Greenwich Village

Aria’s POV:

I stopped by a restaurant and bought pizza and a cocktail before driving back home; I walked in and was welcomed with quietness.

I always loved living alone, as I had no distractions when writing, but now I wasn’t writing anymore. Luckily, I had invested in schools and hospitals; otherwise, what was I going to do without a career?

Spent the day cleaning the house, getting rid of every photo of me and Caleb, every flower or gift he ever got for me… I locked it up in the storage room before eating my pizza with my hair tied up.

My phone rang; it was Ava.

“Hello.”

“Why did you keep ignoring my calls?” she asked.

I just didn’t want to talk to anyone because I knew they were all just calling to sympathize with me. “Can I spend the night at your place?” I asked instead; her house had a homely warmth.

Now her dad and older brother were out of town; they were law enforcement, just like my dad, so only Ava and Sam were at home. It was better to join them than sulk here alone.

“Of course, you have a key, right? Just show up whenever you want,” she said, and a smile crept on my lips. I have had an extra key to their house since I was seventeen; that was my home away from home.

“Okay, I will show up late,” I explained to her that I have something to take care of at 7pm and have no idea how long I would be there.

After the phone call, I logged onto the internet and noticed I had a lot of notifications on every platform handle. I spotted the viral video of Caleb going down there with Olivia and chose to read the comments.

They were all so disgusting, and it’s funny how none of the comments were talking about Caleb or Olivia; they were all about me… about me being a wonderful actress and pretending to have a good marriage life.

Spent more than three hours online just going through every comment and also noticed my followers had dropped to 38M.

And it was definitely going to keep dropping if I didn’t intervene; I took a picture of my pizza and posted it with the caption.

“LOVE AT FIRST SLICE”

-

It was 6pm, so I quickly freshened up and got dressed in a black gown and jacket because it was really chilly outside.

Then I got to my car and searched for the address Julian sent; it is in Greenwich Village. I drove for a while and got there before dialing Julian’s contact, and it got connected.

“Let me guess, Aria Nicole?” he asked.

“Yeah, I am in front of a dance school…” I said while scanning my surroundings.

“Did you come with your car, princess?”

“Yeah,” I replied. How else was I supposed to come?

“I will be there.” Then he hung up, and I turned on the music… It was Ordinary by Alex Warren.

I kept humming to the music until someone knocked on my window. I turned off the music and frowned when I noticed an unfamiliar man standing there.

“Step down,” he ordered, but I didn’t think that was safe. Who was he? Did Julian send someone to get me, or what?

“Come on, pretty, step down already.” He kept knocking on the window, but I shook my head in denial and dialed Julian’s number, which got connected.

“I am almost there.”

“There is a man out of my window; he doesn’t seem friendly,” I explained.

“Oh, don’t step down. Wait…just saw your car.” He hung up, and I kept scanning the place but couldn’t spot him.

The man kept hitting my window, and I rubbed my palm nervously; my eyes widened in shock when he picked up a stick and was about to hit my window.

“Ahh,” I screamed and covered my face, waited for a while, but didn’t hear any glass shattering.

Slowly looked up, and Julian stood by the window while laughing. I pushed the door open and panted.

“What…what just happened?”

“So sorry about that, Aria; the people here love to play,” he explained with a chuckle, and I stared at him in disbelief. Love to play? That man was going to break my car window and only halted when Julian showed up.

“I am going home,” I said. Liam was right when he told me not to show up.

“Come on, no one will hurt you,” he assured me, but it was kind of hard to believe.

“Come down, Aria; the party has started.” He extended his hand to me; I ignored it and walked down the car before making sure the door was closed.

“No one will steal your car either.” Julian laughed, and I rolled my eyes.

We walked in silence for a while before arriving at a little garage, which was filled with people; there were some women roasting by the side and alcohol everywhere.

My gaze moved to the end, where I spotted Liam; he stood there with a fair lady.

“Come, let me introduce you to Salmon,” Julian said, but I shook my head in denial.

“What are you going to introduce me as? We aren’t even friends; I only came here because of some bet.”

He laughed and walked to those women roasting, then returned with two sticks of roasted meat.

“Have a try.”

I contemplated for a while, and he noticed my hesitation. “Trust me, you will love it.”

I took the meat and pulled one out of the stick before sending it to my mouth. It was…hmm, it tasted so good.

I smiled and kept pulling out the meat. “And I am sure you didn’t show up just because of a bet. I mean… Look at your car and also your jewelry; you wouldn’t have lost much if you had transferred 10,000 to me.”

“Julian,” someone yelled from the crowd, and he handed the second stick of meat to me.

“I will be back; that’s my baby mama.” He quickly left, and I was left to reminisce about his words.

I could have easily transferred the money to his account, but I didn’t; maybe I really just wanted to be here…to know people.

All my life I have had a small circle, just Ava and her family. No other friends, of course. I had classmates who bonded with me, like my lawyer Mira, but I had never had a social life, always just stuck at home, reading, watching a movie, or typing.

Caleb was my best friend, and I just wanted to have a life.

I noticed Liam was now walking towards me; I quickly retracted my phone from my bag and got busy.

“Liam,” the girl he was with hurried to him; he was just a few steps from me when he stopped and stared at the girl.

“Go home, Jasmine,” he said, but she pouted.

“Your mom asked I join the party so we could have more time to talk, but you just keep avoiding me.” She hit her foot on the ground like a baby requesting candy.

“Go home,” he added and walked to me. Next thing I knew, he grabbed my hand and kept walking away; I had no choice but to follow him.

We were finally out of the garage and stood under a streetlight. “What was that for?” I frowned. Why do men feel like they can drag me around as they wish?

“Why did you come here?” he asked, and now I realized he was standing so close to me, so close that I could literally feel his breath.