Of all the places that Natalie planned to visit while she was in France, a nightclub named Tulle wasn’t on her list for her second night. After an exhausting trip to Versailles with Mick and Samantha, she spent most of last night exploring her neighbourhood in foot, stopping here and there at little clothing shops (all horrendously expensive), and then collapsed into bed by seven with her cafeteria dinner scattered around her.
She was awoken the following morning by Mick and Samantha pounding on her door and calling her name.
“What?” she’d asked groggily, standing in the crack of the door, wearing the same clothes as the previous day, her hair a disaster.
“We’ve got gift certificates for a spa day at The Grand Milestone Hotel!” Samantha had held up an envelope, but Natalie was too out of it to pay much attention. “Want to come with? There are spare coupons!”
Normally she found obnoxiously perky morning people to be the worst of all humanity, but Samantha had such an infectious quality to her personality, and before she knew it, Natalie was wasting the day away at a high-class spa. Pampered from head to toe, she decided that she desperately needed a day like this, and could put off her sightseeing until tomorrow for the sake of luxury.
Funnily enough, doing nothing all day wiped her out, and after a nap that was supposed to be one hour turned into four, she found herself wandering the hostel for dinner, only to get dragged out by her new Australian cohorts. Dinner was at a seafood place around the corner, and after a bottle of wine was split between the trio, they wandered off to Tulle, and that was where she had been for almost two hours. Midnight approached, and yet she wasn’t constantly checking the time, wondering when they would go home.
Mick and Samantha were incredibly inclusive as a couple, and never once made her feel like she was intruding on their time together, nor did she feel like the awkward third wheel. It was a new experience—to be wanted—and she definitely liked it. This was how it was supposed to feel, wasn’t it? This was how real-world friendships functioned: they weren’t all competitions and heartbreak and drama. Some people could just genuinely be a good time, and as Natalie accepted a large shot glass from Mick, she decided these were the sorts of people she ought to have more of in her life.
“You gotta take it all in one go!” he shouted over the pounding beat, a rhythm she could feel in her bones. “No half-shots!”
“All right, all right, I’m doing it,” she snapped, raising her glass and clinking it with Mick and Samantha’s. “To Paris!”
Mick frowned and leaned forward, nearly knocking his head against hers. “What?”
“To Paris!” she shouted, and he stumbled back, nodding with a drunken grin on his face. Samantha added something, but it was too difficult to hear, and Natalie downed her shot quickly. Undertones of cinnamon tickled her tongue, burning her throat on the way down, and she coughed into her hand as she set the glass down on the nearby countertop.
Samantha grabbed her arm and lurched toward the crowded center of the hall. “Let’s dance!”
Tulle seemed like a popular club with the under thirties crowd, and it was full long before midnight. Everywhere she went, Natalie was walking into people, being shoved into by groups of girls in stilettos, and losing her Australians fleetingly when a crowd got between them. Still, the music was a decent mix of pop remixes that were fun to bounce around to, and the underground hall was enormous. There were a number of bars scattered around the dance floor, and Natalie had spied several corridors shooting off from the main area when they arrived, and the drunker she got, the more she wanted to explore.
On top of all that, there were gorgeous French men as far as the eye could see. She wasn’t sure if she had the confidence to pursue any of the winks thrown her way, but maybe with a few more cinnamon shooters in her, she’d be ready to respond to the flirtatious words whispered to her as she pushed through the crowd.
At first, Natalie had been worried that she wouldn’t look the part of a club-goer. After all, fitted dark jeans and a low-cut (but not quite scandalous) black t-shirt was her go-to attire for dinners, and paired with a set of red heels, she thought she was too fancy. However, Samantha outshone her in multi-coloured body-con style dress, tight in every sense of the word, and even Mick had a grey dinner jacket thrown over his navy jeans. Dinner was a decadent seafood affair, yes, but Natalie thought she’d stick out like a sore thumb if she stayed in the same outfit at Tulle.
But no one seemed to care. Unlike the bars in Cooliage, there was no set dress code, and she saw everything from track pants to sequin mini-dresses. Her barely-there make-up preferences went well with the French style: no one looked like they were wearing any foundation or lipstick or anything, and yet they were all gorgeous.
Squished between Samantha and a couple grinding aggressively behind her, Natalie threw her hands up and swayed to the music. It was hard to believe just a week ago she was moping around in her bedroom, staring at Mark’s Facebook and twitter feed. Now look at her—alone and yet not alone, having the time of her life.
She flinched when something rumbled against her leg, and her eyes darted suspiciously to the newly arrived cluster of men to her right. Popped collars, white sneakers, and invasive smelling cologne, they seemed like the usual butt-pinching suspects, but when the vibration came again, she blushed upon realizing it was only her phone. If she were in Cooliage, she would have ignored it, but her mom had been sending her panicky texts ever since she arrived, constantly asking about Natalie’s well-being.
Now she cared, apparently. When Natalie was heartbroken in her room the woman was nowhere to be found, except in front of the TV. Still, she didn’t have it in her to make her mom worry needlessly, and after the third text arrived, she slipped away from Samantha to a quieter spot on the dance floor, then pulled out her phone.
