quoth_the_raven
Corpse
Thanks so much Cordelia and CSI_in_training! It really means a lot to me, you guys! *huggles both* Here's the third chapter
“I can barely walk in these things…” Sara mumbled to herself watching as she attempted to walk in a pair of black heels she- or someone- had slipped into her closet. She felt like she was walking on two mini sky-scrapers; how could any woman stand to wear these for more than a few minutes without throwing them off of a cliff? They were painful; they squeezed her toes and raised her heel at a particularly painful angle. The heel itself had to have been maybe an inch or two, but whatever it was, no matter how big the heel was it was too big for Sara Sidle to walk around in for hours and hours that night. She could twist her ankle or fall and break her neck, for god’s sake!
Kicking the shoes off of her feet and sighing in relief as her feet were freed for about the third time that night in her hunt for what she was going to wear to the club- shoes and all- she once again kneeled down in front of her closet and threw things (some things she didn’t even know she still had) over her shoulder as she attempted to look for some shoes that looked bearable. She still hadn’t taken a shower so she was still covered in what felt like a few layers of motor oil and transmission fluid, but she wanted to have everything picked out before she got in the shower.
She couldn’t wear her work shoes; heck if she could wear her work shoes she’d probably already be out the door on her way to the club. But that would also mean that she would arrive in her normal attire that consisted of flat black shoes- sometimes even tennis shoes-, a random t-shirt she had picked out from her closet as she reached over her head for clothes, and her signature brown or black slacks. Even Sara knew that wasn’t necessarily ‘stage appropriate’, and she wasn’t one to talk about what was and what wasn’t appropriate in the line of fashion. Tonight she had to look like… well, probably like The Whore of Babylon, as her mother might say if she were there looking at her right now.
Getting to her feet and dusting her pants off with her hands, Sara looked at the clothes in her closet like they were a suspect she was interrogating that she just couldn’t crack. So far, it was closet-1, Sara-0.
Alright, think Sara, she told herself, pacing back and forth in her bedroom which now looked like a regular B&E with the thrown-around clothes and other miscellaneous items laying around on the floor. Why didn’t Sara have that basic woman instinct that told her what looked nice and what didn’t, what showed off just the right amount of cleavage and what didn’t, and that she should always have something dressy on-hand just incase? Well, Sara wasn’t like a lot of other women her age, she thought. She didn’t like wearing things that was revealing in the cleavage department; she didn’t like that, it made her feel naked. Well, half-naked, literally. And she grew up right next to an ocean, she reminded herself, and went to college in Boston, so most of her time outside in the world was spent bundled-up looking like an Eskimo.
This would be the perfect moment to call Catherine for help, Sara knew. But… she and Catherine still had sort of a rocky-relationship, their relationship was nothing like the one she had with Grissom or… say, Warrick, perhaps. But Catherine was sort of the expert in this sort of thing, well, she was better in this field that Sara was that was for sure, so the idea of calling Catherine for help in this sort of thing was very appealing…
But then Sara saw something in her closet behind her layers and layers of solid-colored tops and slacks. Raising an eyebrow in curiosity, Sara walked further into her closet and parted both rows of clothes; she felt like Moses parting the sea. What she saw made her gasp. This was the sort of thing that a teenager wore to prom night underneath their suspicious sweatshirt and sweatpants to retaliate against their parents’ wishes for them to not go looking like a tramp. This was what Sara classified as ‘sexy, black, and…’
‘Tiny’! Good god, this thing couldn’t go past her knees at all!
Swallowing her fear- the fear of this little very black piece of fabric looking like a towel she had wrapped around herself- Sara headed over to her bedroom door and closed it so she could hold it up to herself in the full-length mirror she had positioned on the back of her door. Holding the dress up to herself, she cringed as she painfully watched it end just above her knees. Sometimes Sara wondered why she had to be so tall.
Putting the dress down on her bed, Sara dug into her closet once more, looking around frantically for something else. This couldn’t be the only thing she could wear, right…? She had to have something else, she just had to! She wondered if this was the part in most women’s lives when they discovered religion. Jesus!
Sighing in defeat as her search for another dress came up empty, Sara lowered her head just in time to see a pair of heels that matched her dress. Great, so that was pretty much a guarantee that she would be wearing this dangerous black little number tonight. Now she wished her search hadn’t been quite this easy!
Reluctantly Sara set her shoes down beside her dress and headed into the bathroom for her shower. She must smell like… well, she had just spent hours under a leaking metal piece of crap, she thought!
Getting rid of her work clothes and depositing them on the floor, Sara stepped inside the shower and turned the faucets on, shivering as a gallon or two of ice-cold water poured down her body. Sara hung her head and watched as grayish and brownish liquids receded into the drain from off of her own body. Disgusting, she thought. Well, at least she had one of the women instincts- she knew what was and was not disgusting.
