Pulling up his pants, Dave smiled at his sleeping wife. He kneeled down next to her and moved a lose strand of hair from her face. She slowly opened her eyes, revealing her emerald green eyes.
"Hey," he whispered.
"Hey, you leaving now?" she said in a disappointed tone.
"Um, yeah, I'm gonna head out. But I need you to come with me."
"Where?" she said sitting up.
"Just come on. I'll meet you outside."
Ashli frowned as Dave smirked at her and headed out to the living room. She shrugged and quickly went in her closet to find something to where. She decided on some dark blue jeans and a green wife beater and fixed her hair into a ponytail. Dave was already gone when she came out the room and she used this opportunity to call John.
"Hi John. How are you?" she said sweetly.
"Where the hell are you?! I mean, first you show up late. Now you disappear off the face of the fucking earth! You got five minutes Ashli!"
"Wait! I can't. Family emergency."
"Don't play that shit with me Ash."
"I'm serious. Dave's hurt and I need to meet him at the hospital."
"What? Wait…what-"
"I can't explain. Let me call you back later."
"But Ash-"
She hanged up before he could finish his sentence and she met Dave in the parking lot. She got in the passenger seat and squinted at him.
"Alright Dave. Where are we going?"
"What took you so long?"
"Perfection takes time hon. Now where are we going?"
He ignored her and made his way out the parking space and into the busy road. Ashli continued to watch Dave for any signs of excitement or anger but all she got was a blank expression.
"This isn't funny. I need to be back at work in five minutes. I don't have time for games."
"I'll call John and tell him you can't make it-"
"No! Um…I took care of it. But that doesn't mean that I can be late."
Dave shook his head and took out his phone. "I need you for the rest of the day Ash. I'll just call him and –"
Before he could finish, Ashli grabbed his phone and threw it in the back of the car. Then she leaned over and kissed him passionately, almost causing an accident.
"What the hell Ashli! I'm driving!"
"I know but…I told you I had it under control. John will understand."
He bit his lip and continued to drive, every once in a while glancing at Ashli who was still staring at him evilly.
"Did you know that one time my dad killed a guy for giving him half ass information?"
Dave chuckled. "Your point?"
"My
point is, I don't want to see you dead over something that can just
be solved right here. Where are we going?"
"We're almost
there Ash. Just a couple more minutes."
"I don't have a few minutes. I don't even have a few seconds! Now just tell me where we are going before I kill you!"
Dave rolled his eyes and pulled up to a space near a big park on the corner. Ashli looked around and realized there was something awfully familiar about this place but she couldn't quite place it. Dave got out the car as well as Ashli and they walked on the grass to a big building near a lake. Ashli saw boys chasing girls around and adults telling them to stop immediately recognized it to be a school. He wouldn't do this now, would he? She thought to herself. Dave grabbed her hand and they walked up the gray steps to the building. When they got in, they were greeted by a security guard. The guard winked at Ashli and she rolled her eyes.
"I'm looking for room 713," Dave said, holding on to Ashli's arm tightly.
"Just take the elevator up to the seventh floor and it's the first room on the right," he smiled, never taking his eyes off Ashli. Dave frowned and pulled Ashli away from the security guard. When on the elevator, Ashli punched Dave in the stomach.
"What the hell are we doing here?!" she screamed.
"Today's parent-teacher conference. I figured you like to join me."
"You figured wrong! I haven't seen her in what… a year? I'm not ready!"
"Well it's too late."
"Says who?"
"Ashli-"
"No,
don't say anything to me…ever."
"Ashli, just come and see. If you don't like it, then you never have to come again. But Britt really wanted you to be here today."
They got off the elevator and stood in front of a classroom, still arguing.
"So what! I don't wanna be here!"
"Um excuse me, are you here for PT night?" a tall blonde hair woman asked.
Ashli rolled her eyes. "What does it look like?"
The woman nodded and quickly went back into her room. Ashli looked up and saw that the same room that the lady disappeared unto was the same room Dave asked for.
"Oh great," she muttered.
"Just
relax. It'll be fine."
She bit her lip and walked into the
room where the blonde lady was talking to another parent. The parent
smiled and walked out with their son. Dave sat down as well as Ashli
and the blonde hair lady smiled.
"Hello. Are you Kendra's parents?"
"No, we're Brittany's parents."
"Well welcome. I'm Stacey Keibler, Brittany's teacher. How are you guys?"
Ashli's knee was bouncing up and down fast. Dave put his hand on it, reassuring her.
"Everything's fine," Ashli said. Dave chuckled, happy to see that Ashli somewhere had an inferior side.
"Okay. Well, I'd like to start of by saying that Brittany is an intelligent young lady. She's always on task, always participating and helping other students. Her test and project grades are outstanding, always receiving 90's and above."
