Deception Exposed

The first thing I see when I wake up is my mother sitting on my vanity chair right beside my bed, resting her head on my side. I try to sit up slowly so as to not wake her but it is no use. She stirs and wakes up suddenly to stare at me in disbelief.

"Oh my goodness, you are finally awake."

She wraps her arms around me in a hug and begins to cry. My bedroom door instantly opens as I look up to see my father hurriedly walk over to the other side of my bed.

"We thought you would be asleep forever or worse."

"What happened to me," I ask, my voice hoarse.

'Everything is such a blur. The last thing I remember is walking up the grand staircase to meet the guy I am supposed to get married to.'

"You do not remember anything do you," my mother ask with concern.

"No, I do not."

My thoughts are interrupted as Alexander walks into my bedroom, carrying what looks like a huge assortment of flower bouquets in his arms.

"I got these for her to apologize about earlier. How is she doing," he says laying the flowers on top of my vanity.

"She is okay but does not remember much right now. Maybe she will now that you are here."

I look up into Alexander's eyes and it is this time that my memory comes back to me as I gasp for air.

"I remember now. I was coming upstairs to my room to meet the guy I am supposed to get married to and was surprised to find you in my room. You said you are my future husband and I must have blacked out right after."

"Do you really not like me that much that you would faint at the news of us getting married?"

I look up at his face to see it is saddened with grief at my words. My heart aches for his sudden pain and I find myself wanting to fix it right away but I cannot. I forget his pain as anger rushes to me at the realization that he has known about us this whole time and did not say a word to me.

'Why would he do this to me? Why act like we were nothing to one another when we are supposed to be each other's everything for the rest of our lives?'

"It is not that I do not like you but I am shocked that it is you I have been waiting to meet for some time now." I slowly get up off the bed and shake my head as I try to control the anger and rage building in me.

"Can Alexander and I speak alone," I ask through gritted teeth.

My voice must have given my feelings away because my mom puts my vanity chair back before my dad and her immediately get up to hurry out the door before closing it behind them. I walk over to sit on my vanity chair and start brushing my hair. Alexander follows to stand right behind me. He is so close that I can almost touch him.

"What did you want to talk about?"

"Why did you not tell me when we first met? All this time I have been convincing myself that I cannot have you because I am supposed to get married for the good of the kingdom and now I find out that you are actually the one I am marrying."

"Is it not a good thing? Now you do not have to keep convincing yourself to stay away from me."

"Seriously? You want to joke about it right now?"

"No, I am sorry I did not tell you though. Your parents and I decided to keep it a secret until we could officially meet during your ball tonight. It would give us plenty of time to get to know one another."

I stop brushing my hair and slam my hairbrush on the vanity counter. Glaring, I turn to face Alexander with rage.

"Why now, why wait to tell me now!?!"

"I figured it was better to tell you now rather than the day before our wedding," he says smirking.

I groan in response.

'Why is he trying to be funny? This is not a laughing matter at all. Does he even care about my feelings at all? Well, if he is not going to be serious about me then I will just forget about him and my feelings.'

"I guess you are right. It still does not change anything at all for me."

His face contorted in confusion at me, "what do you mean exactly?"

"I mean we might have to get married but I still have a say in all of this and I am saying no."

I look down to check what I am wearing and notice someone must have changed me while I was blacked out because I am wearing shorts and a tank top instead of my big ballgown. Satisfied with my outfit, I get up from my vanity and move toward the door leading to my other home.

"You may want to be forced to get married but I do not. I would rather find love than be forced to marry someone that I do not. Now if you will excuse me, I have a party that I need to attend."

The sudden shocked expression on his face made me laugh as I went through the door to my other home.

* * * *

When I am back in the attic, I take a deep breath trying to calm my nerves down.

'Telling Alexander that I do not care for him was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. Unfortunately it had to be because he lied to me. He needs to know what he did was wrong and that he cannot just use me whenever he feels like it. How is this happening to me? Maybe I should just be alone, I have been fine so far. Why does Alexander have to be the guy? Why does he have to be the one I marry? Why did I actually fall for him? On some level, I wish I would have never found this door, maybe then I would not feel so crushed or broken hearted right now.'