After scrubbing at her arms and other various parts of her body with a washcloth until she was certain that she had gotten all of the dirt, oil and grime the day had brought off of her body, Sara turned the faucets off and stepped out of the shower, grabbing her towel from off the towel rack and wrapping it around herself. Closing her bathroom door- something Sara always did even though she lived alone and didn’t even have a pet (she needed her privacy, she tried to reason)- Sara grabbed another towel and started drying her hair as she got the blow-dryer ready to use. She hated using the blow-dryer; it was a loud, unnecessary, power-sucking device, but it did come in-handy when she was in a rush and needed her hair dry immediately, she had to give it that.
After using the blow-dryer and combing out small tangles in her hair (which were rarely found among the brunette’s silky brown locks), Sara picked up a can of hair-spray and eyed it suspiciously. On one had she didn’t like using hair-spray as it made her sneeze uncontrollably and become a potential fire-hazard, but on the other hand it did help, so she ended up using it most of the time despite her reasons not to. She wasn’t as foreign to these things she thought she was! She proudly told herself.
Closing her eyes and spraying over her hair, Sara opened her eyes once she was finished and was surprised to find that she didn’t have a sneezing fit as she usually did. The next task on her to-do list was to get dressed in her dangerously-short black little dress. This dress was definitely going to bring her out of her comfort zone; sure, lots of things had brought her out of her comfort zone, coming to Vegas was one of them as the people (other than Grissom) and things here were all foreign to her, but this was something so small- and ridiculous, in her eyes- that would bring her out of her comfort zone physically, not mentally.
Opening her bathroom door and heading over to her bed, Sara picked the dress up once again and held it up to herself. It showed off her legs and arms; the dress ended just above her knees leaving her legs gloriously bare to onlookers, and the dress was also sleeveless which showed off her arms and shoulders. But Trey said that she had a nice body… and that a nice dress that showed off her legs and arms would look nice on her, so that helped to motivate her to actually put the dress on. So Sara put the dress on- with one eye closed.
When she opened her eyes she gasped for the second time that day. The dress hugged every right curve of her body (Sara didn’t know she had curves!), if she did say so herself. Doing a full 360-degree turn, Sara noted that the dress wasn’t skin-tight like Richard Simmons’ shorts were in his 80s work-out videos her mother used to watch, so that made her feel a bit better. She actually looked quite nice, she thought.
Putting her shoes on, Sara couldn’t help but laugh. She sort of looked like she was going to a funeral wearing this solid black dress with the matching shoes.
Heading back into the bathroom, hearing her heels click and clack with each step she took, Sara got ready to add the final touch; makeup. Stage-worthy, she told herself, stage-worthy. She had to look nice, but she couldn’t go overboard. Moving from her normal lip-gloss to actual lipstick, Sara applied a darker color than she usually wore to go with her black theme. Choosing a color of eye-shadow (she finally settled on a dark purple), Sara put it on and looked at herself in the mirror once she was finished.
Sara couldn’t help but smile, revealing her pearly-white teeth. She looked pretty, and she felt pretty.
As Sara was just finishing getting ready, Warrick was already on his way to the club still with the same smile on his face from before. He couldn’t wait to see the look on Sara’s face when she noticed him in the audience. His coming was by no means intended to be rude or mean, or just something he was doing for kicks; he really wanted to go to this performance. And still, Warrick couldn’t help but wonder why he wanted to go to her performance so badly; they were just friends, nothing more, it wasn’t like she was his… girlfriend.
Warrick tried to tell himself he’d do this for any of his other friends; once he had taken Greg to a baseball game on the weekend, another time he and Nick had gone to the monster-truck rally in one of the stadiums along the Strip. They were men, however… and Sara was a woman… a woman he could feel attracted to, a woman he could… develop feelings for.
Just then, to Warrick’s relief, he arrived at the club and parked right next to the building. About to unbuckle himself, a thought quickly struck Warrick’s mind- if he was parked right in front of the building, or right next to it, for that matter, Sara would be able to tell that he was there by the LVPD sticker clearly placed in the right bottom corner of his windshield. Then it wouldn’t be much of a surprise, would it?
Turning the car back on with a slight grin on his face, Warrick looked over his shoulder to make sure no cars were coming before he pulled back into the road to find another parking spot.
I hope I’m not late, Sara thought as she arrived at the Midnight, parking right in front of the building. Of course you’re not. He told you to come whenever you were free on Fridays, Sara reminded herself. Looking in the mirror one last time before getting out, she nodded as if to confirm that she was ready to go inside, and opened her car door, throwing her legs over the side of the seat as she got out. Closing the door behind her, Sara took a deep breath as she did the first time she had stepped foot near the building.
