"Vie! Where are my shoes!" Airen blew strands of stray hair out of her eyes for the millionth time that morning. She bent over to look under the couch, shoving her wild hair out of her face as she went.
Sighing at the lack of shoes, Airen stood and planted her fists on her hips with a sigh of frustration.
"Did you look under the couch?" A muffled shout came from the shared bathroom of the two-bedroom apartment.
"I already looked there!" Airen threw her hands up in the air. She stomped through the small apartment's living space aggressively tossing things around growling under her breath as she went. It was her third sweep of the apartment and there was still no sign of the missing clothing items.
"I'm already late…" Airen grumbled as she glanced at the oven clock in the small kitchen.
"Are they under the mouch?" A tall and lanky young woman appeared in the hall doorway that led to the bedrooms and restroom with a toothbrush in her mouth and white paste foaming around her lips.
Violet Logan leaned up against the doorframe looking somewhat amused at Airen's dilemma. Violet was a pretty young woman with pale skin and dark hair. She stood at about 5'7 and was slim and trim. Violet had jet black hair that she kept short where it hung nice and straight just above her shoulders. Long dark lashes accented her icy blue eyes and prominent cheekbones. She currently wore a pair of dark jeans that hugged her hips and a dark purple long sleeve, see-through blouse.
"Do we need to get your hearing checked? I just said that I already looked there!" Airen huffed. "And I'm already late for my class! Professor Gilman is going to kill me!"
"Why do you even have an 8 am? You hate mornings, especially when they involve school." Violet said with a mouthful of toothpaste as she made her way over to the couch.
"Because I'm a gluten for punishment," Airen said sarcastically. Violet disappeared between the coffee table and the couch and came back up with Airen's converse tennis shoes.
"How did- Oh never mind! Thank you!" Airen lept over to Violet and took the shoes from her. Violet disappeared back into the bathroom and Airen could hear water running from the faucet as she put on the offending shoes.
"Oh! I meant to tell you, John's coming over later. He needs some food and I told him he could come over here and grab a few things." Violet said from the bathroom.
Airen scrunched up her face at the thought of Violet's younger brother going through their fridge.
"Doesn't he, you know, have food of his own he can eat?" Airen said with a tone of disgust in her voice.
"He's just coming to grab some ingredients. Spices and stuff like that that he doesn't have at his place. Besides, what do you care? It's not like you cook." Violet came out of the bathroom toothpaste-free and resumed her earlier position up against the doorway.
"Hey, it's not that I don't cook, it's that I can't. My mom never taught me how to cook, and even if she had I really don't think that you'd enjoy her cooking." Airen said pointing at Violet. Violet rolled her eyes.
"Yeah well, my mom didn't teach me to cook either. It was my dad." Violet chuckled.
"Well, I didn't exactly have one of those," Airen said quietly. Before Violet could say anything about it Airen continued. "Anyway, my point is, he's going to eat something when he's here anyway! It's like that boy's an animal or something the way he eats! Second, if he needs the stuff to cook why doesn't he just go out and buy it? The man's 21 for crying out loud!" Airen stood and grabbed her book bag.
"He's coming, end of story. Honestly, you two are grown. You really do need to figure out how to get along." Violet said.
"Me?! He's the most, the most…ugh! He's the most annoying, arrogant, selfish-! Honestly, he's the most self-centered person I've ever met!" Airen finished off with a huff.
Violet rolled her eyes and glanced over at the clock.
"You should probably hurry. Class starts in 5 minutes."
"Gilipollas!" Airen exclaimed. With a final shove of her hand through her hair, she whirled around in a tight circle to make sure she had everything. Violet sighed and went back to her room to finish getting ready.
"Now where are my keys?"
"Here you go Chief." Johnathan tossed a stack of papers onto the desk in front of him. Robert Cramer the Chief of Gotham City Police looked up from his current task. He raised an eyebrow at the young detective as he looked at him over the edge of his glasses.
"And this is…..?" Chief Cramer drawled.
"All of my reports from the past month," Johnathan answered shifting his weight anxiously on his feet. He glanced at the clock on the Chief's office wall then at the watch on his wrist. He had a long afternoon and night ahead of him and he didn't want to prolong it any more than he had to.
