Taking It All

by J. J. Bella

  Chapters 1 - 3

  CHAPTER 1

  MARY

  Five years ago…

  Bong…bong…bong…

  The low chime of Big Ben sounding its resonant tones pulled me out of my reverie. I snapped alert and looked around me quickly, as though I'd just been abruptly woken up from a nap. And as I came back to my senses and realized that I was still in the charming little coffee shop on Camden High Street where I'd been studying for the last few hours, I wondered what had gotten into me.

  That's how you know you're an American in London, I thought, tucking my hair behind my ears and straightening my shoulders. You actually notice when Big Ben is ringing.

  I checked my phone and saw that, sure enough, it was noon on the dot. The sunny, cheery shop was beginning to fill with smartly dressed men and women coming in for their lunchtime caffeine fix, all of them looking so sharp and well put together that I was certain that they were all clients of Seville Row's best tailors. And looking down at my simple, fitted t-shirt and jeans –standard fare in America for a college student like me- I couldn't help but feel a little out of place.

  Maybe they're right when they say that Americans are slobbish, I thought, taking a sip of my now lukewarm coffee. Or am I just assuming they say that? I mean, the Brits have all been pretty nice to me so far.

  I'd been in London for two months already and I was still being paranoid about offending the denizens of my host city in some way. I shook my head as I flipped listlessly through one of my Political Science textbooks that I'd swore I'd study the hell out of today. But for some reason, I just couldn't motivate myself to do it.

  OK, Mary, focus, I thought, draining the half cup of coffee that I had left in my pink, ceramic mug and turning back to my texts with a newfound sense of determination. And for a few minutes, I managed it. I really did. But after the buzz from the coffee wore off the words on the page turned from dry text about government policy during the English Civil War to a blurry black mess. My eyes drifted to the street outside, and I couldn't help but wish I was out there enjoying this beautiful London afternoon, rather than stuck in a coffee shop cramming.

  You're the one who wanted to go to the London School of Economics so badly, I reminded myself as I heaved myself out of my chair and made my way, mug in hand, to the counter for a refill.

  And I did want to go badly.

  "You like a top-up?" the chipper, pretty blonde behind the counter asked.

  "Yes, please," I said.

  She took my mug and turning to fill it up, and I considered how even now, months into my year in London, I still felt like my accent was something to be vaguely ashamed of. I couldn't help but shake the idea that it marked me as some kind of boorish American, as silly as that sounds. Really, I knew that as much as I'd been chomping at the bit to come to London, the city I'd dreamed of living in since I was a little girl, the one I'd read about in those old Victorian novels since I was able to hold books upright, I was still going through some pretty severe culture shock. Not to mention the fact that I was thousands of miles away from everyone I knew back in Iowa City.

  But I knew going to a top school in a faraway city was going to be a challenge, one that I was still eager to take on, despite the difficulties. So, with a fresh cup of black coffee in hand, I plopped back down in my seat with a new sense of determination. This burst of energy afforded me about an hour more of solid studying before I realized that I wasn't going to be able to shove anything more about the Roundheads and Cavaliers in my head. Besides, I told myself, draining the last drops of coffee and gathering my things, it would be a crime to let a beautiful afternoon like this get away from me.

  My books back in my bag, I placed my cup on the counter and headed out. And right as I stepped out into the brisk autumn air, the sun beaming down on my face, I knew I'd made the right decision.

  There was nothing like living in London. I loved the energy, the people, the architecture- everything. Off in the distance, I could see the twirling, curved figure of Thirty St. Mary Axe, the building known by Londoners as the Gherkin, and decided to head in that direction. Once the green slopes of Regent's Park appeared in my peripheries, however, I decide the afternoon would be better spent there. Grabbing a sandwich on the way, I soon found myself at my destination. Taking a seat on a bench, the greens spreading out before me, I unwrapped my sandwich and raised it to my mouth for a bite. Before I could even get a taste, however, I felt the jarring buzz of my phone in my pocket.

  Slipping my phone out, I saw that it was a message from Anne, my roommate.

  -Big plans for tonight?

  I smiled and shook my head. A student at the University of the Arts, Anne was probably the closest thing to a best friend I'd made since coming here.

  -Not unless you count cramming as "big plans."

  I shoved down a bite of my sandwich and let myself settle in my seat. Anne was always trying to get me to go out to one party or another, but rarely did I bite. I knew I should've been making more of an effort to experience the nightlife of the city while I was here, but until this first semester was under my belt I didn't find myself making time for anything but studying. Anne, on the other hand, was the opposite. A pretty, popular girl with the sort of carefree attitude that only someone from a rich family could have, Anne was definitely more the "party now, study whenever" type.

  -Oh, so boring : ). I've got a lead on a great party tonight. You should come. Get out of that stuffy room of yours.

  Another smile forming on my face, I typed up my response.

  -I happen to like that stuffy little room of mine : )

  Moments later was the response.

  -Maybe if you go out you can find a charming young man to enjoy it with. Just a thought ; )

  Ouch, I thought with a grin. Right where it hurts.

