14

You know I know how

To make em stop and stare as I zone out

The club can't even handle me right now.

Club Can't Handle Me

Flo Rida

Z

The breeze curled around me as I sat peacefully in the sand with the water washing over my outstretched legs. I was warm, and pleasantly comfortable in the hot, bright sunshine.

A loud bang interrupted my sunbathing and I blinked in confusion, only to find myself face first in my pillow and wrapped in a comforter. I groaned as I sat up. I shivered as the cold air of my apartment made contact with my bare arms as I rubbed my eyes. Another loud bang came from outside my bedroom followed by the clank of my lock sliding into place.

Please be Neela. I grumbled in my head as I threw the blanket off my legs, letting in the cold air. I briefly thought I should be more concerned about who was barging into my apartment, but I quickly decided they couldn't be that bad since they bothered to lock the door back.

Unwilling to let my feet touch the cold floor, I jumped out of bed and tried to land on the shirt I had tossed off before falling face first on my bed. I lost my balance a little, but I managed to get it back. I drug my feet to get myself closer to the door, only to have it snap open and almost collide with me.

I gave a disgruntled grunt as Neela stepped through the door with a pout and slammed it behind her. Her pout deepened to a full on frown when she was me sleepily glaring at her in my underwear and undershirt. I raised my eyebrows to dare her to comment on my current state and she started to giggle.

"I take it you had a rough night, Ellie?" She asked as she nudged the jeans I threw off the night before with her toe.

"I got back at ten thirty this morning. I just crawled into bed as-is and haven't moved since." I answered with my voice deep with sleep. At least I was enjoying my first nightmare free sleep in a long time. I couldn't complain about that.

"Yeah, being out all night like that has got to be tough." She said pensively.

"Yeah, it's a pain in the ass." I answered bluntly as she took a seat on my bed. "Why are you here?" She looked down guiltily. "That came out a lot more bluntly than I meant for it to." I amended. "I'm happy to see you, but you usually don't come by without a reason."

"It's Takashi." She sighed. I nodded. I really hated him. "He's just not the man he used to be."

"He's the boss's nephew; he's expected to be womanizing asshole just like the rest of them. Although, his temper is a lot worse than some of those boys." I added as an afterthought.

"It's not getting any better." She admitted. "How are things with you?" She asked to change the subject.

"Well, I'm thousands of miles from home, alone, with a grand total of four friends, running drugs for the Yakuza." I deadpanned sardonically.

"Guess neither of us is very well off." She commented dryly. I hummed in agreement as I picked up my jeans and pulled them on. "Though you seem to be a lot happier lately." She slid the comment in with an attempt at a smile.

"If you came here, you're obviously upset." I told her quietly as I leaned on my door frame. I completely ignored her attempt at changing the subject. Neela would twist everything back on me so she could avoid talking about Takashi, and I wasn't going to let her tonight.

"I don't want to talk about it." She answered quickly. "I just want to forget about Takashi: I don't want to see his friends, I don't want to get asked a million questions about our relationship, and I definitely don't want to see hear about how perfect we are for each other and how we're going to get married one day." She said in frustration.

"Let's go out." I answered automatically. Neela stared at me like I needed to be committed.

I really sucked at comforting people like this. Obviously, Neela really needed someone besides her school friends at the moment; they could never understand the people she was involved with. Unfortunately I knew too much about the lifestyle Takashi would one day be living if his uncle ever let him graduate from collecting money in his store room. I couldn't make myself lie and say that one day it was all going to get better.

"It'd be a good distraction." I added when she didn't respond.

"You hate going clubbing." She reminded with a sigh.

"Neela, after that last run, I'm going to have a few days off. Without someone to hang out with, I'm just going to spend them passed out asleep." I answered as I gestured to the messed up bed she was currently sitting on.

"I just kind of assumed you'd be spending it in bed with someone else." She tried another attempt at humor.

"You don't know that I've ever been in bed with someone else." She gave me a pointed knowing look. "You don't."

"Oh please, that watch wasn't the only thing he unwrapped." She replied saucily.

Without waiting for me to answer, she stood up and crossed the room to my closet. She pushed my clothes to the side and started looking through her section of race clothes she kept for when she got ready at my place. She flipped through her clothes before she pulled out a pale green dress. She held it up for my approval, but I was too busy struggling to keep the blush out of my face to reply.

"I like it." I answered honestly after I managed to slightly control my embarrassment.

"I've got a blue one that would look good on you." She replied as she tossed the one in her hand on the bed and started looking again.

