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Thursday December 1st 12:32pm
3 weeks, 2 days, 6 hours and 28 minutes until Christmas
Profile:
Name: Christina Emily Curtis
Date Of Birth: May 7 1987
Age: 18 and 8 months
Current job status: Have just completed first year of university and work part time in a local bar
Current living arrangements: Well, since Sam decided to spend the holidays in Paris with her boyfriend (lucky bitch) I’m living alone in our apartment.
Marital status: Has a boyfriend (Nick Parker), have been seeing each other for 11 months.
Family: Have two sisters one older (21 years) one younger (15 years) older sister lives out of home and is currently studying law at university, younger sister still lives with parents on opposite side of country. Has two parents, still married, both middle-aged.
Parent’s occupations: Father is a lawyer, mother is a nurse.
Financial Status: Can’t complain, am getting by…just
Chapter OneChristina looked at her watch impatiently as she sat up straight in her chair, and ran her fingers through her recently dyed black hair, which had large streaks of dark blue through it, her green eyes gazing over her surroundings which consisted of tables, overstuffed sofas and a counter, with a giant menu board which had a boarder of Christmas lights, flashing brightly. Christina scoffed at this, as Christmas was still weeks away. In her opinion it was too early to start decorating for the well-loved holiday, but people these days seemed to milk it for all it was worth.
Christina sighed as she looked at her watch for the third time in that minute. She knew she was being paranoid, as it was only 12:32 and they’d agreed to meet at 12:30, which meant so far Nick, Christina’s boyfriend, was only two minutes late, but it must be taken into account that Christina is a horribly impatient person who had an attention span of a goldfish.
She surveyed her surroundings again, watching people in the café. There was a couple at the table next to Christina’s. The woman looked to be in her early twenties and was wearing a white tank top and a casual denim jacket over it. Her long blonde hair was held up in a fashionably messy bun, with wisps curling down. The man also appeared to be a similar age and was wearing a work shirt and had a jacket slung over the back of his chair. They both had empty plates in front of them, and she was cradling a cup of coffee, while he held his in a more brisk manner. Neither of them was talking and they seemed to be just sitting there, looking at each other with loving eyes. Christina had to admit that it was heart warming and cute. There weren’t many people who could sit together in such a comfortable silence. She found herself wishing that her and Nick were like that. Christina sighed and glanced around the café once again, a little half-heartedly, but didn’t see Nick. It wasn’t that her and Nick were uncomfortable with each other or that they didn’t get along. In fact they got along great only they didn’t really talk much. Well they talked, but it was just general chitchat or small talk. No, Christina felt herself continue to drift further and further away from her boyfriend, and was unable to stop it. The rift continued to get bigger with everything they didn’t say to each other; with the time they didn’t spend together. Not that the time thing could be helped, as it was difficult for them to spend time together, with both of them going to university and having part time jobs time was tight for both of them. Even now they had just managed to fit in a lunch date during Nick’s lunch break. Despite their distance Christina still loved him and couldn’t help but resolve to try harder to build their relationship back up.
Christina heard the bell that indicated when someone entered the café ring and felt her heart leap as she saw Nick’s familiar platinum blonde hair. She loved his hair, and the way it would glimmer under the light, even though it was obviously dyed. Christina giggled at the thought. She didn’t know why Nick bothered to claim his hair was natural; as it was obvious when his roots started to grow yet whenever she pointed this out he would constantly claim that she was wrong. She guessed it must be a macho thing, and dying your hair wasn’t manly or something. Men were impossible to figure out.
A smile lit her face as Nick grinned at her and took a seat opposite to her at the table.
“Sorry I’m late.” He said with an apologetic smile.
Christina grinned back. “It’s okay, I’m just glad you could make it.”
“Yeah,” Nick glanced at his watch, then picked up a menu. “Have you ordered yet?”
“What? Oh, not yet.” Christina felt worried, as Nick looked distracted. “I was waiting for you.”
