Michael & Noelle

The GLOWN (chapter 4)

My father was in the army. Nothing too wild.

In the next three months, he was supposed to be back home for good, after serving fifteen years and as much as my mom tried to push it, there was nothing for me to be excited about. I barely knew him.

He visited me probably three times throughout my twenty-one years of existence and the most I would get in his letter he wrote to mom was,

"Tell Lorelei Hi for me."

There was never an I love you . . . or a cute story or none of that dumb s**t so truthfully there was nothing that I cared about less than his arrival.

"Lorelei, get up! They're more things arriving at my house!"

I swung out of bed quickly, racing into the living room past my mother.

"Hey – young lady!"

I wanted to at least see if I could catch the person dropping off my 'gifts' but they were long gone.

"Lorelei get inside, you are not decent enough to be seen in public."

Padding back inside with my sports bra and shorts, I look around to find whatever it Is they dropped off.

"Where is it?"

"First of all," my mother planted a hand on her hip, "good morning."

"Second of all, what did I tell you?"

"Mom can you just –"

"No! Who is this person that just drops off nonsense like chocolates at eight in the morning? And this – very – expensive bag?"

My mother holds up a shopping bag marked 'Louis Vuitton,' and I gape.

"Oh wow," I mutter to myself.

I reach forward to take it from her hands but she shifts away from me. Scrunching my eyebrows, I hold out both hands in confusion.

"What're you doing?"

"You haven't given me a valid answer, Lorelei," she scolds and I fold my arms, "a few days before you never even received a letter, now you have a new car and expensive items showing up at my door every day."

"I'm a grown woman –"

"Oh," she loudly exaggerates, her eyes practically rolling into the back of her head, "so you are a big woman now, eh?"

Her Caribbean dialect leaked more and more into her words, and I knew that she was growing angry.

"All i'm trying to say is, I'm allowed to have privacy, and mail with my name written on it, is mine."

"You want privacy," she narrows her eyes at me, her lips curling with spite, "get your own home. As long as you are living under my roof Lorelei, what's mine is mine, and what's yours . . . is also mine."

"Your father would never allow something like this to happen in his presence."

She drops the bag onto the counter, her eyes challenging me as she disappeared into her room. I wait for her door to slam shut before shaking my head and grabbing my stuff.

Finally, in the safety of my room, I close the door quietly behind me, locking it.

I felt anxious as I emptied the paper bag onto my bed, dozens of different chocolates plopping onto it.

I hope you're not allergic, and I hope you like chocolate. If you don't there's a surprise for you in the bag, buy anything you like. I pray to meet you soon, mon ange. – S

Turning to the Louis Vuitton bag, my eyes bulged and my hands shook. This was the real deal.

Never in my life would I have ever thought that I would be able to hold one of this outside of the store, in my own home, without stealing it. I pulled it out of the shopping bag, and in awe, I placed it onto my lap. It was a multi-colored pastel bag, that was big enough to fit almost every item I held with me when I went out. I zipped it open, froze, then zipped it back up.

"Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy."

This man keeps leaving me money, a lot of it. If my mother wasn't so hell-bent on being unreasonably toxic, she would've surely benefited from this, but instead, I would dump it all onto someone who really needed it.

Cause I sure as hell wasn't keeping Mr. Gang member man S's money.

#

Mr. Barry stared up at me with his lips parted as I lifted the bag throwing the bag all over his desk.

"L – Lorelei . . . where'd you get this?"

"Don't worry about it, Mr. B," I lean on his desk with one arm and wink at him, "just know that your girl got you."

He looked at me and then back at the money before placing his wrinkled hand under his chin.

"You're not . . . you know . . . right?"

I narrow my eyes, " I'm not what?"

Mr. Barry makes circular motions over his crotch and I let out an exaggerated noise.

"Why does everyone think I'm prostituting myself?"

"So . . . you shaking ass?"

"No Mr. Barry, I haven't become a stripper. Just take the money and buy us some flowers."

"Oh, Lorelei," he sighs, a gentle smile on his face, "why didn't you take this money and travel . . . see the world, buy things –"

"I'm gonna stop you right there, Mr. B," I step away from his desk, "you have been nothing but . . . amazing to me, these past three years and honestly it feels like more. You've helped me in so many ways, advice, knowledge, you were my first employer and if I could stay here forever . . . I would, not to mention the countless times you've pitched in for me when I couldn't do it myself. If anyone deserves the good in life . . . it's you."

Mr. Barry's lips trembled, and he drops his head looking onto his lap.

"Aw, don't cry."

"I'm not a p***y, Lorelei," he says, although the roughness in voice said otherwise, "I'm just trying to count the cash."

"Sorry," I purse my lips to contain my laughter, "order them flowers, will ya? We've got plans to fulfill."

I give him one last smile before leaving his office but before I closed the door he says, "I appreciate ya, kid. You're . . . you're the last of the good ones."

This translates to I love you when you really think of it, and I'll take it. I shut the door gently behind myself.

This only solved one of our problems though. Ordering and having the flowers was one thing, but getting people to purchase was another. I had to think of ways to market and get our flowers sold so that we could actually continue operations.

I brainstormed for a moment and thought that maybe it could just be our street, maybe if we were closer to the city where businessmen sent flowers to their mistresses, and hippies attached flowers to their cars while passing through.

"Excuse me, are you Lorelei Madden?"

Noticing a delivery man, I was already familiar with the drill. I sighed the form he gave me and took the paper bag from his hands.

"Uh, sorry, can you tell the person who sends these that it's okay?"

"Huh?"

"Just . . . let him know that he doesn't owe me anything and he's done more than enough."

The delivery man gave me a strange look before shrugging.

"Okay, but tomorrow I'm going to need whatever's in that paper bag back. He said to have it returned to him."

The deliveryman nodded at me once more before leaving me nonplussed.

Needed it back? Did this man want me to wear panties for the night and ship them back to him? Did he want to inhale my scent? Damn, that is all kinds of sick and twisted?

I opened up the bag, and gingerly pulled out a bigger piece of paper. It was a list. Well, a form, and he wanted me to fill it out, and have it returned to him by tomorrow.

Getting to know you, getting to know all about you,

Getting to like you, Getting to hope you like me, - S