Putting a confident smile on her face, Sara walked toward the grayish-orange stucco-covered building and pushed the door open, walking inside. The second she walked inside Sara could definitely tell it was very much indeed a Friday night; the bar area, clean and organized or not, reeked of liquor and cigarette smoke just like any other bar. Sara tried to look around for any sign of Trey but the building was much too crowded for her to single out one particular person.
“Excuse me…?” she asked, making her way through person after person to get to the bartender. Luckily it was the same bartender Sara had seen the other night she was here, so he would remember her.
“Ah, you again,” the bartender said with a small smile, handing another person their drink. “How can I help you?”
“I was looking for Trey,” Sara explained, shooting him a smile. “Do you know where I could find him?”
“Yeah, he’s in his office, just go on back,” the bartender instructed her, pointing to the far back corner of the building where Trey’s office was.
“Thanks,” Sara smiled, walking in that direction. The red, velvety carpet that covered the floor was now littered in peanuts and small drops of beer and other alcoholic beverages, and people were coming and going from the bathrooms like a line of train cars; Sara knew the interior of the bathrooms must’ve been absolutely filthy.
In her observation of the now-crowded club Sara failed to notice that Warrick was sitting in the small area in the very middle of the club set aside for the audience for the performers. She actually walked right past him and probably wouldn’t have noticed his presence until she got on stage on-looking the audience, or even at all if he hadn’t gotten up and bumped into her on his way to the bar.
“I’m sorry about that,” Sara said, finally looking up at the person who had bumped into her.
“Excuse me—“Warrick started, before realizing that the person he had bumped into was Sara. He did a double-take; he didn’t mean to, but he had to make sure the image in front of him was real. This was Sara! Wow! He had never imagined she would ever dress herself up like this; Catherine went out to bars and clubs all the time and he had seen her get dolled-up, but… Sara was really something. He had never imagined…
“…Warrick!” Sara was the first to break the awkward silence between the two. “…What are you doing here?” she asked, not knowing what else to say. Well that sounded rude!
“I, uh…” Warrick said, feeling his eyes begin to travel down her body. Don’t gawk! He told himself. And close your mouth! He thought closing his mouth as his gaze reverted back to Sara’s eyes. “Uh… I decided to come and watch your performance!”
“…Really?” Sara asked, noticing where his eyes had previously gone. Is he checking you out…? Oh my god, I think Warrick’s checking you out! Sara thought to herself, unable to hide an uncontrollable smile as it found its way onto her mouth. She felt like giggling like a giddy schoolgirl who had just been invited to the prom. For what reason, however, Sara did not know.
“Yeah,” Warrick said, shooting her a smile. “I thought I’d come and see you, you know… just to give you some support!”
“Well… thanks!” Sara said. You look like a dork with that stupid smile on your face, Sara!
“Well, uh… you should get going,” Warrick told her. “I’ll see you later,” he said, walking back to his table. Sitting down, he waved at her to indicate where he was sitting.
“Yeah…!” Sara said, even though he was already sitting back down at his table. Turning around and heading toward Trey’s office once again, Sara tried to calm herself down. She needed a net to catch all the butterflies in her stomach right now. But why was she so excited…? Was it just because she was going to get up on a stage in front of a ton of people, or… because she was going to get up on a stage in front of Warrick…?
Just then the door to Trey’s office opened and Trey himself walked out with a smile on his face. “Hello, Sara!” he greeted her, looking her up and down for a moment.
Sara jumped a little when he popped out of the door and she quickly composed herself. “…Yeah!” Or so she thought.
“Well, you do look ravishing,” he told her, shooting her a smile.
“Thanks,” Sara smiled. Up until just now she had completely forgotten about what Trey had done the first time they met, because she decided not to make a big deal out of it. So why should she now? He was just looking at you, you’ll be okay, she told herself and quickly setting that matter aside. Besides, Warrick was here… actually, there were tons of people here, they’d be able to tell if he tried… anything.
“Have you been practicing the song?” Trey asked her, bringing her out of her thoughts.
And then it dawned on her; she had absolutely no clue what song they were going to be doing. Fear and panic began to overcome Sara as she tried to think of the song, momentarily forgetting about what she had just been thinking of.
Trey chuckled. “I’m just kidding you, we didn’t decide on a song,” he told her. “I was thinking about that Sheryl Crow song you sang, though. You did really well on that song and there’s some nice piano in that song I could do in my sleep,” he winked at her.
“…Okay!” Sara said again. You sound like an idiot! She told herself.
“Alright, then let’s get to it!” Trey said, closing the door to his office and heading toward the stage. “Don’t be shy, come on!” he encouraged Sara once he noticed she wasn’t following him.