"No need." I replied with a grin. Her eyebrow raised; I usually didn't buy any dresses unless I had to.

I walked over to my closet and pulled out an extremely low cut dark purple halter dress. I held it up with a grin as I watched the shock spread across her face.

"Wow, I wasn't expecting that; I thought I was going to have to drag the too big, grease stained jeans off of you." She replied as she reached out to touch the fabric.

"Nope. I had to go shopping the other day because all my shirts were ripped or covered in oil and I made myself buy some race outfits and a few other dresses." I replied proudly. She smiled and shook her head.

"I'll do your make up and hair if you want." She offered.

"I thought you'd never ask. I don't want to close my ear in the curling iron like last time." I replied jokingly.

"I'll try to avoid that, then." She joked as walked away to find my curling iron.

Z

The music was pounding so loud I couldn't hear myself think, but that was kind of the point of the place. The techno wasn't what I was used to, but I danced to it all the same.

I had lost Neela somewhere on the dance floor after we had a few drinks at the bar. I was pretty sure she went to get us another one. She was giggling a hell of a lot more than she usually was when she left me, so I was guessing she was drunk at that point. I had just as much to drink as she did, but I didn't feel like I was as far gone as she was.

I was having fun; the only things that matter were the beat of the music and keeping the sleazy guy in the black shirt from dancing on me. I didn't have a job or a boss that rivaled Meryl Streep's character in The Devil Wear's Prada on harassing employees with phone calls to come to work. Neela's asshole boyfriend might as well have fallen off the face of the earth as far as I was concerned.

I was completely absorbed with moving my hips to music, when someone put their hands on my waist. I turned to slap them away before I realized I recognized the guy that had me.

"Hey, Han." Without thinking, I rocked up on my toes to give him a hello kiss. He leaned down to meet me half way, and almost the second his lips touched mine, I tried to deepen the kiss. He let me kiss him for a minute before he pulled back with a smirk.

"Wasn't expecting to see you here." He yelled in my ear so I could hear him over the music.

"Neela needed to get out, so I agreed to go here." I yelled back loudly as I started to sway to the music again. "I thought you'd be partying at home."

"It gets old." He replied. I nodded and tried to get back to dancing, but he kept his hands on my hips, tugging them too close for me to be able to move the way I wanted.

"Han, let me dance." I whined. His smirk grew even wider.

"Thought you didn't dance." He answered in amusement.

"I would if you'd freaking let go off me!" I snapped as I pushed at his wrists. He held firm to my waist. I sighed as I gave up. "Fine, if you won't let go, at least dance with me." I huffed.

As we danced, I started to notice we were drawing a few stares from the girls around us. I wasn't dancing any worse than the drunk girls around me, so I didn't think that was it. I noticed a few trying to whisper to each other. I glanced back up to Han to see him staring at me.

"What are they looking at?" I whispered hoping he could read lips.

"Your dress is almost cut to your belly button." He responded in my ear.

"Yeah, but their's are lower." I said back. He turned my head so I could see the guy in the black shirt and one of his friends glancing our way. I gestured with my head towards the girls.

He just smirked and pulled me closer. The girls quickly forgotten, I rocked up on my toes to reach his lips and he met me halfway again. We stayed like that until we had to break apart for air. I lost my balance and stumbled forward into his chest.

"Are you drunk?" He asked in amusement.

"No, Neela is." I responded a little more whiny than I meant to.

"Come on." He said as he wrapped his arm around my shoulders and tried to pull me off the dance floor. "Let's go find her."

"No." I pulled his arm over my head. "We both came here to dance and be distracted from some stuff. She's getting a drink and she will be right back."

I left him standing there as I walked back to where I was before.

I knew I lost my chance of going back to making out with him as we danced; he'd go find a drunk model. Han wasn't really the type to look after drunk high school age girls. Well, semi drunk.

I moved wrong and almost fell off my heels.

Okay, I'm drunk, damn it.

A pair of masculine arms wrapped around my waist from behind to steady me as I moved. I leaned my head back against their owner's strong chest to see who it was. Han was smirking down at me. I twisted in his arms and wrapped my arms around him.

"You came back." I sad much too happily.

"I couldn't leave you out here in that dress, now could I?" He asked as his eyes flicked down to my exposed cleavage.

"No, creepy Japanese businessmen keep trying to buy me drinks." I said before I could stop myself.

"I'll just have to keep them off." He replied flirtily before leaned back down to capture my lips in kiss again.

It was perfect. Until a drunk Neela stumbled back with two drinks and a whole lot of questions about our sex life.