I make my way downstairs trying to get rid of my negative thoughts. I glance up at the clock on the wall which reads eight o'clock and realize I am already late for Adam's party. I grab my keys off the kitchen counter and run out to my car to speed my way to Adam's house. Lauren is the one to greet me at the door when I arrive.

"I was starting to worry about whether you were coming or not."

"Sorry, I am here now though. Let us get our party on."

Smiling, she grabs my arm and leads me inside. Josh, Stephanie, Adam, Daniel, and Michelle are already on the dance floor showing their moves off when I walk up with Lauren to join them.

"We thought you would never show up," Josh says smiling.

"I had to take care of some business first."

"Well, now that you are here, we can really get this party going."

"Sounds good to me," I say as I begin to move my hips to the banging beat coming from the speakers set up in the corners of the house.

"Hey you."

I turn around to catch Damon standing right behind me.

"Hey yourself," I say as I wrap my arms around him to pull him closer to me.

This is what I need right now; I need to not think and just have fun with my friends. I do not care about what is going to happen right now; consequences be damned for my actions tonight. Damon looks down at me and smiles as if he can read the thoughts running through my head. I smile as I move my hand behind his neck and gently pull him down to me. When our lips connect, I immediately hear laughter surrounding us especially when I go to deepen the kiss.

"Get a room you two."

I pull away from Damon to look over at Daniel.

"I would but I am afraid you might beat us to it. I have not been here long but I have seen the way you look at your girl in the last ten minutes."

Michelle's face turns red as everyone bursts into laughter once more. The bass of the music begins to shake the room all around us. I grab Damon's hand and pull him to me for a dance partner. My hips shake and grind on him as I feel him grasp my waist tight, making sure I do not go anywhere. We stay like this while chugging drinks between the next five consecutive pop songs before I need a break to rest my feet and let the warmth surrounding me fade.

"I think I am going upstairs to rest for a minute and get some air on the balcony if that is okay with you," I say, trying to shout over the music.

"Do you want me to come with you?"

"No I am okay. I actually want to be alone for a bit."

"Okay, I will be waiting for you right here when you get back," he says as he leans down to kiss my forehead.

I walk up the stairs away from the party and blaring music to make my way to Adam's room. Once I step out onto his balcony, I feel a lot better and a coolness envelops me. I look up to admire the beautiful sky that is illuminated by the bright moon and the twinkling stars tonight. The hair on my neck suddenly stands up as I realize I feel a presence behind me. Two arms wrap around my waist making me jump a little. Assuming it is Damon wanting to check on me, I sigh and lean back into his arms.

"I see you have calmed down a little since earlier in our bedroom," a voice whispers in my ear.

My blood turns cold as I recognize the voice of the person behind me. I turn around and pull away from Alexander's hold as I try to take as many steps back from him as I can.

"What are you doing here?"

"I was invited. Come on Celeste, it is a party, you should really lighten up and have some fun."

He begins to walk towards me as I take two steps back away from him again.

"I do not care if you were invited or not, you do not belong here."

"Neither do you."

"I have a right to be here. This is my friend's party so yes I do belong here. You however, do not belong here or anywhere for that matter."

He frowns, "look, I am sorry. I know you are not happy about the whole marriage thing but we really can work this out."

"I do not want to work anything out with you. I was perfectly fine before you came along and will still be fine well after you are gone."

I quickly run from the balcony and make my escape down the stairs before Alexander has a chance to make a move again. Spotting my friends right away, I walk over to join them by the dance floor.

Damon smiles at me, "I was wondering when you were coming back."

A mischievous idea hits me as I watch Alexander descend the stairs and stop at the nearest table to stare at me.

'Well if he will not leave me alone then maybe there is something I can do to make it happen. He needs to think that I have moved on and the only way to do that is to use Damon. Hopefully this does not backfire on me.'

"I missed you too much."

I reach out to grab Damon's shirt and pull him against my chest before kissing him right in front of everyone. When we pull apart from one another, he is grinning ear to ear.

