A/N: In celebration of my birthday (which is today woohooo) I wrote a new chapter. As a present. For myself. 

I love myself.

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Idiot for Hire 

Chapter 3

The last thing I was in the mood for was a party, but apparently, the decision wasn’t mine to make. I’d already told my boyfriend, Mitch, that I would meet him at this black-light party, and my mother wouldn’t let me back out of the commitment.

Caroline and a mutual friend of ours, Alana, were supposed to pick me up in two hours, but my stylists were nowhere to be found, and I was not going to this party if I didn’t look perfect. I kind of hoped they wouldn’t show up so I wouldn’t have to go, actually.

“I’ll do your hair,” Trish offered, plopping down on my bed with a bag of potato chips. “It won’t look good and might give your mom a heart attack, but I’ll do it.”

“No eating on my bed,” I reminded her, snatching the potato chips away. I regretted my action when I began to look at the bag wistfully, my hand hovering over the opening.

“Just have one,” she said. “It won’t kill you. Us mere mortals eat them all the time and still fit into our jeans.”

The temptation was nearly too much to resist. I did manage to pull through, though, and handed her the bag, shaking my head. “No, I can’t. I have a party to go to.”

Trish frowned with disapproval but said nothing else. If she was going to reprimand me, she didn’t get a chance to. My phone vibrated on the table next to me and distracted me. I glanced at the caller ID and answered immediately. It was Ashley, my makeup stylist. My late makeup stylist. “Where are you? I called you fifteen minutes ago!”

“I’m sorry,” Ashley gushed nervously. “There was a lot of traffic, and then my boyfriend called me, and I had to—”

“Okay, I don’t need to hear about your boyfriend and whatever else,” I interrupted. “Just get over here and see what’s taking Winona so long. There’s no way I’m letting Trish do my hair.”

Trish grinned widely at this.                                                 

“I’ll be there in five minutes, and I’ll call Winona,” Ashley said. “I promise.”

“Good.” With that, I hung up, still kind of hoping she’d be late. Normally, I would have been pissed off and probably would’ve considered firing her, though that kind of mentality was exactly what had created my assistant problem. 

The moment my mother walked into the room, Trish flew up and threw her potato chips into my closet. I glared at her, but she just mumbled something about grabbing my towels and throwing them in the wash and ran out of the room.

“Thanks, Trish,” I called out. “Thanks a lot!”

“You act like being left alone with me is such a chore,” my mother said. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve said she was actually offended. “Wait, why aren’t you getting ready yet? Where are your stylists?”

“On the way,” I said, discreetly kicking the potato chips further into my closet when her back was turned.

“Why are they not here yet? You’re meeting Mitch in less than two hours and look like you just woke up.”

“I’m still wearing the outfit you picked out for me,” I pointed out. “I literally haven’t done anything since we got home.”

She considered this before replying. “Well, I have a hair appointment in half an hour, but I don’t want to see you doing ‘literally nothing’ when I get back.”

“My makeup stylist will be here in five minutes,” I said. “Don’t worry.”

She nodded. “Good. I’ll be back soon.”   

“Take your time,” I said, in no mood to deal with her. After she left, my stylists slowly arrived, first Ashley and then Winona. Winona was at least an hour late, and the only choice I was left with was being unfashionably late, much to Caroline and Alana’s annoyance. Still, they chose to wait for me to finish, and it was better than not going at all. 

The work they did made up for their lateness. Winona curled my hair to perfection in a way that made Trish jealous, putting it in a pretty half-up, half-down style. Ashley did what she was best at—smoky, intense looks—perfectly matching the black bandage dress I’d picked out. Red shoes and accessories added color to my outfit, and after one last spray of my favorite perfume, I was finally ready to go.

“About time!” Caroline exclaimed, grabbing Alana and me by the arm. “Let’s go! That hottie Mitch introduced to us is already there, and I am not letting some whore whisk him away!”

“Caroline, he’s married,” Alana whispered, like Caroline’s fetish was some big secret. It wasn’t. “He’s Mitch’s married cousin.”

I tried to resist the impulse to comment on Caroline’s dilemma, but in the end, the temptation was just too sweet. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure you’re the only whore trying to whisk him away,” I said.

She narrowed her eyes at me. “Whatever. Let’s just go.”

And yes, I did relish in how she angrily stomped all the way to the limo.

The black-light party was being held at some hotel in Los Angeles. It wasn’t exactly a five-star hotel, but it wasn’t horrible, either. The music was blaring, and tall, slim bodies were writhing against each other when we walked into the room. It was too late to make a dramatic entrance now that the party was in full-blast, something Caroline and Alana greatly resented. I wasn’t sure how I would even find Mitch amidst this sea of people. Maybe I shouldn’t have come after all.

“What was this I heard from your maid about you firing your assistant?” Caroline asked as we looked around the room. She’d apparently forgotten she was mad at me.

“Mousy wasn’t working out. I have some interviews set up for Monday for a new assistant.” I chose to leave out the reason this choice was so urgent, knowing she was capable of somehow using the information against me.

“Do what I do. Hire whichever one is hotter,” she said with a grin. “Oh, that’s right. I forget you don’t want to look mediocre next to your assistant. Choose whichever one is uglier, then.” Sadly, that was what I usually did, although I would rather eat an entire chocolate cake than tell her that.

“Choose whichever one has a penis,” Alana suggested with a snicker.

“Yeah, I’m sure Mitch will love that.” Caroline snorted.

