6 Double-Dealing

"Of all the lies I have ever lived,

My favorite is you and I."

-Unknown

Over the next few days Laura still hadn't talked to me. I had briefly saw her leaving right as I'd go out to talk to her. She was really upset with me. Our fights had never lasted this long, and I couldn't understand why she was so upset.

I wasn't going to push her to talk to me until she was ready but I was starting to get desperate. I hadn't ever gone longer that three hours of the day without talking to her since we met. We were usually inseparable and it was starting to make my heart ache.

"Jessie, you need to eat." Williams voice snapped me out of my frustrations.

We were sitting at one of the little tables at Sally's. It was lunch time and the shop was closed. This was swiftly becoming our daily routine. I looked down at the cob salad that he had made for me. It looked delicious but I couldn't bring myself to eat anything at the moment.

"I'm sorry William, I'm just distracted." I said as I forced myself to take a bite of the salad for his sake.

"Laura still isn't talking to you?" He asked frowning.

I shook my head and picked up my phone to see if she had texted me back even though I knew the answer. I could feel my eyes watering in frustration as I stared at the blank screen. William reaches over and took my hand in his reassuringly.

"I'll call her and see what's going on." He said pulling out his phone. I wanted to tell him not to worry about it but on the off chance she might actually answer his call I just nodded.

He began calling her, all the while running his thumb across the top of my hand that he was holding. It was comforting and the more he found little ways like this to touch me, the more I realized that I wasn't going to be able to stay away from him. We were on day four of our trial dating and honestly we were fooling ourselves by calling this a trial.

"Laura." William saying my best friends name had my head snapping up to look at him. Unbelievable she had answered his phone call. "She could be doing better. You need to talk to her. Your best friends Laura, practically sisters, now get off your high horse and forgive her for something that wasn't even her fault." I was surprised by the sharp anger in Williams voice.

He hung up the phone and looked over at me. I couldn't help the small smile that slid onto my lips. He had gotten angry at Laura because he wanted to protect me.

"Thank you." I told him before picking up my fork again and starting to eat. The phone call wasn't going to fix everything but it gave me peace of mind none the less.

"I don't like seeing you so upset, it was time I did something about it." He said as Sally walking into the large room.

"You two are just the cutest." She said with a grin.

I smiled warmly at the older lady and watched as she hung up a picture next to the one of Williams parents. Shocked I realized it was one of William and I the first time he brought me here. We were sitting in the love seat and William was reading to me.

"Sally when did you take that?" I asked as I got up to take a better look. "How did we not notice you taking it." I said with a laugh.

"You two where pretty occupied." Sally said smiling at us.

"It's a wonderful picture." I said as William came to stand behind me and look at it as well. He wrapped his arms around me and smiled.

"I like it too." He said.

"So tomorrow is your mother's big fundraiser ball, I take it you two will be going together?" Sally asked.

I forgot about Williams mother's fundraiser. I remember her telling me that she was hoping I'd go to it with William.

"Would you like to go to the ball with me, Cinderella?" William said looking down at me. I rolled my eyes at him but nodded and smiled.

"Im pretty sure your mom is expecting us to go." I said.

"I guarantee she is, in fact I'm pretty sure she has already set out name cards for us." William said with a smirk as we went back to the table.

"So how fancy are we talking for the ball?" I asked him.

"Fancy enough that three majors reporters will be there to cover the nights events."

My eyes widened at his words. That was fancier than anything I'd ever been to. I wasn't sure I had anything in my closet to wear for such an occasion. As if reading my mind William smiled.

"I bought us matching outfits already." He said with a smirk. I raised an eyebrow at him and heard Sally try and stifle a laugh from behind the counter.

"Oh really." I teased.

"I also bought a separate dress for Laura, and it  just happens to match Sean's outfit." He said winking and I couldn't help the laugh that escaped me then.

"I'm sure Laura will be absolutely ecstatic about that. What about Sean, he seems to like her pretty well." I said.

"I'd say they've been dating for nearly a week now." William said with a smile and my own smile fell.

This was news to me. The last I new Laura thought Sean was yummy but she had never said anything about them starting to date.  Maybe she did have good reason to be mad at me. I had been so involved with my own craziness that I hadn't even thought to ask her what was going on between her and Sean.

"Hey, you guys can talk about it when you get home. I'm sorry I didn't realize you didn't know. I bought the dress for her as a surprise for both you and Sean. I figured you could use a best friend as support." He said and I nodded in understanding, hoping I really would get the chance to talk to Laura before tomorrow.

"It's okay, can you let me give her the dress. Maybe I can get her to talk when I do." I said being hopeful.

He smiled and nodded. We finished our food and said goodbye to Sally and George before heading back towards Williams house. When we got there Sean was sitting in the living room looking through some school papers.

"Hey man, did Laura go home already?" William asked him.