"Got somewhere to be Logan?" The chief asked while thumbing through the stack John had tossed onto his desk.
"Yeah, actually. I'm supposed to be-"
"Hey yo, Logan! Macy tells me that you finished up all of your overdue reports for the past month! You trying to get out of here or something?" Tony Risco John's partner and best friend, strolled into the Chief's office.
"Something like that, yeah," Johnathan replied stiffly.
"Hey! I got an idea! Let's go out tonight! Do the whole shebang, ya know, booze, girls…maybe even get into a scrape or two….just like old times! Come on! We'll have a blast!" Tony slapped Johnathan on the back in a brotherly gesture.
"Thanks, Tony, but I can't. Not tonight. Sorry."
"What!? Come on man! It's been forever since we've done anything fun together!"
"Sorry man, maybe some other time."
"Why not tonight? Don't tell me you have to work, you finished all of your reports!"
"No, I don't have to work, but I do have somewhere I've got to be."
"Ohhh…hot date?" Tony winked knowingly at Johnathan. "Anther one of Gotham's high life socialites going to find her way into Detective John Logan's bed tonight?" Tony nudged John in the side suggestively. John gave Tony a side glance before continuing to look straight ahead.
"In a rush for a night on the town and other activities?" Cramer spoke up giving Johnathan a disapproving look.
"No sir. As I was about to say, I'm supposed to go to my sister's." Johnathan cleared his throat nervously.
"Ooohhhh…..so a whole other type of hot date huh? How is Violet's roommate?" Tony asked with a teasing grin.
Johnathan rolled his eyes. Tony was the only person from Johnathan's "public" life that knew about Airen.
Airen Stevens was young, hot, smart, and extremely irritating. Having only been in the city for about 6 months his sister, Violet, had offered to get an apartment with her. Violet and Airen had become fast friends at Gotham City University's law school when Airen moved to the city and began taking classes.
At first, Johnathan had disliked the idea. Not only had Violet just met the girl, but she was a complete mystery. They didn't know who she was, where she was from, who her family was….and Johnathan hated her with a passion. She had a knack for getting under his skin and getting on his nerves.
Airen seemed to read him like a book and push all the right buttons to rile him up. It drove him crazy. So he'd made it his life's mission to do the exact same to her. It took him a while to learn what buttons to push and when. She was always so poised and controlled. She knew what to say and when to say it. So of course, she hadn't liked it when he'd started pushing her buttons. It had taken him a while to learn which buttons to push when. He had also had to pay close attention to her habits and body language. Since she was always so controlled he had to learn what little things to look for in order to see when his "pushing" worked. Surprisingly it was easy to get her riled up. He enjoyed messing with her so much that it had become like a game to him, and he loved every minute of it. So now every time they saw each other it was a game of chicken of who would get angry and end the "game" first.
But of course there was Tony. The only reason that he knew about Airen was that she'd been out at a club one night while they had been working an undercover sting operation. The owner of the club had been suspected of drug dealing and committing homicide so Johnathan and Tony had posed as buyers in order to bust him. Of course, the whole thing had gone south when Airen had made him. John still remembered the chewing out that he and Tony had gotten from the Commissioner himself.
Ever since that night, however, Tony had seemed obsessed with this idea that John had feelings for Airen.
"That true Logan?" Cramer asked.
"No sir."
"You sure about that?"
"Yes sir. It's a hard no, sir." Johnathan said. When Cramer looked away Johnathan sent the dirtiest glare he could muster to Tony. Tony of course just grinned.
"Alright Logan, I guess I got nothing else for you to do. Get out before I change my mind."
"Yes sir. Thank you."
"I'm back!" Airen kicked off her shoes before she even had the door closed.
"Hey!" Violet greeted from the kitchen. Johnathan didn't even glance her way; he just raised a single arm from where he sat at the kitchen bar. Violet smacked his arm with a wooden spoon.
"Ouch! Hey! What was that for?"
"Rude, acknowledge the presence of my roommate." Violet scolded.
"I did!"
"With words."
Johnathan heaved a deep and sorrowful sigh. He turned and said, "hello" before stiffly turning back to his previous position.
