DESPERATE

PAULA

I am walking out of the fabric store, pushing the cart with all my items inside it while I am on a call with my boyfriend of one and a half year, whom my parents dislike so much. He is a biker, a rockstar bandleader with implausible tattoos all over his body, even on his face. His name is Bruce, but everyone else calls him by his stage name, Dungeon Dragon and he has a criminal record. He got his stage name from prison; that is why my parents hate him.

I connect my Airpods to my phone so that I don’t have to hold my phone against my ear while I am walking, pushing my cart to the parking lot.

“What happened?” He asks.

“Well, I had an argument with my parents,”

“Was the argument about me?” Well, most of the arguments I had with my parents were about him and for once today, it is not about him.

“Not everything is about you, you know Amour?”

He chuckles.

“That’s a relief, love. You should have told me that you needed to get out, I would have come and fetched you to like, N*****x and chill, maybe take you to my gig later on?”

“You didn’t tell me that you have a gig tonight,”

“I didn’t think you would want to come, even though I would have loved for you to come,” I shake my head at his response. It is my decision to decide if I want to come or not.

“Where are you now?”

“I am with the band, chilling at my house. Do you want to come?”

“I am coming. Should I bring anything?” I am approaching my car, and from where I am, it looks quite funny. It is so low.

“No, just bring your sexy body,”

“Baby, I hate to cut this call short, I need to go,” I say with panic in my tone.

“You sound shaky, what is wrong?” He concernedly asks, but I hang up as I am now focused on my car wheels. Who the fuck did this? All my tires are flat. What happened?

I look around the parking, and there is this one man standing not too far from my right, staring at me deadly. Could he be the one that flattened my tires? He looks scary and murderous.

He starts walking towards me, and with my trembling hands, I leave my cart right in the middle of the way where cars pass and scurry to my car. I unlock the door before I got in so quickly, locking all the doors afterwards.

I am holding on to the steering wheel for dear life as I see the man through the rear-view mirror getting closer. I close my eyes, making a silent prayer with tears streaming down my eyes.

The knock on my window causes me to jump, scream and cuss at the man. I don’t even look to see if it is really that man who is knocking, but I saw him so it must be him.

“Get away from me you bastard, or I will call the police if you don’t leave now!” I carry on, screaming like a madwoman in my car with my eyes still closed, but the knocking still goes on.

“I said, go the fuck away, you crazy person!”

“Señorita, you left your cart on the driveway. Anyone could steal your things, darling,”

This is no voice of a man. It is as sweet as harmony, and as I took a turn to my left, I saw an old lady with the sweetest smile on her face. The guilt in me slowly made me feel sour. Did I say all those horrible words to her; what happened to that man? Oh, Lord, she must be thinking that I am crazy. I am feeling so embarrassed and ashamed to get out of the car.

I roll down my window and nervously smile at the old lady, not keeping eye contact.

“Thank you,” I said.

Did she hear me cussing at her? I hope not.

“You do look bewildered. Are you okay, Señorita? What happened to your car; it looks like someone empaled your wheels. Did you call for help?”

I breathe, wiping my tears.

“I am sorry,” I uttered.

“No need to be. Do you need any help; I can call my son to help you if you want?” The old lady insists.

“No, thank you. I will call my brothers. They are nearby,“ I lie under my breath.

“Alright, it is well my child. Put your things in the car before anyone steals them.” She said before she walked away.

Meanwhile, I anticipate between calling my brothers or not. They snitched on me last time, so I am wondering if it would be safe to call them again.

Just then, I remembered that Sergio, my new bodyguard gave me his card and I threw it somewhere in the car. I am shipwrecked and I need to get out of here. I am scared too as to how my tires were damaged. They are so fucking expensive, gosh. Who hates me this much?

I start looking under my seat, searching for the card, running my hands in every corner of my car. I jumped to the backseat, searching for it until I found it under my jacket. Right now, my life depends on him.

Argh, I already told this prick that I don’t need him. Ah, well, let me just swallow my pride and call him.

Don’t sound scared, Paula. Make him believe that you are strong, and this is just one of those stranded days.

I dial his number on my cell phone and rest it against my ear.

“Huppert speaking,” His deep voice sent shivers to my body.

“Uhm, Huppert… I mean, Sergio, hi. It’s P-Paula,”

“Paula, how may I help you?” He asked.

I look at the time on my watch and sigh. I hope he is not busy. It is 5:48 PM and I don’t know how far he is from here.

“Can you fetch me at Plenilunio shopping mall now?” I said in a stern voice.

“Are you ordering me, ma’am?”

I can already hear his ego rising.

“Are you coming or not, Sergio?” Annoyed, I asked.

“I thought you don’t need me, Señorita. What happened there?”