Sara just nodded, swallowing hard as she began to follow him up the stairs leading to the stage. This is it, you can do this… just imagine Warrick being the only person in the audience. He’s your friend, he won’t judge you, she thought to herself. Finally getting to the top of the stairs, she took a deep breath as she heard undecipherable chatter amongst the members of the audience behind the curtain covering the stage.
“Alright Sara, hear you go,” Trey said, holding a microphone out to her. “I notice you’re wearing heels, so if you don’t want to walk around the stage, or if you’re just not the type of person who likes to jump around,” he smiled, “You can sit on the piano if you want.”
“Okay, thanks,” Sara told him, shooting him an appreciative smile as she took the microphone. Before she had a chance to say anything else Trey had grabbed her arm, brining her over to the piano. “Alright, do you need some help getting up?” Trey asked her.
“It wouldn’t hurt,” Sara told him, shooting him a bashful smile. The Sara from before who had been paranoid about this guy touching her would’ve never had agreed to let him help her on the piano, but Sara had convinced herself that it was an accident and that Trey wasn’t a bad guy. Sara had completely forgotten about that now; she was so excited, so fully of the ecstasy that was being on stage in front of a crowd of people.
“Alright,” Trey smiled, grabbing under her arms and lifting her up onto the piano. He sat down on his piano bench behind her, rolling up his shirt sleeves. “Here we go, Sara,” he told her, and without much more warning the curtains parted.
Warrick, sitting in the audience, immediately locked his eyes on Sara lying sprawled-out across the piano with a microphone in her hand. She looked so beautiful with the light shining down, the small streaks of gold in her hair shimmering as the light shone down on them.
Without any introduction Warrick watched the man at the piano begin to play the opening notes of Always on Your Side, a song by Sheryl Crow. Wow, Warrick thought, Sheryl Crow? I didn’t think Sara would be singing that song. Then again, Warrick thought, he didn’t know Sara very well and he hadn’t been around her long enough to listen to the things she sang. Sure, he had heard her, but… Sara singing had sort of become something he was used to, and he never really paid that much attention to what she was singing. She could’ve been singing about going to the grocery store, for all he knew.
“My yesterdays are almost up and neatly put away,” Sara sang, “But every now and then you come to mind,” she put a stress on the last word of the verse, “‘Cause you were always waiting to get picked to play the game, but when your name was called you found a place to hide,” she took a small breath, “When you knew that I was always on your side.”
Warrick was staring at her with his mouth wide-open in complete shock.
“Everything was easy then,” Sara started the next few verses.
Wow, that’s tough, those notes are a lot lower than the others, Warrick thought, a small smile creeping its way around the corners of his mouth.
“So sweet and innocent,” Sara continued. So lost in the excitement and intensity of the moment, she failed to notice that Trey wasn’t exactly just playing the piano. “But your demons and your angels—“Sara was about to continue when she felt something on her leg. Skin meeting skin and this wasn’t just from her legs rubbing against each other.
She inhaled sharply, feeling it slowly creep up from her ankle to her calve; he was touching her. Again. And this wasn’t any accident, she knew. He was busy playing the piano, how would he be able to do this on accident?
The audience grew deathly silent as Sara stopped singing but the piano continued playing. Warrick looked at Sara in confusion, noting how uncomfortable she looked. Its okay Sara, you’re doing great, he tried to mentally encourage her, and you can do it. But then he noticed the piano player’s hand which was slowly making its way up to her inner thigh.
Sara stuttered as she started to shake slightly. He was touching her, why was he touching her? She felt his hand creep under her dress and she whimpered softly, shutting her eyes tightly. Why wouldn’t he stop?
Warrick immediately got to his feet, his jaw dropping as his hands balled into fists. Get your hands off of her, you son of a bitch! He thought, watching as the piano player continued playing the piano with one hand, but his other hand doing something else.
Sara felt the same sinking sensation she had first felt when Trey had touched her ‘accidentally’. She felt his fingers rolling over her gooseflesh making her tremble as his hand explored. She wanted to scream and slap his hand away but for some reason she didn’t. She didn’t know if it was because they were on stage in front of a bunch of people, or that she didn’t want to run the risk of losing her job, but she didn’t say or do anything.
Trey finished the song without Sara singing, his hand slowly returning to his side. There was a long silence from the audience until they began to clap softly, looking back and forth at each other as if to ask “What the hell just happened?”
The second Sara felt Trey’s hand move away from her she practically dropped the microphone she had been holding and almost ran off the stage. Trey, however, didn’t see anything awkward or inappropriate about what just happened, or he did and he just wanted to keep the crowd at bay, Sara wasn’t sure.
