AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CHAPTER EIGHT
BELINDA
All evening long, I feel like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I don’t know why.
Is this still the imposter syndrome thing I’ve been feeling with my job—my terrific, right-for-me job, where I’m still terrified that one day I’ll walk into the office and somebody will tell me it’s all a mistake, it’s a joke, there’s no way I could possibly do this job? Is that it, except with this terrific, just-right-for-me man?
I don’t know.
Austin’s parents dance by at one point, making sure to tell me how lovely I look and how glad they are I’m there with Austin (who just rolls his eyes and mutters, “What am I, chopped liver?”).
I meet his older sister’s husband, and we have a nice chat. We have a nice chat with my boss at the hospital and his wife, and then we have a nice chat with friends of Austin’s, and I meet the HR guy from local software company TechBridge, and everything is perfectly lovely. Nice meal, good champagne, beautiful music, and Austin’s an excellent dancer.
I love the way I feel in his arms.
And then I had to visit the restroom. Well, it was inevitable, right? All that champagne.
I came out of the stall and washed my hands, and then refreshed my lipstick, and that’s when this girl came up to me.
Very pretty girl. Very blonde, ice-green eyes, very slender. She looked me up and down, from my updo to my gold toes, and then she smirked at me. There’s no other word, she smirked. “You’re Austin Reese’s date, right?”
I nodded. There was no way this could be good, but there was also no way to leave the restroom without pushing her out of the way. “Belinda Carter. Nice to meet you, Miss…”
Smirking Girl looked pleased. “I’m Camilla Rorrer. Surely you’ve heard my name.”
Camilla. The gold-digging ex Austin mentioned? “You used to date Austin?”
“I dumped him,” Camilla says complacently. “Now he’s reduced to dating someone like you.” She gives me another one of those sneering up-and-down looks. “Where’d you get your dress—Goodwill? Or did your granny make it for you, out of her old curtains?”
I knew it. I knew I’d picked the wrong dress.
Camilla is wearing a dress very similar to the silver sequined one that hadn’t fit me at Timeless Attire. It doesn’t look blingy and cheap on her; it looks worthy of a Hollywood red carpet.
“Excuse me,” I say, and try to go around her.
“He’s cheap, you know,” Camilla says. “Tons of money, but no way he’ll spend it on you.” She tosses her blonde hair. “He wants a whore, but he doesn’t want to pay for one. He picks girls who’ll fuck him for free.”
This is ridiculous.
Austin is not like that.
He’s not.
I pivot around her and leave the restroom, shaking.
I’m not like that.
I can’t think she’s being honest. It doesn’t feel like truth; I’m just afraid it’s truth that I’ve somehow missed.
I’m afraid that I’m the wrong girl in the wrong dress in the wrong job in the wrong town, and sooner or later people are going to label me a fake.
Back at the table, I pretend everything’s okay, even though my lips are numb and I can’t wait to go home and get out of this disastrous dress. Austin wins a silent auction for a pearl necklace, and I let him put it on me, unable to think of a reason to turn it down nicely.
When we dance again, I put my head on his shoulder and pretend that I’m the happiest girl in the world. That he loves me truly. That we’re meant to be together. That I’m not an idiot who has no dress sense and no sense of proportion, and that I didn’t just hand over my body to someone who’ll just fuck me and leave me.
And the midnight kiss is perfect. A Cinderella-at-the-ball kiss, a soap-bubble of perfect happiness and trust and love.
