"It's hard to work with loose hair, I'm telling you," Lissa insisted, energetically waving her hands in different directions, unintentionally bringing back memories of yesterday — the teacher, the spilled tea. Lost in my thoughts, far from reality, I sat staring at a point somewhere behind her.
"Hey." My new colleague snapped her fingers right in front of my nose. "Hello, Lily! Want me to do your hair?"
"Sure," I agreed, nodding in slight surprise.
The girl sighed heavily, stretching her hands, then turned me around in the swivel chair to face the mirror. She grabbed everything she needed: a comb, a brush, and a bunch of hair ties. It was Saturday — my first day at work.
Loud, upbeat music drifted up from downstairs — apparently someone was celebrating a birthday, since the hall had been booked. The occasional shouts of "Happy birthday, Nick!" made it clear that some guy named Nick was the lucky one today. I sighed quietly as two girls who had just arrived wandered between the shelves, admiring the designs.
"What would you recommend?" one of them approached me, looking hopeful. She probably couldn't decide, and I understood her perfectly. A tattoo is something that stays with you for life — you have to choose carefully. And ideally, something that will bring only happiness and harmony later on.
"What are you looking for?" I asked, trying at least to understand my client's preferences.
"Something beautiful… small, and not too dark," the girl said thoughtfully, like an artist describing a landscape she deeply felt, then sighed.
"Could you please hand me a sheet of paper and a pencil? They're on the table," I asked with a slight smile. It was a bit awkward to reach myself — Lissa was still working on my hair. Nodding in understanding, the girl soon handed me what I'd asked for. A moment later, I began sketching smooth lines with enthusiasm, transferring the image she described onto paper. From her excited expression, I realized it was turning out pretty well.
When I finished, I set the pencil down on the vanity table and looked over the "masterpiece." A half-bare girl gazed back at me from the large white sheet, her arms crossed around her neck, her right thumb lightly touching her soft lips. Her hair was carefully braided into a long plait, loose chestnut strands falling gently over her face. A flower crown rested on her head, complementing the hairstyle perfectly.
"Do you like it?" I asked, showing the sheet to the girl.
"I love it," she almost gasped in admiration. "It's exactly what I want."
"Well done," Lissa patted my shoulder approvingly, and her praise felt incredibly pleasant. Moments like that made you realize you were truly good at what you were doing.
Securing the hairstyle with one last hair tie, my colleague sighed in relief, signaling she was done. I usually didn't like braids, but these… Lissa really was a master. Unusual fishtail-like braids decorated my head, while thin front strands — like those of the girl I had drawn — fell loosely over my face, making the hairstyle look more unique.
"Looks amazing, Lissa," I thanked her, carefully examining myself in the mirror. Putting on my square glasses, I took my seat at the workstation.
The girl who had come for the tattoo clutched my sketch nervously, looking at me with slight fear, but I reassured her that it wouldn't be too painful — quite tolerable. I also mentioned that the design would look best on one of her shoulder blades. She agreed, exposing her shoulder, and I got to work.
Clenching her teeth like a soldier, the client sat through the entire process without making a single sound. Anyone could've admired her endurance — even me. Knowing my own pain tolerance, I was sure I'd be screaming across the whole club by now. Her friend, who had come along for support, watched both her and my careful work, reassuring her that everything looked great.
I felt pure enjoyment — real enjoyment — watching the client smile as she admired my finished work. I had never experienced anything like that before.
Paul — the club's bartender and the guy who had first spoken to me — handed me a glass filled with some yellow liquid. At first, I frowned, hesitant to accept it, since I knew I didn't have the best relationship with alcohol, but he assured me it was just orange juice.
"Good job, Lily," Paul praised me, smiling meaningfully at the departing client. God, it felt like I'd heard more praise today than in all seventeen years of my gloomy life combined. I was genuinely happy. Inside and out.
I liked this place. I really did.
Meanwhile, the cheerful, energetic music from the first floor was so loud that its steady rhythm seemed to echo somewhere deep inside my stomach. I went downstairs, where a large crowd was already dancing wildly.
A spotlight suddenly flashed in my face, making me squint for a moment. I spotted Paul skillfully juggling bottles of different kinds of alcohol. He was working alone today, since Tony — the other bartender and Lissa's boyfriend — had taken the day off due to family matters. And Mr. Smoke believed that family came first, so he let him go without hesitation. I slowly took a seat at the bar.
"Good day today," a fairly drunk guy sitting next to me said.
"I guess."
"A good, wonderful day… but she never appeared," he confessed with a heavy sigh. At that moment, I realized I was about to hear a tragic love story, because the words "but she never appeared" were always the beginning of something like that. Later, it turned out it was Nick — the one celebrating his birthday.