What the hell just happened? Warrick thought, watching Sara run off of the stage.
“I can barely walk in these things…” Sara mumbled to herself watching as she attempted to walk in a pair of black heels she- or someone- had slipped into her closet. She felt like she was walking on two mini sky-scrapers; how could any woman stand to wear these for more than a few minutes without throwing them off of a cliff? They were painful; they squeezed her toes and raised her heel at a particularly painful angle. The heel itself had to have been maybe an inch or two, but whatever it was, no matter how big the heel was it was too big for Sara Sidle to walk around in for hours and hours that night. She could twist her ankle or fall and break her neck, for god’s sake!
Kicking the shoes off of her feet and sighing in relief as her feet were freed for about the third time that night in her hunt for what she was going to wear to the club- shoes and all- she once again kneeled down in front of her closet and threw things (some things she didn’t even know she still had) over her shoulder as she attempted to look for some shoes that looked bearable. She still hadn’t taken a shower so she was still covered in what felt like a few layers of motor oil and transmission fluid, but she wanted to have everything picked out before she got in the shower.
She couldn’t wear her work shoes; heck if she could wear her work shoes she’d probably already be out the door on her way to the club. But that would also mean that she would arrive in her normal attire that consisted of flat black shoes- sometimes even tennis shoes-, a random t-shirt she had picked out from her closet as she reached over her head for clothes, and her signature brown or black slacks. Even Sara knew that wasn’t necessarily ‘stage appropriate’, and she wasn’t one to talk about what was and what wasn’t appropriate in the line of fashion. Tonight she had to look like… well, probably like The Whore of Babylon, as her mother might say if she were there looking at her right now.
Getting to her feet and dusting her pants off with her hands, Sara looked at the clothes in her closet like they were a suspect she was interrogating that she just couldn’t crack. So far, it was closet-1, Sara-0.
Alright, think Sara, she told herself, pacing back and forth in her bedroom which now looked like a regular B&E with the thrown-around clothes and other miscellaneous items laying around on the floor. Why didn’t Sara have that basic woman instinct that told her what looked nice and what didn’t, what showed off just the right amount of cleavage and what didn’t, and that she should always have something dressy on-hand just incase? Well, Sara wasn’t like a lot of other women her age, she thought. She didn’t like wearing things that was revealing in the cleavage department; she didn’t like that, it made her feel naked. Well, half-naked, literally. And she grew up right next to an ocean, she reminded herself, and went to college in Boston, so most of her time outside in the world was spent bundled-up looking like an Eskimo.
This would be the perfect moment to call Catherine for help, Sara knew. But… she and Catherine still had sort of a rocky-relationship, their relationship was nothing like the one she had with Grissom or… say, Warrick, perhaps. But Catherine was sort of the expert in this sort of thing, well, she was better in this field that Sara was that was for sure, so the idea of calling Catherine for help in this sort of thing was very appealing…
But then Sara saw something in her closet behind her layers and layers of solid-colored tops and slacks. Raising an eyebrow in curiosity, Sara walked further into her closet and parted both rows of clothes; she felt like Moses parting the sea. What she saw made her gasp. This was the sort of thing that a teenager wore to prom night underneath their suspicious sweatshirt and sweatpants to retaliate against their parents’ wishes for them to not go looking like a tramp. This was what Sara classified as ‘sexy, black, and…’
‘Tiny’! Good god, this thing couldn’t go past her knees at all!
Swallowing her fear- the fear of this little very black piece of fabric looking like a towel she had wrapped around herself- Sara headed over to her bedroom door and closed it so she could hold it up to herself in the full-length mirror she had positioned on the back of her door. Holding the dress up to herself, she cringed as she painfully watched it end just above her knees. Sometimes Sara wondered why she had to be so tall.
Putting the dress down on her bed, Sara dug into her closet once more, looking around frantically for something else. This couldn’t be the only thing she could wear, right…? She had to have something else, she just had to! She wondered if this was the part in most women’s lives when they discovered religion. Jesus!
Sighing in defeat as her search for another dress came up empty, Sara lowered her head just in time to see a pair of heels that matched her dress. Great, so that was pretty much a guarantee that she would be wearing this dangerous black little number tonight. Now she wished her search hadn’t been quite this easy!
Reluctantly Sara set her shoes down beside her dress and headed into the bathroom for her shower. She must smell like… well, she had just spent hours under a leaking metal piece of crap, she thought!
Getting rid of her work clothes and depositing them on the floor, Sara stepped inside the shower and turned the faucets on, shivering as a gallon or two of ice-cold water poured down her body. Sara hung her head and watched as grayish and brownish liquids receded into the drain from off of her own body. Disgusting, she thought. Well, at least she had one of the women instincts- she knew what was and was not disgusting.
