Confessions Of A Chatterbox (Confessions Series Book 2) Page 6

  “So what’s the plan?” I asked, trying to get out of my head and distract myself.

  Her lips lifted into a grin. “Now it’s time for you to meet my pussy.” I choked on the noodles I’d just shoved into my mouth, my gaze batting to her thighs and back up again. “Cat. My cat.” She rolled her eyes. “You’ve got such a dirty mind.”

  I snorted. “Yeah, because we all go around calling cats pussies for fun.”

  “Whatever.” She chuckled. “Fine okay, maybe it doesn’t sound right, but meh.”

  Shaking my head, I asked, “When’s your flight home?”

  “Thursday. Six days.” She glanced around the apartment. “I want to try and get most of the stuff packed tomorrow because the shipping company picks it up Monday.”

  Nodding, I reached for the remote and switched on the TV, not really caring what was on it but liking the background noise.

  “Once that’s done, we get girl time. Oh! And we can go visit JJ and Jeffery when we pick up Colonel Fourpaws on Tuesday.”

  “I have a class on Tuesday morning, so make it the afternoon.” I scooped up a mouthful of noodles. “Wait… Colonel, who?”

  “My pussy.” She made a noise in the back of her throat. “Were you listening to anything I just said?”

  I stared at the TV, watching as the creepy music started to play in a horror movie. “Yeah…sure.”

  Chapter 6

  Confessions #21: You can be anything you want, he said. In that case, I’ll be a cloud, I replied.

  Note to self: Never let Vi pack her stuff away…ever!

  I couldn’t deal with all the goddamn messiness. It was driving me insane. Why the hell could she not just fold a stupid T-shirt instead of scrunching it up? And don’t even get me started on packing supplies. She somehow thought she could just shove them all into boxes and they’d make the journey from here to New York—in one piece I might add. The woman was certifiable.

  It was a good job I was here to help.

  First stop was Staples. Every single thing we needed, all under one roof. The aisles called to me on a level unlike anything else, so while I’d sent Vi off to search for boxes, I wandered around and stared at all the pretty notebooks and stationery.

  Six boxes of Sharpie pens sat in front of me, but all the colors were mixed up, so I bent down and emptied them all, putting them into their rightful place. This store needed a lesson on organization. Surely they should have had that section during their induction to the workplace. I huffed out a breath, placed them back on the shelf, and stood, wiping the dust off my knees.

  “Excuse me?” My head shot up at a woman’s voice. “Could you tell me which one of these is better?”

  She held up two labeling machines. It was obvious she was a mom trying to name all her kid’s clothes. She was prepared, and there was nothing I liked more than a prepared person.

  “Sure!” I took both boxes off her, stared at the names, and nodded. “I thought so. This one is more expensive, but you get the labels included. Whereas this one you don’t.”

  “So I should go with the one with the labels in?”

  “Definitely not! It’s a ploy.” I popped my hand on my hip. “You can’t get these labels from here. They’re freaking hard to get. I know this because I bought this particular machine to label all my jars.” I shook my head. “Some companies just want to rip you off.” I held out the box that didn’t include the labels. “You want to get this one. At least you can buy the labels from here. They should be right next to it.” I started to walk toward the end of the aisle and spotted them above the other boxes of this machine. “Aha! Oh, they’re on buy two get one free too. Bargain!” I smiled wide at her.

  “Oh my goodness, thank you so much.”

  “You’re more than welcome.”

  She picked up six packets of labels and added them to her cart. I stared at her as she maneuvered to the end of the aisle and spun around to put the other machine on the shelf.

  “So you work here now?” Vi asked, and when I twirled around to face her, she had her brow raised and her lips quirked.

  “She wanted help.” I shrugged and straightened the label machines. “So I helped.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” She pointed at the dude next to her. “Johnny is going to get us the boxes, but I don’t know what size you want.”

  My gaze ran over Johnny, his white shirt making his bright-red tie skewed to one side even more prominent. Then I read the name on the piece of plastic covering his chest. “Johnny Buzz?”

