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I reached the room my class was in and took my usual seat. I did my best to pay attention, but during the lecture about the sociology of aging, I couldn’t help but let my mind wander off.
Didn’t I want to be normal? Didn’t I want to pretend that my life wasn’t a shit show? Maybe going out on Friday with Beth and her friends would help me, you know, live a little. Have some fun. Everything in my life lately had been so serious, I’d practically forgotten what the definition of fun was.
Yeah, that was pretty sad.
I just didn’t know if I wanted to go out. It literally sounded like torture. I’d be one awkward wet noodle, probably, so awkward the others would leave me somewhere, I bet, abandoning me for real fun. How shitty would that make me feel?
That was just a what-if scenario, though, and I doubted Beth would actually leave me somewhere just because I was awkward and boring.
Last Friday night Creed didn’t go anywhere. He stayed home with me, and we watched a movie together. He’d even made popcorn. It’d been fun, but a part of me had wondered what he was stepping away from to hang out with me. He wouldn’t be there all the time for me; I didn’t want him to stop living his life all because he was worried about me.
Sociology of aging was my last class of the day, so afterward I walked back to Creed’s place. It was only a fifteen-minute walk, and honestly, walking was faster than waiting for a bus to come, then sitting in a bunch of traffic while waiting for my stop to arrive. There were tons of other people on the sidewalks during the day, so it wasn’t like I was alone or unsafe doing so.
All the while, as I walked, I couldn’t decide what to do. Whether I should cancel Friday’s plans or suck it up and go. It might be the last thing I wanted to do, but I might also be blowing all of this out of proportion. It might be fun. Who knew? I wasn’t a psychic. I couldn’t see the future.
If I was and I could, I would’ve seen my dad choking me and left before it got to that point, but I never thought it would. He might have an anger problem, especially when he drank, but being a single dad had to be stressful. It had to—no. I reminded myself of what Creed had said: I needed to stop making excuses for my dad and the way he’d treated me these last ten years.
I think I understood it now, though. Why people didn’t leave. Why they stayed. Sometimes it was easier to stay. Sometimes there was nothing harder than packing it all up and leaving, especially when you didn’t have anyone. If I didn’t have Creed… what would I have done? Where would I have gone? Beth would’ve taken me in, but she’d have asked a thousand and one questions, questions I wouldn’t have wanted to answer.
The front door to the building Creed lived in was gilded with gold and silver, thick panes of glass between the outside world and the fancy, expensive one lying within. The doorman gave me a nod of his head as I walked inside; Creed had been right. Everyone knew I was temporarily living with Creed the very next day; I never got stopped.
I went straight to the elevators in the back, past the giant front desk and the lounge area. My bag was slung over my shoulders, but after I pressed the up button, I let it slide off my arms and hit the floor. I leaned against the wall as I waited.
I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel out of place in a fancy, hoity-toity building like this. I’d never dream of walking into this place if Creed didn’t live here. Heck, I’d tried asking him once how much it cost to live here, and he’d refused to tell me. Like, outright refused to give me a number, even a ballpark one. It had to be expensive as hell.
The shiny elevator doors slid open after a while, and I got on after grabbing my bag. The operator took one look at me and hit Creed’s floor, not saying a word. He put his arms behind his back after that, white gloves tight on his hands.
I didn’t know why, but my gaze lingered on those gloves, on the way he held them behind his back. I’d never really paid much attention before, but it kind of looked like there was a bulge in the fabric of his dark uniform, on his lower back. A walkie-talkie, maybe?
No, this place wasn’t the kind of place to have freaking walkie-talkies. Come on, Taylor.
As we rode up in silence, I kept glancing at the bulge, unable to help myself. It was too big to be a cell phone under there, so what… my mind trailed off when I thought of something else it could be.
A gun. It could be a gun.
Were these workers packing? The place was definitely secure; there were so many security cameras everywhere, but to have the workers carrying their own guns… was that really necessary? Did they get a lot of people trying to come in here and rob the place and its inhabitants?
Damn.
I shifted my eyes away the moment I assumed it was a gun, and I inched myself toward the door even though we weren’t on my floor yet. My fingers tapped on the strap of my bag, and it seemed like the longest elevator ride in history.
The moment the door opened, I practically sprinted out, turning and heading toward the door. Creed had given me a key and let me know what the code was, so I didn’t need him to be home to let me in. In fact, I was pretty sure he’d told me he was heading into work for a few hours today.
I think I made it fifteen feet out of the elevator when I noticed someone was hanging around Creed’s door. My feet skidded to a halt, and as my ears heard the elevator door close, I stared at the person looking bored and checking out her nails.
A woman with gorgeous blond hair and bright blue eyes, maybe in her mid-twenties. She wore heels, along with a tight, red dress that matched the shade of matte lip gloss she wore. The dress showed off her legs and dipped low around her chest, showing the world just how curvy and beautiful she was. The moment those eyes of hers flicked in my direction, I felt very much like a potato.
She stopped checking out her manicured nails, cocking her head at me. “Can I help you, sweetie?” Her voice sounded nice, but there was a hint of suspicion dwelling within it. Her gaze narrowed somewhat.
Swallowing, I resumed my walk to the door, stopping when I stood a few feet away from her. “Uh, no,” I said, holding her stare. My hand suddenly grew sweaty; I damn near dropped the key. “Can I help you?”
She laughed. “No, I’m not here for you, honey. I’m waiting for my man.”
Her words sounded wrong. She was waiting for her man while standing outside of Creed’s door? What… and then it hit me.Creedwas her man? Of course. He’d told me he didn’t have a girlfriend, but one look at her and you could tell she belonged in this place much more than I did.
Did he lie to me about not having a girlfriend?
“Creed?” I asked, and the very second I said his name, her demeanor changed. Instead of looking mildly suspicious, she looked outright distrustful.