She wondered what was wrong. He had been really busy lately, and they hadn’t really seen each other much in the last two weeks. But now that she saw him, he looked terrible. Despite his brisk outward manner, and clean suit, Nick’s eyes had deep bags under them and his face seemed paler than usual. Christina also noticed that the back of his neck was flushed and his ears were red. She frowned deeply in thought, his ears only went red when he was embarrassed or feeling guilty. Considering his cool mannerism she was guessing it was the latter.
“Nick, what’s wrong?” Christina asked her boyfriend, worriedly.
“What?” his eyes flickered up to meet hers. “Nothing’s wrong. Nothing at all.”
Liar, Christina thought bitterly, but left it at that. If he didn’t want to tell her what was wrong, who was she to force him? He’d let her in when he was ready, or at least Christina hoped he would.
A waitress walked over to them and smiled brightly. “Hi what can I get you guys?”
Christina looked up at the waitress and smiled. It was a young girl, around Christina’s age and she was dressed in a bright yellow shirt with the café’s logo on it and black business pants, which was the uniform of the café. The girl was also wearing a name badge, which said Lily, and had auburn hair, which was pulled back in a ponytail. Overall the waitress was a fairly attractive girl, but her smile seemed forced and her eyes kept looking over at Nick, but she refused to look at Christina.
Christina silently chuckled to herself, God I’m being paranoid today, she thought reproachfully, and shrugged off the waitress’s behaviour. She’s probably having a bad day and thinks my boyfriend’s cute. Christina gave Nick a warm smile. Not everything people do are suspicious Christina.
“I’ll have a ham and cheese toasted sandwich.” Christina said, after a few minutes of reading the menu. “And a diet coke.”
“I’ll have the special.” Nick said giving the waitress a smile. “And just a water please.”
The waitress gave Nick a strange look before going off, but Christina just shrugged it off, going with her bad day theory.
“So, how has your day been?” Christina asked lightly, hoping to start a proper conversation.
“Terrible.” Nick replied. “So much paperwork, meetings, and…I’m just sick of everything right now.
“Yes, I don’t blame you.” Christina said, cringing, as it was obvious he wasn’t listening to her. In fact he seemed to be looking around the café with the pre-determined mission to look anywhere but at her.
“Well, my day hasn’t been that great either.” Christina continued, deciding that if she continued to talk he’d have to pay attention to her eventually. “I mean, ever since Sam left, it’s been really lonely at the apartment, and we haven’t seen each other much lately either.”
“Hm, that’s nice dear.” He murmured non-committed giving her a brief glance.
Before Christina could reply, the waitress came back over and gave them their drinks.
“The food will be really soon.” She promised, not even bothering to smile, and left. Christina didn’t even notice anyway, as she was too distracted by Nick’s weird behaviour, and worried about what it could mean. Christina took a sip of her drink while she pondered this thought.
“What’s happening with you?” She asked before her mind even contemplated the question.
“What?” Nick said, looking up at her in a daze.
“Well, you’ve been all weird and distant lately.” Christina said, talking another sip of her drink, and holding her hands together on her lap so that Nick couldn’t see that they were shaking.
“I’ve been really busy, that’s all.” Nick said with a smile, but any idiot could see it was being forced.
“Don’t lie to me.” Christina burst out, surprised to hear hysteria in her voice. She couldn’t believe she was turning into one of those girls – the girls who were incredibly jealous and made scenes in restaurants.
“What?” Nick was taken back that she would dare speak back to him. Christina herself was surprised as she had always been he passive one in their relationship, but she also knew that she didn’t want to be taken for a fool by her own boyfriend. “You know what, this isn’t working for me.”
Christina actually choked on her drink. “What do you mean ‘this isn’t working for’ you?”
“This relationship isn’t working Chris.” Nick said. “Surely you’ve felt it, we haven’t been the same lately.”
