by Rowan Hanlon
“Thank you,” Kael said and gave her a smile. “I think I’ll take a half-day today. See you tomorrow.”
She smirked at her and turned to leave, throwing the garment bag to the side as she did so. As she exited the room, she heard Celeste exhale loudly, as if she’d been holding her breath since Kael had entered the room. Good enough for her.
But Is It Worth the Trouble?
Kael was vapidly flipping channels on the TV when Nick walked in, threw his keys on the console table by the front door, along with a big stack of mail. He glanced over at the couch where Kael lay, covered by a cashmere throw.
“You look comfy,” he said, loosening his tie.
“Leave me alone.”
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked, eying her. “Are you sick or something?”
“No, I’m not sick,” she said, sitting up. “I just hate my job. No, wait. I hate Celeste.”
Nick held his groan in, but barely. “What did she do now?”
“Oh, God, you wouldn’t believe,” Kael started. “First of all, she’s pissed about the dress—so, thanks for that—then when I tell her I will pay for it, she goes off like she’s insane or something and it just kept escalating until she slapped me.”
“She slapped you?!” Nick exclaimed, shocked.
“Yeah, she did.”
“You need to call a lawyer. She can’t get away with that.”
“But that’s the easy way out, isn’t it?” Kael asked, thinking about it.
“How is that easy? You know how much litigation is involved with something like this? I’m a lawyer. I do.”
Kael stared at him then groaned, “I don’t know what I’m going to do. Maybe I should just quit and do something else.”
“No, you got into this because you want to be an editor. That’s your dream. You can’t let her deter you from that.”
Kael thought about that. He was right. When her mother got sick with lupus, things at home got really bad. The only escape Kael had was through magazines and fashion. The whole idea of it transported her to another place, perhaps even to another planet. She became obsessed with it and it helped ease the tension of her home life. It allowed her to focus on something other than watching her mother wither away. It gave her a sense of control that she, otherwise, might not have experienced. Maybe Celeste was right about fashion being more than meets the eye. She’d give her that.
Nick stared at her. “Kael? Did you hear me? You can’t let her do that to you.”
“But is it worth the trouble?” Kael asked, staring at him. “I mean, we’re getting married. We’ll probably have kids in a few years and none of this will matter.”
“That’s all well and good but you can’t live for your future in your present. It doesn’t work.”
Kael nodded that she understood, loving the fact that Nick always made such good sense. He crossed over to her, bent down and gave her a quick hug.
“Pizza?” he asked, pulling away.
“Chinese?” Kael countered.
“I’ll make the call. Shrimp fried rice?”
Kael nodded. He winked at her and took out his phone from his suit jacket pocket and dialed the number. Kael smiled at him and said, “Thanks, honey,” before getting up off the couch and going to the stack of mail. She went through it rather quickly, then picked up a small, cardboard box.
“Hey,” she called to Nick. “What’s this?”
Nick shrugged, then held up one finger and said, “Oh, yes, I’d like a delivery.” He paused, listened. “Yes, shrimp fried rice, General Tso’s, egg drop. Twenty minutes? Thanks.”
He hung up and watched as Kael opened the box. She pulled out a letter, scanned over it, rolled her eyes then pulled out a small gun with a pearl handle.
“Holy shit!” she exclaimed. “Look at this!”
“What the fuck?” Nick said.
“My dad sent it!” she half-yelled, shaking her head. “I can’t believe he sent this! Oh, and he sent bullets, too.” She held up a pack of bullets and shook her head at Nick.
“How does he know how to send that?” he asked.
She shook her head and glanced at the delivery information on the box. “Well, he’s a cop and a gun collector, so he knows how to send it.” She paused, thinking about her father and suddenly felt an overwhelming sadness combined with guilt. She should call him more. She should go home more often. But there never seemed to be the time. She was always working and when she wasn’t working, she was at the gym or planning the wedding or having dinner with Nick’s business associates. Something was always going on that kept her from being a good daughter.
“You dad is such a character,” Nick said and sat down on the couch, bending over to untie and slip off his shoes.
“I know,” Kael said and stared at the gun. It was really cute and well made. It felt heavy in her hand. He’d probably bought it at a gun show, thinking of her, his only child, and how much she’d like it. What a sweetheart he was. She smiled and almost laughed, then crossed over to the couch, sitting down. “Poor Daddy. Bless his heart. You know he kind of went a little nuts after Mom passed?”
“You told me,” Nick said. “How come he didn’t come to the engagement party?”
“When I invited him, he said he’d think about it. When I mentioned it again, he told me no, he wasn’t coming because he had too much going on at work and I just let it go.” She put her head in her hands in frustration. She pulled back and stared at the gun. “I should have made him come, though. I shouldn’t have let it go. He should have been here. I’m such a bad daughter.”
“It’s okay; don’t beat yourself up for it. You tried. Just make sure he comes to the wedding, though,” he told her.
“Oh, he’s coming to wedding,” she said adamantly. “If I have to go down there and get him and drag him up here, he will come to the wedding.”
Nick smiled at her then glanced at the gun. “Why did he send it? The gun?”
“It’s New York, that’s why. His letter stated that he wanted me to have some ‘protection.’”
