Chapter 2 First Meeting

• Meet Enrique Blackburn
• Birth date: 1 April
• Star sign: Aries
• Age: 23
• Hair color: Blonde
• Eye color: Heterochromia (blue and hazel)
• Favorite color: Red
• Height: 189 cm
• Warning!! There’s a small scene describing his mother’s murder that might be disturbing to sensitive readers!
• Date = 18 March
• Place = San Francisco (Enrique’s home)
• POV - Enrique Blackburn
• With an irritated flick of my hand, I close the laptop on the coffee table while simultaneously getting up from the brown leather sofa. The large windows overlook the ocean, but I don’t even take in the scenery, my mind on the freaking girl in my shower – that I wouldn’t mind joining … actually!
• Thud! Thud!
• The side of my fist collides with the glass, but not hard enough to break it, just a motion to try and calm myself down a little. What the hell did I get myself into?
• I’ve just met my so-called girlfriend and she’s already fucking with my mind and my life. That’s why I never date for too long – women are just too complicated and irrational. I would even go as far as saying that they are irritating all the time, except maybe when you’re fucking them. Well, some can even be irritating in that situation.
• And now I have a girl … eh two girls living with me in my house – a place where no female even stepped over the threshold – except for Mel and Kiara that is. Oh, and Aunt Betty, the lady that cleans up sometimes.
• I try to rather think about the positive parts of this whole fucked-up idea – I’m helping a little girl to get better and I’m going to get the leading role I want. But at what price?
• I think about the contract, and how it’s going to change my life as well as my image forever - an image I’ve been creating for years. Can I really handle this? Or is the payment going to be just too much for me to bear?
• Am I willing to pay with my sanity for my career? I know I’m not as broken as Jackson, but I’m still badly damaged. Seeing your mother’s mutilated body would scar any normal kid and, like millions of times before, I wish I could burn that night from my mind, but instead, I remember it like it was yesterday.
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• We stumbled onto the porch steps, laughing and joking like usual, each of us holding a pizza box.
• “Shush!” Mel held her finger up to her lips. “Mom’s car is here and we’re already grounded.” We were nearly always grounded.
• Nevertheless, we’ve all slipped out to go skateboarding and get some food, thinking mom would be at the tennis club till late like usual. Ug, we thought we were definitely busted.
• Logan opened the door extra quietly, peeking his head inside, turning to look in all directions before opening it all the way. I rushed past him, trying to get to my room before mom can appear from wherever. But then Jackson froze right in front of me and the box in his hands fell to the floor. I bumped into his back, causing my pizza to slam against his body, fumbling the container.
• “What the hell?” I softly grumbled so as not to alert our arrival. The next moment my pizza also landed on the floor and Jackson ran towards the closest hollow container to empty his stomach contents into it. Ilkay’s hand came to rest on my shoulder, while Logan grabbed my arm but neither of them seemed to even be aware of their actions. No, we were all staring, fixed on the scene before us. The house was so quiet I swear you could hear the proverbial pin drop.
• The whole room was a mess like you would see on TV when some crook thrashed a place looking for stuff. Yep, it looked exactly like that. Furniture was strewn around, broken glass everywhere, and a few dark red spots on the white tiles. A bloody trail, as if someone was dragged, lead down the hall to the kitchen.
• This is what caused Jackson to throw up – he unknowingly stepped into one of the wine-red puddles. He sat on the floor, removing his bloody sneakers with a frenzy of shaken movements.
• One blue high-heeled shoe looked lost and out of place in the middle of the corridor. Ilkay told us to stay put, but I followed him with Jackson. Logan grabbed onto our pale sister while I tread on the heels of my older brother. I’ve never listened to Ilkay and I wasn’t about to start then. Jackson never listened to anybody.
• I heard Ilkay’s gasp first, then my eyes focused, and lastly my brain took in exactly what it was looking at. The walls and cupboards, even the ceiling, were sprayed with blood, the color ranging between crimson and burgundy. A metallic stench mixed with the smell of mom’s bolognese sauce, which was spilled all over the kitchen table. I tried not to retch at the smell. But it’s forever burned into my senses … even up to today, I’ve never eaten Spaghetti Bolognese again.
• My eyes slowly traveled down the bloodstained counters towards the floor where they settled on the huge thick pool of blood. My mother’s naked pale-yellowish body was stretched out in a prone position in the center of the pool.
• I immediately knew she was dead and I fell forward onto my knees while biting my fist. I closed my eyes, hoping this was not real.
• The only thing that went through my mind was the argument we had just that morning. She grounded us and the last words I ever shouted to her was to leave me alone.
• ‘I love you!’ - her very last words to me – words that would haunt me forever.
• “Enrique!” Ilkay shouted at me, getting me out of my trans. I noticed Jackson holding my mom’s hand, luckily hiding most of her body from my view – I can’t face her. His socks were drenched in her blood, but he didn’t seem to care and he didn’t throw up, his emotionless face just staring at our mom’s corpse.
