The happy bride in this chapter might be familiar to some of you who read a certain author with nick Wynni ;) Well, I just couldn't torture poor Phil anymore, could I? :D
{Sunday #2}
Wren's revenge upon Dr Wanker might have to wait. There's only one tall fit blonde bloke at the party, but judging by a significantly shiny suit and the long silky hair - seriously, Wren has more split ends than he does - Wren has nothing to catch here. No stereotyping, by the way, he's just making lovey dovey eyes at Dr Horrible. And again, Wren's not judging. The bespoke light grey suit Dr Horrible is wearing makes Wren's fanny shudder in pleasant memories. Shut your gob, Ms Fanny. We are over him! 'You might be, but I'd have some of that deliciousness,' answers the cursed uncooperative organ, and Wren sighs. 'You've had a slice last week, daft muscle,' Wren reminds the fanny, and then feels slightly wobbly on her feet. Why? Because the aforementioned last week's slice is decorously sipping something red from a glass by the bar. What the frack?! Is he stalking her?!
"Thea, that's him!" Wren hisses. "That's the bloke from last week. The tax preparer." Thea prims up like a hound at the sound of a hunting horn.
"Where? Which one? The little one with small hands?"
"How the frack can you see hands from here?!" Thea gives her a pointed look. "Nevermind. Yes, that one, in a brown jacket." Thea is surveying the tax preparer.
"Hm… No, not worth the second round."
"Thea!" Wren squeaks. "I'm not even thinking about second round! It's just awkward."
"Why?" There's sincere confusion in Thea's eyes under her long, fluffy, perfectly mascara-ed eyelashes. "So, you've shagged. You've slept with at least three more men here, and speed dated another thirteen, and by the way your Scotsman is waving to you."
Wren returns the wave from Dr Horrible's ginger cousin, Dain, with a plastic smile plastered over her face, and then she grabs her friend's hand and drags her in a corner behind a giant vase with some poofy purple flowers.
"I'm not ready to face all of them!" Wren starts pulling at her coiffured curls. "I'm OK with Killian, he's cool. I'm OK with Phil of course, his bride is nice, and we got sloshed together couple times. And the footie team are my mates. And I'm even mentally - sort of - prepared for Dr Horrible and his Cruella De Ville, but not Bill! That's just too much!"
"God, Wren, you have so much to learn in the world of casual shag, you depress me!" Thea rolls her eyes. "It's called ripping the plaster. Go straight to him now and make it un-awkward. Set the rules of engagement. This way you can enjoy the do and find someone new. Speaking of..."
Thea licks her lips and floats away, her hips moving seductively under a pink lace dress, towards an unsuspecting bloke sipping a martini at the closest table. It's Dwalinson, the footie team forward, and Wren wishes them luck. They both will need it.
Wren lingers behind the vase for a mo - watching Thea on a pull seriously requires David Attenborough's voiceover - and then she inhales sharply and marches towards Bill Baggins, the tax preparer, and the owner of an excellent Bedmonkey mattress.
"Hi, Wren!" he cheerfully greets her, and Wren immediately feels better. Phew, bless his non-judgy attitude. And bless the men who remember that one off implies only one instance of - getting - off. Well, they had three, but you get the point!
"Hi!" She smiles to him. "Bride or groom?"
"Sadly, I'm neither." Wren blinks, and he blushes a bit. Oh, right, that's his self-deprecating humour. "I'm the tax preparer of the groom's Uncle's clinic. You?"
The honest answer is 'I shagged the groom, and his brother, then had seven months of monogamous bliss with the Uncle, and then he dumped me cruelly, without any explanation, but with a lot of direct and painful accusations in depravity and dishonesty.'
"I know the groom's family." Here we go, nice and vague.
A slap so loud that its sound carries over the jazz cover of one of the Roxette overused hits makes Wren and Bill turn towards the table, where Dwalinson is sitting pressing his spade like hand over his cheek. Thea is regally moving to the next table, where Bifurson's eyes boggle and he chokes on his drink. Wren returns her attention to the tax preparer.
