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Petrichor: Chapter 3

Serena and Marley Series

By Sharlene AlbaPublished 6 years ago 10 min read
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Photo by Jonathan Gallegos on Unsplash

MICHAEL

Doing payroll was the most boring job in the entire world besides being a librarian. Now that shit made me fall asleep just watching them give out books. But payroll was my job at Danny's shop and if he trusted me enough with all this shit, then I had to do it. I couldn't let my boy down. Lucky for me, Jesse was helping me out today so I'd be able to head to Marley's Bed and Breakfast by noon. She had a full house for the week and adding wedding planning to the mix only made her crazier, so I had no choice but to help take some of the stress off her by showing up with something nice.

I don't get why we couldn't just go to the court house and call it a day. I just wanted that woman to be my wife. That's all. I didn't need a big wedding with a DJ and center pieces and all that bullshit. There was no changing Marley's mind so I had to go with it. Thank the lord the wedding was next week, so I wouldn't have to sit down to do seating charts for the reception anymore. Who gave a shit who sat next to who? The wedding wasn't about them anyway.

Stepping into the Danny's shop, I took my sunglasses off and looked around for Daniel among the other mechanics working on their cars. I didn't see his truck parked outside when I pulled up. Maybe he was out getting everyone donuts again as an incentive to get us all to work faster. I wasn't mad at it. The more calories I ate, the more I could use it to add more muscle to my body at the gym later.

"Hey, Jess. Where's Daniel?" I asked, hanging my jacket up on the coat rack when I entered my office. We usually did the payroll in here since it was a bigger space and we had more room to spread out. Jesse looked up at me, and I noticed the dark circles underneath her eyes. She's been working late again. Probably because of Daniel. I told that girl to stop looking after him the way she did. She was only going to end up like all the other girls he fucked up before her. Don't get me wrong, Daniel was my brother for life, but he's been fighting his inner demons since we were kids and it didn't look like he was any close to winning. Not this time around anyway. With the way Serena broke him by leaving and taking his kids, I don't think he'll ever be free.

"He's... somewhere. I don't know," she answered mysteriously as she took a bite out of her granola bar and continued doing whatever she was doing on my computer.

"Should I be worried?"

"We all should," she uttered, looking defeated as she spoke. I raised an eyebrow, and pulled up a chair to sit next to her, pulling out the timesheets from the folder sitting on my desk.

"Long night?" I pushed and she shrugged it off. She didn't want to talk about it and I had to respect that. I did however need to know if we had to force Daniel back into rehab again. My boy fell off the wagon the moment he lost his family five years ago and he started drinking heavily after that. It wasn't until we found him unconscious at his house that we all decided rehab had been the best option for him. He got sober for a couple a months before going back to the bottle. Every time I looked at him now, I could see how easily I could've ended up like him if it weren't for Marley. I was never one to put my all my faith in just one person, but if I had to, it would be her.

"He's fine, Michael. That's all you need to know for now," she snapped, and got up from her seat abruptly. I cocked my head to the side, crossed my arms and waited for the woman to calm the hell down so she could tell me what this attitude was all about. One look at the goofy face I made, and she was laughing before she could blink.

"Jerk," she cried playfully as she sat back down and offered me a bite of her granola bar. I refused because that shit looked nasty as fuck. I preferredreal food, with a lot of meat and hot sauce.

"It's not my secret to tell. I learned my lesson last time," she mentioned, referring to her talking shit to Marley years ago about what Serena and I were doing at the beach house. It had been a surprise for Marley back then, a token of love as my fiance still called it to this day. Damn, I loved calling her that. It made me want to call her right now just to hear that pretty smile in her voice. But she hated getting phone calls when she was busy and it was almost lunch time, so she was probably fixing to start cooking for her guests. She had a damn chef there, I didn't know why she insisted on cooking anyway.

"Are you sure he's okay?"

"Yes. Let's get all this done so we can leave early. I have a date tonight," Jesse replied as she tried to hide her smile. Now this I had to hear about. The girl has been up Daniel's ass for so long, I wasn't sure she knew there were other men out there for her.

"A date? You need a wing man? Please tell me you need a wing man. I can't spend another night talking about what color the fucking table clothes should be," I begged her, and it made her chuckle as she shook her head.

"Michael, be nice. Marley deserves this," she pointed out and although she was right, my girl still drove me nuts.

"Now about that date, what's he like?" I reverted the subject back to her and her grin spread even wider as I began calculating the hours for each of the employees we had working for us.

"It's a she actually," she corrected, watching my expression carefully and I turned to look at her with raised eyebrows and even more curiosity. She blushed and I reached to tickle her side so she could tell me more, "I experimented alot in college. Most of it with girls. Most of it very pleasant and since men are so disappointing--"

"Hey! I'm fucking offended by that."

