Page 15 of Stroked by (Stroked)
She laughs and nods her head. “Damn, you really are superstitious. Glad I’m not an athlete, would hate to look like a clucking idiot in my own home.”
“You learn to live with it.”
Her cheeks slightly blush, and she glows from our joking. There is the smallest dimple that peeks through on her left cheek, barely making a showing, but when it does, it’s sexy as fuck.
“What’s good on the menu—?” she starts to ask right before a giant Gucci crocodile skin bag is dropped on the table.
“Ugh, why is this world crowded with sweaty, fried-food loving masturbators? Some man eating a sausage and egg McMuffin chased after me on the streets while holding his crotch, manipulating his balls to represent the ‘OJ’ he wanted to offer me. It was vile. Has this country been so washed out by crude humor that we can’t show a touch of self-respect while eating breakfast? We have to go around, clutching our crotches, offering them up to people just to get a little bit of attention?” Bellini shakes her head and huffs out a disapproving sound. “I’m barely hungry after seeing that man drool all over the nooks and crannies of the over-processed gluten—”
Throwing the menu up to block her face from Paisley, she hisses at me while pointing, “What isshedoing here?”
Lowering the menu so Paisley doesn’t feel left out, I say, “Paisley is here because she is our assistant, and we have a lot to talk about.”
“What do you possibly have to say to her?” Bellini turns to Paisley, looks her up and down in a sneer full of distaste and says, “Are you going to be serving us? Taking our order? I don’t want anything from here. Run across the street to Starbucks and get me a venti iced skinny hazelnut macchiato, sugar-free syrup, extra shot, only seven cubes of ice, and for Christ’s sake, no whip, with a side of two orange Tic-Tacs. Go ahead, scurry along.” Bellini runs her finger across the table, indicating for Paisley to leave. “Oh, might as well stock up on Tic Tacs, because I can down at least three at a time.”
She says that as if sucking on three Tic Tacs is like eating five western bacon cheeseburgers from Carl’s Jr. in one sitting.
Paisley, confused and a little disoriented pushes back from the table and grabs her purse. Before she can leave, I say, “Don’t go, Paisley. Please sit down.” I turn to Bellini and try not to blast my fingers through her eye sockets. “Get a drink here. We have things to discuss.”
Like a child throwing a temper tantrum, Bellini stomps her foot, crosses her arms over her chest, and pouts. “What could possibly be so important that Mauve over here can’t get me my venti, seven-cubed, iced, skinny, sugar-free syrup, extra shot, no-whip hazelnut macchiato and two orange Tic Tacs?”
Testing my patience, I say, “For one, she is not here to serve you, she’s supposed to help with our travel arrangements, run media interception, schedule our days, and assist with our jobs, not our needs. And two, trials are coming up in two weeks, and we need to make sure we are set for those.”
“Trials?” Bellini looks at me confused. “What trials? If it’s some kind of Botox trial, I will not partake in it. My features are flawless, why mess with perfection?”
Before I can answer, Paisley says, “I think he’s talking about the Olympic Swimming Trials.”
Bellini’s head snaps in Paisley’s direction, a look of pure death on her face. “No one asked for your interjection, you stupid piece of fabric.” Bellini then proceeds to shut Paisley’s menu and say, “You’re not eating here. You can feast on one of the Tic Tacs I spit out after sucking on it for a minute.”
“That’s enough,” I say, raising my voice and hitting my hand on the table. People surrounding us look in our direction but I don’t care. I don’t put up with Bellini’s crap . . . ever.
Like the drama queen she is, Bellini waves her hand in front of her face as she looks around. “Reese, people are staring.”
I lean forward and talk through my teeth. “Then I suggest you start acting like a normal human being, and not some spoiled little debutante who thinks she’s better than everyone. Newsflash, Bellini. Your real name is Agatha and your dad is only rich because a pig humped him. Believe me, you are in no way better than most of the people in this damn restaurant.”
“How dare you!” she hisses, possibly pissed from bringing up her real name. Her lip trembles, her eyes start to glaze over, and I immediately prepare for what’s next.
Have you ever seen Kim Kardashian cry? Her face squishes together, her mouth thins and widens, and you’re not quite sure how it’s possible for one person to morph their entire face into another person within a blink of an eye, but it happens.
That’s what Bellini looks like when she cries.
Right before us, her face transforms into a squished-up version of Bellini, and she starts to cry, large crocodile tears. “You’re being so mean to me, after I’ve had such a stressful and disastrous morning. I didn’t want to bring it up, but I just can’t hold it in anymore.” I can barely understand her as she continues to cry and talk at the same time. Paisley hands her a napkin that surprisingly Bellini takes. “I’ve been working day and night over a new design for Pope Francis, a cassock with glitter-threaded rickrack trim, and a cadmium-red pigmented rope girdle, but do you think they sell cadmium-red pigmented rope girdles on ‘dress your priest dot com’? No! I spent precious minutes on the phone with those bible-busting witchcraft hunters telling me I had to dye the rope myself. ME! Dye something? Are they insane? It’s such a nightmare.” She gets up from her seat, steps toward me and sits on my lap, burying her head in my neck. “Oh Reese, I don’t know what to do. This is such a disaster.”
I glance over at Paisley who is looking down at her lap, biting her lip from the smile threatening to take over. She looks so fucking adorable, that all I want to do is toss the wafer sitting on my lap to the side, clear the table, and nibble on Paisley’s luscious lip myself.
But that’s not the case. Instead, I inwardly roll my eyes, buckle down to my commitment, and pat Bellini on the back, trying not to catch the bitch virus she emanates on a daily basis. Her cheek rubs against my neck and her hand grips my shirt, clinging on for dear life.
“I’m so upset,” she cries out.
“Maybe I should leave,” Paisley says, a smile still evident on her face.
“Don’t,” I say rather sternly, more out of self-preservation than anything. She listens and straightens herself in her seat. Needing to take care of the leech, I say, “Bellini, I’m sorry about your misfortunes this morning.” It pains me to be nice to her. “Maybe we can start this brunch over again, start off on the right foot. How does that sound?”
Her wet and snotty nose rubs against my neck, and I refrain from standing up quick enough that she falls to her back on the table like a flipped turtle.
“I think that’s a good idea,” she says between cries.
“Good. Then you should get up and sit back in your seat. We don’t want to cause another scene, do we?” God, this is like parenting a toddler.