  Anne never let me forget the fact that I'd been in the city for months and had yet to even kiss a guy. I'd sworn that I'd spend the night studying, but maybe she was right that I needed to get out of the flat once in a while. It was a Saturday night, after all.

  -I'll think about it.

  Moments later, the response.

  -Do more than think ;)

  With that, I slipped my phone back into my pocket and started the walk back to Bloomsbury, the bustling little ward where my shared flat was. After a time, I arrived back at my flat and found Anne on the couch, a glass of dark red wine on the coffee table in front of her as she sat with her iPad on her lap and the TV on mute. Her painting supplies were off to the side, and she looked up at me with her big green eyes as I entered, jumping to her feet.

  "There's the girl," she said in her posh, upper-class accent. "I do hope you'd have time to consider my little offer, my Mary-Mary-quite-contrary."

  Even standing there in her comfy clothes Anne was the picture of British beauty. Her face was trim and angular, her lips were red and full, her green eyes were like emeralds, and her jet-black hair was tucked behind her ears. Winding tattoos up and down her forearms made it clear that she wasn't your average upper-class girl, however, and marked her as the edgy artist that she was. It was no wonder that Anne never seemed to have any trouble finding cute boys to pass her days with, and sometimes I found myself wishing that her luck would rub off on me. In the meantime, however, I contented myself with the fact that her parents paid the majority of expenses for the apartment, and my contribution to the budget was low enough that I was able to live in a neighborhood like this that I otherwise wouldn't have been.

  "I don't know…" I said, dropping my bag, my eyes drifting to the beams of light coming in through the living room window. "I've just got so much studying to do."

  I plopped down in the armchair and rested my head on my hand.

  "Oh, please," said Anne, tromping out of the room and returning moments later. "You see these?"

  She tossed a printout of my mid-semester grades onto my lap.

  "Wha- are these my grades?" I asked. "Did you take these out of my room?"
<
br />   "Beside the point," said Anne, a wry smile on her lips. "But do you know what those grades tell me?"

  I picked up the folded sheet of paper and looked it over. My grades were nearly perfect. Nearly.

  "That I'm getting the grades that I need to in order to graduate with honors?"

  Anne scoffed and rolled her eyes.

  "No, darling, those grades mean that you've been working your little rear off for months and have earned a night out or two."

  Anne plopped back onto the couch and brought her wine glass to her lips.

  "I remember that first week you were here," she said. "You went on about how much you loved London, how you've dreamt of coming here since you were a little girl, and that now you're finally here all you can do is spend the hours with your nose buried in your texts."

  I felt my face grow hot with embarrassment.

  "Yeah, I know," I said, my voice weak.

  "Oh, don't be ashamed- London is the greatest city in the world; you're quite right to want to live here. However, to live here requires, well, actual living."

  "You're saying that I'm not living?" I asked.

  "You're putting yourself on the path to the year flying by with nothing to show for it other than teacher's pet grades and intimate knowledge of the inside of just about every coffee shop within a two-kilometer radius."

  "And what's so bad about that?" I asked. "Good grades are important."

  "Well, sure," said Anne, tilting her head to the side and conceding the point. "But let me ask you this: when you were a girl, fantasizing about Regent Street, didn't you imagine having a gorgeous, charming, well-dressed, sophisticated British man at your side? You know, showing the town, explaining all the finer points of this lovely city of ours in that accent that you Yanks all seem to love?"

  She'd gotten me there. I mean, I wasn't obsessed with finding a man, but the little scene that she’d described did sound pretty damn nice.

  "I mean, you're right, but Mike…"

  "Oh, Mike this, Mike that," said Anne, swiping her hand through the air and dismissing the name.

  Mike was the boy who I'd dated during my last year in high school. When we both went off to separate colleges, we decided that a long-distance relationship was something we both felt up for. And, for the first semester of freshman year, all seemed to be going well. The second semester, however, was a different story. His texts became more infrequent, and our Skype calls dwindled from nearly every day to once a week to once or twice a month. And when I finally did get him on, he couldn't be less interested.

  During the last month of the semester, I found out why. One of my friends from back home who'd gone off to UCLA with Mike sent me a few pictures of him at some bar where she'd spotted him. Of course, just like I'd been suspecting for the last few weeks, he was there with a girl on his lap, that curly hair of his wrapped around her finger. But just because I'd been suspecting it didn't make it any easier to accept.

  After a few wine-fueled angry texts on my part, my relationship with Mike was as done as it gets. I couldn't believe that he tried to convince me that the series of pictures of him with some skank, the final one being that of him with his tongue down the girl's throat, weren't what they looked like. I felt naive for trusting him, but I wasn't stupid. And just like that, it was over.

  The rest of the semester was the usual blur of studying and finals, and before I'd had a chance to relax, I got the news that I'd been accepted to the London School of Economics for the next year. The summer went by in yet another rush, and by the time I arrived here I'd realized that I'd managed to put the pain from Mike off, and now it was hitting me hard and deep.

  "I'm telling you," said Anne. "Getting involved that seriously with men at this stage at our lives is a mistake. We're young! We're supposed to be chasing boys and all that. We have the rest of our lives to settle down."