Ashli crossed her arms over her chest. "But…"
Stacey cleared her throat. "Well, for the past couple of months, she's been really moody. Her work usually involves a lot of emotions about her mother. Um, here's a story she wrote about her mother. She talks about how much pain and resentment she feels when she thinks about her."
Ashli rolled her eyes and shifted in her seat. "So?"
"Are you her sister?"
"Why?"
"Well, I've never seen you before. I've met Mr. Bautista as well as his girlfriend Dawn Marie but, never you."
"Oh? So Dawn's been here before?" Ashli said loudly. "Alright. I'm finish now."
Ashli got up and stormed out of the classroom with Dave hot on her trail. He grabbed her arm before she reached the elevator.
"Listen, I had to bring someone-"
"So you brought your little bitch her and made her pretend to be my daughter's mother! Then why the fuck did you bring me here? To let me see your happy family?!"
"Brittany wanted to see you! I figured you like to come!"
"That's bullshit because if you thought I was okay with it, you would've told me!"
"Alright,
I'm sorry. I should have told you. But you're here now-"
"The
hell I am! I'm gone!"
"Wait, please, just stay until we get Brittany. It'll mean a lot to her!"
"I'm going back to work and if I were you, I'd stay the fuck away from me."
Ashli went into the elevator and left Dave holding his head, trying to figure out another way to lie to Brittany.
Ashli snuck in the front door and smiled at the people waiting to get massages. Michelle McCool, secretary and sister of John, waved at her to come over to the counter.
"Hey Michelle, where's John?"
The petite blonde behind the counter smirked. "Stephanie's back there. Probably cursing about you, as usually. Where were you?"
"Another meeting with the husband. He just fucked up my whole day now."
"You know had men lined up here this morning."
"They
still there?"
"There's two left if you wanna meet them.
Brooke and Kelly said they have no problem covering for you."
Ashli smiled. "Well, at least there's some good news out of this. I'll be back."
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to go bother the married couple in the back."
Ashli made her way to the back of the building and heard screaming coming from John's office. She smirked and without knocking, opened the door. John looked up from his position on his couch while the tall brunette woman eyed her evilly.
"Hey Stephanie. I haven't seen you in a while."
Stephanie rolled her eyes and focused her attention back on John. "Can you please tell that little whore to leave-"
"Whoa, where do you come off calling people whores miss around the way?" Ashli snapped.
"Look little girl, you have a job to do and before you get fired, I advise you to get to it."
"Says who?"
"Ashli," John finally spoke, "Just go. I'll see you tomorrow."
"You need to fire her nasty dirty ass now!" Stephanie screamed.
Ashli sneered at her and sat on the couch next to John. She crossed her legs and glared at him. "Well, it seems as if there's something you need to tell me John. What is it?"
"Well-"
"No, let me honey," Stephanie said interrupting him. "You've been late everyday for the past couple of months and Metamorphous has been losing profits because of it! Most of our-"
"Our?" Ashli frowned.
"Yes! I'm the one who invested in half of this place. My husband and I built this place from scratch and we let your scrawny ass work here, thinking we were helping an educated young lady out. But instead, we got the slut of the century."
"Excuse me, I'm married," Ashli said, now examining her nails.
"So what? I know you cheat! With the amount of men that walk in and out of this place, you must be doing something more than giving massages. You probably give them blow jobs on the side!"
"Hey, hey that's enough now!" John yelled getting up. "Look, ya'll need to stop all this back and forth shit cause' ya'll givin' me a headache. Steph, don't come in here accusing my employees of things they ain't done. Ashli, just take the rest of the day off. I'll speak to you tomorrow morning."
She smirked at Stephanie and got up. "That's fine by me John. See ya later Stephanie."
"Bitch, its Mrs. Cena to you," she said waving Ashli off.
As much as she wanted to, Ashli didn't even bother to comment. Her day wasn't going exactly as planned and she had no more energy to argue with anyone else for the day. As she walked out to her car, she noticed a familiar man standing next to her bus stop. She rolled her eye and sat down next to him.
"What do you want Ken?" she asked with an attitude. Ken Kennedy was one of her father's assistant. She knew every time she saw him, she would be seeing her father sometime through out the day.
"I came to remind you about the family dinner tonight. Remember 8:00 pm, sharp."
"Goody can't wait."
"Why are you out of work?"
"I had the day off. Is that okay with you?"
"You need a ride?"
"My car will do fine."
"I came by earlier. That cute girl at the desk said you left. Where'd you go?"
"I'm a grown woman Ken. That's none of your business."
"Alright, alright. I'll see you tonight. And dress nice. You look a fucking mess."
She glared at him as he smirked and drove off in his black dodge. Great, first Dave, now daddy. Can this day get any worse?