Ch. 15 A Look Inside

Erica spends the night alone at Kent's house and cant help but rummage through old photos, she finds out more about him and also comes up with a plan for the Great Gatsby party later that night.

Chapter 16:

A Look Inside



Erica woke up feeling more refreshed than ever, but like a dork she curled up in Kent's covers, tangling herself up even more. His peppermint scent still remained strong on the pillow covers, she could feel it tingling in the pores of her face. God she wished she didn't have to go to work. The only thing that could have made the best-ever-nights sleep even better was if he was here, waking up next to her. Oh, and if she wasn't engaged to his best friend, just a minor detail.

Then again she was still in her serene spell of a flawless nights sleep. Or was it actually the spell of being carried upstairs, kissed, and taken care of by Kent? What would have happened if he hadn't got sick last night? It remained in her mind like an itch she couldn't scratch, and was beginning to feel more like a curse. A lovely curse.

She didn't want to let herself forget the harsh words Kent had said to her only a few days ago, but it was so much easier pretending only the sweet part of Kent Whitlock existed. Either way, she shouldn't have allowed him to become such a major part of her life, but somehow he had snuk his way in. Not like she hadn't gone part of the way too. What was it that kept bringing them together?, she wondered. Probably the fact that he was the only one who knew her real life, but by now he would have either told on her or forgotten all about it. Or maybe it was the fact that these bad things were happening to each of them, Kent with his meningitis, and Erica getting her arm carved with a knife last night. Either way they seemed to be there for eachother, despite whatever horrible things they'd say to eachother. Erica finally concluded that their odd up and down relationship was just a direct result of recent drama, that they were just friends. Oh yeah, very buddy buddy. Especially the way they might have slept together last night if it hadn't been for Kent's interupting coughing fit. That only further confirmed that she should stay with Marcus. Kent was just an infatuation, and an occasionally sweet guy that had cared enough to let her have a good nights rest last night, but it was back to real life now.

Erica finally forced herself out of the comfort of his bed, and wondered if it would be completely rude to take a shower before she left. She figured he wouldn't know the difference anyway, especially since he said he had no desire to go back there, and decided to go on a hunt for the bathroom. She exited the beautiful bedroom and walked down the endless hallway, becoming more and more distracted by the various paintings and sculptures. At the end of the hall, a room stood with the door partially cracked open, it seemed so far away.

Half aware that she walked right past the bathroom, she felt like she was being pulled to this paticular room, and for some reason she became anxious as she entered. Erica became blinded at the morning sunlight that flooded the room. Compared to the other rooms, this one was abnormally bright.

The walls were painted a light indigo, with a gorgeous antique framed mirror mounted on the wall. An assortment of handpainted plates were placed around the mirror, and a medium sized chandalier hung from the ceiling. A sun faded sofa sat lonely in the room, with a French mirrored dressing screen folded up next to it. Everything in the room appeared handmade, making Erica curious who the artist was. The colorful room was such a sore thumb in the black wallpapered and black marble floored home, it was like she'd stepped into a different house completely. A tall mahogoney shelf sat on the opposite side of the room filled with clutter of open books with flowers pressed inside the pages, magazines, faded photos of what looked like the beach outside, and many more feminine knick knacks, that Erica knew wern't Kents. This had been his mothers room, she realized.

An empty easel stood by the window sill, and she knew this had once been an art room of some type. Erica wondered when the last time someone stepped foot into this room? Had his mother just left all of her beautiful things here and disappeared? It looked that way, Erica looked down sadly.

On the bottom row of the shelf she noticed a brown leather binder with glossy pieces of paper sticking out of it every which way, seeing that it was a photo album. Erica bit her lip trying to ignore her urge to look through it, but she couldn't bring herself to leave the room. Snooping would be totally wrong, but she just had to see what was in this thing. She knelt down and tugged the photo album out of it's dusty spot, and slowly opened it.

Papers, and more pressed flowers spilled out, but her eye quickly caught one paticular photo of someone who looked quite familiar. There Kent was as a little boy, with his hand floating above his face, staring through the sun at the camera. His expression was of an adults, with only a slight twinkle of a child in his eye. He had to be around eight or nine years old, and was clad in his private school uniform, sitting on the ledge of a wall with his feet dangling over the edge. He was wearing the same exact Superman watch he'd given her not that long ago. Erica couldn't help but beam at the little adultlike boy, he was still exactly the same. She flipped through more pages containing his birth certificate, more old adorable childhood photos, and then stopped taken aback by a full page portrait of a woman, that read Cecilia Whitlock at the bottom, his mother.

She had long sleek black hair, the same color as Kent's, with a more feminine version of his astonishing face. Her eyes wern't quite as forest green as Kent's but very similar. Just from her headshot Erica could tell this woman carried herself high. The fade made the photo look almost like an old Renaissance painting from centuries ago, and she some form of royalty, the way her confidence exuded through the picture. Even though his mother was beautiful, it was unthinkable to Erica how she could just leave her son. No wonder he looked so serious in each photo, the kid looked like he never had a silly or carefree day in his life.

Unable to help herself now that she opened Pandora's box, Erica flipped through the rest of the photos and lingered on the ones with Kent and his father, Kent's expression looking forced and uncomfortable in every one. There didn't seem to be any birthday party photos or holiday photos, only school photos and some occasional piano recital ones which she found strange. Hopefully those were in another album, but this seemed to be the only family album.

Erica closed the thing shut, put it back, took one last look around the room and left. Walking past the hallway clock she realized she had lost track of time, and realized if she didn't leave now she'd be late for work. She would have loved to explore that house all day, and see into every realm of Kent Whitlock, but she realized she'd have to do that through him, even if he made it difficult.

Once she left and was on her way to her usual bus stop to work, she suddenly remembered that the 1920's Great Gatsby themed party was tonight, and she didn't have anything to wear. S**t, she cursed herself wondering where on earth she was going to find a dress last minute. She could wear the Chanel dress Kent got her, but she'd been wearing it so much lately, and she needed something new to wear around Marcus. As much as she knew she could easily steal from any place she wanted, she remembered the promise she made to Kent about ceasing her kleptomania, plus she was getting paid today, but certainly not enough to afford the type of glamourous dresses that would probably be worn at that party.

She sank down on the bus stop bench and racked her mind for clothing options. It was too bad she wasn't a sweet pure little princess, otherwise her fairy Godmother could have created an amazing dress for her. Then, through her wistfulness she remembered a cute little store a few blocks away from her work that she knew carried well priced vintage clothing. Sure, vintage stores usually carried dusty yellowed crap that simply needed to be recycled, but she knew from experience that there could be some real gems amongst all of it. See, she told herself, she didn't need a damn fairy Godmother by her side, she could do things herself, that's what she'd been doing her whole life anyway right? Now convincing herself she didn't need a prince, well that was another story.

Reviews

[emmajoy]

This has the makings of a wonderful post, but, I think it rambles sometimes. Your main character grows as you write whereas Kent is quite vague which is strange considering he's the object of her desire.

I like the touches about the rooms, her feelings and insights into them.. you have a very natural way of writing so the focus turns from this to that.

I plan to read more because you've drawn me into your words..

[Bud]

You keep me yearning for more! The imagery is Excellent. I think this is a Great story. Keep on writing!