Elementary Virtue: The Prophecy (12 page)

Leyla felt out of place, she had done Ana the favor to go with her to this birthday party of one of Saul’s friends. Whom she hadn’t met previously and naturally she didn’t know anybody else at the party.

Ana had been a nervous wreck, when she met her at the Hotel to pick her up. She changed clothes seven times and buzzed around Leyla like a bee until she finally was ready to leave. When they finally made it to the elevator door, she suddenly wanted Leyla to braid her hair into a pigtail and since she didn’t hold still, it had taken ages till they managed to leave the hotel. When Saul finally appeared, Leyla thought that Ana would faint. But, miraculously she pulled herself together just in time, before they met.

Saul was nice, handsome and above all, he acted quite humble. Leyla was surprised about that, as he was the raising shooting star around here. Quite impressive, she thought to herself, as most of the ones that succeeded in the Music industry, were usually smug, and off-hook. Fair enough, but they disappeared in no time, and one didn’t need to have clairvoyant abilities to know that these two had got it badly. They could hardly keep their hands off each other. Not that they made out embarrassingly in front of her, but their eyes spoke volumes. It was a mystery to Leyla how Ana imagined she should prevent this relationship to get to the next level. In her opinion, there was nothing to do about that. You couldn’t stop an express train when it was rolling, and oh boy, this express train was running at full speed. No one could do anything to stop it.

She was standing around not sure what to do next. Ana really owed her for this, she had lied to her parents once again. Shamelessly, so, that she could act as a chaperon, which she had to admit was clearly a completely impossible task.

She thought about leaving, but she had promised Ana to make sure that she got back to the hotel to mummy instead of ending up getting nooky with the aspiring pop star. Great, how was she going to do that? She didn’t have a clue. Maybe they were laying somewhere in a room in the house doing who knows what. She could hardly look into every room and possibly throw herself in between preventing Ana from hitting the sheets with Mr. Superstar. It was already half past eleven and she was bored leaning against the wall.

Most of the guests were no longer sober. She watched the birthday boy, tall, athletic, tanned, with blonde short hair and bright blue shiny eyes that shone like two marbles, which was most likely because of the booze consumption or worst. He introduced himself as Bongo which was his nick name with the Boy Scouts. In fact, his real name was Raul, what he probably didn’t consider to be cool enough. He was quite easy on the eye, but unfortunately also pretty drunk. He tried to hit on a Girl babbling as she passed by. His pick-up lines, were such as "I have a really great bed, do you want to have a look at it sometime," Leyla grinned. She watched the two of them for a while and was surprised that his stale pick-up line seemed to work and the girl walked by hand in hand with Bongo, probably on their way to some free rooms to be undisturbed.

Unfortunately, the hanky-panky of the birthday boy came to an abrupt end, shortly after the two of them walked by, Raul or Bongo suddenly started to choke and puked into a corner. Well, Leyla thought, even if you were into someone, puking on the floor was definitely the ultimate downer for every burgeoning feeling of pleasure. The girl got him a glass of water and he recovered amazingly fast making a second attempt to lure her into his room. The girl patted him on the shoulder and said, "No thanks, I think it’s time for me to go home.” She got her jacket and left through the front door. Raul was standing beside Leyla toasting her saying, "Well, what's up?" he took a sip of beer. Leyla shook her head, it didn’t actually seem to bother him that much, that his beloved girl was hitting the road.

Leyla got herself comfortable in the kitchen on the improvised bar and Raul lurched back into the parlor. She watched him, grinning, he would probably soon puke into another corner. It sure would be great to clean up the mess in here tomorrow. Here a wet spot, there a wet spot. As she was sitting, there all by herself, grinning, suddenly a red-haired boy with a Mohegan hairstyle came into the kitchen getting himself a glass of water. He stopped in front of her, looking interested. Then he tapped on her shoulder, "Hi, what are you doing here all alone, you should come into the parlor, they are playing truth or dare, after the poetry slam and there aren’t enough girls around," he grinned at her. "I almost had to kiss a guy, that’s why I left," she couldn’t suppress a smile, "sorry, I don’t feel like participating. I’m not into playing party games." He sat down beside her introducing himself, "I am Gecko, Raul’s brother." "Gecko? What an original name." She frowned, and he grinned at her, "My real name is Peter, and that's not unique. “Oh, I get it. You mean you are Bongo or Raul's brother. Hmm, Bongo and Gecko are cute nicknames. Besides, your brother has quite a stomach problem tonight." He looked at her questioningly. Apparently, he hadn’t noticed that his brother decorated the apartment by puking all around. Well he would find out soon enough. The latest tomorrow morning, as he was a family member, which probably meant that he was part of the cleaning team.