After scrubbing at her arms and other various parts of her body with a washcloth until she was certain that she had gotten all of the dirt, oil and grime the day had brought off of her body, Sara turned the faucets off and stepped out of the shower, grabbing her towel from off the towel rack and wrapping it around herself. Closing her bathroom door- something Sara always did even though she lived alone and didn’t even have a pet (she needed her privacy, she tried to reason)- Sara grabbed another towel and started drying her hair as she got the blow-dryer ready to use. She hated using the blow-dryer; it was a loud, unnecessary, power-sucking device, but it did come in-handy when she was in a rush and needed her hair dry immediately, she had to give it that.
After using the blow-dryer and combing out small tangles in her hair (which were rarely found among the brunette’s silky brown locks), Sara picked up a can of hair-spray and eyed it suspiciously. On one had she didn’t like using hair-spray as it made her sneeze uncontrollably and become a potential fire-hazard, but on the other hand it did help, so she ended up using it most of the time despite her reasons not to. She wasn’t as foreign to these things she thought she was! She proudly told herself.
Closing her eyes and spraying over her hair, Sara opened her eyes once she was finished and was surprised to find that she didn’t have a sneezing fit as she usually did. The next task on her to-do list was to get dressed in her dangerously-short black little dress. This dress was definitely going to bring her out of her comfort zone; sure, lots of things had brought her out of her comfort zone, coming to Vegas was one of them as the people (other than Grissom) and things here were all foreign to her, but this was something so small- and ridiculous, in her eyes- that would bring her out of her comfort zone physically, not mentally.
Opening her bathroom door and heading over to her bed, Sara picked the dress up once again and held it up to herself. It showed off her legs and arms; the dress ended just above her knees leaving her legs gloriously bare to onlookers, and the dress was also sleeveless which showed off her arms and shoulders. But Trey said that she had a nice body… and that a nice dress that showed off her legs and arms would look nice on her, so that helped to motivate her to actually put the dress on. So Sara put the dress on- with one eye closed.
When she opened her eyes she gasped for the second time that day. The dress hugged every right curve of her body (Sara didn’t know she had curves!), if she did say so herself. Doing a full 360-degree turn, Sara noted that the dress wasn’t skin-tight like Richard Simmons’ shorts were in his 80s work-out videos her mother used to watch, so that made her feel a bit better. She actually looked quite nice, she thought.
Putting her shoes on, Sara couldn’t help but laugh. She sort of looked like she was going to a funeral wearing this solid black dress with the matching shoes.
Heading back into the bathroom, hearing her heels click and clack with each step she took, Sara got ready to add the final touch; makeup. Stage-worthy, she told herself, stage-worthy. She had to look nice, but she couldn’t go overboard. Moving from her normal lip-gloss to actual lipstick, Sara applied a darker color than she usually wore to go with her black theme. Choosing a color of eye-shadow (she finally settled on a dark purple), Sara put it on and looked at herself in the mirror once she was finished.
Sara couldn’t help but smile, revealing her pearly-white teeth. She looked pretty, and she felt pretty.
As Sara was just finishing getting ready, Warrick was already on his way to the club still with the same smile on his face from before. He couldn’t wait to see the look on Sara’s face when she noticed him in the audience. His coming was by no means intended to be rude or mean, or just something he was doing for kicks; he really wanted to go to this performance. And still, Warrick couldn’t help but wonder why he wanted to go to her performance so badly; they were just friends, nothing more, it wasn’t like she was his… girlfriend.
Warrick tried to tell himself he’d do this for any of his other friends; once he had taken Greg to a baseball game on the weekend, another time he and Nick had gone to the monster-truck rally in one of the stadiums along the Strip. They were men, however… and Sara was a woman… a woman he could feel attracted to, a woman he could… develop feelings for.
Just then, to Warrick’s relief, he arrived at the club and parked right next to the building. About to unbuckle himself, a thought quickly struck Warrick’s mind- if he was parked right in front of the building, or right next to it, for that matter, Sara would be able to tell that he was there by the LVPD sticker clearly placed in the right bottom corner of his windshield. Then it wouldn’t be much of a surprise, would it?
Turning the car back on with a slight grin on his face, Warrick looked over his shoulder to make sure no cars were coming before he pulled back into the road to find another parking spot.
I hope I’m not late, Sara thought as she arrived at the Midnight, parking right in front of the building. Of course you’re not. He told you to come whenever you were free on Fridays, Sara reminded herself. Looking in the mirror one last time before getting out, she nodded as if to confirm that she was ready to go inside, and opened her car door, throwing her legs over the side of the seat as she got out. Closing the door behind her, Sara took a deep breath as she did the first time she had stepped foot near the building.