“Okay, so what, you want to break up?” Christina said, and was proud of herself for keeping her voice so calm. Her outward appearance showed a woman who didn’t care if they broke up or not, and that’s exactly what she wanted to appear like.
“No, I…” Nick faltered, much to Christina’s surprise. He was always confident in every situation. She figured he’d breeze through this discussion, calmly telling her that it was over, before standing up and walking off. Instead she got… “I still love you, but I have a confession to make.”
“What?” Christina asked in a quiet voice, fear building up in her throat.
“I’ve been…” He lowered his gaze to focus on the table in front of him. “I’ve been cheating on you.”
“What!” Christina exclaimed in surprise, half shocked and hurt, yet angry that he couldn’t even force himself to look at her while confessing that. She didn’t know he was such a coward.
“I’m so sorry.” Nick said looking at her crestfallen. “I really do love you, really I do.”
“Tell me your confession again.” Christina replied, feeling completely numb, which left her unexplainably calm. “Only this time say it to my face.”
Nick looked up, and his face showed that he was unsettled by the tone of her voice, but he still complied with her request. “I’m so sorry Christina, but I’ve been cheating on you.”
Christina nodded, as the full weight of his confession sunk in. “I’m sorry too.”
“What…” Nick began to speak, but trailed off into silence.
“We are so over.” Christina continued, and gave him one final look before getting up out of her seat.
“Come on Chris, don’t do this.” Nick pleaded. “I love you.”
“Yeah.” Christina snorted. “Obviously not enough.” Not waiting for him to reply, she headed for the exit. As expected Nick didn’t call or chase after her. He was too cool and dignified to do that.
Christina was proud of herself, as she managed to get across the car park and into her car before the tears came. At least this way, even though she was absolutely devastated she still preserved some of her dignity. It was a small thing, but it was something.
Sniffing loudly, and wiping her nose with a crumpled tissue she found in the glove box Christina decided to calm herself down enough to drive without causing an accident, just in case Nick decides to come out in hope of finding her, and finds her in this condition. That would take away whatever advantage she had gained by breaking up with him and walking out of the café with her head held high. Besides, if Nick did come over to her now, when she’s like this it would allow him to sweet talk her, and she’d probably fall for it and agree to give them another go, and then she would hate herself for agreeing to continue a relationship with a man who didn’t even respect her enough to be faithful. So she wiped her face with a fresh tissue and put her keys in the ignition. She then started her car and pulled out of the car park before searching through her radio channels. Once she found a heavy metal type song she turned it up really loudly and focused on the road. She didn’t much care for heavy metal, but it went with her mood, and she’d much rather listen to heavy metal than any sappy love song.
Christina threw her bag down onto the ground an surveyed the room, which had been below standard in tidiness since Christina’s roommate actually left for her three month vacation in France. Not bothering to pick her bag up off the middle of the floor Christina just breezed past and into her bedroom, as the tears, which had began with the loud bang of her slammed door, flooded down her face. She threw herself onto her bed, and sobbed into her pillow. After what felt like forever, she finally found herself able to cry without body shaking sobs, and flipped onto her back to stare at her ceiling. By stare at her ceiling she was really looking at the blurred whiteness that would be her ceiling in her eyes weren’t so full of tears.
Sick of her ceiling, Christina turned to curl herself up in a ball, when she realised she was still wearing her shoes. She kicked them off, and thinking of her walk up the stairs was thankful she’d worn sneakers to lunch.
‘Maybe that’s why he cheated on me’ She thought miserably. ‘I wasn’t woman enough.’
“Bastard.” She cursed out loud. She couldn’t believe that he had made her doubt herself like that. It wasn’t her fault the arsehole cheated on her, it was his and blaming herself wouldn’t change the situation. Nor would eating a ton of ice cream, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t make her feel better. Christina thought, as she got up and headed to the freezer.