  Vi pinched her lips together, obviously trying to hold in her laughter.

  “That’s me.” He smiled wide and ran his hand through his surfer-looking hair and down over his strong jaw. Dude could cut glass with that jaw it was so sharp.

  “Lead me to the boxes.” I pointed and ambled closer to them, following as he led us toward the back of the store.

  All it took was a couple of minutes for me to determine which boxes we’d need, and once I’d listed the six sizes off, I told him, “We’ll take four of each.” He nodded and reached up. “And three rolls of bubble wrap.” He grunted in reply. “Do you have any packaging labels?”

  “Hmmm.” He looked up at the ceiling. “We sure do.” He threw his thumb over his shoulder and spun around. I followed him, my stomach flipping as I walked past all the pretty stationery again. I didn’t know what it was about pens and notebooks, but every time I saw one, I had to buy it.

  “Do you do discounts for large orders?” I asked.

  “Depends how large,” he said, coming to a stop in front of a huge display of labels, this one much different to the small machine the woman was looking at. “I’m sure I could swing you a discount though.” He winked, but I was oblivious to his flirting. All I wanted was a discount.

  “Awesome! I’ll be using that then.” I started to grab some labels and handed them to him. “I think we’ll need a cart.”

  He grinned, one of those boyish ones that would probably have all the girls at high school flustered, but it didn’t work on me. I was practically married to the most handsomest gay man of all time.

  I continued down the aisle, picking up highlighters, Sharpie pens, packing tape among other things, and balancing them all in my arms as I halted at the end of the aisle.

  “Jeez, El. We don’t need this much stuff.”

  I raised my brow. “Yeah, we do.”

  “I could have got some boxes from Jeffery.”

  Johnny Buzz halted next to me with an empty cart. I placed everything inside, took hold of the handlebars and started down the next aisle, both of them following me.

  “Didn’t you say he owned a pet store?” I picked up a pack of drawing pencils and put them into the cart too.

  “Yeah, which means he has loads of boxes.”

  “Ugh.” I shook my head and turned back to Johnny. “She has no idea how packing works.” He watched me with amusement in his eyes as I stopped and planted my hands on my hips. “You should have seen what she was doing when I woke up this morning. She put breakables in a box with no wrapping! Does she want them all to break on the way to New York?” He opened his mouth to reply, but I didn’t give him the chance. “I don’t even think she cares if she breaks them.” I shook my head and whispered, “She just doesn’t care.”

  “El.” Vi stepped forward and placed her hand on my arm.

  She didn’t get it. She couldn’t possibly get it because she was the kind of woman who didn’t worry about anything. Whereas I was the complete opposite. I was a worrywart, the kind that couldn’t be blasted off with the freeze guns.

  I mumbled to myself as I walked away from them, throwing random crap into the cart to calm myself down. Once it was overflowing and I could only balance the bubble wrap on the top, I headed to the checkouts where Vi and Johnny Buzz were waiting.

  “I got the boxes,” he said, his lips turned up so much that he looked like The Joker. Freaking lunatic.

  I scraped my hand over my forehead and pushed my hair out of my
face. “Thanks a bunch.”

  We made quick work of checking out and organizing delivery for the morning. All the while, Vi was silent. It wasn’t until we were back outside and in the LA heat that she spoke.

  “Feel better now?”

  “Much.”

  “Want to go sit in a coffee shop so you can breathe in the fumes?”

  “Hell yes, I do.”

  My pencils were all lined up in a neat row on the desk, my notepad sitting next to them with my open laptop behind that. I’d checked the slideshow six times so far, and not once was there a problem. Most probably because Chad hadn’t messed with it this time.

  I hadn’t heard from him since he dropped us off at the airport, and it wasn’t like I hadn’t tried to call. Maybe we both just needed a little time to adjust to this new life we were trial-ing. Because that’s what this was, right? A trial? So why did it feel like we’d broken up when we weren’t even properly together in the first place?

