While most people would spend the evening ‘getting ready’ for a date such as his, where he and his (virgin, btw) girlfriend were going to be alone in a hotel room… finally, with no one to helicopter them and break their
zone. Other people would be stressing out, showering, and drowning themselves in too much cologne. Damian O’Connor, though, was not ‘most’ people, nor was he ‘other’ people. Damian O’Connor was one of a fucking kind, that much was for sure.
What was he doing? Damian was sitting in his
comfy chair, in his boxers, watching TV. What was on right now? Some kind of cartoon — it was on Boomerang, and he thought it was like… the Flinstones, but he didn’t know. He wasn’t sure. He wasn’t focused, he didn’t care. He was just sort of waiting for Joy to text him to come get her, so they could get to the hotel and eat dinner and then hopefully get down to business.
Damian had a bowl of mixed nuts on his chest and he was casually fishing out the cashews and throwing them into his mouth, when his phone rang and he put it to his ear. After hanging up, Damian slowly pulled the leg rest down. Duty called.
After Damian
got dressed, he hopped in his car and it wasn’t long before he was at the mall, and leaning over the console to open the passenger door and let Joy in.
“Hey, what’s wrong? You look angry. I brought you snacks.” Damian said, gesturing at the bag of Doritos — spicy Nacho, of course — awaiting his girlfriend.
“Ease the pain.” Damian was prepared.
Tossing all the shopping bags, a lot of shopping bags in the backseat, Joy scoffed,
“Don’t even get me started.” Her tone wasn’t loud but there was heat radiating from her body and she was still red in the face with anger. She would at least keep a calm tone. She wasn’t
Katie who screamed when she wanted to be heard, as if Joy couldn’t hear any of the ridiculous words that spewed out of her mouth anyways. Once she closed the backseat door, she made her way to the passenger seat, which Damian had kindly opened for her from the inside. Slumping in, crossing her arms, wearing the first outfit she tried on which Katie told her she needed to get — it better not be a bust, Joy looked at the chips then at Damian’s face then back at the chips. She pushed the bag away.
“I lost my appetite.” Damian, for some reason, didn’t believe that. Joy wasn’t really the type to ‘lose her appetite,’ but he wouldn’t say anything about it. At least, not yet. Damian, did however, look Joy up and down and smile, nodding his head.
“Hey, that looks great on you. Let’s just go to the hotel, if you’re not hungry, we can just hang out in the room?” Damian offered, shifting the car into gear and pulling out onto the road. He’d have to charm her and cheer her up… But that was easy, he could definitely do that!
“Fine.” Her response was curt. Turning to the radio, she turned it on to whatever Damian was listening to last and then stared out the window. If she kept to herself and let her anger simmer, maybe she’d be able to focus on the moment with her boyfriend. Even so, her mind was stewing on how foolish Katie’s points were and how she knew Katie would never apologize. Her ‘friend’ was unyielding, and yet she failed to realize Joy could be stubborn too. Two could play it like that. Just because Katie was used to the kind nerd didn’t mean Joy didn’t have a bite. She had her uncle in her.
Stupid.
Honestly, Joy wanted to lay down and sink into the hotel bed, forgetting all her troubles. Did Damian ever get in a fight with his friends? The sudden question that popped in her mind caused her to turn away from the window and glance over to him. He was too much of a diplomat. It’s hard to see him fight with anyone that isn’t his mother. Yeah, it’s a silly thought to have. Then again, he wasn’t necessarily on her father’s good side either. Relationships with parents were different than relationships with friends, though. They didn’t count. Not in relation to her and Katie, at least.
As soon as Joy hit the stereo on button,
Damian's music blasted from the speakers, filling the car. Damian was quick to turn it down slightly, though — before it hit the drop. He liked to cruise with the music blaring, but that didn’t mean he wanted it blasting when he was with his girlfriend! She probably didn’t like music quite as loud as he did, and she was kind of angry already… he didn’t wanna add his… well,
aggressive music to that feeling. It would only make things worse!
Damian glanced over at her as he cruised through the LA streets, rolling down his window to let in some of the brisk, chilly air into the car as Damian threw his arm out the window.
“You should eat some of the food. I bought the chips just for you! And I can’t exactly eat them, they’ll throw my diet out.” Damian said, before he pulled the arm back in the car, and put it on the wheel. Instead, his other hand went over to Joy, resting on her bare thigh and giving her what he hoped was a comforting squeeze.
