The Wild Child's Bodyguard

I throw winks everywhere

• the Wild Child's bodyguard •

Calm down, Lisa. Breathe- that's rule one of surviving the unexpected. Maybe your hangover is giving you hallucinations. Maybe with your incredible luck, he's not even real.

Yeah. My inner voice is right. If I'm incredible, my luck must be too.

I rub my eyes.

Then I rub my eyes again.

He's still standing there, hand raised, ready to seal the deal to my doomed fate.

Another possibility is that I'm seeing ghosts. But how do I determine that?

I can't call the ghostbusters, so I do the next best thing.

I reach out and pinch his cheeks.

He doesn't even flinch.

"Nope," I say, more to myself than him, "-no way. Nuh-uh." I make an 'X' with my hands. "You're joking. This is a big joke, isn't it?" I turn behind me, facing my new police friend Kennedy, "Please tell me he's not real." he responds by giving a pathetic shrug.

Ryder retracts his hand when it's clear that I have no intention in acknowledging his physical existence. "And why would I waste my time on something as frivolous as jokes?" he spits the word 'joke' out like some sort of virus.

Curse his British accent! I need to get used to this and stop giggling mentally.

Well, on the bright side, my suffering is not entirely in vain- this event has proved an important conclusion for the relationship between me being incredible, and my luck- they are obviously inversely proportional to each other.

I force out an indignant laugh and instead of yelling at him saying 'in case you haven't noticed, you have no rights to appear in my life ever again after taking a huge stab at my pride', I say, "In case you haven't noticed, I'm 17 years old. I'm more than capable of taking care of myself."

"Coming from a reckless drinker who had gotten ambushed and getting caught for stealing a car in one day, I'd say that it's debatable."

"And coming from a guy I met in the club last night taking shots, I'd say you aren't qualified." I pretend to give him a once over, "Besides, what are you? Twelve?"

"Unlike you, I actually had some business to attend to last night." his expression remains unreadable, "My age does not concern you. All you need to know is that I'm more than able to keep you safe."

I give a mocking laugh, looking at my mum with the can you believe this joke? expression. "Business? In a club full of underaged drinkers? Really? Did dad stick to a low budget when putting up all those 'bodyguards wanted' posters and came back with this?" my mum does not look amused, and I continue, "You're trusting my life on a lying, alcoholic twelve-year-old that dad probably picked up from the streets living off leftovers?"

Now Ryder seems to betray a hint of annoyance. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing now that I've confirmed he's not an entirely emotionless robot. "Ms Kingsley, with all due respect, I have been training with the most powerful secret service in Britain. I would appreciate it if you could keep your snide comments to yourself." 

"I guess I could..." I pretend to think thoughtfully for about two seconds before going back to glaring at him, "But I won't. And if you don't like that, you should leave."