"I missed you too. Is everyone ready to go?"

I peek over Damon's shoulder at Alexander. The irritated look on his face at this very moment is quite priceless. He deserves it after not telling me about our marriage proposal right away. I put my arms around Damon to push Alexander's jealousy over the edge some more.

"Where are we going?"

"I am hungry so I was thinking we could go grab something to eat and bring it back here. You all can stay the night if you would like," Adam replies.

I smile, "sounds good to me. How about everyone else?"

"Yeah sounds great to us."

"Wait, what are you going to do with all these people," I ask as I scan the room.

I watch as Adam ponders for a second before shrugging his shoulders.

"You do not want to leave all these people here, they will trash the house if we leave. If it is okay with you, I may have an idea."

Not waiting on his response or approval, I walk over to the speakers and yank the cords to them out of the outlet. The blaring music immediately goes dead as several complaints start to arise.

"Alright, the party is over. You all need to leave."

Groans from the crowd are heard as they all dispersed toward the front door to leave. My eyes scanned the crowd leaving, looking for a trace of Alexander but to no avail.

'Good, maybe he took my hints and decided to stop pursuing me.'

"That was awesome. Thanks Audrey, now we can go pick up some food without having to worry about all those people."

"You can thank me by paying for my half of the food," I say to Adam as we all walk out to my car and head down to the road to the nearest pizza place.

I park the car in the closest spot to the door as soon as we get there. Everyone piles out of the car and heads inside to find a seat.

"I thought you said we were going to just pick up some food."

"Where is the fun in that? Now that no one is left at the party, we can sit here and enjoy our dinner."

I look around at my friends to notice they all are shaking their heads in agreement and are getting more comfortable in the booth.

'Well, I guess I am outnumbered in this.'

A waitress comes up to us then, "what can I get for you guys tonight?"

I peek down at the menu debating on how hungry I am and what exactly I am in the mood to eat.

Damon looks over at me, "do you know what you want?"

"I am thinking of just getting pepperoni pizza, it is my favorite after all."

Josh claps his hands together suddenly making me jump a little out of my seat.

"Great, we will take two large deep pan pizzas; both with extra cheese and pepperoni on them. Can we also get an order of breadsticks and two pitchers of Pepsi please."

The waitress writes down what Josh says before excusing herself from the table. We all turn to glare at him.

"What was that?"

"Yeah, why did you order for all of us?"

"Is that not what we all wanted," he ask looking completely confused.

I laugh, "yeah but you should have asked everyone first before just going ahead and ordering. What if someone wanted something else?"

"Well did they," he said while looking around the table.

Everyone exchanged glances but no one spoke up.

Josh sighs, "see it was fine, but next time I will remember to ask before I order for everyone."

I laugh at his response because I know he is going to do the exact same thing again if given the chance. I lean back and relax in the booth as everyone begins multiple conversations on how the party was tonight. About twenty minutes later, our food and drinks are finally brought out. Paper plates fly through the air as we all fight over the plates to get our pizza first. Mouths completely full, we all eat in silence as we savor the flavors. One by one we all finish eating, Adam calls the waitress over to pay for the food before we all head back out to my car to go back to Adam's house. I groan silently as I imagine the mess that is yet to be cleaned up in the house. Opening the door, I see my imagination is not as bad as what the mess actually left around the house is. Plastic red cups are thrown all over on the floor along with plates of chips and snacks sticking out everywhere there is a flat surface.

"So who is going to clean up this crazy mess?"

I look over to glare at Lauren, "we can help Adam clean it up so he does not get into any trouble when his parents come home on Monday. Plus we need to clean so we can have somewhere to lay down and sleep tonight."

"Thank you for the offer Audrey, I promise it will only take a few minutes to pick it up if we all chip in. When we finish then maybe we can watch a movie or something."

We all scatter out and start picking up the trash that is laying everywhere. I climb the stairs, figuring most of the trash is not up here but wanting to just make sure. Opening doors, I see that indeed the upstairs is pretty much clean and do not see one piece of trash anywhere. I start to make my way down the hallway to go back down the stairs when I see something like a dark shadow move in one of the rooms on my left side. It is Adam's room with the balcony, the one I was in earlier tonight.

