by Sophie Davis
Not so long ago, I’d felt the same way. Then again, not so long ago, I’d still thought my father an honest, righteous man. Now, I wasn’t exactly sure who he was. I loved him and always would. I just wasn’t so sure how much I liked him, or how much I wanted to be involved in our company—now or ever.
My father and I reached the small landing at the bottom of the staircase, still steps above where partygoers stood in a large cluster. My father kissed my cheek. My mother stepped forward to give me the most awkward of hugs. And then she was on; my moment was over and hers was to begin.
A microphone appeared out of nowhere. My mother took to the spotlight, thanking everyone for coming. I shifted my plastered-on smile from my parents to the crowd below, hoping I was projecting warmth and graciousness. As she extolled the wonders of being my parent, her eyes shone with unshed tears, the emotion as fake as cubic zirconia. The effort that must’ve taken her freshly Botoxed face was more touching than her words.
She ended her speech with a rousing, “I hope you all have a truly magical evening,” before slipping her masquerade mask into place and basking in the gazes of so many onlookers. The guests followed suit and added polite golf claps. I slid my own mask down over my eyes and went in search of the Eight.
“Be still my heart!” Ilan was the first to notice me. “Who is this ravishing creature? Will she return my heart, or shall I be cast off forever in search of it?”
“I think I saw it over by the canapés,” I said sardonically, reaching for Ilan’s outstretched hand to twirl and show off my duds.
“Holy shit, that dress is amazing!” Camilla crowed in delight, purposely ignoring the disapproving looks she was getting from my mother’s friends. I loved Cam even more for it.
“Thank you, thank you,” I said, exchanging the obligatory air-kisses.
“Seriously!” Taylor chimed in, “Wasn’t that just on the runway at Paris Fashion Week?”
“The show-ender,” I replied, unable to repress my glee. A beautiful gown can do that to a girl.
This gown was a midnight-blue so deep that it could easily be mistaken for black, if not for the shimmering threads that caught the light. Cut in a mermaid silhouette, there were endless layers of tulle fanning out from my knees to the floor.
Alistair handed me a glass of champagne, ever the gentleman. “May I propose a toast?” he said, his British accent making the line sound ever so proper. “To Lark: the stunning and charming birthday girl. You are a wonderful mate to all of us, and we are so lucky to know you. I hope you have a brilliant night full of mischief and maybe just a touch of mayhem.”
“To Lark!” The rest of my friends exclaimed, almost in unison, calling attention to our group.
For the first time that night, a real grin made its way to my lips, and I raised my glass to clink gently against those of my friends. Looking around the circle, my heart ached with how much I loved these people and how much we’d all been through together. I’d become so jaded in the past several months and hadn’t truly appreciated just how much they all meant to me. I was going to miss them when I moved to D.C.
“Miss Kingsley?” a voice called from behind me.
Turning, I saw Jarett Brandley, the infamous Page Six photographer standing only feet from me and my friends.
His ever-present camera in one hand, he extended the other to shake mine. “Happy birthday, Miss Kingsley,” Brandley said, oozing manufactured warmth. “Would you mind if I get a shot of you and your friends?”
As always in these situations, I had two choices: I could refuse and undoubtedly read about the rich, snobby birthday girl in The Post tomorrow. Or, suck it up and give Jarrett a couple of shots for tomorrow’s paper—and avoid a fit from my mother, who would relish in the pictures making Page Six.
“Come on guys!” I said, my smile a little less bright than it had been moments before. I hated random strangers seeing intimate pictures from my life. I hated the scrutiny and gossip. I hated being considered a socialite. Sadly, it was easier to give in with a small smile than rail against the system. For now.
Everett and Barrett stood on either side of me, their identical arms wrapped around my waist. The rest of my crew gathered in and the flashbulb went off several times, leaving bright spots in my vision.
“Okay, thank you!” I said finally, unable to bear any more of the assaulting light. With my practiced gracious smile, I gave Brandley a dismissive wave.
“Thank you so much,” the photographer replied. “Have a wonderful night.”
As soon as he walked away, I tipped my champagne glass back and drained it dry. No sooner had I finished my glass than a waiter appeared with a tray, offering fresh glasses to the group. He was young, probably in his early twenties. His smooth, tan skin and sparkling, blue eyes peering out from behind a black mask were indicative of a model or actor paying his bills as a cater-waiter while waiting for his big break.
“Keep ‘em coming, my good man,” Alistair said with a grin. “What’s your name?”
“Andrew,” the handsome waiter replied with an easy smile. “Is there anything else I can get you?”
“Nice to meet you, Andrew. This here,” Alistair slid his arm around my waist and pulled me close, “is the lady of the evening; the reason we’re all here. And we want her to have the best night ever. Think you can help us out and keep her from getting thirsty?” With that he slid a bill into the young waiter’s free hand.
Knowing Alistair and the correlation between his generosity and his intoxication, the young man would make more tonight than he had in all his months of waiting tables.
“No problem,” Andrew replied, his bright-blue eyes now trained on me.
“How about a couple of Goose and tonics?” Barrett chimed in, before giving us girls a questioning glance. “You ladies want anything else right now?”
