Chapter 48: Chapter forty eight
ARIELLE
“Has hell frozen over or am I hallucinating?” Brett said as Suzie and I walked into Chuck’s after school that day.
“Haha! Very funny.” Suzie replied flatly and pinned him with a glare.
I was happy the glare wasn’t wasn’t directed at me. It was refreshing to see her mad at someone else for a change. Truth was, the girl was low-key scary when she was mad.
“Suzie and I resolved our differences. We’re ready to work together to help Chuck.” I supplied.
Brett leaned closer to me and whispered,
“How exactly did you do that? Did she throw you into a ring and punched the frustration out of herself?”
I couldn’t help but chuckle this time.
“Dude! Why would you assume that? I’m not that aggressive.” Suzie scoffed and walked behind the counter. She dropped her backpack and began tying her apron. I leaned on the counter and folded my arms.
“You kinda are.” Brett said and I nodded in agreement.
Suzie shot me a stern look and I raised my hands defensively.
“In my defense, I was only judging based on the version of you I met first.”
“Me and you both, Blondie. She almost scarred my perfect skin with hot coffee on her very first day here. Imagine this handsome face with a third degree burn? God, no!” Brett said with an horrified expression.
“It’s not my fault I couldn’t operate the espresso machine. You were supposed to teach me but you were too busy hitting on female customers.” Suzie shot back.
“Oh my God! How many times are we going to have this conversation? I wasn’t hitting on those girls. It was the other way round. I was just trying to let them off nicely.”
“Yeah yeah, if that helps you sleep better at night.” Suzie rolled her eyes.
Brett turned to me with a pleading look in his eyes.
“Blondie, a little help here?”
“Why are you asking me? I wasn’t there. I didn’t know what happened.” I shrugged.
Brett let out a defeated sigh. I tried to rein in my laughter at the look on his face but it was almost impossible. Their banter was hilarious.
I could finally understand the sense of family Drayton felt in this place. Suzie and I have only been talking for a few hours but it felt like I’ve known her forever.
In here, I didn’t have to pretend. I didn’t have to be Charles McAlister princess or the sick girl. I could just be me. Just Arielle. And these people wouldn’t fault me for being me. They won’t criticize me or single me out.
“Whatever. Since the both of you have decided to team up against me, I’m just going to wait for D to arrive so we can level the field. Where is he anyway? Aren’t you guys supposed to arrive together?” Brett asked, directing his question at me.
“Yeah, but I sent him a text to inform him that I would be coming with Suzie. He should be here soon. It’s been a while since I sent the text.”
I brought out my phone to shoot Drayton another text when the door opened and he walked in. I wasn’t prepared for the smile that took over my face at the sight of him. I was caught off-guard by it and immediately set my face in a scowl.
But my scowl became real when I saw the deep frown on his face. I opened my mouth to ask him what was wrong when he walked straight to me without sparing our coworkers a glance.
“I received your text. Did something happen?” He asked, his voice laced with worry.
“Why would something happen?” I asked in confusion. Nothing about my text implied that I might be in trouble.
“Cuz you sent me a 911 text.”
“Seriously? You too? I wasn’t going to try to kill her. It was just a bus ride that lasted thirty minutes. Jesus Christ!” Suzie cried.
“What do you mean?” Drayton asked.
Brett threw Suzie a ‘I told you’ look before saying, “The two of them showed up together few minutes ago. I was just as shocked as you are, Brother.”
“Wait, seriously?” Drayton’s eyes darted between Suzie and I as if expecting us to say it was a prank. We both gave him a nod.
“I didn’t send you a 911 text.” I added.
“Yes, you did. You sent ‘LET’S MEET AT CHUCK’S’. All in capital letters. That’s clearly a 911 text.”
“He’s not lying. It does sound like an emergency.” Brett pointed out and Suzie nodded in agreement.
I checked my phone and confirmed the text.
“That was just my keyboard setting. But I guess I could have been a little bit more explanatory. That was kinda my bad.”
“Kinda?” Drayton said and arched an eyebrow.
His features were more relaxed now, not as tensed as when he first walked in. I tried to ignore the warm feeling in my chest at the thought of him being so worried about me and instead rolled my eyes at him.
“Now that we’re all here, we should discuss how to help Chuck.” Suzie spoke, breaking the spell between Drayton and I. The three of us turned to face her.
“I think Arielle’s idea is great. We should definitely go with it.” she added.
Drayton and Brett exchanged shocked expressions and I snorted a laugh. I understood why they looked so shocked. Suzie was the only person that disagreed with me the last time, now she was the first to call my idea great.
That was a lot of progress for an apology and a few hours of honest conversation.
“Not a single word.” she said sternly, her eyes darting between Drayton and Brett.
The two of them were clearly about to make a comment but wisely kept their mouth shut. Brett made a show of putting a lock on his mouth and throwing the key away.
“Hosting book events would clearly bring in more customers. We can even name pastries after some trending book characters. Maybe search through booktok for inspiration of those characters.” she added.
“How’d you know about booktok? Thought you didn’t read fictional books.” Drayton said.
“I’m a sixteen years old in a high school full of hormonal teenagers looking for sexual release whether real or out of their imaginations. Of course, I know about booktok, and porn sites. They’re basically the same.” Suzie responded. And just like that, my book girlie side was triggered.
“As an avid reader, I’d like to say that it is a huge blasphemy to compare the two totally different platforms to each other. But since we are in the middle of planning something for Chuck, I will table that argument for now so we can get back to planning.”
The three of them looked like they were trying to hold back their laughter but I didn’t get what was so funny. Brett’s voice interrupted me before I could ask what they found so amusing.
“Love that you’re basically turned on by literal ink on paper but I just thought of something a little bit more fun we could add.” He said with a wide smile on his face.
I decided to let go of my argument and tell him I wasn’t turned on by my books so I could hear his idea. I mean, yeah, reading about a hot supernatural guy pin his mate to the headboard can be a little triggering, but he didn’t have to put it like that.
“The dance studio down the street is having their big showcase soon. We can convince them to hold it here instead of renting out a big event hall.”
“That’s a great idea. It would bring a lot of people here at once. If things go well, we can make all the money we need in one night.” I gasped.
“Have you seen the size of this place? There is no way we can host an event that big in here.” Suzie said.
“That’s a valid point But we can clear out the roof and hang some decorations. The cool breeze. The view of the city. The ambience. It will be perfect.” I pointed out.
“We still have a few left over decorations from the Christmas party last year. It will save us time and money.” Drayton added.
We all started pitching in ideas for the dance showcase, and honestly, it felt kinda good.
“Okay guys,. this all sounds good in theory but we haven’t even asked if they would want to hold their showcase here.” Suzie cut in.
“At least we have a plan. That’s more than we had few days ago.”Brett said.
“True, but we all know you brought the suggestions because of the hot dancers.”Drayton smirked at him.
“No, that’s not why.” All three of us turned to him with our eyebrows raised.
“Okay, it’s a nice perk, but can we fall back to what’s important? Getting them to have the party here.” Brett said, easily diverting the conversation.
“Yeah!” We said in unison.
And then we went back to planning intensely for the next few hours.