Airen rolled her eyes and took a sip of her iced coffee. Ever since discovering them she'd fallen in love and couldn't stop drinking them. She'd even included the coffee shop in her daily routine.
The cup made a slurping sound as she sucked the last few drops from the bottom of the cup.
"Done yet?" Violet asked in a tense tone. She hated the sound of someone sucking the life out of their already dead drink, but Airen loved it.
"Yup." Airen deemed the drink gone and threw the empty cup away.
"So, how mad was Gilman when you showed up late?" Violet asked.
"Oh, I wasn't late," Airen said without thinking. Violet turned with a confused look on her face.
"How? You didn't leave until 5 minutes before class was supposed to start."
"Oh, um I wasn't late because Gilman was late so class didn't start on time," Airen said quickly.
"Really? She's always on time for my class with her."
"Yeah, some sort of car trouble or something like that." Airen tossed her book bag on the couch before strolling over to the kitchen bar. Airen noticed the sizzle of something on the stove and Violet stirring something.
"What are you making?" Airen asked curiously. She leaned up against the countertop and put her chin in her hand.
"I'm making Legumes e Arroz," Violet said with a rough accent.
"Vegetables and rice?" Airen said in a questioning tone.
"Trying to make," Johnathan mumbled without looking up from his phone.
Violet whirled around and pointed her wooden spoon at John. "You shut up. You," she pointed it at Airen. "I thought it was Portuguese?"
"What was?" Airen asked confused.
"The dish!"
"…the words were Portuguese," Airen said weakly. "Well, sort of."
Violet huffed and turned to glare at her cooking as though it had committed a great offense by not being Portuguese.
Airen sniffed the air a couple of times. Something smelled weird, but to her, it was a familiar weird.
"Is something burning?"
"My frittata!" Violet exclaimed. She threw down her wooden spoon and grabbed oven mitts that were sitting next to the stove. She opened the oven and pulled out a pan with a yellowy substance that was black on the edges and gooey in the middle.
"What is this, cultural food day?" Airen joked.
"Don't ask," Johnathan muttered.
"Mason's coming to pick me up and we're supposed to eat something light before we leave and he likes exotic international dishes." Violet sighed heavily.
Airen noticed the disaster of a kitchen for the first time since walking in. Flour, sugar, and baking powder seemed to have exploded all over the kitchen. Dishes that were covered in raw dough and bits and pieces of other ingredients lined the counters. Spice bottles were strewn about as though someone had randomly tossed them into the kitchen. The sink was full, broken eggshells were everywhere and something that looked suspiciously like green jello was plastered on the cabinets.
Violet herself was a sight. Her hair was sticking up in odd angles and had bits of food in it. Her clothes were covered in various stains and other substances. Her face, hands, and arms were covered in flour and a flimsy apron did little to protect her jeans from the mess.
Airen stared at the kitchen and her roommate in shock. She turned to the virtually lifeless and therefore useless boy sitting at the kitchen bar.
"You!" Airen smacked Johnathan's arm to get his attention.
"Ow!" He looked up from his phone and gave her a death glare. "What was that for?"
"Don't you cook?"
"Yeah? But that's no reason to hit me!"
"Couldn't you have helped?!"
"She wouldn't let me!"
"Oh, she wouldn't "let" you? Methinks someone just wanted to take advantage of their big sister's hospitality and just play on their phone while she did all of the work burning down the apartment." Airen crossed her arms as Johnathan stood.
"That's not true. I offered to help, I even offered to do it for her when I saw that she was doing it wrong! But she wouldn't let me, so I just kept my mouth shut."
"Oh, like you could do any better?"
Johnathan stalked closer to Airen.
"Yeah, actually. I could."
"I think you would have just burned down the apartment faster."
"Wanna bet?"
"Prove it."
They had both been inching closer to each other to where they were now in one another's personal space. Each one looking the other over from head to toe.
"That what you wore in public today?" Johnathan sneered.
Airen uncrossed her arms to look down at her outfit. She wore a white t-shirt that was a bit too small for her. It hugged her every curve all the way to where it ended just above her belly button. Her low-rise, slim boot jeans sat perfectly on her hips and hugged her every lower curve just right until the knee. Then of course her worn black and white converse sneakers completed the simple but suggestive look when she had them on.