Putting a confident smile on her face, Sara walked toward the grayish-orange stucco-covered building and pushed the door open, walking inside. The second she walked inside Sara could definitely tell it was very much indeed a Friday night; the bar area, clean and organized or not, reeked of liquor and cigarette smoke just like any other bar. Sara tried to look around for any sign of Trey but the building was much too crowded for her to single out one particular person.
“Excuse me…?” she asked, making her way through person after person to get to the bartender. Luckily it was the same bartender Sara had seen the other night she was here, so he would remember her.
“Ah, you again,” the bartender said with a small smile, handing another person their drink. “How can I help you?”
“I was looking for Trey,” Sara explained, shooting him a smile. “Do you know where I could find him?”
“Yeah, he’s in his office, just go on back,” the bartender instructed her, pointing to the far back corner of the building where Trey’s office was.
“Thanks,” Sara smiled, walking in that direction. The red, velvety carpet that covered the floor was now littered in peanuts and small drops of beer and other alcoholic beverages, and people were coming and going from the bathrooms like a line of train cars; Sara knew the interior of the bathrooms must’ve been absolutely filthy.
In her observation of the now-crowded club Sara failed to notice that Warrick was sitting in the small area in the very middle of the club set aside for the audience for the performers. She actually walked right past him and probably wouldn’t have noticed his presence until she got on stage on-looking the audience, or even at all if he hadn’t gotten up and bumped into her on his way to the bar.
“I’m sorry about that,” Sara said, finally looking up at the person who had bumped into her.
“Excuse me—“Warrick started, before realizing that the person he had bumped into was Sara. He did a double-take; he didn’t mean to, but he had to make sure the image in front of him was real. This was Sara! Wow! He had never imagined she would ever dress herself up like this; Catherine went out to bars and clubs all the time and he had seen her get dolled-up, but… Sara was really something. He had never imagined…
“…Warrick!” Sara was the first to break the awkward silence between the two. “…What are you doing here?” she asked, not knowing what else to say. Well that sounded rude!
“I, uh…” Warrick said, feeling his eyes begin to travel down her body. Don’t gawk! He told himself. And close your mouth! He thought closing his mouth as his gaze reverted back to Sara’s eyes. “Uh… I decided to come and watch your performance!”
“…Really?” Sara asked, noticing where his eyes had previously gone. Is he checking you out…? Oh my god, I think Warrick’s checking you out! Sara thought to herself, unable to hide an uncontrollable smile as it found its way onto her mouth. She felt like giggling like a giddy schoolgirl who had just been invited to the prom. For what reason, however, Sara did not know.
“Yeah,” Warrick said, shooting her a smile. “I thought I’d come and see you, you know… just to give you some support!”
“Well… thanks!” Sara said. You look like a dork with that stupid smile on your face, Sara!
“Well, uh… you should get going,” Warrick told her. “I’ll see you later,” he said, walking back to his table. Sitting down, he waved at her to indicate where he was sitting.
“Yeah…!” Sara said, even though he was already sitting back down at his table. Turning around and heading toward Trey’s office once again, Sara tried to calm herself down. She needed a net to catch all the butterflies in her stomach right now. But why was she so excited…? Was it just because she was going to get up on a stage in front of a ton of people, or… because she was going to get up on a stage in front of Warrick…?
Just then the door to Trey’s office opened and Trey himself walked out with a smile on his face. “Hello, Sara!” he greeted her, looking her up and down for a moment.
Sara jumped a little when he popped out of the door and she quickly composed herself. “…Yeah!” Or so she thought.
“Well, you do look ravishing,” he told her, shooting her a smile.
“Thanks,” Sara smiled. Up until just now she had completely forgotten about what Trey had done the first time they met, because she decided not to make a big deal out of it. So why should she now? He was just looking at you, you’ll be okay, she told herself and quickly setting that matter aside. Besides, Warrick was here… actually, there were tons of people here, they’d be able to tell if he tried… anything.
“Have you been practicing the song?” Trey asked her, bringing her out of her thoughts.
And then it dawned on her; she had absolutely no clue what song they were going to be doing. Fear and panic began to overcome Sara as she tried to think of the song, momentarily forgetting about what she had just been thinking of.
Trey chuckled. “I’m just kidding you, we didn’t decide on a song,” he told her. “I was thinking about that Sheryl Crow song you sang, though. You did really well on that song and there’s some nice piano in that song I could do in my sleep,” he winked at her.
“…Okay!” Sara said again. You sound like an idiot! She told herself.
“Alright, then let’s get to it!” Trey said, closing the door to his office and heading toward the stage. “Don’t be shy, come on!” he encouraged Sara once he noticed she wasn’t following him.