• I looked down, and only then did I grasp that my hand was covered with blood. I wiped it against my jeans and in my mind the stains were shouting out regret, to remind me that all of this was my fault. I’m the one that suggested we sneak out because I was still mad at our mother. If we stayed in the house she would not be dead. We could have saved her.
• “Let’s go.” Ilkay grabbed my arm and lead us outside where Mel and Logan were waiting.
• “Where’s mom?” Logan asked, but I could not answer him.
• “She’s dead,” Jackson said harshly, “So is Dobby.” He started hitting his fist into a wall. I haven’t seen our husky’s body. Luckily I didn’t. Poor Dobby must have tried to protect mom. Logan clung even harder onto my sister, both of them ghostly pale.
• I couldn’t hold it in anymore and vomited in the garden. Not getting hold of our father, Ilkay phoned Uncle John and he took us to his house after the cops and ambulances arrived.
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• That night I had my first nightmare, dreams that I would get used to over the years. Dreams about mom (sometimes she blames me, sometimes she begs me to save her), dad (blaming me), and even Dobby (his eyes begging me to do something).
• It’s then that I realized that I don’t deserve to be loved. So I closed my heart and put up my shields. I became a robot with a fake life. I’ve been playing my part so well that not even my family truly knows the real me anymore. I’m not even sure I myself know the original version of Enrique Blackburn at this stage … I’ve been acting fake for so long, I’m starting to believe it.
• Little beads of sweat trickle down my face and I wipe them away with my hand. Now is not the time to dwell on this, I have to figure this contract shit out first - this new path I was forced onto.
• The thing is, my bad-boy, fuck-them-and-leave-them persona is the biggest part of my shield, the image I’m hiding behind as not to face my fears. I’ve deeply buried my heart and feelings and poured concrete over it, vowing to keep it covered. I don’t deserve to ever hear the words ‘I love you’ and I can’t say them out loud.
• And I’ve done a pretty good job of showing the whole world through my actions that I don’t have a heart, that I don’t feel a fuck. And I pretty much want to keep it that way.
• But now, because of this piece of paper that we’re going to sign, I’m forced to act the opposite of what I’ve always done, I have to act in love. So I’m scared that people are going to start digging where they’re not supposed to and I can’t have that. And is it even possible to act on an act? To act the opposite of what I’ve been acting all along. Just thinking about it makes my head hurt. Fuck!
• The moment she walked through the door I knew she was going to be trouble – and not just with a capital T – all CAPITAL letters. Not only was she probably the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen, but her whole endeavor screamed loudly out in my mind.
• I was not expecting her to look like that … I mean, we’ve Skyped once but her hair was hidden under a towel and her face was covered in some kind of mask. I wasn’t attracted to her at all and that was one of the reasons I was prepared to offer her the contract. And here she shows up, looking like a freaking dainty fairy in probably the sexiest outfit ever. Okay, it’s only jeans, a short top, and a jacket, but nonetheless. I instantly needed to shift my stance a little due to the sudden tightness of my pants.
• Aria – I say the name in my head a few times. I mean, I should fix it in my mind, don’t want to have a forget-her-name slip in public.
• Soft laughter echoes through the house and bumps from wall to wall, like a blind stranger looking for the right path, and then it ghosts through me, leaving a little drop of warmth behind in my chest. I sneak towards the half-open door like a thief in the night, not wanting to intrude and stop the sunny sounds. For some unknown reason, it fills a void inside me I didn’t even know existed.
• I lean against the doorway, just staring at the little girl on the bed. A soft light illuminates the newly decorated room with a color scheme of soft pinks and greens - pink being Leyla’s favorite color. Mel painted a huge mural of a realistic fairy-tale forest scene, complete with a unicorn, fairies, and other cute creatures on one wall. I must admit, it turned out pretty awesome and Leyla flipped when she saw it.
• “Pascal is my favorite.” It takes me a while to realize she stopped laughing and is in fact talking to me. She points at the built-in flatscreen where a green chameleon is pulling funny faces. Then she pats the bed with her hand and I sit down.
• “I’m glad my sister found you, Enrique Blackburn,” she gives me a little smile and I swear that’s what an angel must look like.
• “Now she can be happy for once. She’s been crying a LOT.” For some reason, I don’t like the idea of Aria being sad.
• A little ungirly snort draws my attention and Leyla’s concentrating on the television again.
• A white horse fights with a guy over some bag and the horse’s expressions are just hilarious. Leyla giggles again and the sound puts a smile on my face.
• “I like the horse,” I say, feeling awkward next to this child.
• She looks at me pouting her mouth.
• “Yeah, you would. His name is Maximus. He’s like you - acts tough, but is a real softy underneath.”
• I wonder for a moment if she can see into the shadows of my soul, but before I can ask, Aria appears with towel-dry hair in super-short red pants and a black t-shirt and I’ve never seen anything so sexy in my life. Scratch the previous outfit, this one is now number one in my books. This girl is fucking beautiful, and that’s a problem … for me.
• Her plump lips part and I have to hold myself back not to grab her to get a little taste of that perfect mouth. I may not have a heart, but I am still a man.
• “Tangled again?” she asks her sister lovingly, oblivious of my inappropriate thoughts, and receives a big smile as her answer.