Wild Bastard by Ella Savitskaya (book suggestions .txt) 📕

"Is it your turn to serve us now?" One of them with the stylish stubble on his face grins in a gooey smile.

"Yes" I clip my name tag to my shirt and point my finger at it. "Marina. At your service."

"Nice to meet you, Marina. I'm Alec, and this is my friend Eric. What do you recommend with beer?"

"Well, since we don't have much choice, you can take either dry snacks or sandwiches. If I were you, I'd stick with the house specialty – Burger King." I can still taste the mustard sauce on my tongue, and I couldn't help recommending this splendor.

"Great, should I order from you, or is it just the bar?"

"It's just the bar. Take any seat you want, the waitress will come to you."

"Aren't you the waitress?"

"No" I upset the guys. And after giving me frustrated exhalations they slid off the bar stools and take a seat at one of the tables.

I check the glasses, picking each one up and holding it up to the light. Kate is a good girl, but she has a sin of not doing her best. Like now. The glasses have white stains on them, which means that either she did not wipe them after Maria at all, or she did it in a hurry.

I wipe them thoroughly again. It's a luxury in a place like this, and it's unlikely that drunken faces would even notice such tiny specks, but I need my job too much to be negligent about it.

Mrs. Blanchard is not a very honest hostess, but she is fair. Sometimes I think that she watches the video from the security cameras in slow motion, and sees all the mistakes of every employee. Which is why my salary at the end of the month is a couple of bucks more than Kate's one.

A couple of hours later, the doorbell chimes, announcing a new visitor, and I glance out the front door and notice Lana.

For the umpteenth time in a row, I note her ability to look stylish and tasteful.

The girl is wearing white jeans, a pink top, a matching purse, and snowy high-heeled sandals to complete the whole instabarbie look. If I were a guy, I definitely wouldn't have missed such a cutie.

The girl runs up to the bar and leaning over it kisses me on the cheek. When Lana first started greeting me like that, I scrubbed the sticky sheen off my cheek several times in a row, not sure what all that familiarity was for.

I thought she was trying to show the others that she had the privilege of knowing the bartender. But then, after getting to know the girl better, I realized that for her it was just a sincere desire to say hello that way. She has practically no friends besides me, only acquaintances, and I was even at one point pleased that such a girl from high society, where I could never get to, had found a friend in me.

"Hi, Marina. Where were you this afternoon?"

"Hi. I was out running errands," I shrug indifferently, not revealing my true whereabouts. She does not need to know that. "Why didn't you tell me yesterday that you were coming to see me?"

The girl sighs, and it's only now that I notice how puffy her bright blue eyes are. It's like she's been crying for hours.

"I wasn't going to. It was only this morning that Matt drove me to it, and I ran away. I didn't know where to go. Mark was busy, so I went to your place," Lana's thin fingers reach into the box of tissues, pull out one, and begin nervously folding it.

The memory of her brother makes me feel a little bit of faded anger myself.

"I was lucky enough to meet your brother yesterday."

Lana looks at me sympathetically.

"Oh, my God. I hope he was behaving normally?"

I hum, occupying my hands with making a cocktail. Clear images of the self-righteous bastard blatantly groping me send a tingle through my skin.

"Well, how can I put it? Your brother seems to have a lot of narcissism. It's been a long time since I've met anyone that disgusting, I'm sorry."

Considering I've seen a lot of things in my life, her brother's the one who tops the list of assholes.

The blonde's face shows undisguised satisfaction, as if I had said something magical.

"Finally, at least someone shares my point of view. All the girls I know are ready to kneel down in front of him. And I don't understand why! He's rude, disgusting! Marina, Matt won't let me make friends. He asked me to introduce you to him, and I'm afraid that now he'll forbid us to be friends too."

Lana's voice trails off, and when I look up, I see her chin starting to shake. Here we go, tears again. I move mojito to her, and, breaking the personality barrier, I wrap my arms around her cool palm.

"Come on, Lana. Who is he to forbid it? Calm down, I'm not going to fall for your asshole brother."

"You don't know him, Rinnah! If he wants to, he can even lock me in a room. We've been over this more than once."

Before, I'd assumed that the girl was exaggerating, telling lies about her brother, but after yesterday, I could see the whole picture. Matthew doesn't have even a fraction of the warmth of his sister. I don't know what made him like this: the money and the permissiveness, or his inner brokenness, but it's a fact that there are no boundaries for the guy.

"I know one thing: I'm not going to kneel down in front of him and betray you. After all, you have a father who can decide who you want to hang out with."

The friend smiles sadly, rewarding me by placing her palm on top of my hand.

"Promise you won't leave me, Marina! You're the only one who isn't afraid of him and doesn't spread her legs for him. If I lose you, too, I won't be able to survive it."

There is so much genuine pleading in the girl's voice that for a moment I think there really is nothing more important to her than having at least someone prefer her to her brother.

I gently take my hand away, feeling the closeness of the girl makes something stir inside me, and I tousle Lana's hair, as I always do when I want to cheer her up.