  The door opening snapped me from my thoughts, and several students walked in, most of them moving toward the back rows. I smiled at that. It was exactly what I used to do, especially when I was in Professor Henry’s class. He was a spitter, and god help those who didn’t turn up early because they’d have a mouth shower from him. I shivered at the thought and memories. I was late to his class once, and I soon learned my lesson.

  I waited until five minutes past the hour to close the door, and when I did and moved over to my laptop to swipe my finger over the mouse, everyone was still talking. It was what I’d expected, but when I said, “Good morning,” and they carried on, I had a second of doubt where I didn’t think I could do this. Confident-El had left the building, and Woe-Is-Me-El was firmly in her place.

  Shit on a stick.

  I worried my bottom lip, my gaze roving around the room and taking in the thirty-plus students. This was the first of four classes I’d be teaching each week. Each class would have different students, so I’d be able to repeat Monday’s class throughout the week. By Thursday, I’d have the lecture down pat.

  I’d practiced this lecture over and over again...in the mirror. It was scary at the time because I’d just woken up and my reflection wasn’t pretty in the slightest. Wild hair and bags under my eyes didn’t reflect all these perfect eighteen to twenty-two-year-old college students. I could categorically say that it didn’t compare one bit to standing here in front of everyone.

  “So then I said…” I cleared my throat and tried my best to make my voice carry across the room. “You want to put your dick where?”

  Silence.

  You could hear a pin drop in the room, and I tried so goddamn hard to keep a straight face at the open mouths and wide eyes. I nodded to myself and paced in front of the first row of chairs where one person sat, probably trying to protect themselves in case I was a spitter. It was her lucky day because I liked to keep my bodily fluid inside my body and not share...unless it was with a super-hot guy.

  “Note to self: say dick if you want the room’s attention.” I looked up to the ceiling as if I was mentally making the note, which I kind of was. “Awesome! So... Shall we start?”

  There were a few shrugs and one or two agreeing murmurs, so I took that as my cue to commence.

  “Welcome to Freelance Business 101. This semester you’ll be learning everything you need to know to start a freelance online business.” I gripped my hands behind my back, channeling Professor Henry. It seemed to work for him back when I took his class because all the students paid attention to him. I was aware that I was a twenty-six-year-old woman imitating a sixty-odd-year-old dude with fluffy white hair, but hey, whatever worked.

  “You’ll see the class schedule on your worksheets.” I closed my eyes briefly, smiling to myself. I was totally bossing this right now. “I expect all assignments to be handed in on time. If not, I will knock marks off. Unless…” I stared at all the students, stopping on one a few rows up who was smirking at me. “Unless there’s some kind of valid excuse.”

  “Does a frat party count as an excuse?” Smirker-Dude asked.

  “It depends,” I answered, walking closer to him as I looked like I was debating it. “Was there tequila at this party?”

  He shrugged. “There could be tequila at this party. It is Monday, so we could swing that.”

  “Then no. Because tequila isn’t just for Mondays.” I pointed at him and narrowed my eyes. “Tequila is for every day of the week. That’s the first thing you need to learn.” I paused. “You should probably write that down.”

  He winked and wrote something on the paper in front of him. “Noted.”

  I shook my head and opened my mouth, about to say something else when the girl’s hand in the front row shot into the air.

  “Yes?”

  “Where are the worksheets?”

  Ah shit.

  I smacked my palm off my forehead and scrambled over to my desk. “Here.” I handed them to her and let her pass them around. Once they all had the sheet in front of them, I cleared my throat. “Each week will have a topic, so read up on that topic the week before because we’ll be having discussions in class followed by an assignment. Next week’s topic is branding.”

  I moved over to my laptop and clicked on the trackpad to bring up the second of three slides. The first slide had my name on, and I realized I hadn’t even told them who I was, so I went back to slide one.