“Well… There is one,” I said, although I wasn’t sure continuing was such a good idea after all. They weren’t the most trustworthy people I knew.

“Seriously?” Caroline asked, stopping in her tracks.   

“Yeah, but he’s an absolute idiot,” I said with a laugh. It wasn’t hard to guess that Nathan wasn’t cut out for the job. “It would be a bad idea.”

“Wait. Is he hot?” Alana asked.

I let out a low whistle. “Ridiculously hot. Tall, dark, and handsome, nice body… everything.”

The moment they heard this, their eyes widened and they both got so excited and intense, it almost made me jump. “Do it!” they urged.

“No way. It’s a horrible idea,” I insisted, although in the back of my mind, I was beginning to consider the possibility. It would infuriate my mother, which was always nice…

“Hire the idiot,” Caroline said gleefully, doing a complete 180 from her earlier snarkiness.

“Come on, how much damage can the guy—oh.” Alana stopped in the middle of her sentence, frowning at something on the dance floor.

I followed her line of sight until it landed on my boyfriend of three years. Mitch was dancing with some voluptuous blonde I’d seen at a few parties before but hadn’t given much thought. Dancing was too nice a word for what they were doing. It was more like clothed-sex, and it was atrocious.

Caroline tried to conceal her giggles, but in the end she couldn’t. “Oh, shit,” she said, covering her mouth to hide her grin.

I scoffed. “You’ve got to be kidding me. I’ll be right back.” I walked onto the dance floor and strode right up to them, placing a hand on my hip and raising my eyebrow at the spectacle before me.

“Cute,” I said, alerting the two to my presence.

I knew who Mitch was. I knew it perfectly well. I knew he wasn’t the trophy boyfriend people thought he was, but this was a new low, even for him. Instead of waiting for me, he’d chosen to grind against some random girl at the party. Gross.

“Adriana—” he began, shooting me his once-charming smile.

I ignored him, turning to the blonde instead and flicking my hand at her. “Scram.”

I didn’t have to ask her twice. She looked like she wanted to get the hell out of there the moment she saw me. In a blink of an eye, she was gone, caught in the sea of people that surrounded us.

“Adriana, baby,” Mitch said. “I was just getting warmed up for you. I haven’t danced in a couple weeks. You know I’ve been so busy with work.”

“I’m sure,” I said tartly. I took the blonde’s place and reluctantly pressed my body against his, using the intimacy to speak into his ear without having to worry about being overheard. “You and I both know that breakup rumors aren’t welcome right now. Dating me built your career, Mitch, and unless you want it to be destroyed as quickly as it arose, you better control yourself. If I were you, I’d watch who rubbed their ass against my crotch, or the only movies you’ll be starring in will be pornos.” I talked a big game, but I actually wasn’t sure what would happen if we broke up because of him. I had a feeling our parents wouldn’t let it go so easily, and his career would be salvaged in the end.

He just chuckled at my threat. “That’s harsh, baby. Maybe if you’d give me what I want more often, I wouldn’t have to control myself. Maybe it’d just come naturally.”

I laughed, but it sounded fake even to me. “Maybe if you’d quit looking for excuses to find what you ‘need’ elsewhere, we wouldn’t have a problem.”

“Shouldn’t a girlfriend help her boyfriend out?” he asked, pulling away to look at me. “Last I heard, that’s what girls do for their guys. Isn’t it?”

I wrinkled my nose. “I’d sooner go gay than ‘help you out.”  

“Is that what’s next for us? Is that how our three-year romance will flame out? I kind of like it. It makes me look like the victim.”

“It also makes you look like a failure. Poor little Mitch wasn’t up for the job. He couldn’t handle his girl.”

“Let me show you how up for the job I am, then,” he said, moving even closer to me. “And then we’ll see if you’ll still go gay.”

“I didn’t come here for that,” I replied, trying not to sound too repulsed. “I’m not interested.”

“I’ve been your boyfriend for three years,” he said, frustration etched in his tone. “Doesn’t that count for something?”

“No, it doesn’t, Mitch. Not when you don’t respect anyone, not even yourself.”

“If you weren’t interested, why’d you scare the blonde away?”

He was unbelievable. He was in public. This wasn’t the privacy of his hotel room. Word of his “dancing” with that blonde was already going to get out, and if it had gone farther? God would have had to have mercy on his soul, because both his family and mine would kill him. “We’re not having this conversation right now. There’s a camera in the corner. Dance with me and wipe that scowl off your face.”

“Whatever you say, Your Highness,” he responded sarcastically.

“Thank you, Princess,” I replied in the same tone, forcing a smile. The smile he gave me in return was just as pitifully false. This whole relationship was a pitiful farce, and it had been for a while now.

It wasn’t always this way. It was beautiful at first, unrealistically so. Mitch was the kind of guy I’d dreamed about meeting since I was a little girl. He was a gentlemen, he was fun, and he made me feel beautiful. It genuinely felt like a fairy-tale romance, right out of the books, and I felt like the luckiest girl in the world. Until I realized the entire relationship was a setup. Our parents had arranged the relationship for a mutual familial benefit. My parents had basically bought me a boyfriend, but as I soon found out, you can’t buy love. And yet, I still paid heavily for it, and I was scared I’d continue to pay for the rest of my life if I didn’t get out soon.

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Hope you guys enjoyed and have a happy TheFlamingPopsicle's birthday (which should be a holiday, I think. How do you submit suggestions for new holidays?)