"I decided to give her a shot. See where it goes," she interrupted and I smirked, nodding in approval.

"I'm so proud. And I can still be your wing man if you want. I'll even pay for dinner," I pleaded, with my best smile and she chuckled again, as she threw her empty granola bar wrapper at me.

"Nice try. Your wedding is next week and you need to focus," Jesse reminded me and I sighed in defeat, returning to the timesheets on my lap. Once she put on some old school rap, we jammed while we got all this paperwork done within two hours and with ten minutes to spare, we wrapped everything up and called it a day.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jogging up the steps to the front door of the bed and breakfast, I fished for my keys in my pocket and opened the door to find the main living room filled with guests gathering around for some afternoon cocktails and weird looking sandwiches. I nodded politely towards them, hiding the bouquet of yellow tulips I picked up on my way here behind my back and found my girl in the kitchen on the other side of the house. She was laughing at something the chef was whispering in her ear. I would've felt some type of way if the dude weren't gay.

"Do that again," I demanded playfully, causing her to look at me, her eyes brightening as soon as she saw me leaning in to kiss her cheek.

"Do what?"

"Smile," I whispered in her ear, nuzzling my nose against her cheek as I handed her the flowers and she leaned into me. The group of guests sitting just a couple of feet all cheered for her and we laughed as we waved to them.

"Did you get all your work done?" Marley asked, putting the flowers in a spare vase she had stored underneath the sink, as she handed me a plate full of chicken quesadillas. I groaned, silently patting myself in the back for picking such an amazing cook to be my future wife.

"Yes ma'am. And thank you for these," I replied, leaning in to kiss her before I stuffed my face. My head fell back as soon as I tasted the spices and almost died from the amount of joy I felt.

"I spoke to Danny about the wedding this morning," my fiance mentioned when she pulled me into her office upstairs a few minutes later, closing the door as I placed the plate of food onto the console table near her door and pulled her closer to me.

"And?"

"He says he's still going. But I don't know anymore..." she trailed off and I kissed the worry lines off her forehead, her arms wrapping around me while I held her against my chest.

"If he shows up, he shows up. If not, we go with our second choice," I reassured her and while I really didn't want to go with our second choice, I didn't really like anyone else enough to make them my best man instead. It was either Daniel or Freddy and it was starting to look like I had to make that uncomfortable phone call to Freddy. He was married now, and mostly kept to himself, to his wife and Giselle, but I always kept an eye on him when he was around Marley. I don't know what it was he had that made women go fucking nuts, but I didn't want Marley leaving me at that altar, forcing me to turn into Daniel. Or worse.

"I know I'm bugging you with all this wedding talk, but your final tux fitting is tomorrow and if you reschedule it again, you're going to find yourself sleeping next to a very grumpy, flannel pajama-wearing fiance," she threatened sweetly and I fell to my knees, surrendering to the crazy woman.

"Don't. Please don't take away the black lace panties. I can't live without those, Marley," I whined and when she laughed at my despair, I pouted as she pulled me back up.

"Behave and you'll get to see those black panties again," she promised, grinning wickedly as she leaned in to kiss me, and grope my ass. The woman was asking for me to bend her over that damn desk of hers right now but I controlled myself. This was a business establishment. They didn't need to hear our sex noises. At least not so early in the day.

"I should go before things start happening in here," I insisted, not bothering to move away from her lips in between kisses.

"Good idea," she said, smiling as she pulled away from me and I groaned when I glanced down at that amazing ass of hers. Shaking my head, I took my plate of food and ate the rest of the quesadillas on my way back down to the kitchen to place the plate in the sink. Grabbing a water bottle from the buffet, I headed back out to my car and pulled out my phone when I heard it ringing in the back of my pants. When I saw it was Daniel calling, I quickly answered the call and held the phone against my ear as I entered my car and closed the door.

"Dude, where the fuck are you? You've been M.I.A all day," I scolded and when I heard him say Serena's name, I knew shit was about to go down, "I'll be there in five... of course I'm fucking going... no way is she gonna come back and fuck shit up for you again, bro... Daniel... Daniel I swear to God if you hang up this fucking phone-" Click. The fucker ignored my warning and I hurried to turn my car on, speeding my way back to his old farmhouse.

literature
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About the Creator

Sharlene Alba

Full of raw and unfiltered fluid poems, short stories and prompts on love, sex, relationships and life. I also review haircare, skincare and other beauty products. Instagram: grungefirepoetry MissBeautyBargain Facebook: grungefirepoetry

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