A glimpse.
Alicia and Derrick halted their steps. A leggy brunette was scuttling out of the bedroom while jamming a bunch of dollar bills into her Nicole de Rivals bag. After she slammed the door closed, she fixed her bed head and put on her heels. She smiled at the two in acknowledgment prior to leaving. She wasn't Massie, no. She was Rumi, the last guest from the party last night to exit the premises. The others had gone much earlier. Any sign of the night before ebbed magically as well, thanks to the Blocks' housemaids. That included the Skittles Dune have scattered inadvertently in the hallway leading up to Massie's room.
The raven-haired Rivera daughter slowly opened the door to Massie's room. It was completely dark. Massie had thick heavy drapes covering her window. She didn't like sunlight interrupting her sleep, she knew that.
Derrick flicked the lights on. The room was all white: the floor, the ceiling, the furniture and fixtures. Even her bookshelf housed books with white spines. She must've painted and covered them in plastic. There was a platform with a claw foot bathtub, close to it a white side table with a large white scented candle and a book. The only pop of color came from a red rotary dial telephone which was on the floor beside a white throw pillow and a half-empty martini glass. He noticed this and immediately imagined her last night lying on the floor and staring at the ceiling while talking to him. Well, whatever good feeling he got from that memory got ruined not seconds later.
"Mass?" Alicia asked, now standing beside the bed. That's when Derrick saw: next to a sleeping Massie is a dark-haired boy lying on his stomach. His face was buried on the pillow, but he could tell who it was. The guy who was always with her wherever—apparently including the bed.
The half-asleep Massie whimpered. She covered her eyes with her right arm at once. Her left arm jostled her bestfriend alongside her, and as soon as it managed to reach his head of hair, whisked him awake. "Lights… fucking blinding… put out the lights."
Without getting up or even removing his face which was still slumped on his own pillow, said bestfriend uncaringly pulled out the pillow under her head and dropped it over her. The pillow was heavy and made a sound as it hit her face.
But it blocked out the light for her anyway, which is just what she wanted. "Thank you, baby," Massie mumbled, her voice drowsy. Her left hand rubbed his bare back as a sign of affection and then settled there.
Alicia heaved a sigh. "Seriously? Sweetie, your mom is going to freak. She's going to be in a terrible mood coming from her flight. You know she hates JFK. Both the airport and the man it was named after." Kendra was in LA for the week but would make it in time for brunch at Mark's new Tribeca condo.
The eldest Harrington son Mark had moved last week, and the mothers of their group were all too quick to pester him to throw his very first and very own brunch. The same brunch his younger brother Derrick was looking forward to since the morning when he hung up the phone, up until this point in time, the time his eyes set on a shirtless Cameron Fisher sleeping on Massie Block's bed.
He felt his chest tighten. He couldn't figure these two out. None of them did. Are they or aren't they? Are they or aren't they? "I'll meet you outside," Derrick gruffly said before storming out.
He didn't need to be here.
A/N: Sorry if this is too short. This is the shortest chapter I've written actually. There are other scenes after this which I already have planned out but have not put into words yet. Just thought of posting this one as soon as I wrote it for the new batch of readers I've enticed from the last weeks! Another note, just to be clear about the hickey, I already referred to who really gave it to her in the earlier chapters (chapter 6?). As many have mentioned it in their reviews, I got inspired and thought of writing about that in the later chapters. So expect it to be addressed again next time! Thank you for reading. Let me know what you think please.