Chapter 138: Us Against the World
Moana
I knew that I should have just walked away, but I was too stubborn to just let these women get away with talking so poorly about Edrick like that.
When I pushed the door open, the women suddenly stopped talking. Their eyes were wide as they turned to face me.
“What are you talking about?” I said as I stepped into the bathroom.
The women were silent. I felt like I was being appraised and judged as they looked me up and down, but I didn’t care. If people were going to say such nasty things about Edrick, then they could judge me all they wanted; but I was going to say something about it, and I felt as though I caught them in the act.
However, the women’s shock quickly wore off. Their wide-eyed looks turned to plastic smiles.
“It’s not very polite to eavesdrop,” one of the women, a blonde with an enormous diamond ring on her finger, said. She leaned into the mirror and wiped a bit of her lipstick away from the corner of her mouth with her pinky finger, eyeing me in the reflection as she did so. “I hope you don’t eavesdrop often. It’s not very becoming; especially not for someone of your status to be doing to a group of upper class werewolves.”
I opened my mouth to answer, but nothing would come out; and the women quickly realized that their rudeness left me speechless, which meant that they had won. All I could do was stand there with narrowed eyes while all three of them brushed past me, one after the other. The last woman bumped me with her shoulder deliberately before she left.
Once I was alone, I stood there feeling a combination of both sadness and anger; sadness that my social status would never let me be worthy of respect, and angry that these seemed to be the types of women I had to look forward to in the future now that I was involved with an Alpha billionaire. If I went on to continue to be in a relationship with Edrick, real or fake, I couldn’t help but feel as though I would never be able to make any true friends again. If this was what wealthy women were like, then I didn’t want any part of it. And I could only hope that I never turned out like them in the end.
…
Finally, the event came to an end. On the way home, I kept trying to remind myself that I did have a nice time with Edrick during the comedy show, and that was the most important thing. None of the other things, such as the paparazzi or the mean women in the restroom, mattered. But that was easier said than done, and I still felt sad.
As we got ready for bed, I was too tired to even hide my sadness anymore. And Edrick seemed to notice.
“Are you alright?” he asked. He was sitting up in bed with a book in his lap while I busied myself with brushing out my hair in the bathroom mirror. I had just taken my makeup off, which always made me sad because of how beautiful Tyrus’ work was — and I didn’t care one bit if those horrible women thought that my green eyeshadow was ugly. I thought it was perfect, and from now on, I knew that I would always ask Tyrus to give me green and gold eyeshadow just to spite them.
I nodded at first, but as I looked in the mirror, I could still see the deep frown at the corners of my lips and the sad look in my eyes. Edrick noticed, too, and wouldn’t let me get away with lying.
“I can tell something’s wrong,” he said, shutting his book and setting it on the side table before folding his arms across his chest. “Just tell me. Is it the paparazzi? I promise you’ll get used to it, and they’ll calm down eventually so it won’t be so bad in the future.”
I shook my head and set my hairbrush down with a sigh. “It’s not that,” I replied. “I know it’ll get easier. It’s just…” My voice faltered. I hung my head, unsure as to how to broach the subject. I didn’t know if I should have told Edrick about what those women were saying or not; maybe he would have just told me that it was nothing more than gossip and he would have looked down on me for falling victim to it.
“Go on,” he urged.
Another sigh escaped my lips. “After tonight, I’m just worried that I’m ruining your image,” I finally admitted. “At the event, I knew that people were staring at me and talking about me. And I’m worried that it’s going to reflect on you in a negative way. I don’t want to hurt how other people see you. What if it makes you isolated?”
Edrick was silent for a long time. I was still facing the mirror, watching myself as I talked, but I finally worked up the nerve to turn to face him. I didn’t realize it at first, but I now noticed that he had gotten out of bed and was now standing in the bathroom doorway.
“Why do you think I would care what any of those people think?” he asked, his voice low and quiet as he fixed his gray eyes on me.
I shrugged. “They’re your colleagues. Your peers. I assume some of them are even your friends.”
Edrick scoffed. “Friends?” he said with a laugh. “None of those people are my friends. In fact, I can’t stand a single one of them.”
My eyes widened. I was taken aback by what Edrick said; at the event, he seemed to interact with all of them so naturally and charmingly. I watched him all night as he laughed along with his business partners and colleagues, how he charmed the women and bantered with the men. Their faces had all been stiff and plastic, but I assumed that it was just because of my presence. But Edrick had seemed to be enjoying himself just fine, which made me surprised to hear that he couldn’t even stand any of them.
“Really?” I asked. “All night, you seemed to get along with everyone—”
“Sure, I played nice,” Edrick replied with a shrug. “That’s just what you do at these sorts of things. It doesn’t mean I like any of them. The only thing I liked about the entire night was just having dinner and watching the comedy show with you. I could have been perfectly happy if that was all we did, but I had to pretend to like people for appearances.”
As Edrick spoke, I felt my face get hot. His words made me blush.
“I enjoyed dinner and the show with you, too,” I said quietly, staring down at my feet to hide my red face.
“Good.” Edrick turned then and climbed back into bed. “All that matters to me is that you had a nice time, even for just a little while.”
Edrick laid down then and shut off his bedside lamp. I stood in the doorway for a few moments, still in shock, before I finally crawled into bed myself.
And as I fell asleep next to him, I couldn’t help but smile as I thought about Edrick’s sweet words.