He yawned laying his head on her shoulder, "You don’t mind if I lean a bit on your shoulder, I've been working all day and am currently a little on the tube." Leyla had no idea what she should do, hopefully he didn’t have anything stupid in mind, which she really didn’t need tonight, "You work? Good for you. What are you working then?" When no answer came from him, she thought at first that he hadn’t heard her. Until she heard a loud snore, the guy had actually fallen asleep on her shoulder. Wha next? She tried to shake him off so that he would wake up, but he was as heavy as a sack of potatoes in his sleep and dumped in her lap. He lay literally on her knees. She was practically nailed to the bar and could hardly move.

Leyla took her cell phone out of her pocket and dialed Shane's number. She hoped that he was still in town. He would get her out of here. It rang forever and she wanted to hang up, when she heard a hoarse voice, "Hello," a rustling was to be heard, "Shane?"
"No, it’s me, Mila," she heard a breathless voice say, "well, well that's interesting, what you are doing with Shane's cell phone, did you confess about your feelings or have you made him docile with a handful of herbal stuff?" Leyla asked being quite amused. "Shut up, nothing like that," Aiden has Shane's cell phone and we are on the way home from work at the Crowd, where you didn’t show up, my dear.” Leyla sighed, "That's a long story and Aiden knows about it, I did a favor to this Ana girl, from Judo Training. I went with her to a birthday party, because she has that huge crush on a guy and didn’t have the guts to come by herself. Now I am in a mess, as things for her have taken off to the next level and the brother of the birthday boy is sleeping off his intoxication on my lap. I am having the time of my life tonight, believe it or not."

Mila laughed, "That sounds indeed very entertaining and what did you want from Shane?"
"Honestly, I wanted him to get me out of here. Although I promised to take care of Ana, so she doesn’t do anything stupid. Which unfortunately turns out to be difficult because she is missing for hours." Mila seemed interested. "Shall I come with Shane to save you?" Leyla laughed, "That would be brilliant, but please don’t forget about rescuing me on the way here. Not that the two of you should also disappear for hours. I am still nailed on the bar with this guy on my knees." "Stop it, I’m getting red ears, out of sheer anticipation." Leyla heard a muffled voice in the background. "Aiden spoils everything he wants to come and get you first, he says it’s a detour," Mila said grimly. "Well, I'm sorry for you Mila but please hurry up, the guy on my knees weighs a ton.” She gave them Raul's address and hung up.

Leyla was sitting on the bar, both legs numb, but she couldn’t get this seemingly hibernating stranger Peter off her knees. Frustrated, she rested her chin on her elbow, which she placed on Peter's head. She hoped that Aiden and Mila would get here quickly. Suddenly Ana and Saul appeared back on scene. They came together in the kitchen, both looked damn rumpled and confused. When Ana saw Leyla in the kitchen, she came over to her immediately, "Leyla I am sorry that I let you hang on dry like that, but we fell asleep I don’t know how that could happen, but we just woke up now," she whispered the second part of the sentence, probably she didn’t want Saul to hear. Saul suddenly appeared at the bar and he sure looked battered. Tangled hair, crazed look, and he seemed strangely absent. Ana, however looked normal in the meantime, if you refrained from looking at her strangely swollen lips. She had recovered quickly, "I'm sorry Ana, but I have to go now," Saul kissed her lightly on her cheek and said goodbye to Leyla. "It was nice meeting you," And then he was gone. Leyla was left behind with a befuddled Ana.

