Rounds

Chapter 17

Linda pulls up into her drive way and gets out of her car, she slams the door behind her and storms into her house, her neighbor Samantha sees her, "Hi, Linda," waving, "Oh, hey Sam," "You don't look so well, everything alright?" "Yeah, sure, just a rough day at work," "Oh alright, well if you ever need to talk in here," Samantha says with smile, "Yeah..alright," Linda says talking out her keys and letting herself into the house. Linda walks through the door and the atmosphere immediately changes, she heads to her office and sits down in her office chair, thinking about today's event, she can't believe Jay would do that, so she comes up with the idea to call her cellphone. Se grabs her cellphone and dials Jay's number, she waits for her to pick up, but there was no answer, she calls again, still no answer, so Linda sends her a text. "Call me as soon as you can, we need to talk, like now," Linda sits there and waits for her to reply, she instantly replies, "What is it, Linda?" "I thought you were my friend, what's going on, like are we not friends anymore?" "Oh Linda, I don't have time for this right now, I'm a little busy at the moment, I'll call you when I'm done," she replied trying to be smart. Linda couldn't believe what she was hearing, this wasn't the Jay she met in middle school, a cloud of sadness flows over her head.

As the night came, Linda waited and waited for Jay's call, she finally calls, but the tone hangs up immediately, Linda goes to her messages again and sends a message, "You were just calling me, what happened?" Linda snaps, "Hold on," she replies fast. Linda sits there and pouts on her bed, then her phone rings, Linda immediately answers, " Yes, Linda?" "What is going on with you?" "What are you talking about?" "What is going on with you and Aidan?" Jay rolls her eyes over the phone, "Nothing is going on, what are you talking about?" "Don't play dumb with me, Jay?" "I'm not," Jay says certain, "Okay, do you work tonight?" "Yeah, I work every night," "I'm coming to your bar tonight, and we're going to talk about this," Jay grew silent over the phone, "No I don't think that's a good idea," "Oh well, I think it is," Linda snaps, "See you tonight," Linda says hanging up the phone, not giving Jay a chance to say anything.

"Who was that, babe?" Brian asks, "Oh, um no one," "What were they asking about," "Nothing, it was something about the bar," "Oh okay," Brian says, Jay gets up from the bed, staring at the body mirror at herself and spaces out, " You okay?" Jay sighs, "Yeah, I'm fine, just a lot of things going on," "You wanna talk about it?" Brian says with a flirtatious tone in his voice, "No, I have to get ready for work," Jay says, walking away from the mirror and into the bathroom. Brian gets up, wobbling away from the bed, he was so high and drunk that he couldn't see straight, Jay is steady getting ready, gets in the shower, puts on her clothes and make up, and is headed for the door, Brian follows her to the door, "Will I see you tonight?" Jay hesitates, "Maybe, I'll call you," Jay says with a low voice, kissing Brian on the cheek. Jay heads to the front door of the apartment building and gets in her car, she sits at the wheel thinking about the phone call with Linda, she sounded mad, and Jay knew why, she knows what's about to happen at the bar tonight and she's well prepared. Jay starts her car and pulls out of the parking spot, just then a red Nissan taps her car and puts a dent into it, "Fuck," Jay says under her breath.

Jay gets out the car angry at the other driver, "What the fuck?!" she yells, the driver of the red Nissan gets out the car, "I am so sor--, heyyyyy, you're that girl that I saw at the bar," Jada says, "Yeah, I am, but you put a dent in my car!" "Yeah, sorry about that, I'll back up so you can see the damage," "I already see it! It's clear as day on my car!" Jay says snapping at her, "Okay, no need to get all rowdy and loud, my car isn't in good shape like it was two seconds ago," "My car is priceless! Unlike you little red car!" Jay says rolling her neck, "Well I'm not being mean to you am I, stupid bitch!" Jada snaps back, Jay gets closer to Jada, "You may wanna back up, cuz I'm not the one to play with," Jada says, warning her, "I don't give a fuck about you, bitch, what matters is you hit my car!" Jay says, yelling and getting closer to her face, "Get the fuck out of my face, homes," Jada says calmly, trying to stay calm. Jay gets closer and keeps yelling at her, she's not lightening up at all, and very heated, something came over Jada, she swings her little fist and it hits Jay in the face very hard.