“I’m good with champagne,” Annie answered.
Cam and I nodded in agreement.
“A round of lemon drops?” Taylor said, giving me a wink before plastering on her trademark look of practiced innocence.
“There you have it,” Alistair said to Andrew, slipping him another folded bill. “Whatever these gorgeous ladies want, they get.”
“Of course,” the waiter replied. “Anything you need at all, just let me know.” With that, he headed toward the bar.
As soon as Andrew disappeared into the crowd, Taylor began fanning herself. “Day-um!” she exclaimed. “Those muscles did not come from carrying drinks around.”
While Cam agreed and the guys heckled them, I turned to Annie. “You look gorgeous, by the way,” I said, squeezing her hand. “Love that dress!”
“I swear, my mother drove me crazy until I agreed to wear white,” Annie replied, rolling her eyes. “It’s like she thinks it will send off a subliminal message to some random guy: ‘This one over here is sweet and untouched! She’s primed and ready for marriage!’”
I couldn’t help but laugh, since I knew exactly how her mother could be—just like mine, except with more weight placed on acquiring a ring.
“Well, regardless, you look amazing. The dress and the color really suit you,” I said with a wink.
And it did. The ivory, scoop-neck gown with the occasional seed pearls sewn into the bodice was stunning, and the shade of white perfectly set off Annie’s flawless complexion. With her light-brown hair swept in a high bun, it highlighted the matching low dip in the back.
“So,” I said, “What did you decide about Brent?”
Annie wrinkled her nose. “I chickened out.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I just felt like this night should be about us and our friends, and—”
“Ladies!” Alistair appeared out of nowhere, slinging his arm around Annie’s neck. “Shot time!”
“We’ll talk about it later,” I promised Annie.
We slid back over to where the crew was gathered around Andrew, everyone taking a shot glass and a lemon covered in sugar granules.
“Birthday girl?” the waiter extended the engraved silver platter toward me.
“Thanks” I said, passing the small glass back to Annie before taking one for myself.
“To the Eight!” Ilan proclaimed, extending his shot glass into the air.
We all groaned in unison. The name was obnoxious, and after four years of it, most of us were tired of the moniker.
“To staying single—” Barrett began, cut off by another wave of protesting groans.
“To one hell of a night,” Cam said simply, thrusting her glass up in the air in front of her.
The vodka was top shelf, but it still burned slightly going down. Quickly biting down on the lemon to ease the sensation, my mouth was flooded with a sweet, and then bitter, taste.
“You ready to have some fun?” Taylor asked playfully, bumping my hip with hers.
“Absolutely,” I replied, truly meaning it.
Unfortunately, I had no idea what the evening had in store for me.
CHAPTER TEN
LARK
A NEW GUY started working for David last week. He was so much younger than the rest of the crew. And far friendlier.
Given the complete lack of activities to occupy my time, most nights I watch a movie. I wait until it’s late and everyone has gone to bed. It’s the only time that I feel at peace. The only other people up are the guards. I’ve been here for months now without trying to escape, or doing anything out of line. Yet they still eye me suspiciously and are careful to keep their distance.
That’s why it’s so startling when the new guy sits down on the couch beside me while I’m watching my nightly movie. With his eyes on the screen and not me, he extends a bowl of popcorn in my direction, a silent offering. I shake my head adamantly. The new guy shrugs his shoulders and digs in, crunching the kernels a mouthful at a time.
The bowl is extended my way again several minutes later, now half empty. Looking over to where his eyes are still focused on the screen, I smile and take a handful of popcorn. For the next hour, we sit companionably, neither of us saying a word nor looking at the other. When the credits begin to roll, he stands, smiles at me, and then disappears into the darkened hallway.
He shows up again the next night, though he’s there at the beginning of the movie this time. The third night, he speaks. It’s nothing earth shattering, only a comment about the movie itself, but it surprises me nonetheless. We continue the light conversation about the movie and plot holes, but nothing more is discussed.
Then, a few days later, I notice him during the day. A wink and half-smile comes my way when we pass each other in the hallways—nothing overt, nothing crazy. We keep up the late-night movie watching, alternating between his picks of Guy Ritchie films and my nostalgic favorites. Then, last night during the original Sabrina, one of my all-time favorites, he scooted closer to me—closer than I am comfortable with. But not so near as to mitigate my curiosity in what I assume he was about to say.
His gaze swept from the reading nook on one end of the room to where the grandfather clock sits on the other side, right next to the hallway. With a not-so-subtle glance over either shoulder to ensure we were alone, he whispered the most beautiful words my ears have ever heard: “Do you want to leave?”
My mind and heart rushed with a mix of emotions. My first instinct is a product of the environment I’ve been rotting in for far too long: he’s fucking with you. So I didn’t answer him; instead, I gave him a sidelong glance before returning my attention to the antics of Kristin Wig, my new favorite funny lady.
He repeated himself: “Lark, seriously, do you want to get out of here?”