"What was that?" Ana looked questioningly, at Leyla. "Beats me, maybe he's gone because he is scared to get too involved. Guys usually run when they realize that they don’t know how to handle a situation. Apparently, pop stars don’t have different reactions from normal guys." "Huh? What do you mean by that? And who is that guy on your knees?" Leyla laughed, "May I introduce, Peter, Raul's brother," she patted him on the back, which he acknowledged with a loud snore. Ana shook her head and ran her hand through her hair, "Guys! Some fall asleep and others escape." Leyla nodded, "Exactly, you nailed it."
"Can we go home?" Ana wanted to leave as soon as possible, she couldn’t stand to stay any longer, somehow the evening had not ended as she had hoped and Leyla was right. He ran, after he had come too close to her. Apparently, she scared the shit out of him. How she felt about him should have frightened her too, but it did not at all. Well, maybe she was just crazy, completely out of her mind, whenever she was in the same room with him.

Leyla nodded, "My friends will pick us up, they are already on the way, don’t worry," her phone vibrated. A look at the display and Leyla froze. Ana didn’t know exactly why but she knew immediately who was at the other end of the line. "Is that him? Gregory I mean?" Leyla nodded and stared hypnotized at her phone. "Are you going to answer it?" "No, in here it's too noisy and the reception is bad, I will try to call him once this guy is no longer laying on my knees snoring." Ana nodded, "Why is the reception bad in here? He must really miss you if he calls you in the middle of the night."
"He's not in Canada. He is in Europe on an island, the net is mostly pretty bad, and probably he doesn’t think about the time difference. Or he has lost track of it." Startled, she paused. She hadn’t meant to give away that much to Ana. But she was so excited that he tried to call again. He missed her probably as much as she missed him and that made her happy. But she wanted to be alone, when she spoke to him, she didn’t want to be on the road surrounded by strangers when she talked to him. Those moments when she heard his voice were precious to her. She was going to call him back when she was home.

Soon after, Mila and Aiden showed up, they freed Leyla from Peter leading him with joined forces to the next sofa, where he slept on blissfully. First they drove Ana to her hotel, and then they dropped Leyla off at her house. Leyla was a little worried about Ana because she told her about her eating disorder. After all, her date that had gone wrong with Saul was certainly not conducive to Ana’s inner peace. She would get in touch with her tomorrow, trying to cheer her up if necessary, and meet her again. Now, that she still remained another week in Toronto. She hoped that she would have some fun, even if things hadn’t worked out as planned with Saul.

Leyla was lucky. Her parents hadn’t noticed anything about her unauthorized trip to the birthday party and were convinced that she worked her ass off as a waiter at the 'Crowd'. Since it was Saturday, they even agreed that Leyla and her friends took Ana to a baseball game. Ana had never seen a Baseball game and it was certainly an experience for her before she flew back to Europe again. Today the Blue Jays played against the Boston Red Sox in the Roger Centre and Leyla's dad had snagged some free tickets from a customer. Actually, six VIP tickets, normally these were extremely expensive. A proper VIP-box including food and drink of the highest quality, and as much as they could eat, was available. She decided to ask Brooklyn, Aiden, Mila, Shane and Ana to come along. But since there was not enough space in Aiden's car, Leyla was going to pick up Ana from the Hotel. They would get to the Roger Center by subway.

She expected to find a sad and devastated Ana and was surprised to find her in a cheerful mood. Leyla asked her about how she felt after yesterday’s party. Ana smiled, "You know maybe it's better that way, because it wouldn’t have worked out anyway between him and me. I'm leaving in a week and to be honest, what am I supposed to do with a famous guy who always has a lot of screaming girls following him around?” Leyla was surprised and relieved at how well Ana dealt with the situation. It would have been a bit stressful if she had been a crybaby the whole day. Still she couldn’t help herself, yesterday she had the impression that there was a strong connection between Ana and Saul and was almost a bit disappointed how rationally and sober Ana looked at the situation.

Ana had an upcoming dinner with her father she barely knew and her half-brother on her mind and this made her feel uneasy. She asked Leyla whether she would come along so that they could then get out as quickly as possible if she didn’t feel at ease. Leyla didn’t know what to do. She had no great desire to meet Ana"s father of whom she had only heard bad stuff, or this mysterious half-brother. Then again, Ana didn’t want to go by herself and there was nobody else to go with her. Therefore, she agreed hesitantly.