A year to remember

29. Mila

After all the drama of the snow trip weekend, I decided to head to New York City for Christmas as soon as school finished up for winter break. I do think the fact that I refused to apologise to Scarlett and Jared, or hell, even Mila and Jake, for 'rocking the boat' had something to do with the fact they we were still cold towards me. I don't really get what their problem was. I just pushed them all to be upfront and honest with each other; virtues that I could never truly live by. Jake was the only one who was acting normal towards me. He really was one of those people who could just forgive and forget, and his kindness was slowly growing on me. Unfortunately, the rest of my 'friends' were a different breed. Their upper class privilege led them to believe they should be treated like royalty at all times. 

Ever since the hot tub incident, and the immediate scandalous event that followed, Scarlett was quiet and distant around me. She was stuck in her own head 99% of the time, and only Jared was allowed in. You would think the whole school finding out they had chemistry and shared a steamy kiss would make it easy for them to be together, but no. Scarlett acted like the little victim she truly believed herself to be and Jared stuck by her. Fuck it, if they needed a bad guy, then I would play the role.

Alyssa was back to her pre-Jake normal self; she was snarky and cold, just like she used to be. Her relationship with Jake hadn't progressed any further, but he had been 'checking in' more regularly to ensure they were still on the same page. I could just imagine how those conversations went. He would be like 'hey Lys, still happy to keep being my fuck buddy? You're such an epic mate, but definitely not girlfriend material.' To which she would toss her hair over her shoulder feigning indifference and say 'yeah, I'm only in it for the cock anyway, I don't actually love you'. 

They were all kidding themselves, all I had done was try to make them see that. It's not my fault that they were all drunk and acted like I was in the wrong. I just pushed them closer to the edge, they're the ones who jumped.

So fuck them. I packed my shit, headed to New York and crashed with him for Christmas. Just me, him... and his family. 

Okay. Truth time. My life wasn't all it was cracked up to be. I worked hard to bury these secrets. 

I was twelve when I discovered my parents were not madly in love, and that I was a secret love child from an elicit affair. I had gotten into a fight with my mother and I told her I was going to go and live with my father, only for her to turn around and tell me his whole life was a lie and he had his own family. My whole world shattered. Whenever I spent a weekend with dad, we had stayed in what thought to be his fabulous apartment, with views of Central Park. In actual fact, it turned out to be some rented apartment he hired and pretended was his. His real house was in New Jersey. On the rare weekends that I stayed with him, he told his wife and family that he was with clients in the city. That's right- his wife and family. He had a wife named Stacy and three girls.

My mother and I created our own narrative; that we were rich and fabulous and successful. My mother lied and pretended she was an unconventional partner who didn't believe in marriage but had a life partner- my father. She told her friends that she loved the charm of the country town we lived in, and didn't want to leave. She said New York was too busy for her to live in; the people were too rude, the traffic was too loud. Her friends respected her, as most of them were envious of her free lifestyle when they all felt trapped in loveless marriages full of resentment. They saw her as a modern, progressive woman. Little did they know, every weekend that she 'jetted off' to New York City to spend time with my father, she actually drove her leased vehicle to meet some sugar daddy who paid our mortgage off. She hadn't seen my father in years. 

My father had been married to Stacy for three years before he met my mother. They met one night, in a seedy old bar downtown, and struck up an elicit affair. Mind you, this all went down whilst his poor wife was trying and failing to conceive a child. That's right, she was on fertility injections and going through multiple rounds of IVF, all while he was banging some young, fun German model on the side. He had told my mother the fertility issues wore on their marriage and they had lost their spark, so my mother did what his wife couldn't; she fell pregnant. My mother is the epitome of everything that is wrong with women these days. She glorified a toxic relationship and intentionally fell pregnant to trap a married man. But to my father, her pregnancy seemed like a miracle. He was set to leave his wife, until he found out that Stacy was also expecting. Although he continued his illicit affair with my mother for another ten years, he remained married to his wife, and they went on to have another two children. 

His family didn't know about me until I discovered the truth and he finally came clean. Stacy was a better woman than any I had ever met, and she stuck by my father.  And while I'm being honest, I wasn't even in New York City for Christmas, but New Jersey. I caught public transport into the city to take it look like I was living the upper class dream tallow my instagram followers. My mother and I had worked hard to maintain this image. But the reality was, I wasn't filthy rich, and I wasn't in the same elite class as my friends. I think that's why I tried so hard to fit in and be accepted and liked by them. That, and the fact that I was mixed race and the world is just kinder to people who looked like them. That's not me feeling sorry for myself, because I am fucking awesome, it's just a cold hard fact. 

So there it is. My truth. And do you want to know just one more? Right at this very second, I was standing outside of a gorgeous Upper East Side brownstone. I knocked, three times, and listened for the scuffle of footsteps on the other side to come and answer the door. 

Charlie answered the door, his hair sexily tousled and his face making pleasant surprised 'oh'.

"Mila?" he breathed.

"It's a Christmas miracle," I laughed, my arms open for a hug.

Still stunned, he accepted my hug and welcomed me inside.

"What are you doing here?" 

Maddison was pretty, but she didn't seem like the kind of girl Charlie would normally go for. I was here to win him back. 

"Oh, I was just in the neighbourhood," I responded as he closed the door behind us. 

Was it really my fault that I lied and cheated my way through life? After all, it's all my family had ever modelled.