Sighing she opened the freezer and fund herself oddly disappointed, as there wasn’t much in the way of sugar. She found a container of plain vanilla ice cream, which had been left in the freezer by Sam, as Christina didn’t really buy ice cream, and only had about a third left. Christina took it out and grabbed herself a spoon deciding that this would do for now, and once she had straightened herself out a bit she’d go stock up on sympathy food and probably a heap of alcohol too.
It only took her a mere ten minutes to finish the ice cream. After taking the container out of the freezer, a spoon out of the draw, and not bothering with a bowl Christina made herself nice and cosy on the couch, where she devoured her frozen treat and flipped through TV channels trying to find something half way decent. Once the ice cream was finished though, she stopped looking, coming to the conclusion that there was never anything good on television at two in the afternoon. With that determined, she turned the box off and decided to have a shower and clean herself up a bit. Entering the bathroom, she immediately went over and turned the hot tap on full bore so the water could warm up while she was getting undressed. Christina cringed as she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her face was puffy from crying and she generally looked a mess. The water did very little to improve her mood, but she hoped that scrubbing her face would at least make her look less like a crazed person, and more human. She also chose to dress in baggy pants and an old jersey she still owned. It wasn’t her nicest outfit, but it was comfortable and decent enough to be seen in public wearing. That being done Christina ran a brush quickly through her freshly washed hair and, not bothering to put any make up on she put some clean socks on and shoved her feet back into her sneakers. Christina glanced quickly into the mirror, which showed that she didn’t look like she’d been crying. As long as she could keep it all together while she was out she could save herself the despair of having everyone in the streets know her private affairs. Christina walked out of her room, turning the lights and fan off as she left, before grabbing her wretched bag off the floor on her way out of the apartment. Once again, to avoid running into her neighbours, Christina took the stairs down to her car. She managed to make this journey undisturbed and was quite glad of that.
“Rough day?” the clerk asked as he scanned her products.
“You could say that.” Christina muttered and looked up at them for the first time. The clerk was male, maybe a little older than her with blondish hair and, apart from a few pimples, quite a handsome face. Normally she would try flirting with him a bit, but tonight all she could feel for men is complete hate.
“Sorry about this, but I really should see some ID before I sell this to you.”
“That’s fine.” Christina replied showing him her driver’s licence. She knew she didn’t look younger than she was, in fact she probably looked a little older, but she still looked young and knew that a lot of minors looked older than they actually wore. She didn’t hear the amount he said her drinks cost, so she handed him what she thought should be right and she figured she’d handed the right amount because he didn’t complain and he even gave her some change, along with a receipt. Christina thought she heard him say something about having a nice night, but she’d stopped listening by then. All she wanted to do was go home, have a few drinks, eat a whole tub of ice cream and cry for hours.
Of course things never go to plan. As soon as she got home, ditched her shoes and put the ice cream in the freezer and the chocolate in the fridge, her mobile phone rang. At first Christina was just going to ignore it, assuming it was just Nick calling to beg her forgiveness. However, she then decided to check the caller ID and if it was Nick she’d ignore it. It wasn’t Nick, so Christina answered it.
“Hello?” Christina answered.
“Hey Christina, it’s Tiffany.” A bright voice said on the other end, and Christina visibly relaxed. Tiffany and Christina both worked at a bar together, and even though they weren’t really friends they got along pretty well.
“Hey, what’s up?” Christina said, as she got a new spoon out of the drawer and opened a tub of ice cream.
“I was just calling to make sure that it’s still okay for you to cover my shift tonight.” Tiffany said. “Because I’ll totally understand if you can’t.”
Christina stifled a groan that threatened to escape. She seriously didn’t want to work that night, mostly because working would get in the way of her plan to drown in vodka and ice cream. However she’d promised Tiffany that she could cover her shift, and Christina knew Tiffany wanted the night off because it was her daughter’s eighth birthday.
“Yeah…that’s fine.” Christina replied after a moment, knowing that despite what happened to her today she couldn’t just back out on her word.