“You got me,” Nick said, grinning. “I protect you.”
Kael cracked up. “I know! Right? What else do I need?” She smiled at him and then thought about her father again. “Just let me call him. But what the hell am I supposed to do with this thing?”
“Is it even real?” he asked.
“Oh, it’s real.”
“But it’s so small,” he said.
“Don’t be fooled. This is a very powerful weapon.”
Nick laughed. “Listen to you.”
“Hey, I know my guns,” she told him and nodded knowingly. “He’s had me shooting since I was six years old. And I always had toy ones. And, no, it wasn’t because he wanted a boy. But he did say he didn’t want me to be a sissy. And I’m a good shot, just let me tell you. He taught me well.”
Nick chuckled and took the gun. He pointed it at a lamp, cocked the hammer and fired. The lamp exploded. Shards of glass flew everywhere. Nick and Kael ducked for cover. When it was over, they turned to each other, mouths on the floor.
“Fuck! I thought the safety was on!” Nick exclaimed. “And I didn’t know it was loaded!”
“Then why did you fire it? You idiot!” She grabbed the gun and put the safety on and eyed him. “Maybe my dad was right about me needing protection.”
Nick nodded, then stared at the gun. “Can I do it again?”
“No!” she said and looked around for a place to stash the gun. She spotted her purse on the console and got up and went to it.
“Come on,” he said, following her. “You hated that lamp. I did you a favor. I’ll take anything in this loft out you hate. One shot.”
“No,” Kael said then eyed the obelisk, which he still refused to part with. Now that was tempting. But the mess it would cause would not be worth the trouble. It would take forever to clean the mess from the lamp he’d just shot.
Nick came up
behind her, still eying the gun. She shook her head, held the gun away from him, grabbed her purse and slipped it in, then the bullets. Nick made a grab for it, but she held it away from him.
“I said no,” she told him. “Now be a good boy and get washed up for dinner.”
“Okay,” he said, obviously disappointed. “Maybe later?”
“Maybe not,” she told him.
* * * * *
About the same time, Celeste was in her kitchen sitting at the island doing some work on her laptop when her husband, Clifton, entered, undoing his tie. She barely acknowledged his presence and kept working.
He glanced at her, then at the computer then yelled, “I am going to fucking kill that son of a bitch someday!”
“What happened now?” she asked, barely looking up at him.
The tie was undone and off. He threw it down on the island along with his phone. “Same thing that always happens. He acts like a little bitch and I have to clean up his fucking messes.” He groaned loudly, gritting his teeth. “I could fucking punch the wall.”
Celeste finally looked up at him. “You wanna take some of that aggression out on me? I had a shitty day, too.”
Clifton’s mood swiftly changed from anger to excitement. “Really? We haven’t done that in a while.”
Celeste shut the laptop and smiled slightly at him. He took that as his sign and crossed over to her, pulled up off the stool and pushed her up against the sink. She moaned softly as he grabbed the back of her head, pulled it back and kissed her with force. She matched him and they kissed hungrily. It had been a while since they’d had sex and it showed in their passion. They’d both missed it and couldn’t get enough.
Clifton turned Celeste around and pushed her skirt up over her hips, pulling her panties down until they were off then he unzipped his pants. She moaned more loudly as entered her roughly. That was the way she liked it. She pressed back onto him, moving her hips until he couldn’t take it anymore and had to turn her back around. He pushed her up on the counter, ripped open her shirt and began to devour her breasts. She grabbed his face and brought his lips back to hers, sucking and eating at him. Then they began to have sex again and it didn’t take long for them both to orgasm. Once it was over, they were both breathless.
“Wow,” Clifton muttered.
Celeste smiled him and gave him a small kiss. “Does this mean you’re cooking dinner?”
“It means you can have anything you want,” he said like he really meant it. He gave her another deep kiss, then pulled away and zipped his pants. “Let me get changed and we’ll go out.”
She watched him leave the room and smiled with satisfaction. “Okay,” she said and attempted to button her top. It was hopeless as he’d torn the buttons off. She sighed and got down from the counter and started to follow him when his phone rang. She stared at it, wondering if it might be important and picked it up. She didn’t recognize the number. The phone beeped and went into voicemail. She told herself to set it back down but something inside of her wouldn’t let her. It might be important. And it might not be.
“Fuck it,” she muttered and went into his voicemail and retrieved the message then hit the speakerphone so the message played out loud.
“Hey, baby, it’s me, Lara. I just wanted to know if you wanted to party tonight. I’ve got some time between six and ten, so let me know. Bye, honey.” The young woman paused then said, “Oh, call me if you can get away!”
They say there are three ways to react to fear. The first is to run. The second is to fight. The third is freeze, which most people don’t even think about as the first two mean survival and the third might just mean death. It’s an instinct that’s been carried over for thousands of years, from our caveman days to our present day lives. We can’t escape these sudden feelings because they are so ingrained in us.
“Hey, babe, come in here!” Clifton called from the bedroom.
Celeste was stuck in the third phase. She was frozen. She couldn’t move. She was stuck. And it showed on her face.