  I never really thought of myself as the boy-crazy type like Anne, but I knew there was some truth to what she was saying. I'd been putting off starting any sort of new relationship for too long, both out of fear of being hurt again, and fear of being viewed by any man that I might be interested in as some empty-headed Midwesterner.

  "But not everyone can get guys like you," I said, looking Anne's trim figure up and down. "I mean, you're hot, Anne."

  This statement resulted in the biggest eye-roll I'd seen yet from Anne.

  "Please, darling," she said. "You know you're beautiful, right? Here, stand up and let me have a look at you."

  I felt a hot flush of embarrassment come over me.

  "Come on now, don't be shy."

  Realizing that I wasn't going to get out of this, I rose from my seat. Anne placed her chin in the crook of her hand and walked around me carefully, like a collector inspecting a work of art.

  "Just like I thought- you're a babe, as you Yanks say."

  She reached over and ran her fingers through my hair.

  "Chestnut-colored hair, beautiful hazel eyes, a face like a damned model. No, that's not even right- models would kill for plump lips and a button nose like that."

  "Stop," I said, smiling and shaking my head.

  "And just look at this little bum," she said.

  Without a word of warning, she pulled her hand back and gave my rear a hard slap. I let out a yelp and started laughing.

  "If you're trying to seduce me, you're gonna have to do better than that," I said, remembering that not all of the partners that Anne had brought home were of the male persuasion.

  "Not my type," she said. "Too much of a goody-goody. I like my ladies with an edge."

  Her appraisal completed, she plopped back down on the couch.

  "It's official," she said. "You're bloody gorgeous. You come down to my school and there'd be boy after boy begging on his hands and knees to get you naked and paint a picture of you."

  "You're just being nice," I said.

  "Please," she said. "I'm a lot of things, but ‘nice' isn't one of them. And I've got the blubbering texts from boys begging to see me again to prove it."

  Anne was a strange girl, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel a little bit better.

  "So," I said, "what's this big thing you want to do tonight?"

  Anne flashed another wry smile before getting back up and leaving the room. She returned a few moments later with an empty glass of wine.

  "But it's too-"

  "Ah, ah, ah," she said, raising a finger as she poured me a tall glass of red wine. "Not another word."

  The wine poured, she pushed the glass across the coffee table towards me. The glass was full nearly to the brim, and the ruby-colored liquid looked like it just might splash over the rim.

  "Now, you're going to enjoy this delicious wine that my parents sent over from their villa in Burgundy, and I don't want to hear the slightest bit of protest about it."

  Truth be told, some wine did sound nice. I'd been studying since this morning and my brain felt like it was about to burst.

  "OK, you win," I said, taking the glass

  "I always win," she said with a wink.

  I took a sip of the wine, being careful not to spill any. It was tart and delicious.

  "Nice perk of having a family with their own villa," I said.

  "Don't I know it," she responded as she took another sip.

  "Anyway," she continued. "Some friends and I from school are going to a gallery opening tonight. Might be a little annoyingly posh for you, but there's good networking to be done. After that, however, we're going club-hopping. And I'm going to make it my personal mission that not one of my friends goes home without a tall slice of man on her arm. Got it?"

  "I hope you know what you're getting yourself into," I said, taking another sip of my wine.

  "Please," Anne said. "With a hottie like you, it'll be more a matter of keeping the riff-raff off that ass of yours. I don't want you going home with any old schoolboy; only a real man will do for a proper, fit babe like you."

  My face went hot again, and
I was sure it was as red as the wine. Anna then hopped off the couch and started towards her bedroom.

  "Here's what's going to happen- you and I are going to finish off this bottle of lovely wine, and then we're going to put on some show-off clothes, and then we're going to meet my friends. We're going to have a bloody good night, and I don't want to hear a word."

  I opened my mouth to speak, not even sure of what I was going to say.

  "Ah-ah-ah, what did I just say?" Anna said over her shoulder, wagging her finger as she walked away. "Now drink up- I have a feeling this is going to be a night to remember."

  ***

  I pulled the skin-tight skirt that Anna lent me further down my legs. I was showing off far more thigh than I normally did, and it made me a little uncomfortable. Not to mention the chill from the evening air was quite brisk,

  "Now, what are you doing there?" Anna asked as we walked down the busy Chelsea street towards the art gallery. "You know, the whole point of a short skirt is that, well, it's short."

  "I know," I said, trying to multitask between pulling down the skirt and walk in the heels that I'd dug out of the back of my closet. "But I don't normally wear stuff like this; it feels weird."

  "That ‘weird' feeling is called ‘looking hot as shit,' which you do, by the by."

  As we walked, I couldn't help but notice how Anna walked with such long, purposeful strides; it was like she owned the entire city. Men's eyes latched onto her body as we walked, and she seemed to be reveling in the attention. It was all I could to do struggle to keep up.

  "How do you not go crazy with all of these guys staring at you?" I asked.

  "I could ask you the same question," said Anna.

  "Wait, what are you talking about?" I asked, still struggling to keep up.

  "Please, are you playing coy, young lady?" she responded. "You're getting eye-fucked by the second."

  I didn't know whether to be flattered or offended.

  "You're…just saying that," I said.