Chapter 20: Your Personal Cheerleader

< Shirley >
Currently, I and my friends were at our hotel suite, arguing over whether we should go out or not.
Last night, after Dylan's driver dropped back at the hospital, I entered to find Ryan's parents were present there, so they told me to go back to the hotel. As Ryan now had someone to take care of him, we decided to go back to New York since our jobs were pending. Not my work, however.
But as awesome as our luck was, there were no flights till tomorrow, that's why we were staying for the day. Therefore, my friends decided not to waste the precious off-day and planned a whole itinerary, for which I wasn't in a mood.
"Dummy, we are doing this to get rid of the mourning environment. Plus, Ryan's parents told us to have fun," Grace explained, trying not to let her anger out.
"But I'm not in a mood," I whined.
"So do you want to sit at a corner of the hotel and sulk the whole day? Dude, it's not every day we have nothing on the schedule. God gave us an opportunity to enjoy. Why not grab it and explore Manitoba?" Violet pointed out, resting her palm on her hip.
"I don't wan—" Just then something clicked in my head.
"I have to participate in a race tomorrow." Dylan's words rang in my head. Now that was a golden opportunity to gain some experience.
"I will go. But I have one condition." A creepy grin took over my face, making my friends take a few steps back.
"Now that's weird," Violet muttered, shrinking away from me, just in case I put out some weird, kinky condition.
"We'll go to see a car race!" I squealed. I never witnessed Dylan's race live. I had all of his racing videos memorized like the back of my palm, but I was sure it would give me a different sort of thrill to watch it from close. I could feel my adrenaline rushing at the thought of the car race I was about to see.
"Is that it?" They all gave me a flat look. I nodded vigorously, letting my messy hair fly all over. "Okay," they replied in boredom.
"Yay!" I jumped up in the excitement and started doing my victory dance, whereas my best friends started laughing at me.
As they all went away to change, I took my phone from the nightstand and booked the arena tickets. After that, I pressed the phone against my right ear after dialing a number and waited for the person to pick up.
"Hey, what's up, potato?" Adrian chirped.
"Nothing much, spinach," I replied.
"Why are you calling me 'spinach'?" he inquired in a grumpy tone. I could imagine him giving me a poker face.
"That's the first name that came to my mind." I laughed, hearing him sigh in irritation. "I will be coming back," I informed him, rummaging through the wardrobe to pick an outfit.
"Why don't you stay there a few more days? You have nothing to do here, anyway. You will just waste family property by feasting here." Adrian taunted, and I rolled my eyes.
"By the way, how are Mom and Dad?" I haven't been able to call them since I got here, so I was sure they were getting paranoid by now.
Right after talking to Adrian for a while, I called Mom, which helped me feel lighter. I told her everything about Ryan, excluding the stalker part. She warned me to be extra careful.
While on the call with her, I changed into a black crop top and black jeans along with black leather boots. I put on a black leather jacket as if I was the one who's going to participate in the race. But who cared as long as I liked the outfit?
I put my hair in a high ponytail and walked out of my hotel suite, making my way to the ground floor where my friends were waiting not-so-patiently.
Before they could start scolding me, I started pushing them outside. "Let's hurry."
"Hold your horses, buddy," Grace hissed and stopped on her track, right in front of the exit door. She put her hand on her hip and asked, "What's the hurry about?"
"We are going to miss it," I responded.
"No, we won't. It starts at three in the afternoon. It's only eleven right now. We have plenty of time." I pouted as Violet kept speaking, "We are going to explore around and have a big lunch. Then we will go to your race arena, and don't forget we have more plans after that," Violet finished.
I exasperated a sigh, letting my shoulders slouch in depression, and mumbled a small 'okay'.
The time went by very slowly before I finally reached the racing arena.
I scanned the surroundings with my curious eyes. It was getting crowded with each passing second. Hollering of the vendors, gossiping of teenagers, and excitement of the mundane people were oozing off the place.
I rushed inside the racing arena, not bothering to bring my friends along. I noticed that I wasn't the only one who was dressed in my outfit. I climbed to the top of the arena and stared at the humongous racing tracks with my jaw dropped open.
Suddenly I heard some commotion, which made me turn my head to find the stars of the car race, as in the participants, were here. A smile crept up on my face when I spotted Dylan among the crowd. He had an annoyed look plastered on his face like always; like he couldn't wait to get out of there. I was going to rush down again, but someone caught my wrist.
"We have to reserve our seats," Eric instructed me and pulled me along with him. My other friends were behind him, shooting daggers at me through their eyes. I flashed them a sheepish smile and followed them obediently.
By the time we reached our seats, the commotion quieted down. As Richard and Eric were looking away, I sneakily slipped off their grips and started wandering around, trying to find some of the entrances to the participants' room to meet Dylan.