Mark’s name flashed across the screen in obnoxiously fat letters. Her heart hammered in her chest, her breath hitching in her throat. Mark. Mark who couldn’t be bothered with her when she was in Cooliage. Mark who sent her three mammoth-sized texts about how much he missed her, how much he regretted ending things the way they did. Now that exams were over, he wrote, he could see that he was being unreasonable and stupid with their relationship—and he wanted to go back to the way things were.
Natalie reread each text a few times, eyes brimming with tears. If she had gotten a barrage of messages like this two weeks ago, she would have been in the car and on the road, running red lights just to get to his door. But now she was in Paris, and there was a whole continent to explore—and it made Mark and her problems with him seem so small.
No more men for a while. As she wiped under her nose and chuckled weakly, she decided they were nothing but trouble. They’d whisper sweet nothings to her in a club, then leave her the next morning. They’d date her for four years, then drop her for good grades and career prospects. When she was ready again, she’d go for a guy like a Mick: not the most gorgeous guy in the room, but so obviously devoted to the woman in his life. She’d find a man who could appreciate her, not text her when he got lonely—and probably horny.
“Nat?” Mick voice broke just before the bass dropped, in the calm before the storm, and she looked up with tears in her eyes. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine—”
He grabbed her by the arm and dragged her off the dance floor, Samantha in tow, and pushed her gently into an abandoned booth. Natalie gathered the empty cups to one side of the table, peering around for their owners.
“What’s wrong, doll?” Samantha asked, her hand on Natalie’s back. She shook her head.
“It’s nothing.”
“Obviously not…” Mick slid onto the black leather bench across from her, hands drumming the tabletop.
She sighed. They’d only known her for two days, and she didn’t really want to unload all her home drama onto them this early. Still, with Samantha blocking her in on one side, and Mick staring her down from the other, it didn’t seem like she was going anywhere
anytime soon.
She pressed her lips together, fiddling with her phone for a few moments, and then finally said, “I… My ex just texted me.”
“That bastard!”
“Mick,” Samantha warned, eyes narrowing at him. They seemed to have a silent conversation between themselves, and then Mick went back to tapping his hands on the table as Samantha turned her full attention to Natalie. “What’d he say?”
“Oh, you know, the usual,” she said with a sniffle. “He wants to give us another try, even though he dumped me because, apparently, my life was too distracting around exam time.”
Samantha’s eyebrows shot up, raising her hairline with them. “You can’t be serious…”
She nodded. “Unfortunately, yes.”
“What a jerk!”
“Like I said,” Mick added, “total bastard.”
“Are you going to reply?”
Natalie glanced down at the messages, then scrolled through them slowly again. “I don’t know.”
“I wouldn’t. He doesn’t deserve it.”
This was what she had needed when Mark initially dumped her. She needed more “He’s a jerk!” and less “I told you so!” from her supposed best friends, the ones she had known for years and years. She’d known Samantha for two days, and already the woman was a better support system than anyone else had been. Well, she said what Natalie wanted to hear, anyway.
“Yeah, he… he doesn’t deserve it.” She took a deep breath, shaking her head. “He was such a terrible boyfriend near the end, but I was just so comfortable that I didn’t see it. I used to do his laundry…”
Samantha giggled a little, eyes wide again. “What?!”
“Yup!” Her head fell into her hands, and she let out a long, slow exhale. When she straightened up, she felt better, like she was talking about something that happened a lifetime ago—something that wasn’t important. “His mom stopped doing it, so I actually drove to his place, picked his hamper up, and washed his stuff with mine… All because he suggested it once.”
“Natalie… Don’t ever do that again.”
“Oh, trust me, I don’t intend to,” she assured her. “I just… I thought he was the one for me. We’d been together since high school, and I was happy… most of the time.”
“You should have happy all the time.” Mick sidled out of the booth as Samantha spoke, and Natalie watched him shoot his wife a smile. “The person you choose will choose you too. Don’t waste any more time on a guy who is second-guessing everything.”
A small smile crept across her lips, and Samantha threw an arm around her shoulders.
“Why are you so nice to me?” The question slipped out before she could stop it, and she heard Samantha giggle again.
“Because you seem like a nice person, and we like to associate with nice people,” she replied, slurring her words a little. “You’re sweet and fun and kind, and Mick and I like to meet new people. You’re our new person, and we’ll make you forget all about ol’ what’s his name.”
“Mark.” The name felt dirty in her mouth when she said it aloud, and she cleared her throat, nodding as she tucked her phone back into her pocket. “Thank you.”
“Here we go! Here we go!” Mick deposited a tray of different coloured shot glasses in front of her, and then slide back into the booth. “Best way to forget a lost love is to drink.”
Normally she hated that attitude: she saw too much of it at school. Tonight felt different, however, and Natalie grabbed a pink shot without hesitation, downing it and puckering as the bitter liquid coursed down her throat. Pink was followed by purple, then green and blue, beige, yellow, and black… A strange rainbow of shots pressed to her lips, and she downed each one of them, matching Mick and Samantha drink for drink. When that tray was done and her head was spinning, Mick had a waitress bring by another one, and the whole thing started all over again: shot after shot after shot, Natalie slipped into drunken oblivion.