"So, you know John…" Don't ask, don't ask, don't ask! "How's he doing?" Damn it, Wren!
"John?" The accountant gives her a confused look.
"Nevermind," Wren tries to hastily fix her mistake, but it's too late.
"Dr Thorington? He's your ex?!" Bill asks, and Wren groans. "The one who broke your heart?"
"Why does everyone automatically assumes I'm the victim here?!" Wren flails her arms. "Maybe, it was I who dumped him! Look! He's clearly on the rebound as well!"
Wren regrets pointing it out because it leads to her and the tax preparer actually looking at Dr Wanker. Who is currently leaning to the ear of the mind blowingly sexy blonde in a tight dark green dress - pencil skirt and all - whispering into that said ear! 'He used to whisper into me!' hollers Wren's ear. 'It was sexy and I enjoyed it,' chimes in Wren's fanny, and Wren grabs the nearest unclaimed glass of water and topples it into her throat. She so wishes she could get bladdered right now. Nice drunk and disorderly is exactly what she needs. Alas, after two drinks Wren is pretty much a Dalek without the outside dome - goo like, and pathetic, one eye open but bleary, and no capacity for bipedal locomotion.
"So what happened?" asks Bill Baggins with sincere sympathy in his voice, and Wren imagines drowning herself in a punch bowl.
"He broke it off without giving me any explanation. Just said he didn't want to waste time on… on the likes of me." What is this manky croaking sound? Oh, it's Wren's voice quoting Dr Prick.
"Oh..." the tax preparer breathes out.
Sadly, she can imitate the intonation quite easily. She hears and sees this scene repeatedly in her nightmares.
Honestly, two flutes of champagne, and she won't remember anything. Here, fizzy poison, kitty kitty kitty! Come to Wren!
"Wren!" the happy voice of the soon to be Mrs Phil comes from across the room. Saved by the bell. Well, more like a fox hunting horn, because blimey, the chick has lungs!
Future Mrs Blonde Pediatrician With Noble Intentions is cutting through the room like a purple icebreaker, all curls and curves. She's American and properly stretches her vowels, like the characters in those films who wear wide hats and shoot guns at the dawn under the town clock. And there is no stopping her!
Wren is grabbed, hugged, squeezed, minced, and slightly lifted off the ground, and shaken.
"Howdy!" The bride is grinning from ear to ear. "I was hoping you'd come. But didn't know if you'd risk crossing paths with Majestic Grumpus over there." Bri - that's the name of soon to be hitched receptionist who one day just marched into her boss's office and asked him out for ice cream - rolls her eyes and points at Dr Wanker.
"I wouldn't miss it!" Wren gives back a smile as fake as the crab canapes over there. Everything here is tofu. The groom and his mother are vegetarian.
"Brilliant!" Bri grins even wider. "Glad you ain't rattled by the breakup. And I see your friend's making progress."
Wren looks. Bifruson has been scanned and put aside, and Thea has moved to the table where three more footie team members are currently salivating excessively. Wren agrees with them. Thea is the most moreish pudding here.
"Alrightie, need to go! See ya!" Bri disappears in a cloud of ruffles on her lilac dress and some flowery perfume.
"How did they meet?" Bill asks watching the bride hang on some new unsuspecting relative. "The bride and the groom?"
"She was his receptionist, and was pining over him for three years, and then one day he had… an aggro of personal kind... " Uhem, when a certain ginger and him had a misunderstanding regarding what that one time hanky panky meant. "And she decided to go for the Golden Slam. Just grabbed him, and Bob's your Uncle." Wren throws an envious look at the happy Septic bride. "Don't let them tell you how they realised they were each other's destiny on the first date, and how he proposed on the second. The story might give you diabetes." Wren sits on a chair near Bill and sighs.
It's not like she was imagining herself where Bri is standing right now. OK, maybe she did. Once! OK, more than once... And with another man, and definitely more meat in the menu, and less purple flowers everywhere. But there was this one moment in those seven months with Dr Sexy when she sort of thought that maybe he was… it. As in, 'that's it.' End of the line, the Golden Snitch, the Holy Grail to her Dr Jones, the pie to her Dean. Bugger.