After listening to my new acquaintance's complaints for quite a while, I actually started to feel sorry for him, realizing how many problems he seemed to have. He kept ordering martinis from Paul, sighing heavily, occasionally asking me something. Strangely enough, in such a short time, he almost started to feel familiar to me, with all his little troubles.
"A shot for my friend too, bartender," Nick slurred, but Paul still managed to understand him. It was part of his job — understanding drunk customers and taking their orders.
"Juice," I mouthed silently, and Connor — Paul's last name — nodded knowingly and started mixing another drink.
"Chriiiis!" Nick suddenly shouted happily at someone approaching, whom I hadn't really noticed at first. "Meet my new friend…"
"Lil—" I tried to finish for him, realizing he had absolutely no idea what my name was, but I stopped mid-word in surprise. Oh, you've got to be kidding me!
"Stryker."
That painfully familiar, ironic tone.
"So… you two know each other?" Nick looked back and forth between Collins and me, raising his eyebrows in confusion.
"More than that," the teacher confirmed with a slight smirk. "Come on, Lily, I'll steal you away from this partying birthday boy for a bit."
"I'm thirty! I have the right!" Nick shouted after us, waving his index finger dramatically. "Take her — she's probably already tired of me."
Thirty? He didn't look older than twenty. I wondered if all of Collins's friends looked that young. What on earth were they taking to have that effect?
Suddenly pulling me closer, the teacher drew me into a slow, effortless dance. He took my hand, intertwining our fingers, making it hard to breathe. I placed my other hand on his shoulder, gently swaying my hips as our bodies moved slowly to the music.
"What are you doing here, Stryker?" he suddenly dipped me slightly, studying my chocolate-colored eyes. "Decided to repeat Wednesday?"
"I work here, actually, Mr. Collins."
The biologist raised his eyebrows in surprise, but soon his expression returned to that familiar indifference.
"You can call me by my first name. We're not at school, after all," he said seriously. "And this isn't even tutoring."
"Alright," I agreed quickly. "Then I want to ask something. Is that your… girlfriend by the bar, staring at us like that?"
"Dora," he sighed, glancing briefly in her direction. "Ex."
"She dumped you?" I smirked.
"Actually, I dumped her."
"Terrible," I shook my head reproachfully, looking away.
"Maybe," he agreed.
Abruptly have turned me around, Collins wrapped his arm around my waist, hidden by my thick knit sweater, and kept moving more casually. For some reason, I smiled with anticipation, completely losing myself in our dance. When I turned back, I froze for a moment. His palm slid across my cheek, his thumb tracing the outline of my lips, slowly and so effortlessly. It seemed at that moment my heart stopped, ceased beating.
The next moment, his lips covered mine, drawing them into a tender and oh-so-sweet kiss. I involuntarily wrapped my arms around his neck, allowing his tongue to penetrate. The world around me momentarily disappeared, leaving only the two of us. Holding me by the waist, pressing me tighter, Collins switched to a more powerful and assertive kiss, accidentally biting my lip, and then I came to my senses.
It felt as if someone had suddenly dumped a bucket of ice-cold water over my head. Startled, I jumped away from the teacher and quickly disappeared into the crowd of moving bodies. I ran without looking back, rushed up to the second floor, and soon found myself in the locker room. Breathing heavily, I slowly slid down the wall, clutching my head.
What had I just done? What the hell was that? Saying I was shocked would be an understatement.
"Lily," Lissa entered the locker room, finishing a phone call. "Hey, did something happen?"
I looked up at her, confused, wanting to say something, but I couldn't catch my breath.
"Lily, I'm serious," Lissa repeated, sitting down beside me. "What happened?"
"I… did something," I nervously bit my lip, suddenly tasting metal on my tongue. Pulling my knees close, I wrapped my arms tightly around them, trying to calm the sudden trembling.
"Did you kill someone?" Lissa's guess made me give a faint, fleeting smile.
"Worse. I kissed him," I admitted, raising my eyes to her. "I kissed my teacher."
The room filled with my colleague's genuine laughter. She wrapped her arms around me, holding me close, looking at me like I was a careless child.
"Oh, come on," she waved her hand dismissively. "Who hasn't had something with a teacher? For me, it was the history teacher. A young guy — he came to our class in eleventh grade. Half the girls in school had a crush on him. And in the end, he started dating me. Though that love story didn't last long. But that's not the point."
I found myself smiling as I listened to her short story. I realized that maybe what had happened today wasn't so terrible after all. Still, there was an uneasy feeling in my chest.
"So, Lily, stop overthinking it," Lissa advised. "Come on, let's get back to work."
I got to my feet with her but regretfully told her I wouldn't be able to work anymore today. Lissa nodded in understanding and, reminding me once again not to overthink things, left the room, leaving me completely alone.
I felt awful. Truly awful.