Jay falls to teh ground, knocked out and blank, unresponsive. Jada gets in her car, backs up off of Jay's car and carefully goes around Jay's body and speeds out of the apartment complex. About forty-five minutes later, Jay wakes up and there's people all around her and her car, she panics and gets up quickly, she hears police sirens in the distance and panicked even more. Jay jumps in her car and beeps her horn so the people can get out of the way, she speeds out of the apartment complex and heads to the bar. On the way there, she stops at a red light and bursts into tears, "I really want to crash this car right now," she says to herself, the light turned green and she was sitting at it for a good minute, cars were beeping at her and going around the other cars, and she didn't care not one bit. Five minutes passed and the light changes back to red, she still sits there in sadness and gloominess.

Minutes go by and she's still there, but all of a sudden she lifts her head and looks straight at the light, the red gleams on her face, her anger starts to rise and all she sees is the color red. She speeds off to the bar, on the way she runs every red light there was to pass. When she arrived to her bar, she sits on the outside of the bar, watching people stand on the outside and chat until it opens. Jay sits in the car, thinking about her car with pain in her face, she almost didn't want to get out of the car, she didn't want anyone to see her face all puffy and messed up.

Jay gets out the car anyway, as she gets out of the car, she sees Linda pull up in her Bentley, "Awh shit," she says under her breath, "Jay!" someone yells, "What's been going on!? The bar hasn't been opened for a few days!" they call out, Jay covers her face and quickly gets out the keys to the bar and goes inside, the big crowed follows her in. As Jay got in, she had to wash the dishes and her team that she hired not too long ago, had to prep the food, she was moving fast and so were the cooks. Linda slithers in the bar like a snake, watching everyone and finally, she spots Jay behind her bar, Linda goes to sit at it and watches Jay at her work. A few moments later, Jay makes eye contact with Linda, Linda looks at Jay with a disgusting look, Jay looks away quickly and slides her a shot of Vodka, "On the house," she says to her, not looking at her, "I need to talk to you, now" "Hold on, let me serve these people, and I'm all yours," Jay says with a smile.

Linda sits at the bar, still watching Jay's every move, she takes the shot, it calms her down a bit, she sits and waits patiently for Jay to finish serving the customers, minutes later, Jay is whipping glasses and her pace starts to slow down. Jay gets four shots of Rum and comes to Linda at the bar, she sits down with a smile on her face, "So, Linda, what did you wanna talk about?" Linda takes another shot and slams the cup down on the counter top, "You know exactly why I want to talk to you about,we talked about it earlier," "Hmm, Aidan? The guy that you're helping?" "You know damn well who he is," Linda says in a low hostile voice, "Okay, you got me, what about him?" "What is going on with you two?" "Nothing, nothing at all," "Now??" "What do you mean now? There was never anything going on in the first place," Jay says with a smile, "Can you cut the crap and tell me what happened?" "Nothing happened, sis, I'm telling you the truth," Linda took a deep breath, "If you don't tell me, I'm going to drag your ass out of this fucking bar and beat your ass," Jay was silent and shook, "That's not how a lawyer talks, sooo unprofessional," Jay says trying to get under Linda's skin.

Linda looks dead at Jay, "Tell me what's going on?" "Fine," Jay took a deep breath, "Me and Aidan we're talking, but he came on to me," Why didn't you let him down easy?!" "Because he's cute and I didn't want to turn him down," "Knowing that I like him!" Linda yells at Jay. The entire bar gets quiet and all eyes are on them.