She wasn't shy, and she wouldn't pretend to be. No, her choice of outfit wasn't exactly standard for women of her particular body type, but she looked good. She knew and her boss at the modeling agency knew it too. In fact, just today he had had her do a shoot in that very outfit.
Airen did another once over of Johnathan. He was handsome, she'd give him that. Tall, muscular, tan…the boy had it all. Standing at 6'3 with black hair, the beginnings of the muscles of a Navy Seal, and the tan of a Hawaiian surfer the man defined tall dark, and handsome. His perfect white smile, not that he showed it much, and his deep, dark, intense ocean blue eyes didn't hurt.
Airen focused on his attire. She couldn't allow herself to get lost in his deep blue eyes.
'Sheesh, where'd that come from?' She thought.
He was wearing dark jeans with a light blue polo and black combat boots. The shirt did well to hug his upper body and the jeans fit him nicely. The boots gave him a sort of rugged look which only added to the outfit's appeal.
"You wear that to work? I must say, GCPD must be 'laxing up on their dress code."
"I changed before coming here," Johnathan grumbled. Airen opened her mouth to retort but Violet interrupted them.
"Stop it! Stop it both of you! My dinner is ruined, I have to start getting ready, Mason will be here in almost 2 hours….so would you both please just stop!" Violet had tears in her eyes as she stood amidst the mess she had created.
"Sorry Vie," Airen said quietly.
"Yeah, sorry," Johnathan added.
"What do you need? What can we do?" Airen asked.
"I-I don't know!" Violet said, desperation clear in her voice.
"I know, you go get ready. Johnathan can salvage your dinner and I'll clean the kitchen and make sure that the apartment is presentable for Mason." Airen walked over to Violet and patted her shoulder in order to try and comfort her.
Violet sniffed. "But he can't! He has to go get ready too!"
"Yes, I can Violet. I'm not going." Johnathan responded as if bored.
"What!?" Violet cried. "You have to go! It's mandatory!"
Johnathan shrugged. "I don't have a date." He said it matter-of-factly as if that explained everything.
"You still have to go." Violet insisted.
"What happened to your little girlfriend, gah! What was her name? Lilith?" Airen asked.
"Lila." Johnathan corrected.
"Yeah her! What happened to her? Can't she go with you?" Airen interrogated.
Johnathan glanced over at Violet. "We broke up."
"Why? She was perfect for you." Airen pressed.
'Perfectly annoying.' She kept that thought to herself.
"Things just….did not work out." Johnathan and Violet shared a look that was not lost on Airen.
"Ok…well then why don't you take someone else? You never have a problem with finding a date." Airen didn't pursue the matter of the look shared between siblings. She'd grill it out of one of them later on.
Johnathan rolled his eyes.
"There isn't enough time to find one now."
"Don't you have a little black book or something of rich socialite's numbers who live for this kind of thing? Call one of them."
Johnathan grinned to himself as he looked off in the distance as though remembering something. Airen frowned. Then he blinked and firmly shook his head.
"Not a good idea. They're all currently involved."
"You still have to go." Violet deadpanned.
"I am NOT facing that crowd without a date. Especially Mom and Dad." Johnathan protested.
"Ok well, what do you suggest?" Airen asked annoyed. Violet suddenly gasped.
"What?" Airen and Johnathan both asked at the same time.
"I know! Airen! Do you have any plans tonight?"
"No, but-"
"Great! Then, John, you take Airen as your date!"
"What!?" They both yelled in unison.
"It's perfect! John, you get a date to face Mom and Dad and the rest, and Airen it gets you out of the house!" Violet smiled broadly in excitement. She reminded Airen of a cat that ate a canary.
"But-!" Airen and Johnathan both began to protest at the same time.
"Nope! No "buts"! We're doing this! Now, Johnathan, you salvage my dinner then go home and get ready. Airen, you clean then get ready yourself. I'm going to get in the shower." With that Violet bounced off to the bathroom leaving Airen and Johnathan to stare open-mouthed, wide-eyed, and speechless after her.