At one point, while Mick and Samantha tried (and failed, repeatedly) to build various pyramids and towers with the empty shot glasses, Natalie yanked her phone out of her pocket and pulled up Mark’s messages. The letters blurred together now, and she read the same sentence three times before realizing she was doing it, but the gist of his words were etched into her brain, belligerently drunk or not. So, she tapped the reply space, and carefully typed the three words she thought he deserved.
Go to Hell.
She had both Samantha and Mick proofread it for drunk-text errors, and then pressed the send button. Once it was gone, she was free. Free to laugh, to smile, to drink. The Mark cloud had hung over her for so long, and now with three little words, that chapter was closed.
Shots, shooters, pints—whatever she could get her lips on, Natalie tossed back. It wasn’t until she realized she was drinking with a group of complete strangers at one of the various bars that she noticed Mick and Samantha were gone.
“No… ‘scuse me,” she stammered, pushing away from the woman laughing noisily in her face. “Hafta find… Micky… Sammy…”
Although a little wobbly in her heels, she managed to find the exit and stumble out, envisioning Mick and Samantha waiting for her on the curb. When they weren’t they, she figured they’d left for the night, and staggered away from the bar clutching her purse. It was hard to focus on anything in particular: street signs blurred, cobblestones caught her heels, and people skirted around her when she tried to slur her way through a question—namely, where was her hostel.
Bed. That’s what she wanted. Maybe some pizza, but definitely bed.
“Rue, rue, rue,” she sang to herself, squinting at a street sign hanging from a lamppost. A cab driver laid on the horn when she skipped in front of his car, and Natalie stumbled to the side, hands over her ears.
“C’est bruiyant, hein?”
Eyebrows furrowed, she searched out the source of the voice in the shadowy street, and when they eventually landed on a man leaning on a small blue car, she cocked her head to the side.
“What?”
He stubbed out his cigarette on the hood and pushed himself up, hands going to his pockets. “Ahh, American?”
Natalie’s heel gave out, her ankle lurching sideways. When she had righted herself, the stranger was much closer than he was before.
“Steady,” he rumbled, his hand clamping down on her forearm. “Let me help you.”
She shook her head, the sober self-reliant part of her pushing through the drunken clouds. “No, ‘m fine.”
“Nonsense.” Before she could stop him, he started moving her steadily along the sidewalk. They walked right by regular people, people unaware that something was amiss with the couple. “We can go somewhere for you to sit down.”
“I can g-go alone.” Palms sweaty and ankles twisting in her heels, she tried to pull herself loose, but he wouldn’t let go. “Can you let go of me?”
He grinned at her, the expression more of a leer than anything, and then shrugged. “I’m sure I can.”
With clothes and breath reeking of cigarette smoke, his grip tightening on her arm, this guy was officially her least favourite person in France. Natalie tried to twist out of his grasp again, and then squealed when he hauled her into a dark alley between two buildings, both of which appeared abandoned for the evening. When she felt the backs of her arms pressed against smooth concrete, her stomach knotted—she wanted to throw up. In fact, she hoped she’d throw up. With all those shots ruminating around in her stomach, there was bound to be some drunken puking in store—and now would be an opportune time.
He took hold of her hips and spun her around, pressing her face into the building, hips thrust against hers. Something sharp grazed her skin where her shirt lifted. She froze, panic making her numb.
“No screaming, huh?” He breathed the words against her ear as he smoothed her hair out of the way. Natalie nodded, unable to do anything else, and squeezed her eyes shut when she felt his hand wander down to her hip.
He was so he
avy against her, hot air puffing against her neck, and her lip wobbled when he yanked her purse off and tossed it onto the ground. So heavy, so much weight for such a thin guy—and then it was gone. One moment she was suffocating, the next she had never breathed so easily. Her attacker grunted when he hit the ground, and Natalie whirled around to find another man had come to her rescue. Knees weak, she slid down to the ground, drawing them close to her body and whimpering. A white plastic knife, the kind you might get from a take-out restaurant, fell from her attacker’s hand. He scrambled away with a small cry, fleeing into the dark alley without another threat.
“Oh my god…” Natalie buried her face in her hands, head spinning and nausea building.
“Are you okay?” She felt a presence in front of her (a British presence at that, judging by his suave accent), but she couldn’t stand to open her eyes just yet. “Miss? Did he hurt you?”
She exhaled, long and slow, and finally glanced up shyly. There he was—her rescuer—and he was probably the most handsome man she had ever seen. Dressed in a pair of light slacks, belted with brown leather, and a light green button-up dress shirt (sleeves rolled to the elbows), he looked like he was on his way to a semi-formal dinner. A thick watch sat on his wrist, and his shoes were perfectly polished. Chestnut brown hair, visible in the light trickling in from the nearest streetlight, made his bright green eyes come to life before her, and she tried not to gawk at his strong jaw, kissable lips, or prominent (but not horribly so) cheekbones.
London Calling Page 3