Sara just nodded, swallowing hard as she began to follow him up the stairs leading to the stage. This is it, you can do this… just imagine Warrick being the only person in the audience. He’s your friend, he won’t judge you, she thought to herself. Finally getting to the top of the stairs, she took a deep breath as she heard undecipherable chatter amongst the members of the audience behind the curtain covering the stage.
“Alright Sara, hear you go,” Trey said, holding a microphone out to her. “I notice you’re wearing heels, so if you don’t want to walk around the stage, or if you’re just not the type of person who likes to jump around,” he smiled, “You can sit on the piano if you want.”
“Okay, thanks,” Sara told him, shooting him an appreciative smile as she took the microphone. Before she had a chance to say anything else Trey had grabbed her arm, brining her over to the piano. “Alright, do you need some help getting up?” Trey asked her.
“It wouldn’t hurt,” Sara told him, shooting him a bashful smile. The Sara from before who had been paranoid about this guy touching her would’ve never had agreed to let him help her on the piano, but Sara had convinced herself that it was an accident and that Trey wasn’t a bad guy. Sara had completely forgotten about that now; she was so excited, so fully of the ecstasy that was being on stage in front of a crowd of people.
“Alright,” Trey smiled, grabbing under her arms and lifting her up onto the piano. He sat down on his piano bench behind her, rolling up his shirt sleeves. “Here we go, Sara,” he told her, and without much more warning the curtains parted.
Warrick, sitting in the audience, immediately locked his eyes on Sara lying sprawled-out across the piano with a microphone in her hand. She looked so beautiful with the light shining down, the small streaks of gold in her hair shimmering as the light shone down on them.
Without any introduction Warrick watched the man at the piano begin to play the opening notes of Always on Your Side, a song by Sheryl Crow. Wow, Warrick thought, Sheryl Crow? I didn’t think Sara would be singing that song. Then again, Warrick thought, he didn’t know Sara very well and he hadn’t been around her long enough to listen to the things she sang. Sure, he had heard her, but… Sara singing had sort of become something he was used to, and he never really paid that much attention to what she was singing. She could’ve been singing about going to the grocery store, for all he knew.
“My yesterdays are almost up and neatly put away,” Sara sang, “But every now and then you come to mind,” she put a stress on the last word of the verse, “‘Cause you were always waiting to get picked to play the game, but when your name was called you found a place to hide,” she took a small breath, “When you knew that I was always on your side.”
Warrick was staring at her with his mouth wide-open in complete shock.
“Everything was easy then,” Sara started the next few verses.
Wow, that’s tough, those notes are a lot lower than the others, Warrick thought, a small smile creeping its way around the corners of his mouth.
“So sweet and innocent,” Sara continued. So lost in the excitement and intensity of the moment, she failed to notice that Trey wasn’t exactly just playing the piano. “But your demons and your angels—“Sara was about to continue when she felt something on her leg. Skin meeting skin and this wasn’t just from her legs rubbing against each other.
She inhaled sharply, feeling it slowly creep up from her ankle to her calve; he was touching her. Again. And this wasn’t any accident, she knew. He was busy playing the piano, how would he be able to do this on accident?
The audience grew deathly silent as Sara stopped singing but the piano continued playing. Warrick looked at Sara in confusion, noting how uncomfortable she looked. Its okay Sara, you’re doing great, he tried to mentally encourage her, and you can do it. But then he noticed the piano player’s hand which was slowly making its way up to her inner thigh.
Sara stuttered as she started to shake slightly. He was touching her, why was he touching her? She felt his hand creep under her dress and she whimpered softly, shutting her eyes tightly. Why wouldn’t he stop?
Warrick immediately got to his feet, his jaw dropping as his hands balled into fists. Get your hands off of her, you son of a bitch! He thought, watching as the piano player continued playing the piano with one hand, but his other hand doing something else.
Sara felt the same sinking sensation she had first felt when Trey had touched her ‘accidentally’. She felt his fingers rolling over her gooseflesh making her tremble as his hand explored. She wanted to scream and slap his hand away but for some reason she didn’t. She didn’t know if it was because they were on stage in front of a bunch of people, or that she didn’t want to run the risk of losing her job, but she didn’t say or do anything.
Trey finished the song without Sara singing, his hand slowly returning to his side. There was a long silence from the audience until they began to clap softly, looking back and forth at each other as if to ask “What the hell just happened?”
The second Sara felt Trey’s hand move away from her she practically dropped the microphone she had been holding and almost ran off the stage. Trey, however, didn’t see anything awkward or inappropriate about what just happened, or he did and he just wanted to keep the crowd at bay, Sara wasn’t sure.
What the hell just happened? Warrick thought, watching Sara run off of the stage.