shoulder. I'm ready to curse out whoever decided it was a bright idea to disturb a woman who was peacefully being a creep and making up stories about other people's lives. However, when I see who it is I can't help but smile.
"OH MY GOD! MARK! IT'S SO GREAT TO SEE YOU," I exclaimed.
           Mark Zigler was my best friend in college, oh the good times we have had. One summer night we were in our mutual friends Tatiana's dorm room. She had her walls painted cotton candy pink and her bed was king sized since she had a solo room. An hour into our biochemistry study session, she left to "go to the bathroom," which was code for sneaking into her boyfriend's room. As soon as she left Mark and I just looked at each other, stood up, grabbed both ends of the mattress, lifted it, and started running up the stairs to my room, I led the way. Once we got to my room we started writing crazy shit everywhere on the mattresses, "I love Brillo pads,""I can't cook cause all I eat is Brillo pads," "Brillo pads are bae." I don't know what it was about Brillo pads that day but they were our victim of choice. After the whole mattress was covered in Brillo-pad-obsessed writing, we ran back down with the mattress and placed it on her bed. We put the sheets on it too so the writing wouldn't be visible. It took a week for Tatiana to notice it but it only took those thirty minutes for me and Mark to become best friends.
     "Ronny, it's great to see you too. It's been so long. You still look as hot as ever though.I see you got rid of the glasses," he says as he analyzes my long legs, olive skin, hazel eyes and wavy chestnut hair.
     "Yeah, I have contacts now. It has been TOO long, you're a big shot photographer know, you travel all around the world with the greatest cameras but still can't manage to keep a phone on you."
     "Yeah, well you know me, I don't like to be brought down by the weight of social expectations."
     "So what brings you here?" I say while analyzing his aesthetically pleasing bod. I don't know if was the fact that I haven't been with anyone for a month or my eyes deceiving me but Mark was looking good enough to eat with his shaggy honey hair, chiseled jaw and toned arms. And I always did like a man with glasses.
     "Well I just landed,back from Thailand, and I figured why not come and visit my oldest friend? I knew you'd be here."
     "Ugh. I am not old. I have three more weeks left of my twenties and I plan on milking it for all its worth."
     "Speaking of your soon to be age, do you remember the night of the Met ball in 2007?" he asked.
     "Yeah, where we drunk our feelings away after we both got turned down by the Stensen twins whose looks should be illegal."
     "Kristine was sexy as hell, and you swore up and down you'd marry her brother Todd."
     "Todd was one fine specimen."
     "Anyways, that's not the point. I seem to remember we made a pact that day...the desperate, drunken best friend college pact," he says with a smirk on his face. I don't remember.
     I look at him with one eyebrow raised and say, "I'm not sure what you are talking about Mark."
     "How do you not remember?!" He says somewhat agrily, and I see a quick flicker of crazy flash in his eyes. "We made a pact that if we were both single at 30 we would get married."
Now I remember. It was July 18, Summer of '07, we had just gotten rejected by the Stensen twins and were sitting in my dorm. My roommate Kate had left to "use the bathroom." Mark and I were moping over a bottle of Cîroc about how we'll be single forever when suddenly he looked at me and said, "let's make a pact." At the time it seemed like a great idea. Mark is handsome, smart, nerdy, there's nothing wrong with him. Plus, at least this way I know I won't die alone if I don't find a man as great as every male fictional character I have fell in love with, I thought. I said yes, pledged on a PEOPLE magazine that I will keep this pact intact and never gave it another thought...until now.
    "Like you said, Mark, we were drunk and desperate." Laughing I say, "You can't really believe it was a serious oath."
     "Oh yes it was, we pledged on the best magazine of all time," he replies. I couldn't tell if he was playing or not. Either way for some odd reason, I'm actually considering it. I mean it wouldn't be that bad getting with a rich photographer who happens to be my former best friend.
     "Alright, let's get married, then." The words spill out of my mouth before I even realize I am saying them. Before I know it he's down on one knee with a 120 carat princess cut diamond ring. "Wow, you really thought this through. What if I would have said no?"
    "Oh shut up. You know you can't refuse me. Anyways, I want to do this properly. Saffron Linda McCarthy, will you do me the immense pleasure of having you as my wife? I promise to love you till death do us part. To take care of you until we're both poor and dead. To be mindful, and honest with you until my very last day." Wow, way to lay it on me. Shit, am I making a mistake? What if it in a few years I meet the perfect man for me. Or maybe Mark is the perfect man for me...only one way to find out.
     "Yes. YOLO," I scream. "I can't believe I am engaged to such a stud," I say smiling.
       We walk out of the Cafe holding hands and smiling. "I can't believe I just went from single to engaged in a matter of ten minutes. I don't know how this is going to work. I mean, I guess we can grow to love each other in a romantic way over time. I did used to have a little crush for Mark back in college, maybe it can grow again," I think as we walk to his jet black BMW.
     "Do you remember where I live?" I ask.
     "Yea, 501 West 23st on the third floor, apartment 3B?"
"Close. 3D." Wow, I can't he remember my address cause I sure as hell forgot his. When we both moved here, he rented a studio apartment on the east side, while I lived with my sister Carrie, who decided to venture out to Florida with her husband a few years later. Speaking of sister I should probably tell her the news. Maybe she has heard from our hippie parents recently while they're on their quest for spiritual freedom. My mom is more adventurous while my dad is reserved, so she dragged him along, probably promised a buttload of sex.
     "In two and a half weeks,I have to go out to Cali for 3 days. I'll be back the day of your birthday, but I figured while I'm gone you can move yourself into the town house in the upper east side I bought a couple years ago. It very spacious, and that way you'll be closer to work...and me."
     "Sounds good", I say just as we pull up to my apartment. I don't know whether to hug or kiss him goodnight.