And there he is now, sipping champagne and chatting with other guests, and a sexy blonde's hand is on his sleeve, where Wren's used to be, and Wren knows how the muscles feel, warm and firm, under the jacket and the shirt, and…
"Wren, you're crying..." Bill the Tax Preparer whispers, and she quickly hides her face into the handkerchief he hurriedly pushed into her hand.
"Just something got into my eye… Both of them..." Wren squeaks, jumps on her feet, and rushes away.
What is the daftest thing a pale skinned ginger with multiple allergies can do when wearing makeup? Exactly. That would be crying and rubbing her eyes. Now she looks like a rabbit that overdosed on sea food it's allergic to.
Wren isn't sure what got to her. She seemed to have been handling her break up with Dr Horrible quite well all month, and she even ran into him once. They ignored each other, and she ate only half a pint of ice cream afterwards, and it was her favourite Cornish clotted cream, so she counts this as success. What's wrong with her now?
It isn't even the other woman. After all, sisterhood of women and such! And it's no surprise, Wren had heard of her before. There are always some 'well-wishers' who are just dying to let one know that a man they thought was the love of their life had moved on in just two weeks after the break up and was seen jogging in the morning with a woman who doesn't need jogging. Seriously, did she order those legs in some perfection catalog?
Wren isn't even angry or jealous. Wren is sad. She doesn't understand. Why did it fall apart? Did she do something wrong? And it's a very unhealthy tude, and an independent self-assured modern woman shouldn't think in these terms, but it just was so brill! And they clicked, and shag was great, and he made her laugh. He had all those cute habits, and they shared paper in the morning, and he would read with his glasses low on his nose, and she adored him at that moment.
Wren realises the remaining mascara of hers has just travelled down her chin, and she wipes the tears and loudly cleans her nose in the hankie of Bill Baggins, the tax preparer.
"Walk-in coolers are for yelling, not crying." A low rumbly male voice comes from above, and Wren's eyes fly up. "Cooks come here to release rage."
Mr Beorn, the restaurateur and the caterer on this lovely event is standing in the doors of the walk in fridge Wren is hiding in, his log like arms folded on his chest, blue eyes sparkling. Wren sniffles.
"I was going to go to the loo, but there are people everywhere..." Her voice is nasal. He beckons her with his finger and disappears outside the fridge. Wren sighs and drags her sorry arse out.
"Sit. I'll make you tea."
The man is huge. Wren thought she'd dated huge. She was wrong. What is he, six seven or so? The chef garb really suits him, the haircut on this silverfox is short and stylish, and she fancies the clean shaven jawline.
He puts a kettle on the stove, Wren is still frozen. It's sort of awkward, but on the other hand, she properly doesn't want to go out there. And this is a back-up kitchen, all his staff and all the action is happening in the main one.
He points at the counter, and she realises there are no chairs or stools.
"Um..." Wren shifts between her feet in front of it, and then two hands the size of a gravy boat lie on her sides - she emits a choked half squeak, half surprised snort - and he places her on the counter.
He's making tea, she's sniffling.
"So, talk." He places a mug in front of her.
"Isn't it usually a bartender's job? To listen to sappy stories?" Wren asks and tastes the tea. It's perfect. Ace leaves, steeped just right, and she detects a tinge of mint, and just the perfect amount of cream.
The restaurateur takes a sip from his cuppa and smirks to her.
"Well, you got me. Tough tits. People normally don't cry in my fridge on weddings. And you don't look the type."
Wren sighs, Loki, the Sexy God of Sass knows which time in the course of this evening. She surely doesn't look the type. She's wearing her sexiest dress. It's champagne coloured lace mini, and it's new. He hasn't seen it before. Damn it, Wren means to say no one has seen it before. Who cares which parts of her wardrobe Dr Horrible had the privilege to observe, and which he didn't?!