Why does he get to make this harder than it already is?

“No, I still don’t need you, sir. I just want you to come and fetch me and take me home, that’s if you still want your job, Sergio!”

“Suit yourself, rich girl. You are too rude for my liking, and as much as I want this job, I will not endure the rudeness that comes with it. I will call your dad by the way,”

“No, Ser-“ My phone beeped, ending the call. This fucking bastard hung up on me!

He is going to call my dad, proving him right that I need a bodyguard and I am not going to hear the end of it. “I told you, Paula. Why don’t you listen to me?” Argh, I can already hear his voice growling in my head. What do I do, what do I do?

Without having to think hard, I call Sergio and this time he takes quite long before he finally answered.

“Yes,” He rudely answered.

“Sergio, listen, you can’t call my dad,”

“Or what? Should I feel threatened?” He gets cocky.

It’s getting dark outside and arguing with Sergio won’t get me out of here.

“I am sorry, okay; I am sorry. I need you, please, Sergio. I am scared,”

He sighs and goes quiet for a second.

“Where in the mall are you?”

“In the underground parking area. Point C,”

“Stay in the car, I will be there in twenty minutes max. Make sure you lock all the doors.”

After the call, I went out of the car, vigilantly, and got all my things in the cart in the car. I am so exasperated right now, and my phone battery is about to die. Sitting alone in this silence makes my horrific thoughts get loud. I am starting to believe that someone wants me dead, I mean, this is the second time I am getting attacked, or at least my car was attacked this time. The man I saw earlier, where did he disappear to because I know my eyes were not deceiving me. I saw him coming towards me.

For what I know now, he could be somewhere here, watching me. I think I am going to have a panic attack.

My hand trembles its way to the engine start button before I turn on the radio. I left the volume very high with Eminem’s ‘My name is’ playing, so it blasted in the car, making me scream and jump; same time, someone knocks on my window, and I screamed even louder than Eminem yelling at me right now.

I looked outside and Sergio stared at me apathetically. I just made myself a fool in front of him; my day just keeps getting worse.

I turn off the engine, unlocking the car before I got out.

“For someone whose expensive tires were pierced like that, you seem to be doing fine. What happened?” He makes fun of me.

I roll my eyes, getting all my things.

“Just get me home, Sergio. What happened here is none of your business,” I dismiss him.

“Did you at least report this, Paula? Who did this to your car?” I gasped, realising that I could have called the police when I thought about it and reported this, but my dumbass was just being blonde.

“You are right, I should call the police and-“

“I’ll handle this, Paula. Let’s go home, plus the mall is about to close now. Did you get everything in your car?”

“Yes, I did,” I am so humbled right now, that I can’t even keep up with the eye contact.

“Alright, hand me the car key and I will call my guys to take care of it,”

“No! I will call my guardian angel to take care of it,” I sneer, he chortles.

“You mean the car insurance that your father pays for? Every message and every call that you make to them clocks in his phone. How about you start explaining to him how all your tires got smashed? Help me remember, baby girl; how much does one tire cost? Around 700 Euros? Just allow me to call my friends and get your car fixed because as far as know, your father will ask about your car and you are going to have to tell the truth,”

I hate that he is right. I need to convince my parents that I don’t need a bodyguard so that they fire Sergio since they have the power to do so. I can’t wait for that day to come because I don’t like him. He is egotistic and gets on my nerves.

“As you said, each tire costs over 700 Euros, how are you going to afford that?” I tilt my brow.

“I know people, okay. Let me talk to the security to watch over your car. I will make sure that you get it first thing in the morning. If your parents ask, just tell them you left it at a friend’s house because you had a little too much to drink, so you called me to fetch you because you couldn’t drive,”

“What, are you crazy?”

“Come on, baby girl. It’s not that bad,”

Oh, God. I am never going to survive with this man. I am going to have a serious problem with him.

“I have never had an arrogant bodyguard like you. You talk too much for my liking, Señor,”

He smirks.

“I’ll take that as a compliment, Señorita,”

“Argh, where is your car? I want to leave, right now,”

“Right in front of your eyes, Paula,”

My eyes widened, running from Sergio to the car.

“You got to be kidding me, Sergio. I have just had the worst day of my life; I am hungry right now; how sure are you that this car will take us at least halfway? It looks like we won’t even make it out of here,” He drives a white Cressida that looks like it will break down when he starts the engine.

“You are being disrespectful, little girl. Just get in the car.” Sonorously, he said.

I think I made him mad.

When I got in the car, my phone rang, but when I was about to answer, it went off. Bruce was calling me. He is going to be so mad at me right now.

Looking around the car, I must say it is very clean and smells good too. The interior looks nothing like what it looks like externally.

***