I open the door wider and take a couple steps into the bedroom. Everything is dead quiet. It is so dark that it is making it very hard to see anything around, especially with the very little light shining from the balcony attached to the room. I make my way out on the balcony to see if there is anyone waiting outside on it.

'Absolutely no one is in sight. Maybe it is just my imagination but I could have sworn I saw a shadow earlier.'

I walk back into the room and try to open the bedroom door. It will not budge at all, not even an inch.

'Something is very wrong with this door right now? How can it possibly be locked from the outside when I just came through it?'

Something suddenly stirs behind me making my blood run cold. I take a deep breath before turning back around to scan the room again. But I do not see anyone here in the room with me unless I cannot see them. I slowly creep forward to the balcony once more, afraid of staying in the now pitch black room.

'How am I supposed to get back downstairs to my friends with the door being locked?'

I dart back to the bedroom door and try to pry it open again, but it is no use. The door is still solidly locked in place. When I turn around this time, I see a dark hidden figure standing in the far off corner.

"Who is there?"

The dark figure does not answer. Instead it begins to slide slowly away from the wall toward me.

"This is not funny," I say as I back up into the wall right behind me.

The figure continues stalking toward me until it is an inch away from my face.

'Why are my eyes not adjusting to the dark yet?'

I freeze in terror due to the closeness of this shadow stranger and not being able to tell who it is due to the pure pitch-blackness of the room. The light from the balcony seems to have faded away within the last few minutes.

"Who are you? Why are you doing this to me? Is this supposed to be funny to you? I swear this better not be you Damon trying to play some sick trick on me."

The figure must have moved because suddenly two hands are on either side of my face before using them to shake my head to say yes. Is that supposed to answer my questions?

"Damon? What are you doing in here? Why are you trying to scare me and why is the stupid door locked?"

His chest leans in against mine as I feel his breath against my skin before he bends down to kiss me. When our lips meet , I feel this sudden burst of energy flowing throughout my body. This feeling is like a drug and I want more; no, I need more. His arms encircle my waist as I grab the back of his head and pull him even closer to me. There is so much passion within this kiss that is making it hard to concentrate on anything else around me. When we finally pull an inch apart from one another, he kisses my forehead before his shadow seems to look toward the door. I abruptly hear muffled sounds before the bedroom door opens seconds later. Lauren walks in then, cascading light into the bedroom from the hallway.

"We were wondering where you went off to. You have been gone for awhile."

"I was just checking for trash in the bedrooms. I went to leave when I noticed there was no trash but the door was locked."

"How was the door locked? I thought they could only be locked from the inside?"

"I have no idea, but Damon was here so it was okay."

I look around to notice that he has vanished and is no longer in the room with me anymore.

"So that is where he went off to. Well come on then, we are putting a movie in downstairs."

I shut the door behind me before following her down the hall to join everyone downstairs. They are all seated on the couch, covered in blankets by the time I join them. I take the empty seat by Damon as I grab an extra blanket off the floor.

"Hey, where did you go?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you were upstairs but then you disappeared."

"Oh, well I came back down after I noticed there was not any trash."

I smile up at him. Of course he is going to say something like that. He probably does not want the others to know what happened upstairs. The movie begins to start and I lay against Damon as we all sit in complete silence to watch the movie. I try hard to enjoy the movie but my mind has other plans because right now all I am thinking about is that kiss from upstairs.

'It is the first time I have actually felt anything like that when I kiss Damon. The kiss itself had so much passion and want contained in it that I was begging for more. The only problem is why in the world did Damon leave in a hurry before Lauren came in. Honestly, I do not think she would have cared at all if she caught Damon and I together. So then why did he leave without saying a single word to me?'

I look up at his face to see he is still watching the movie, not paying attention to anything else. Rolling away from Damon, I realize how tired the day's events have made me. I curl up on the edge of the couch away from everyone and gently fall asleep.