Why are you going to him to get yourself thrown out by the collar? my inner voice questioned, and I smirked.
There was no way that I wouldn't annoy Dylan when I came all the way here.
Finally, I found a door that was guarded by two guards, which meant it belonged to the participants. As I was about to approach, one of the guards blocked my way.
"Where do you think you are going?" He asked.
"Inside," I replied and took out my checkbook, making their eyes almost pop out of their sockets at the amount of money I wrote and handed them. This time, they moved away and bowed their heads to welcome me. I knew this world's way too well.
As I walked in, I realized it was a waiting room. I was looking around when a disembodied voice questioned, "Hey, are you a participant?"
"No," I replied and came face to face with a blonde in his mid-twenties, whom I recognized to be Aiden Maxwell. I scrunched up my nose in disgust. I personally didn't like his personality since he had a very backward mentality about women.
"Then what is a pretty lady like you doing here?" Aiden asked and eyed me top to bottom, which made me feel uncomfortable.
I was about to answer but was cut off by a very familiar voice.
"She's not bound to answer you, Maxwell," Dylan spoke up and stood in front of me protectively, hiding me from Aiden's view.
"An acquaintance of yours, Lewiston?" Aiden raised an eyebrow in amusement.
"I don't see why that is your business," Dylan retorted, and Aiden scoffed. "Why don't you try putting your heart and soul in car racing, instead of chasing women?"
Aiden scowled at Dylan and challenged, "Oh, you just wait. I'm going to win this time."
"Sure, all the best. However, just so you know, I don't think of you as a threat at all," Dylan countered, and Aiden clenched his jaw as it seemed to have hurt his ego. But I was well aware that Dylan was only provoking Aiden. As a racer, Aiden definitely was a threat to Dylan, considering he always came in second after him.
"You will be licking your words when I beat you," Aiden hissed and stormed away in anger.
I heaved a sigh in relief, now that the strong competitive atmosphere had disappeared. Just then Dylan turned around and glared at me, making me quiver in my shoes.
"Care to explain what you are doing here, Ms. Disaster? You don't think you can participate, do you?" he rebuked.
I swallowed and let out with a nervous smile, "I came to wish you luck."
"You mean, bad luck?" he cut in.
"No, very good luck," I exaggerated, raising my nose to a perfect ninety-degree. "You should know, I'm everyone's good luck charm." Even though the last part wasn't entirely true, my dad told me I was his good luck charm, and that's all that mattered to me.
"Certainly not mine. Why do I get a feeling I am going to die today?" Dylan murmured to himself in disbelief, and I shot him a glare. He never really got tired of demeaning me.
I was not unlucky. Everyone should know that.
"Anyways, why did you come here?" Dylan questioned again and leaned against the wall.
I put on a coy smile and raised my arms, saying, "Didn't you know I'm the lead cheerleader?"
"Really now?" He pretended as though he actually believed me with that annoying sarcastic smile.
"Yes, I'm your personal cheerleader." I took a step closer to him, giving him a seductive look with my eyes batting and lips parted.
For a moment, his eyes lingered on my lips before gulping and taking a step back. I was about to touch his side of his face with my finger when he turned away from me. "G-go and wave around your invisible pompom then."
"Geez, why are you always in a hurry to leave?" I let out, resulting in him frowning, killing the previous sensual atmosphere.
Dylan huffed. "What are you really doing here? I'm sure, you didn't come here only to annoy the hell out of me." If only he knew that was the real reason, he would find out sixty-nine ways to murder me. "How did you even get in?"
"I'm not bound to answer you." I decided to keep my mouth shut by rephrasing what he said to Aiden earlier. However, when I looked at Dylan...only if looks could kill, I would probably be long dead by now. I gulped and answered, "Simple. I bribed them."
"Damn rich brat," he muttered under his breath.
I gritted my teeth as I always hated when someone called me that, even though it was true. Dylan was gonna pay for it. He—
"Get out of the way." Dylan was about to walk past me when he stopped and said, "Oh, since you are here already, you should try learning something. Observe and learn how difficult it is. Then rethink if you still want to become a car racer or not." With that, he walked out, leaving me alone in the waiting room.
"Hey, wait! I wanted to say 'best of luck'!" I shouted out and heaved a sigh in frustration as he was already out of earshot.
But anyway, what did he mean by that? I was well aware that car racing posed risks, but everything in our life was risky. One wasn't even safe in their own houses because one never knows when there would be an earthquake and the building would come crashing down, or when a Mafia would invade the house and murder them all.
I, for one, had watched enough car race videos to know what could happen in it. I wasn't going to lose my life. I was confident about it.

The Mafia Secrets
Detail
Share
Font Size
40
Bgcolor