“Do you wanna talk about it?”“Am I wrong? For standing up for Owen? He’s basically a brother to me.” She sighed, trying her best to let her anger dissipate as she noticed the little things Damian was doing to make her feel better. He was trying and it was wrong of her to let her foul mood ruin their time together. Unfortunately, she could not be like her uncle in this moment. He had tremendous control over her emotions. By default, she was born with estrogen, her father spent years managing his anger, and her mothers, from her surrogate, Owen’s mother, and the one that she aims to never disappoint, Jude, Joy came to terms that she had a higher probability of thinking with her heart than not. Even if before she fell hard for the Elite king she was more mind over matter, more in control, that doesn’t change it was only a matter of time for her to lose that control because of these sinking feelings.
“We fought. About Jamie. About Owen.” Katie basically admitted if she were in Jamie’s position, she would’ve done the same thing to get ahead and destroy the ladder, all at the same time. Everyone painted Owen to be a psycho but they didn’t see him, for him. They always used him for their narrative, including Trixie, and he never had a say for his own image. Of course that would piss him off! And Katie was just okay with her brother adding fuel to the fire?
Joy didn’t understand. She couldn’t! It didn’t make logical sense to support someone that gets involved in other people’s businesses and— her mind came to a halt. Why did she care so much about their business? This was an issue between her brother and his enemy. Not her’s. Why did she care?
“It’s stupid. I know. I feel stupid.”That made sense.
Damian knew how close Joy and Owen were, and he also knew how frustrated Owen was — in a shocking turn of events, Owen was being active in the Group Chat. That never really happened, but apparently he was just frustrated enough to explode in chat, rather than just ignore them and occasionally scream about how much spam they tended to post.
To be fair… it was a lot of spam.
Damian didn’t really agree with Jamie’s choices, but, like Joy, he was somewhat biased. He was Owen’s friend, and he’d have to take Owen’s side on most situations, including this one. Besides, the one thing that
everyone should have known about Owen was quite simple: he was a private person. He liked to keep it that way, and people prying into his private life… well, it was like shaking a pinball machine: shit broke. Went on full tilt. This was the same!
“It’s not stupid.” Damian decided to start there, with a bit of reassurance. Simple and to the point. It wasn’t stupid, and being reminded of that was important!
“But I think you should talk to her. You don’t wanna burn your whole friendship over this, right? Calm down, take a breathe, then call her — or text her, I guess.”“HA!” Joy CALL her?! Yeah, okay. Reaching for the food he got for her, she started angrily eating. Okay, she was hungry. She always was. When the food gave her some fuel to spit out words, she continued,
“Katie can call me. I’m not going to be the first to apologize. She needs to learn that she isn’t always right and that sometimes SHE needs to be the bigger person. I’m giving her a taste of her own medicine. If she wants to keep me as a friend, she can come to me. Not the other way around.” She used a dorito to wave around in frustration,
“The only person I care to make happy is you. She’s use to me keeping quiet and letting her go full femi-nazi on people. No more, I tell you!”“You should be careful with that line of thinking. There’s more to life than just like, me.” Damian glanced down at his body briefly, before adding.
“There is a lot of me though.” With that, the classic, customary grin back on his lips, rubbing Joy’s thigh as they drove down the street. He had to be careful with his reply, because Joy was getting worked up and… honestly, Damian still wanted to get laid, even if he didn’t want to be
obvious about it… that was the whole point of this plan, after all.
“Alright, alright, but just remember that… holding onto anger, and hatred, is cancerous. And understanding and forgiveness is the only cure.” Damian paused, and decided to go back on a thought he’d had just a few seconds ago.
“What color panties are you wearing?” It couldn’t just be
all sage boyfriendly advice.
Joy raised her eyebrows at the sudden change in topic. It caused her to disregard anything he said prior and focus on that single question. Prior to him picking her up, she called her Mitty, but Ruby picked up instead and gave her a suggestion since the lingerie she picked needed to be changed into. It didn’t necessarily feel nice under the top she was wearing. Joy didn’t anticipate him asking her, out of the blue, what she was wearing underneath. Looking away from him, staring straight ahead, she tore a piece of her dorito into her mouth, nervously cleared her throat, and answered with a question,
“What… panties?” Well, he hadn’t been expecting an answer like that, but he had to say he was pleased.
“Now that… is the right answer.” Damian said, nodding to himself, as he pulled into the parking lot of the hotel they were staying at. Did they have to go to dinner first? He definitely didn’t want to now.
“Okay….” He had to make good choices, though.
“Dinner?”