Genevieve

"Gen, come on. I can’t believe you've lost your job again! That’s the second one in six months, I’m not always going to be able to just cover your rent, you know”.

Alex has been shouting at me over and over since I got him three hours early from work and told him I had lost my job.

"Alex, you know it’s not like that. He grabbed my ass as I walked past, and you expected me to say nothing”.

"Gen, of course, I didn’t expect you to say nothing, but I for sure did not expect you to break the guy's nose”.

"Alex, come on. You know I’m going to pay you back as soon as I get another job. I’ll be out first thing tomorrow morning.”

I hold my hand over my heart and bat my eyelashes at him. It is a trick I’ve used countless times and I know it works. Truth is, since I have been in New York, things have not been easy. Waitresses like me come and go constantly, so when you stand up for yourself against sleazeballs or shitty colleagues, usually it will be you end up jobless as I have now found out.

"Look Gen I’ll cover you for another month but first thing tomorrow you have to go and look for a job”.

I shoot up from the sofa, running to give him a hug, but he holds me back.

​​

"Another thing —- you have to make dinner tonight. Also, I need you to accompany me to a work party I have as my date since I no longer have a girlfriend”.

With that he pulls me in for a hug muttering about how happy he is I have agreed, I would protest but to be honest, he is doing me a favour, so I can’t complain too much.

Alex works at this super fancy tech security firm, you can guarantee if you have any form of automated security on your laptop or in your house Maddox INC have supplied it.

Pulling away from Alex and sliding around the kitchen unit to reach the fridge, I pull out some ingredients while he sits on the stool on the opposite side.

"So, when is your super fancy party anyway?"

"It’s in a few days, and we will have to get you something new to wear too”.

I turn to him and frown.

"Excuse me. What’s wrong with the way I dress ... also you need money for that and in case you forgot, I no longer have a job”.

"Gen there's nothing wrong with the way you dress, it’s just a little too London high society and a little less New York bold you know”.

"I wasn’t aware I moved in with Alexander Wang. I’ll be sure to note that the next time someone asks me who I live with”.

Alex has been amazing since I got here. We met online a few years back when we were studying for our degrees on different continents. By the time I decided to move back to America, my parents passed away and all their money was dried up by my prick of an older brother, and I was pretty much penniless because I never finished my degree. I hit a downward spiral because what little money they did leave me was gone within the year, and some of it was never even given to me as my brother decided I did not deserve it.

Alex saw on social media that I was looking for a place in New York. By this point, he was established as a tech genius and was making good money at Maddox INC, so he offered me a room in his place for extraordinarily little rent money, stating that he wanted to help a friend. I always suspected if he had seen some news articles from London about my wild nights partying and my brother disowning me, but he never said a thing. The reality of the situation is, without him, I would never even be able to afford to live in New York, let alone an apartment like this.

It has a huge open-plan kitchen/diner that is linked directly to the front room, and3 massive rooms with a balcony that shows you most of New York and the edge of Central Park.

As soon as I got here, I changed everything about myself so no one would recognise me, and I would just blend into the background, which is exactly how I like it. I am pulled from remembering how grateful I am by Alex asking me what’s for dinner.

"So, we have 1 onion, these sorry-looking tomatoes, and half a bag of pasta”.

I turn to the fridge and pull off the menu for the pizzeria down the street.

"And this delectable looking takeaway menu. So, what will it be big-boy?"

He rolls his eyes at me, taking the menu from my hand and dialling the number, as he orders I mouth to him to get pepperoni before heading into my room to take this stupid diner outfit off.

As I get out of the shower, I hear the door knock, so I rush to get changed, while my stomach growls. I did not realise how hungry I am.

Alex is already sitting on the sofa with pizza boxes laying out on the coffee table.

"Do you want a cup of tea, Alex?"

"Absolutely not Gen, but I’ll take a normal drink”.

"Tea is a normal drink, forgive me for being civilised”.

I put on my best British voice, which really is not that hard considering I lived there from the age of 8.

I grab him a beer from the fridge and head to sit down. Alex puts a movie on while we dig into the pizza. We both sit scrolling through our phones, paying no attention whatsoever to the movie and showing one another stupid stuff that appears on our feeds.

After a while, Alex finishes his beer, sets it on the table and turns to face me.

"So, this party is a pretty big deal for me Gen. It’s hopefully going to get me a promotion. As I’m paying for two people to eat, sleep and live now, I need it”.

He flashes me a wink followed by a cheeky smile.

"Don’t worry Alex, I’ll be on my best behaviour. What time do you want to go shopping for a dress?"

He picks up his work phone, pressing a few buttons then focuses his attention back to me.

"Come by the office at 1.30. I’ve just moved some meetings so we will have an hour to find you something”.

"Okay, sounds good "

Our focus returns to the TV for a while longer before I ask the question I have been longing to.

"Alex, is Mia going to be there tomorrow?"

Mia was his fiancée up until very recently when I moved in. She made a massive fuss that he might cheat on her, but it turned out she was cheating on him all along and using him for all the things he could buy her.

Alex's face hardens at my question.

"No, she can’t, but she will be at the office tomorrow when you come by, so just be sure to be nice”.

"Alex, you know I can’t control my tongue around that she-devil”.

He smiles and then returns his face to one of seriousness.

"Seriously, Genevieve, please don’t do anything”.

I throw my hands up in the air in surrender.

"I won't, I promise”. Internally, however, I am thinking to myself as long as she doesn’t start anything.

When they broke up, I became the centre of her focus as she tried repeatedly to blame me for the breaking up, saying I had made it up. Honestly, I did not, but what I did do was take a picture of her making out with some guy in a restaurant as I walked past and showed it to Alex.

Alex is a good guy, and he deserves someone good for him, and that she-devil was certainly not that piece of human garbage.

About an hour later, Alex and I slipped down the sofa into full potato mode. I am basically lying down at this point, so I decide to go and do that in my bedroom.

"Alex, I'm going to bed. I’ll see you at your office tomorrow okay”.

He nods and murmurs some incoherent words in his half-dazed state, and I head to my room.

As soon as I laid down, the reality of the day’s events hit me. I lost my job again because of my smart mouth. When will I learn to just bite my tongue? I sit back up, pull out the copies of my resume and place them in a folder. I then head to the wardrobe to pull out my best 'please hire me' outfit and hang it on the door, at least this way I do not have to think about it tomorrow.

Once I am in bed again, I open my phone and hit play on the audiobook I’m listening to currently. Since my parents died, silence is far too haunting for me It just brings back memories of the night the police came to my door in the middle of the night as the London rain beat down on them. As soon as they told me about my parents, my whole world stopped and the sound of static was all I could hear as I struggled to breathe in and felt crushed by the news. It was like that till I got to the hospital in my pajamas, wrapped in the policeman's coat.

I managed to see my parents in the hospital before they passed away, but I don’t really know if they knew I was there. It turned out that I had a shock-induced panic attack caused by the news, which should go away now as the experience is over, but the panic attacks never seem to stop.

I used to drink to numb the pain and to stop it from happening. I figured if I constantly partied, I would be happy then and my body would not need to be panicking all the time. Unfortunately, that is not how life works and I had to find other ways, and listening to audiobooks is just one of them.

After plugging the phone in to charge and placing it on the bedside table, I snuggled down into the bed, letting the voice of the reader send me to sleep.