The Perpetual Fan
Kael decided to take matters into her own hands. Even though Nick had insisted she file a complaint against Celeste for slapping her, she knew she couldn’t and the main reason was because she knew she was just as at fault for it as Celeste. She’d pushed her too far and she really didn’t want to bring all that up in some boardroom with lawyers and mediators and the like. She knew she could end up looking just as bad, if not worse, than Celeste. There had to be a reason Celeste was acting so off and if she could figure it out, she could confront her and they might just be able to move forward. And if not, then not. Kael would have no other alternative than to go to someone about Celeste. The situation was giving her little choice in the matter.
She arrived at the Haute Woman offices early the next morning. The halls were pretty much empty so she was able to slip into Celeste’s office unnoticed. She looked around just to make sure no one was there and shut the door quietly. Then she headed to the desk and began to open the drawers at the top of the desk. There were three of them, long and slender. Kael opened the first and found some papers, pens and stuff that most desks have. She opened the second and it was pretty much the same. But in the third drawer, she hit pay dirt, or so she thought. Inside were many odd looking little syringes. She held one up, wondering what it could be.
She was about to put it back in the drawer when she was interrupted by Liza, who had entered with a big black board full of different shots of the same model in the same dress. She stopped short when she saw Kael.
“What the hell are you doing?” Liza asked.
“There’s something going on with her and I’m going to find out what,” Kael said and studied Liza, scanning over her outfit in the way only a fashionista would—with a critical eye and a slightly raised eyebrow. She took note of her long, flowing black skirt and flats. It looked okay. Her top was a plain white t-shirt which was covered with at least ten different kinds of beaded necklaces. Too messy and too busy. Kael shook her head and decided that the woman was dressed like a cross between a hippie and a suburban mom. While it worked on the surface, once you started dissecting it, it fell apart. She didn’t dare say a word to Liza, though. She had too much respect for the woman for that.
“You can’t just go through her stuff,” she told her and set the board down.
“Oh, come on, Liza. She had it coming.”
“What does that mean?” Liza asked and shook her head in confusion. “It doesn’t matter. Just get out of here.”
“Why? She’s been giving me a hard time and, apparently, it’s because she’s on some kind of drug.” She held up the syringe.
“Put that back!” Liza hissed. She walked over to her, took the syringe and put it back in the drawer, then slammed it shut. “Now get out of here!”
She shooed her towards the door but Kael stopped before they got to it and turned to her. “Well, I think someone should know,” Kael said, refusing to listen to her. “She’s got drugs in her desk! Come on!”
“Those are fertility drugs, Kael,” she said as if she were losing patience. “She’s been trying to get pregnant for years.”
Kael was stunned into a moment of silence. She finally managed to say, “Oh, shit. Shit! I didn’t know that.”
“No one knows but me. And her husband. And her doctor. Oh, and her assistant. But no one else.”
“Oh, God,” Kael said and sighed. “I feel awful now. But she’s just been such a bitch to me lately.”
“You don’t understand how hard her job is,” she told her, giving her a slightly hard look. “She started a few years after me and she was way younger than you when she did. She’s done her time, Kael, and you can’t just decide to take it away from her.”
“I’m not doing that!” Kael exclaimed.
“Then why are you snooping in her desk?” Liza asked and crossed her arms.
Kael stared at her and sighed. “Fine. But she’s such
a stick in the mud.”
“No, she’s the editor-in-chief. Just leave her alone.”
“I’m trying to! It’s just that she’s always coming after me.” Kael blew a strand of hair out of her face and shook her head. “I just don’t know what to do.”
“Stay away from her, that’s what to do,” Liza told her. “You never know what’s going to push someone over the edge.”
Kael studied her. What was she getting at? She wasn’t pushing anyone. She was the one being pushed.
“Listen,” Liza continued. “It’s never a good idea to push anyone, Kael, and it’s particularly not a good idea to push someone like Celeste. Stop clashing with her. Get out of her face and lay low. Let your animosity just go, okay?”
“Yeah,” Kael said, considering it. It was exhausting trying to one-up Celeste all the time and she was ready just to put the whole damn thing to bed once and for all. “You’re right. I think I’ll just apologize to her and see if we can mend fences.”
“No, don’t do that,” Liza said and shook her head adamantly. “Leave her alone.”
“Why?”
“It’s like throwing salt into a wound,” she told her. “Just let it go and in a matter of weeks, I can assure you, she will have forgotten it and you can move on.”
“But I feel bad,” Kael said. “This isn’t me. She just brings out the worst in me.”
Liza considered this and was about to respond when Celeste entered. Kael and Liza both froze when they saw her. Celeste stopped and turned to them, glancing over their outfits, as she did with all her employees, with a raised eyebrow. She obviously didn’t like what she saw and shrugged, then went to her desk. Kael held in her groan at this.
“You both know I do not like anyone in my office when I’m not here,” she said and threw her bag down on the desk before turning around and leaning against it, crossing her arms as she did so. “So, what are you two doing in here?”
Liza hurriedly tried to smooth it over, “Oh, I just wanted to run something by you. I called Jacob Anvil’s people and told them about the dress.” She paused and gave Kael a hard look.