After You... (Official Edit)

Chapter 6 - Nobody Needs To Know Names For A Night

**** I'm still updating lol. I know. I keep going because I've set myself some goals and I'm trying to reach them (namely, fix this mess of a manuscript and finish the entire story), which is why I'm still here :D

Also, some exciting news for anyone who may have read TMAAYM, there's finally going to be an update for that in the coming weeks! I'm really gassed!

This chappy's for my sister, my dad, and my best friend who are all reading this (my dad'll probably stop soon cos its not his thing lol but he wanted to read some of my stuff), and to all who have been kind enough to vote when you didn't have to. Thank you so much. All blessings, much love. Keep going with it cos it gets amazing!

So just briefly about this chapter -- this was originally part of the last chapter but it was too long (7-thousand words originally, like damn) and has been split and now becomes its own scene with a new chapter title. I also felt it needed to be its own moment from all the convoluted goings-on in the 1st draft . This is not one of the brand spanking new chapters but its pretty close to new  cos I've made changes to this conversation & to characterization too. You'll see. Hope you enjoy! ****

Chapter Six

      Nobody Needs To Know Names For A Night

I didn't wait for him to respond. I didn't want him to say anything else so I cut the call off. Message to my heart, it's one-nil to my head. You lose.

I sank against the wall. To say I was curious though was the moment I learned how little that message to my heart meant. It hadn't lost. How could it lose when curiosity pricked at me with a stubbornness I couldn't shake?

The trick is to think it like I meant it—that my head was winning—but I couldn't fool myself. Under the flip of my hair I lifted my chin like nothing mattered and to hell with needing to know what he wanted to say. But try being defiant when it's not real. So I said it again to myself; I didn't need to know, and convinced myself I was better off having him crawl back under that ten-month old rock he'd been under. As the syrupy air from garnished drinks went down my neck I gagged the sweetness from my throat. I needed some air. I had to get out of here.

Next thing and I edged through the crowd and lost my view ahead while stepping on things that weren't the floor. Cue stepping on someone's heels, some fashionably scuffed Keds, and one casual brogue while narrowly escaping the other. Then, having moved with the current, I didn't know where the doors were. Other than stepping into laughs and slipping between leather grunge jackets with wannabe grunge attitudes, the one thing I recognised was the bar.

Racing past it, I halted when I latched eyes on the bartender. It was just in time for him to look up from passing a shooter to some punters looking thirsty for a blinding hangover.

"You okay?" he called. His voice managed to hold over all the crazy.

I matched his volume. "It doesn't matter." Then zoomed past him.

The stupid thing was not knowing where I was racing to and not wanting to look stupid either, but I'd found the doors. After pushing one and cursing them out for being locked I spotted the handle. A damn handle. Pull. I was supposed to pull not push. My forced slam behind me shook the door into an echoed tremor once I'd hotfooted it out of there.

Except I wasn't where I thought I'd be. There were no streets. No boozy people. No nothing but tables, chairs, benches, wood flooring. And air. Lots of air. A beer garden.