"Well, goodnight," I say as I reach for the door with my left hand that is now worth millions of dollars.
     "Wait, let me walk you to the door," he says as we both step out of the car. Forever the gentleman. Once we reach the door to my building, we stand there awkwardly. The silence gives me anxiety. Fuck it, I'm going in, may God bless me. I don't want to embarrass myself. As I start to lean in for the kiss I am met halfway. It only lasts about five seconds...way longer than it should have.
"Well goodnight" I say as I enter the building trying to rid my mouth of that childlike kiss. I know it will get better in time though. It has to.
        Today's the day Mark is going off to California , so I'm packing my things to move in. The past two and a half weeks have been incredible. Mark would pick me up every day from work, we'd head over to the cafe and talk for an hour. Then we'd head out to a exotic restaurant, a different one each day. I'm surprised I haven't blown up to the size of a sumo wrestler at this point. Maybe I need to start that new diet this New Years. Oh God, I can't believe I just said that. I'm turning into one of these delusional women. As I finish putting my final items into the last box, I wonder what we will do with my apartment after we're married. I live on the lower west side of Manhattan. Not nearly as fancy as the east side but just as beautiful, He wants to get married three months after my birthday, so in three months and two days. I don't want to give up my apartment, it my safe haven against this world of such cruelty. I would come here to cry, cook, drink, watch black and white films, just about everything. But then again, it does have some awful memories. Like on that dusty blue couch in the living room where Tristan told me he had to break up with me because I "wasn't good enough for his parents," or on the white loveseat where Jack told me he had to break up with me because he was "interested in other people." No matter how bad all these memories are, I have had great times here, like last Christmas eve when I threw a legendary party. There was two big Christmas trees beautiful decorated with snowflake ornaments. I even hired belly dancers for entertainment. I woke up the next day to a few friends passed out on the very same couch I was dumped on, I had sex on, and I cried on. That being said, everyone had a great time. I do a walk through my apartment. Two bedrooms, Two bathrooms, and one huge stainless steel kitchen. That wall I have filled with polaroids of all my meals. I will definitely miss this place. This is where I grew as a person, and I wouldn't replace that for the world.
          As I drive to his place I contemplate fighting for my apartment. He never said I had to give it up. And I make enough as an executive assistant to pay rent at my apartment and half the rent at his. I doubt he would make me pay rent though. Now that I think about it, he probably owns the Townhouse so I won't need to pay. I'm definitely keeping my apartment.
     I finally arrive to his townhouse, it only takes 25 minutes. He lent me one of his cars to put my boxes in. I have about ten of them so I have to make multiple stops up and down the stairs. When I finally finish unloading I take a tour of the duplex. Its decorated with blue furniture but the walls are plain white. The living room is big, the kitchen is even bigger. "This is going to be a great place to cook," I think out loud. There's a game room and a guest bedroom with a shower on the first floor too. I walk up to the second floor where the two master bedrooms are. The bathrooms have tubs and showers. This is definitely an upgrade.
     I head into what I assume to be Mark's room based off the all the Star Wars posters. He has a king size bed with black sheets. On the right side of his bed is a white night stand with a grey lamp on top. On the left side there is a stack of books. There's a window by the books pile that illuminates the room. I work towards the window and for some odd reason the wooden floors creak when I step on them. I walk away from the window and back towards it to make sure it's not my imagination. Having watched every episode of Criminal Minds and taking a class on architecture in college, I know this can mean one of two things, a hidden room or really bad carpenting. I check the wooden tiles, and by a miracle three conjoined tiles lift up, revealing stairs. Maybe this is where he does his photo editing, I think as I take the those erie steps down towards what could be my fíances man cave. "Holy shit. Holy shit Holy shit Holy shitttt I have to get out," I say to myself as I look around. The first thing I see is what looks like a murder board from CSI. But instead of pictures of victims , Its pictures of every single guy I have dated since college. There's pictures of each of them in my house with me, on the street walking home, and at their workplace. Next to each name theres a list, an only one item circled on that list. A list of reasons to breakup with me. Tristan's list says "You're ugly, You're too controlling, Not good enough." Not good enough is circled. In the comment section of that list it says, "He was in love with her, had to threaten his family to get him to leave her." Oh my God, he's been convincing all my boyfriend's to leave me, He's fucking psychotic. All this time I thought I was the one with issues, when really all my boyfriends were just scared of this crazy ass dude who was supposed to be traveling around the world. Wait. If he's been here, then how does he travel and take pictures? I don't have time to dwell on this because the door behind me just got slammed shut. Damnit I already know who it is. I do a quick prayer to God as I turn around and see...Deborah from HR? God bless me based on every Killer couples episode, it should have been Mark who entered.
         "Omg you scared me, what are-"
        "I came to warn you," she cuts me off.
       "About?"
       "Mark, he's crazy. Please don't hate me but for the past 10 years he's made me spy on you. I had to become best friends with you, learn all your business and report it back to him. He told me it was for your mom, but I'm not stupid. I'm sorry," She says on the edge of tears
         "Why would he ask you to help him?"
        "Because I'm his sister in law. I got married to Marks brother a few years back but then we got divorced and Mark has been helping me get back on my feet. He got me the job at Napa Inc, and let me stay here in the guest bedroom... until recently when he forced me to move out, he said I had accomplished my mission and I was no longer needed. I knew something was up, so when you came into work with that rock on your finger I understood why he made me do what I had done. Please forgive me, I know I betrayed your trust but you have to understand I needed his money, I mean help. We can stay friends, right?"
     Woah, that's a lot to take in. How could I have trusted this leech? I don't have time to stress this. I need to figure out a game plan. I turn thirty in two days, that gives me two days to get married to someone else before Mark comes back. I need to find Tristan and fast.