-Chapter Two

-Chapter 2

As I walk into the atmosphere that feels so familiar, I can hear the noise of someone walking behind me. As I quickly turn back, I found that it was Daniel.
‘What the heck are you doing, Dan?’ I ask while eyeing him suspiciously.
‘Nothing. I just wanted to check out Bro’s work place. And it smells goo-oo-od.’ He says while looking at the cakes at the counter in Amour.
‘Well, I’m the one who makes most of the cakes, so thanks. But must you follow me so indirectly, Dan?’ I’m starting to feel annoyed.
‘Ok. But don’t call me so casually by the name Dan. I’m not close to you yet.’ He says while walking over to the counter and started to flirt with the cashier/my current girlfriend/my worker.
By the way, my girlfriend’s name is Jackie. Not the greatest name, but, it suits her as she’s usually boyish but that’s what I like about her.
While Daniel is there flirting with Jackie, she eyes me suspiciously. I pull her off from Daniel’s conversation with her that proves to be about the mark on his buttock when we fell down. He’s a good show off, I can say that. As I drag Jackie into the staff room and looked around for any other staff, she starts laughing like she just got injected by some laughing gas.
I stare at Jackie and finally after 5 minutes, she stops laughing. ‘Mark, that’s the funniest guy I’ve seen in the world. And his name is Dan and apparently he got this mark on his arse because he got into this fight with a delinquent and,’ she stops to laugh a little more ‘and you told me last night he got this piece of glass stuck there and he had to have 5 stitches on it.’ She stops again for another short laugh.
‘Seriously, I thought that if his name was Dan, he’d be cooler, but that name doesn’t seem to suit him.’
‘Ha bloody ha. And were you flirting back to him, Jackie?’ I asked her directly.
‘’Course not, Mark. But it just seemed so interesting to fool around him a little bit. But I guess it’s a little too over, right?’ she seemed like she finally recovered from her laugh.
Jackie and I walked out the staff room and David was standing there. I see that he was grinning and asked ‘David, you heard our conversation, didn’t you?’
‘Correct, my dear Mark. And I think that Jackie’s got a point about Daniel.’ He replied while grinning and looking over at Daniel at the same time.
I just grin back at him and walk into the kitchen to start work for the day. After recovering from the hospital, I felt like I owe David a lot because he let me rest for a whole week. And in that mean time, Daniel moved into my apartment too.

My apartment was somewhere near the coastline, and apparently Daniel just sighs and said ‘I’m going to get sea-sick. Or in this case, I’m going to get coast-sea-sick.’ I just felt like punching him right in the face. This apartment wasn’t cheap and it was convenient as Amour was just a few hundred yards away. And Daniel said he owned a hotel. The one in the next street called ‘Hotel Rivera’ and that was why he agreed to move in with me. Because it was also convenient to him.
At first I couldn’t believe what he had just said, especially the part where he said ‘I own that hotel on the other street.’ After checking about with David, Daniel actually owns the hotel.
‘But how could a 19 year-old guy like Daniel own a hotel. And in fact a four-star one.’ I asked David anxiously on the phone.
‘He just did what he needed to do. Our family is big in the hotel industry, and Daniel is very capable when he starts to get serious.’ David briefly said and then I put down the phone. But seriously, a guy like him, so weird and stupid looking, owns a hotel? When I asked Daniel about it he just replied with a ‘Yeah, so what?’ face and it clearly states that he wants to have some privacy as I’m following him into the bathroom while asking him. I did it sub-consciously I explained but Daniel just slammed the door in my face and I could hear him unzipping his pants while walking away.
Then only after that I called up Jackie to keep her up-to-date. She was laughing the whole time because I stated out that Daniel got a chuck of glass on his buttock the other day. And I when I was almost done talking, Daniel just took my mobile and hurriedly pressed the ‘End’ button.
‘What was that for?’ I asked him as I snatched my mobile back and quickly texted Jackie to say ‘I’m sorry the phone was hung up because of this bastard.’
‘For telling people about my privacy, especially your girlfriend.’ He answers stiffly. ‘I’m going to rummage your fridge now, excuse me, as I haven’t eaten anything decent since I went into the hospital.’ He glares at me accusingly while saying the sentence ‘Since I went into the hospital.’ I think that he’s just being childish.
I mean, he can eat all he wants now. So why blame me? He ran for the watch first. And speaking of the watch, none of us got it and we ended up splitting the money for repairing the shop window which cost a whole thousand-nine. And plus the watch that we wanted which was shattered together with the window, it cost us more than we thought.
As I start mixing all the ingredients to bake the cupcakes that comes with the breakfast set, Daniel walks in and stares at what I am making.
‘You got a problem with my mixing?’ I asked him rather casually.
‘No, it’s just that I’m wondering why a guy like you can do other things like business and stuff but instead you’re here mixing some baking powder and a dough mix.’
‘Well, I like baking because it’s fun. And guys these days can even sew and cook okay, so it means that you’re the one weird.’ He flinched on that remark and just when he wanted to get out David came in and said ‘Mark, could you be kind enough to show Daniel the town later? I’ll give you a bonus if you could do it today and tomorrow.’
Ah, this is the thing that I like about David. He is really considerate, although he doesn’t show it. He’s offering me a bonus as he knows travelling around the town consumes time and money and Daniel is a little more than fussy. In fact, he’s picky.
‘Ok, sure.’ I reply while pouring the dough mix into the cupcake tray. After setting the oven temperature and my alarm clock to count the time, I looked around the kitchen for Daniel but apparently, Jackie said that he went out to look at his hotel. ‘Must be bragging around his female employees, I guess’ before realizing I almost said it out loud in front on David.
Luckily at the last moment, I stopped myself from doing any harm to the relationship between us which seemed good now. But now I’m starting to wonder if Daniel has a brother complex towards David.
Because now everything that Daniel does towards David looks so… Close and romantic. In a brotherly way, not a guy to guy way. But I doubt David knows that. Maybe he thinks that it’s normal for Daniel to be like that, and if it is, then that proves that Daniel was always like that in his own home somewhere south. Or was his last house somewhere near San Francisco?
But I guess I’ll find out about that sooner or later. Because the important thing now is to plan where to take Daniel in this ‘trip around town’ as David says.
But I don’t think I quite want to, although I have no choice but to follow it for now as I can’t turn back anymore.