Though the words could be taken the same way a frat boy in a bar meant them, I knew that this wasn’t an offer for awkward groping. He meant escape. But I wasn’t going to take the bait so easily. My father taught me a long time ago that you could often force people to bid against themselves by simply remaining silent after an offer had been made. The same tactic also applies to retrieving additional information. People have an innate desire to fill awkward silences.
I applied my father’s wisdom to this situation. It’s a game of chicken and I just had to wait for him to swerve. Turning my full gaze on him, I raised an eyebrow and said nothing. As expected, I won the game.
He continued: “Okay, I guess that’s a rhetorical question. I know you don’t want to be here. It’s just…well, you don’t belong in a place like this, with these kinds of people. It’s not safe.”
“You think I don’t know that?” I replied incredulously.
“Let me help you.”
And apparently, he meant it. A few hours ago, he slipped me a note: Take only what you absolutely must. Be ready.
A Burberry tote is among my belongings in the closet. I pack clean underwear, several t-shirts and pairs of jeans, and a couple of pens. When I’m done writing this, I’ll slip this diary inside, too. I don’t know where I’m supposed to go, where I will be safe, and what I’ll need once I get there. But nothing else in my prison cell, besides the iPod, is worth taking. I’ll put the iPod in the slim, front pocket of the tote when it’s time to go, but I’m not ready to sit in silence just yet—this Foster the People song about falling in love is soothing to my nerves.
How I got here is still a puzzle to me. Though I’d like to know the answer, it isn’t as important as knowing when and how I will be leaving. Even through my excitement, a small part of me worries: is this a trick? Is he going to turn me in? Or take me somewhere even worse? A part of me didn’t care. I would do anything to get far away from this place and these people who hold me captive.
Now I’m sitting here on my bed, hiding out to conceal my anxiety. I can’t seem to stop my foot from tapping, my eyes from checking the clock every ten seconds.
What will happen if I’m caught? The unbidden thought flashes through my mind at random intervals like a neon sign. It doesn’t matter. Honestly, they can’t do much worse to me, right? They’ve already stolen my life. Stolen me. Even though I know that’s not true at all, that I can, in fact, be treated much, much worse than I have been, I tuck away that truth in a distant corner of my brain. I’d risk physical pain and psychological torture to get out of here. To get back to him.
Shit, I can’t let my mind go there, to let myself think about him. I miss Blake so much it physically hurts. I’ve read about this ache, this longing. I’ve seen it portrayed in movies. And I always thought it was a thing of fiction, something dreamt up by novelists and screenwriters. It’s not. It’s a very real, visceral reaction to being apart from the person you love. I miss his smile, his laugh, his smell, his warmth, his…everything.
Great, now this page is splotchy and smeared with tears. I can’t afford to act like anything is amiss. I simply can’t think of him right now.
Focus, Lark, focus. Don’t think about the very real possibility of seeing him so very soon. Don’t think about anything beyond this hour, this minute, this second. Don’t count on anything happening until it’s already occurred—another mantra of my father’s. I realized I didn’t appreciate my father when I should have. I didn’t appreciate all the life advice and sage wisdom he tried to pass along.
Even if I do make it home from who-knows-where, I will not have much time left with him. Will it be enough? Will I get the chance to tell him that he’s been a good father, that he’s done the best he can? Will I get the chance to tell him that he has been a reprieve from the constant pressures of my mother—the only soft, warm place in my cold, hard childhood? Will I get the chance to tell him that I’m sorry, that I never wanted to hurt him? Will he understand why I had to do it, had to set things right if I ever wanted to live a life without guilt and shame I’d been drowning in for so long?
Seriously, Lark, stop. This isn’t the time for these mental wanderings. You need to concentrate on handling this moment, nothing else. If it was any other night, I would soon be tiptoeing out to the dark living room to sit on the couch and watch a movie. I need to sulk and ignore e
veryone, just like every other night; to wait with as much patience and as little anxiety as I can possibly muster; to wait for their Judas to come let me out.
I’m going to go now. I’m going to go sit in the middle of the lions who skulk around me in the darkness. The next time I write, I might be free. I know I shouldn’t get my hopes up that he’s going to come through. Hope is an ill-advised emotion when you’re in a situation like this. But I can’t help it. Hope is all I have right now, so I’m clinging to it for dear life.
I hope I live to put pen to paper here again. If not, if someone else is reading these words, just know this: sometimes you must take risks, proportional to your desires, to get what you want. And there is so much that I want. So I’ll risk it all.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
LARK
ANOTHER GLASS OF champagne later, I was far less tense and was getting caught up in the spirit of the evening. The dim lights, the elegant gowns and tuxes, the masks lending an air of mystery to it all…it was exactly how I’d imagined the party, but better. If nothing else, my mother knew how to build an entire atmosphere, as opposed to simply having a theme.
Leaving the others behind, Annie came with me to work the crowd, greeting and thanking them for coming. It was best to get protocol out of the way before the guys ordered any more drinks.
“Ms. Stories, how lovely to see you,” I said, swapping air-kisses with Camilla’s mom.
“Have you met Jacque?” she asked, gesturing to the tall, broad man standing next to her.
There was no doubt—he was a hunk. His thick, dark hair hung just past his ears, in a style that said exotic without being hippy.