15 - A Friend's Advice

Less than forty minutes later, Paige parked the motorbike outside the front of Magicka, chaining the wheel down to the wrack. Double checking to ensure that the lock was secure on the chain, having no time for someone to steal her bike while she was working. Even in the business district crime was rampant in the city, as the disreputable youths were too stupid to realize their destroying their own lives. There'd been far too many of those over the ensuing years, which seemed to have gotten worse since her own childhood.

No need to worry, it was.

Knowing that the theft of her bike while she was working wasn't a cause for concern, Paige grabbed her bag from the bike basket. Sliding the strap over her shoulder, she smiled at some women who were wandering down the street, then went inside Magicka.

"You're late," Amber bluntly informed her in lieu of greeting as she sauntered through the front door of the store, her gaze glancing at the clock hanging in the corner. "Nearly twenty minutes."

Paige grimaced, "I'm so sorry Amber."

Amber kept a stern face as she stared her down. "As your employer, I'm quite disappointed in your continued tardiness. I expect my employees to arrive at work at the pre-scheduled time, especially without proper notice. I will be docking your pay for tardiness."

She tossed a furry stuffed animal taken from a close close by, watching as Amber was forced to sidestep the missile launched at her. "Don't even start with me, Amber. You aren't my boss. Even if you were you'd never do something so cruel to me."

Amber finally let loose a hearty laugh, a wide grin spread across her face proof of the playful mood she was in this morning. "I'm sorry Paige, I just couldn't help myself. So now that you're finally married and out of Eric the Snake's dwelling, do you want your ownership to be verified?"

"No," Paige finally spoke. Only after she had thought on it for a long time, wanting to give herself the proper time to consider her options. "I might have moved out of the house, but that doesn't mean he won't come crawling back. The second that he discovers his step-daughter earns a sizeable income, he'll come crawling back demanding money from raising me. He and his leech family members will do everything to milk me dry."

Slowly bobbing her head as she listened to the reasoning behind his actions, Amber allowed the matter to drop altogether. "I don't see how your mother could've ever been stupid enough to marry a slimeball like him. You'd think she'd have better taste."

"He was different," Paige finally admitted after a space of time, considering the choices that had led them all to this point in life. "I mean in the beginning he had his faults, but he put on a great show for her. For the both of us. Or maybe he got the self-righteous the more money that he brought in. With each new promotion, he changed."

Amber bobbed, "He wanted his cake and to eat it too."

"Exactly," she agreed.

Placing her shoulder bag on the shelf behind the counter Paige was consumed with thoughts of her parents. The man who'd become her father. She gnashed her teeth. "He's gotten so greedy the last couple of years, you would think he was broke."

Listening to her prattle on Amber paused momentarily, a thoughtful expression encompassed her face at her own thoughts. "As the manager of Burmington Electronics, he has to make a rather sizeable income of his own. He has to make a good several hundred thousand dollars a year. Somewhere in the ballpark of six hundred thousand."

Paige anxiously raked fingers through her hair in an agitated gesture, hating the thought of her stepfather. At the man he'd become in the last couple of years, the greedy stranger that had taken the place of the man she'd loved. "Oh, he does. He bought himself a brand new car better suited to his position, Armani suits, Rolex watches, yet whines about every little penny my mother spends. He won't even buy her a car claiming he can't afford the added bill, despite the fact she has the twins and has to push them everywhere."

"So this new hubby of yours," Amber finally broached the topic that weighed heavily on her mind, though it was more to get off of sadder topics. Amber hated the sadness and pain that welled up inside of her eyes anytime mention of her stepfather came up in the conversation, knowing it was hard on her. "What's he like?"

"His name is Noah," she admitted.

"Noah," she mused thoughtfully, "Ooh, sounds sexy."

Paige burst out laughing at her best friend's statement, fully aware of where her thoughts were leading her in that moment. She shook her head ruefully. "Well let's say he's not ugly. Rather handsome to be truthful. I haven't had the chance to spend much time with him, as I was asleep when we came back last night, but we talked a bit over breakfast. He's not much of a talker and definitely old-fashioned."

Very old-fashioned, she thought.

"Old fashioned?" her friend queried. "How so?"

Sitting down at the table off to the side of the cash register, Paige propped her feet up onto another chair. Her lips twisted in a thoughtful expression, at the memory of the man that she'd married yesterday. "Well, I sorta might've offered to go in halves with him. I mean it's the same thing Eric had suggested to Mom a few times. I wanted him to see I wasn't stingy with my money to avoid money problems."

"What did he say?" She wondered.

A myriad of emotions washed across her features, at the memory of the outcome of their conversation during breakfast. Paige frowned, still confused. "He didn't take the suggestion well. In fact, he downright refused it, informed me he made enough to take care of his wife. I mean I tried to explain to him that I knew ours was a marriage of convenience and I didn't expect him to foot the bill for me, but he wouldn't hear it. Strangers or not, I was his wife and he would support me."

Amber chortled gleefully at hearing her friend's explanation of the morning's events, which definitely seemed to please her. "Well to me it sounds like this Noah is a good man and his pride was stung with you thinking he couldn't care for you."

Paige sighed wearily, "He even went on to the discussion of my motorbike. Said something about it being unreliable transportation and I needed a car. He said he was off Saturday and we'd go care shopping for me."

Amber's opinion of the man was instantly boosted, "I've told you that same thing a thousand different times but you refuse to listen to me. So what did you say?"

"I of course instantly turned down the offer of a car, letting him know that my motorbike was perfectly fine," Paige gave her the response the both of them knew she'd made, as she'd never been the type of person to accept a gift. Not even from family. "He of course said we'll see. Like he expected it to be still open for debate."

Amber snickered under her breath. "He sounds like a very determined man, in my estimation. It doesn't sound like you're gonna be able to talk him out of his decision. Like it or not, the motorbike's days are numbered."

Paige jumped to her feet and started to pace the floor, growing a little agitated at the memory of the morning events, "I just don't understand him. I needed a husband to move out of my parents' house, not to take care of me. I might not be rich, but I make more than enough money to buy a car if I wanted one."

Amber came around to stand in front of her friend and stared straight into her eyes, stern seriousness in her own. "I know you're used to handling things on your own, but please take the time to get to know him before you judge him incorrectly. Besides, this might be a foreign concept for the chaste and pure Paige Emberly-Asherton, but maybe this is how real couples worked."

"Fine," she groaned. Paige might not be pleased with someone else calling the shots in her life, having never been particularly interested in finding male companionship, but Amber was right. Relationships were all about the give and take. Now that she'd found herself the secondary part of a marriage, it was time for her to accept the inevitability of it and get to know her new husband. To at least see if there was something worth enjoying.