Basta's Love Game
Part 2
Basta decided to go with the card in his hand since it had seemingly done a pretty good job convincing the girl. He also decided that because it was supposed to be a girl sending the gifts, it didn't matter whether the presents were girly, and so he made his way over to the chocolate counter where a smiley blonde assistant was giving out free samples.
"Hello, sir! Looking to buy some chocolates for the special lady in your life?" the assistant greeted him in a sickeningly sweet sing-song voice.
Basta balked at the word 'lady', "Uh, yeah sure." he muttered, eyeing the tantalising selection of chocolates spread out on the counter before him, the mere sight of them was enough to make his mouth water. Basta had a sweet tooth.
"Well, we have a wonderful selection! You can pick the box and the wrapping paper and ribbon. And then mix and match the chocolates to put inside! Isn't that just wonderful, sir?"
"Yeah, that's…uh…great." he stammered, more than a little creeped out by the woman's enthusiasm.
"And if you buy the biggest box, we'll even give you one of our lovely Valentine's balloons for half price. Half price, sir!"
'Bitch, just get to the part where you offer me free samples to try!' Basta inwardly screamed, but instead he responded with a polite, "Uh-huh, that sure is great. I guess I'll go for that."
"Wonderful! Now, first things first: what shaped box would you like? We have square, oval, heart-shaped, or perhaps you'd like-"
"The heart. Just gimme the heart." he interrupted.
"Lovely choice! Now, the ribbon. I always say add a special touch by choosing a ribbon the same colour as her eyes. What's the colour of your lovely lady's eyes, sir?"
Basta was half tempted to say that his 'lovely lady' didn't have eyes, just to see the look on the assistant's face, but of course he didn't, "Green." he randomly blurted.
"Green!" the assistant sighed dreamily as she cut a length of ribbon, "How lovely! How exotic!"
Basta was getting agitated and very hungry, and bad things tended to happen when Basta was agitated - even worse things happened when he was hungry. Right now he was having trouble deciding between just grabbing a handful of chocolates and shovelling them in his mouth, or punching the assistant in her stupid, creepy, annoying, grinning face. Both seemed equally desirable.
"Lastly, the wrapping paper. Might I suggest this lovely shade of blue to offset the green?"
"Fine. Sure. Whatever." Basta said through gritted teeth, his hands clenching into fists.
"Wonderful! Now, onto the choosing of the chocolates!" the assistant beamed, clapping her hands excitedly.
"Great." Basta snatched a chocolate at random from one of the trays and popped it into his mouth, "So what's this I'm eating?" he asked as he chewed.
"That's a caramel heart."
"What about this one?" he had put another chocolate in his mouth without even waiting to finish eating the caramel heart.
"White chocolate with a strawberry swirl."
"And this one?" A third one joined the other two.
"Chocolate-orange."
"And what's this?" Basta's words were almost completely garbled due to the four chocolates stuffed in his mouth.
"Turkish Delight covered in milk chocolate." the assistant looked a little nauseated by his show of gluttony so Basta swallowed what was in his mouth before selecting the next chocolate.
It took a couple of chews before the flavour hit him, "Oh Jeez, I hate marzipan!" Basta spat the chewed up mess into his hand but the revolting taste of marzipan still lingered on his tongue and he began retching loudly. By the time his stomach settled everyone in the store was staring and even the smiley assistant was fixing him with a look of undisguised disgust.
"Here's a napkin, sir." she said tonelessly, handing him a square of paper.
"Thanks. Look, just put one of every kind in the box - except the marzipan." he said as he wiped his sticky hand.
"Wonderful, sir!" she said cheerily, perking up and recovering her previous vigour at the prospect of a sale. Basta found himself hating this woman with her fake cheeriness and her 'Wonderfuls' and her 'Sirs'.
When the chocolates were placed in the box, and the box was wrapped and tied, Basta reluctantly paid the woman the ridiculous amount they were asking for stuff he could get for a hell of a lot cheaper any other week of the year, and trudged from the store with the card and chocolates under one arm and the special half price balloon bobbing along after him.
He was almost out the door when the skinny boy dressed as Cupid intercepted him again, "Before you leave, sir, I would like to tell you about the special offer we have on-"
"Will you just get away from me, you freak!" Basta all but screamed in the boy's face as he shoved past him.
Inside the car, Basta dumped the items on the passenger seat and started up the engine. Then he noticed the time on the clock on the dashboard. He'd been in town an hour, if he was gone for too long then Capricorn would notice and begin to get suspicious as to why his faithful right-hand man was not at his side. Shit! He had to get back to the village fast.
Basta drove like a madman, overtaking other cars recklessly and turning corners so fast that the car was practically on two wheels. As he drove, the balloon kept incessantly drifting in front of his face, blocking his view of the windscreen. Basta lost count of how many times he smacked it away only for it to resume making its slow journey in his direction. It was the final straw when the balloon blocked his view again and the car ended up cruising onto the wrong side of the road and into the path of an oncoming lorry. When the balloon was out of the way again and he realised what was happening, Basta emitted a rather unmanly shriek and quickly swerved the car back onto the right side of the road. As the lorry passed the driver threw an extremely rude hand gesture at Basta. Deciding that he didn't fancy getting into a head-on collision all for the sake of a crappy Valentine's balloon, Basta opened the sunroof and let the offending item float up and away out the car.
Once back at the village he parked the car and walked to find Mortola, the card and box of chocolates hidden under his jacket. He found her in the kitchens which were, thankfully, empty - if one of the maids happened to witness the items changing hands then they might make assumptions and no doubt the rumours of 'Basta's crush on Mortola' would spread throughout the village like wildfire. He thrust the items wordlessly into her hands and left her to worry about finding a way to smuggle them into Capricorn's bedroom.
One week later and all was back to normal. With Valentine's day past, the almost unbearable atmosphere of sexual tension between the maids and the men had died down and Mortola's scheme seemed to have worked. Basta actually found himself relaxing, thinking that Capricorn had fallen for the ruse and believed that one of the maids had sent him the anonymous gifts. Then he was summoned to Capricorn's house.
At first Basta thought nothing of it, he was often summoned to Capricorn's home to assist his master with business or some new scheme. Capricorn was in the drawing room, standing with his back to the door, looking out the window. Basta had just opened his mouth to greet his master when he noticed the card and chocolates upon the table, the sound came out as a strangled cry instead. Capricorn turned around, his silver eyes narrowed as studied Basta carefully.
"Have you ever seen those items before, Basta?" his master asked him, his voice menacingly calm.
"No." Basta croaked.
"Is that so? Then please explain this."
Basta took that envelope which Capricorn held out to him. Inside he found two pieces of paper, the first he couldn't read but the second was easy enough to understand for it was a photograph. A photograph of him. From what Basta could tell, it was taken by one of those newfangled speed-cameras which actually took a photograph of the offending car so that the driver could be identified. And there he was, melted chocolate smeared round his mouth, snarling as he batted away that troublesome balloon again.
Basta felt sick.
"The other piece of paper tells me that you were travelling at a ridiculous speed over the limit and that I am expected to pay a fine of 125 Euros because the car in question is registered in my name." Capricorn said coldly.
"Sir, I…" Basta bleated.
"I expect the money in full by this evening. We shall say nothing of what you were doing on that particular trip."
"Yes, sir." Basta said, turning positively scarlet with humiliation.
"You are dismissed."
Basta hightailed it out of the room and into the village. He had to find Alexi and talk to him about getting a loan.
The End