Chapter 7: Story Behind the Blood

"Now as I looked up from the balcony of my suite. I found him. The rat. Looking at me with such big watery round eyes," he continued as the audience rocked laughing from their seat. 

He was telling his adventure in Spain, where he got wasted for the first time and stripped naked on a hotel balcony with a rat as the bystander. 

Horace banter went on but Cleo, on the other hand, kept a straight face, Horace pay no mind at her though, instead his whole attention was on something in his mouth. 

He waited for a second, enjoying the laughs of the people listening to him and as if it was planned, a dark red slimy liquid flowed on his mouth, it was a blood fall.

Horace enjoyed the horror etched on each audience as he continued to spit blood on his mouth, but he pushed it way too far that he choked on his throat and the audience changed their expression into an amazement  as if saying that his act seemed so real.

Except that he wasn't acting, it was real that his choking up the blood from his mouth, his faced went red instantly as he caught his breath and on one last big coughed, he throw the last bit of blood but as he spit, it splashed the dress of the nearest person on the audience. 

Slowly, he stared at the person he spit blood onto, she has a stoic, expressionless face despite having fake blood splattered on her white dress. 

"I... I'm sorry." 

It took Cleo a second to register that Horace's face was only a few inches closed to her. 

A loud, ear-splitting scream escaped from her lips if only Horace didn't cover her mouth in a split second, the bar would surely put their focused on them. 

So he jumped of from the stage to cover Cleo and her scream, his Manager Ainé pushed all the big boxes and tiny blockage from the side for an opening on the back stage and Horace didn't waste any second to dragged Cleo to it.

Cleo's frozen in shocked as she stood in front of him who was now on a lavatory, drinking water from the faucet. 

Manager Ainé bombarded the room with dozen of tissue and another box squeezed in her left arm.

"Oh god. Oh god." Ainé chewed the insides of her cheeks as she ran towards the still-shocked Cleo. "We're so sorry." 

Cleo's eyes quivered with fury as she comes back to reality when the slimy and sticky fake blood dissolve in her body. The fake blood travelled all over her chest as Ainé desperately wipe it off with tissue. 

"Slidell was now on stage to continue your show," Ainé inquired as he looked at Ace who got the box of tissue on Ainé's arm. 

But he doesn't seemed to mind it, instead he looked at Cleo who stopped her Manager's hand from rubbing more of the fake blood from her dress. 

They exchange looks and Cleo muttered something he did not catch. 

Clearly, one thing was for sure, she was mad at him. Cleo was mad at Horace. 

"You can wear my jacket," he offered, unzipping it from his neck. Cleo did not answer.  The smell of rust dancing on her nostrils.

"Uhm.. you're the lady Horace brought, right?" Ainé who looks confused by the behavior of the two decided to asked.

"Yes. She's Cleo," Ace answered, successfully taking off his jacket but not cutting his gaze on her.

"I'm so, so sorry this have to happened." She repeatedly said, not only to her but to him as well.

It was like a time bombed that ticked to it's end, when the picture of bloody red flashed through Cleo's and disperse in her mind. 

Cleo was the first one who flinched, she turned at Ainé who was now pulling another batch of tissue paper and tried to shake off the feeling of uneasy she always felt whenever she saw blood. 

"It's fine," was the first word she muttered. She held Ainé's hand to stopped her it fidgeting, "I'm okay," she assured then returned her gaze to Ace who was holding his jacket. 

"I'm going to take it," she said, rather softly.

She slowly and carefully wore the jacket and zip it to it's neck. It's a bit larger than her size but considering it was a men's jacket and she just wore it because she needs to cover the fake blood from her dress, it was an understandable pretense. 

"I choked on the fake blood, Slidell put too much in my capsule," Ace explained, Cleo took a step back and let him and his Manager talked about what happened. 

She excused herself from the room and waited in the long hallway. A box of what seemed like a feathered scarf and other things was on a pile of box placed on a base drum and a long stick for fishing settled beside her. Shecrossed her arms and looked at her feet. 

To think that it was just a fake blood but it made such shocked to her, it was like a forewarning that she must finished her mission as soon as possible or else she's the one who'll have to shower in blood instead. 

She must have gone nuts to convince herself that she could let go of her past once she change her environment, but she's  completely wrong, her mission was the same as her failed one, and the organization was just giving her a chance to change her failure to success. 

Shame on her on thinking she could get away with killing. 

"Shall we go home?" He suggesteafter closing the door of his changing room.

Cleo nodded and they walked out from the back to the side of the stage, she even heard Slidell faking a cough when he noticed them sneaking out of the Drollery like what he thought they'd be. 

- 

"Are you sure you want to continue this?" He asked for the umpteenth time they got home and was welcomed with a pink board and all of the things where still there and it smelled like the footprints of Penelope.  

Cleo cringed at the pink fruity smell it emits. 

"Yes, yes, I'm sure, definitely!" She answered. She got a new set of clothes, a loose white shirt and squared pants and even if it's already nearing midnight, Cleo was still on high spirits to continue his game. 

Even if it was fake blood, it was still a blood, and they did a great job on implicating it like a real blood, because they made Cleo looked around and contemplate kn her mission again. If she wanted to end this quickly, she has to act fast and head for him so that the image of blood spilling on her body would not come true. 

She only need self-control, yes, self-control, for his. 

"You're not mad?" 

"Why would I?" Cleo replied, faster than she exhaled. 

Ace's face crumpled, but he pointed at the direction of the board on the living room. "Here is the board that girls like— as you saw Rachelle really likes it— now for you, I'd like to test your endurance slash reaction time with this."

"Why is that part of the test?" She asked, her voice was still in more higher pitch than usual. 

"Huh? Don't you know this when you're in grade school? Junior or Middle school? Even college students do this. Anyway, put the stickers on the board." 

Cleo, holding her breath almost crushed his head with her bare hands but stop mid way. She keeps her silence and walked slowly to get those stupid stickers on his worn-out couch. 

She post it one by one on the glittery board even if the only thing she want to do right now was to burn the board together with him. 

Self-control. Yes. Self-control, she reminded herself, she must invest a lot of time with him to finished her mission, she couldn't get another failed mission for the organization or else they would take her as a fool.

With the last sticker on hand, her halting of her breathing was no problem when she was still on training with the people of the organization, she can hold her breath underwater, on ice cold temperature and made her breathing technique while she was on a shrinking house.

There's no way she could not pass this task but with her anger from him going on inside her veins, she could feel every bit of her nerves pulsating to strangle his neck. Cursing him with the passing seconds and digging a hole fit for his body 7 feet under the ground until she was satisfied and can finally breathe.

"Okay so you've done great on the first task. Now for the second, I have here a luggage bag." 

Cleo looked at him with a raising brow as he showed a medium size luggage on her. 

"Fit yourself here," he said tapping it like that was not annoying as hell. 

She doesn't gave him a second to instruct her again, instead she removed her house slippers. Step on the luggage and showed him that a five foot seven inches lady can fit on his luggage, when she finally settled herself in it, she took on the other side and close the luggage herself from the inside. 

He was left with his mouth half-opened. "Second task done." He aimed for his clipboard and put something in there.

After he said that, he helped Cleo off of the luggage and step aside when she got her stance back. 

"Let's go to the kitchen," he said, not even looking on Cleo's eyes nor putting the luggage back. 

"I have this box here with a lock, try finding the key with this various exercises that I set on this table. This will test your math skills, language competency, chemical skills, crafting skills, geography, nutritional—" 

She didn't let her finished by throwing an apple she found on the basket next to the set of knives; That will surely hit hard without spilling his blood on the kitchen. She's done. She lost it.