"My ex is here with his new… girlfriend, I reckon. She looks lovely. And smart. And confident." Why is Wren pouring her soul out? She doesn't know, but maybe she is just tired of pretending she's fine. She isn't. It's like she has a Dementor, like a grotty balloon on a string, constantly following her around, and using her for midday snacks.
"That's tough." The man nods pensively, and they enjoy their cuppas in silence for a few minutes. "I'm Mik, by the way."
"Wren." She wonders if she should take one finger and shake it like sprogs do, because she surely can't take this whole hand. Also, she quickly wonders how hands this big would feel on one's posterior. Probably quite yum.
"I've had my share of manky break ups, Wren." He throws pensive long look at the bunches of leek on the opposite wall. "Last boyfriend did quite a number on me." So, none of these big hands on Wren's bum. Dang it. "All we can do is shake it off, and carry on."
"Amen." Wren nods, and they click their mugs.
"And, girl, fix your mascara. You look like a racoon." He points at a chrome pot on a shelf, and Wren peeks. He isn't wrong.
She rummages in her clutch in search of supplies, and starts cleaning the smears under her eyes with the hankie of Bill Baggins. Her mirror is too small, and she twists her neck like a pigeon to see all of the disaster that her face is at the moment.
"Wait, you still have some here." The chef steps closer, between her legs, and picks up her chin with one of the giant hands - seriously, dang it! - and starts carefully wiping her cheekbone, angling her face. His nose is right in front of her.
The door behind them opens sharply, and they both look.
"Mik, Bri was asking about the hummus..."
Dr Horrible is frozen in the doorframe, mouth half open, eyes wide. Right… Has Wren mentioned that her skirt bunched up mid thigh when she spread her knees for Mr Mik Beorn in a purely platonic, mascara cleaning way? What? The man is wide!
Interestingly enough, Wren refrains from 'it's not what it looks like!' squeal that is trying to escape her. Why? Because it's none of his fucking business!
Oh look! Dr Horrible looks like that red character in Inside Out. The colour is rising, the masculine jaw is suddenly set, and the blue eyes are narrowed in - what Wren would smugly call - murderous rage. Yep. Someone is toast.
"For fuck's sake, Wren, at least not at the party..." he snarls through gritted teeth. A. Fuck you, John! B. What a sexy beast!
Mr Mik Beorn is no clot, that's for sure. One doesn't open the most successful grass eating restaurant in the city for nothing. He put two and two and got just the result Wren needs at the moment.
"An engagement party is a celebration of love, Thorington," the restaurateur booms. "We are celebrating."
Wren wraps her legs around the man's hips and gives Dr Wanker a wide smile.
The door bangs behind Dr Horrible's muscular back, and Wren releases the caterer.
"Thank you." She gives his chest a soft pat, and he barks a low laugh.
"I haven't been that close to a fanny for years." They both chuckle. "You're welcome. The man was out of line."
They have more tea, and when Wren returns to the party, she finds out two things. The first - not too surprising - is that Dr Prick left right away, his blonde goddess in tow. The second one is that Thea is gone too, and apparently the catch of the night is none other but Mr Tax Preparer and Glorious Kisser Baggins. Wren wishes them all the orgasms in the world, and proceeds enjoying the do. She dances with the footie team, enjoys the vegan gelato, and laughs until her side stitches at the game of charades at the end. And doesn't think about her past woes even once. Take that, Dr What's His Name!
Author's Note:
Have you checked out my webserials on JukePop dot com? :) Blind Carnival (its first two chapters were written here as a prompt in #14 and #15 in We Are Scattered in Time and Space) is finished, and I'm posting an epilogue to it this Thursday. But wait for it... with the teaser for my new webserial (to be updated every Thursday)! This time it's again a humorous take on a harlequin novel and erotica, but this time with ghosts. Dark haired, blue-eyed, possibly bearded, six feet four ghosts ;)
I'll post the teaser for it in We Are Scattered in Time and Space on Thursday. Stay tuned :D
Best,
Katya Kolmakov