“Are you sure?” Tiffany asked anxiously.
“Yes, I’m sure.” Christina said. “Just have fun tonight, and wish Cassie happy birthday for me.”
“I will. Thank you so much for this.” Tiffany said sombrely. “You rule Christina, you truly do.”
“I know, now have a good night.”
“I will, bye.”
“Bye.” Christina hung up the phone and shoved a few spoons of ice cream into her mouth before checking her watch. She still had a few hours before she had to be at work, but it still meant she couldn’t drink, as they frown upon employees coming to work after having been drinking, even though it was a bar.
That didn’t stop her from eating half a tub of ice cream, crying some more and then giving up, putting the tub back in the freezer. She then decided to have another shower, which this time was followed up by a quick brush of her hair and a lot of waterproof mascara. Christina then put on a pair of black jeans and a T-shirt with the bar’s slogan on it. The bar she worked at, Shenanigan’s, didn’t really have a uniform, just wear decent pants or a skirt and wear a shirt or tank top with the bar’s slogan on it, which they provide for employees. Christina owned a work tank top, which she usually wore, but tonight she felt horrible and wasn’t really in the mood to be hit on by random drunk guys. Christina knew that would happen, regardless of what she wore, even if she went to work in a sack she’d still be hit on, but she knew that a tank top was more provocative and wearing a shirt would hopefully reduce the number of boys, and sometimes girls, who hit on her.
Christina cringed at the comment, but merely forced a smile on her face. “Thanks Eric. That’s just made my day.”
“Hey, what’s wrong girl?” Eric asked the goofy grin that had resided on his face was quickly replaced by one of concern at her cheerless tone.
“Nothing.” Christina sighed, dumping her bag on the staffroom table. “I’ve just had a really crappy day.”
“What happened?” Eric asked softly. Christina looked at Eric in surprise. She’d always been friendly with Eric, it’s not like they’d hang out outside of work or anything, but they joked around with each other ad such. He was always the person that kept the mood light, and gave this energy that got the other employees through their shifts when they borderline exhaustion. Christina had never actually seen him act serious, and could hardly believe he was now, even though she was here witnessing it.
“Well, let’s see” Christina pretended to think and quietly regretted the bitter sarcastic tone she was taking, but couldn’t help herself. It was all she could do to stop herself from crying. “Today, at lunch, I found out my boyfriend of eleven months was cheating on me, and you know how that sort of thing can ruin a girl’s day.”
“Oh honey.” Eric gave her a half-hug. “Are you okay?”
“I’ll live.” Christina flashed him a slight smile. “It’s just hard that it happened now, with Sam away and everything.”
“Yeah...” Christina had told Eric about Sam’s trip. “Hey, give me your phone.”
“Uh…okay” Christina opened her bag and dug around before pulling out the small silver device and handing it over to him. Eric opened her phone up and started to type in it.
“Okay,” he said, still typing. “I’m adding my number in here, so feel free to call me if you ever need anyone to talk to, day or night.” He passed his phone back to her and gave her one of his goofy grins. “I rarely sleep anyway.”
Christina gave a little chuckle. “Thanks Eric.”
“Anytime girl.”
After that they were up for a big night of serving beer, fighting off groping patrons and dealing with all the fights and tuffs that occurred. Shenanigan’s, for some reason, was unusually restless and there were quite a few fights, much to Christina’s frustration. By the time she’d finished her shift, packed up and grabbed all her stuff, Christina found it was 2 am, and she was absolutely exhausted, both mentally and physically.
“Bye Chris.” Eric called from behind the bar, as he was working a double shift and didn’t finish til 6 am.
Christina waved her hand in the air, being too tired to actually reply to his words. Eric didn’t seem to take offence to this, as working in the bar was tiring enough, and he knew the kind of day she’d had. As Christina walked to her car, which was parked round the back in the staff car park, she couldn’t help but curse to herself, and ask the question, ‘Why the hell did this day suck so much?’