  “I’m Ella Magpie, but you can call me Ella or El. Never, not once, call me Mags, Magpie, Maggie or Bird. Got it?” I raised a brow and made sure to make eye contact with each student. I clicked on the second slide. “As I was saying, in the online portal, I’ve put together a document for each week. In the document, you’ll find resources you can access and the topics in class discussions. Everything you will need for each lecture will be online. I’ll know if you haven’t accessed it.” I paused to let that sink in.

  “I get what it’s like to be a college student. I was one just a few years ago, and I wanted to do bare minimum work so I could pass the class and get my ass to the closest party I could. But let me tell you something.” I leaned my ass on the edge of the desk and was kind of amazed that they were all paying attention to me.

  “Business now is so different from how it was even five years ago. That class you’re taking on stock markets? The one you’re doing about gaining new clients by meeting them face-to-face? It’s not as relevant now as it was back then. Times have changed.” I tilted my head to the side. “How many of you have been scrolling through social media, saw an ad, clicked on it, and bought a product right then and there?”

  All hands went up, and a few murmurs echoed.

  “Thought so. Online businesses are where the money is at. I’m not going to sit here and tell you that building a business is easy. I’m not going to tell you that it’s all about loving what you do either. That is part of it, but you know what matters the most? The bottom line. And let me tell you, if you start an online business and listen and learn what this class will teach you, you’re going to have a huge advantage to everyone else who’s trying to get off the ground. And it will show.”

  I glanced up at the clock over the whiteboard, noting that it was ten minutes until the end of the class. “So with that said, read up on the next topic, and come prepared next week.” I stood. “You can leave early today.”

  There was a second where they all just sat there and then they seemed to stand at once and stampede out of the class, all apart from the blond dude who waltzed over to me as I packed my own things away.

  “So, El.”

  I turned to face him as I pushed my laptop into its case.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’ll make sure I have that tequila at tonight’s frat party. I’m Omega-Phi…in case you were wondering.” He shot me a wink, pushed his huge hand through his hair, and spun around, swaggering out of the class.

  Why did frat guys always think they were hotter than they actually were?

  Chapter 7

&nb
sp; Confession #40: Word pronunciation is poop. Who the hell needs the G in cardigan, anyway?

  What did respectable ladies do on a Monday after bossing their first day at their new job?

  Yep. You got that right. Partaaay!

  My makeup was slapped on my face in several layers, my hair curled and poofed to ergonomic heights, and my little black dress was fitted snuggly to my body. Yes, snuggly. I was ready to party the night away after teaching my first lecture. Ready to get so drunk I didn’t even know what my name was.

  So why the hell was I sitting on the arm of this sofa listening to Vi and Axel as they FaceTimed? I had to hold the throw-up down several times as they spoke in that lovey-dovey tone. My vagina was over here as dry as the Sahara desert, and they were flaunting it for all to see. It didn’t matter how many times I photoshopped men’s abs and tattoos, practically drooling over my keyboard when a client sent me an exclusive image of what had to be a real-life god, it was never the same as the real thing.

  I needed a lover—STAT.

  Did I just say lover? Ack. I felt like a fifty-year-old woman when I used that word. Lover. Loooover. Ew-ack.

  I frowned over at Vi as she brought her cell closer to her face and blew a kiss. “Are you done yet?” I huffed out a breath, stood, and placed my hands on my hips. “Vi? Come on! All the good booze is gonna be gone.”

  Vi turned around to face me, her brow raised. “A bar won’t run out of alcohol, El.” She moved her attention back to her cell, asking, “What?” She shifted closer as I took two steps toward her and landed behind the sofa so my face was in view.

  Axel’s gaze met mine, and I threw him a sickly sweet smile. “Can Vi please come out and play?”

  “I—”

  I rolled my eyes and plucked the cell out of Vi’s hands, cutting Axel off as I said, “We’re going to get drunk now. Sayonara, Barbara.” Ending the call, I stood to my full height and picked my clutch bag up off the sofa as I walked toward the door.