Author's note: I am but a humble newcomer, and have just moved (what an ordeal that was, oy) so am sans internet at home, but am slowly maing my way through your fabulous stories - reviews will be forthcoming, I swear. In the meantime here's another short piece featuring our dynamic duo.
C.C. sat with her back to the table staring absently over the dance floor. She had been thinking.
She had also been drinking, but that didn't seem relevant.
She had been thinking that Maxwell and Nanny Fine looked happy, and that they looked alien. A million miles away from her.
She had been thinking that she had never really liked Maxwell, not in that way. He lacked vision. He was a good businessman, but boy, he was terrible at judging scripts and almost as bad at casting. He was slow when it came to people, never understanding what was going on around him. And more than all that, he was dull.
But despite the lack of any deep affection, she had always hoped they would end up together, because that's what happened in her world (which, she was shocked to realise was still her parent's world. She had never found her own place to fit in). It didn't matter if two people loved each other, or even if they liked each other, so long as they fit the mould.
C.C. knew, better than she knew anything, that in her parent's world Maxwell fit the "husband" mould to a T, and to marry someone like him would mean winning their approval.
That thought definitely called for another drink. Just as she was summoning the will to make her way to the bar and demand the pubescent boy hiding behind it just give her the damn bottle, Niles sat beside her holding two full glasses.