"Yeah she just left, said she needed to talk to Jess." Sean said without looking up. I looked over at William and having him a excited smile.

"I'll walk you home and I'll have the dress sent over tonight." William told me as we headed back towards the door.

When we got out of earshot of Sean I smiled and turned to William. I pulled him down into a smoldering kiss. When we pulled away we were breathless.

"Thank you William." I said wholeheartedly. I wanted him to know just how appreciative I was of him helping me mend mine and Laura's friendship.

"Anything for you brown eyes." William said with a grin before softly kissing me again.

I felt warmth spread through my body as he kissed me and held me close. I felt so good and I didn't want to move away from him. He pulled away before I did though and when I frowned he laughed.

"I believe you have a meeting with a certain hot tempered blonde." He said taking my hand in his.

He walked me home and gave me a quick kiss goodbye before leaving me to go talk to my best friend. When I got inside she was sitting on the couch looking at her phone. She glanced up as I walked in and looked slightly guilty.

"Laura, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have ignored your phone calls and texts the other day." I started and she nodded.

"No you shouldn't have, and I shouldn't have been so hard on you about it. I was really worried though. I couldn't figure out why you wouldn't talk to me and tell me what was going on."

"I'm sorry. And I'm sorry I wasn't hear for you to talk to about Sean. I didn't even know you guys were officially dating until William told me today." I said sitting down next to her.

She smiled and hugged me. I hugged her back and said silent thanks to the heavens. Laura was practically my sister and I didn't know what I'd do without her.

"So I have a question." I said as she pulled back. "Williams mom is doing this charity ball tomorrow and I was hoping you'd go with William, Sean and I. Sean doesn't it know that I'm asking you to go and he hasn't asked because it is such a last minute thing and he never rsvp'd that he would be bringing a plus one." I was begging to babble and I the look in Laura's face was confirming it.

"I don't have anything to wear to a ball." She finally said. I grinned wildly.

"Don't worry about it, William planned a head for both of us." I said making sure to give my man the credit for everything he has done.

I paused, I just thought of him as my man. It was official I had tricked myself into thinking that by calling it trial dating that it in fact was a trial. It was clear that was a out right lie, we were clearly passed that.

"So can we talk about the stuff with your mom?" Laura asked me breaking me out of my inner thoughts.

"Yeah so after you sent William to the restaurant he didn't like the way my mom was talking to me so he pretended to be my fiancé. He told her off and saved the day like you guessed he would and then we just had lunch with his parents." I said with a shrug as if it wasn't a big deal.

"You do realize your mom and her husband are moving here right. And they are freaking out about you being engaged to a guy they've never met. Fake or not." I stared wide eyed at her. My mother was moving here!

"If she is moving here than..."

"You are going to have to pretend to be engaged or tell her the truth." Laura finished for me. 

I groaned in frustration. If I didn't tell her the truth than my lie would have to either turn into the truth or William and I would have to break things off for real. Or I could tell her the truth and she would flay me alive for lying to her.

"I don't know what to do, I didn't know she is moving here." I said.

"Well we may want to figure it out."she said.

"We?" I asked.

"If you think I'm going to let you deal with this on your own you are wrong." She said.

I laughed and gave her another hug. The rest of the evening we studied together and had dinner. After dinner there was a knock on the door and I went to get. A man I didn't recognize stood there holding to dress bags.

"Miss Mathews?" He asked and I nodded. I let him in and he placed the bags on the couch. "I have a couple boxes as well, I'll be right back with them." He said and went back outside.

"Jessie who is it." Laura called from the other room.

"Our outfits for tomorrow." I answered back.

The man came back inside holding a couple of shoe boxes and a few other smaller boxes. I was surprised I thought William was just sending our dresses not an entire wardrobe. The man finished carrying in boxes and left without a word.

"Damn. This is a lot of stuff." Laura said coming into the room.

I nodded and started opening the boxes. There was jewelry and and shoes, dress shawls even clutch purses. I set the last box I had opened down and looked to Laura.

"This is a lot of very expensive items." I said.

"You should see the dresses." Laura said pulling out a beautiful ruby red dress and holing it up to me. "This one is yours." She said handing me the dress.

It was beautiful, it had beautiful silver beadwork that elaborately enhanced the curves of the dress. It was a halter top, floor length dress, with a scooping deep neck line and a slit up my thigh that would show my legs. I'd never worn something that looked so expensive. I looked to Laura wide eyed she just grinned at me excitedly.

"What does yours look like?" I asked her.

She pulled out an elegant frosting pink dress that was long and flowy. It had gold belt like beading around the midsection.  I nodded towards the shoe boxes and she went to look. There was a pair of strappy gold heels and a pair of silver stilettos.

William wasn't lying when he said it was a fancy event. I laid my dress on the couch and grabbed my phone off the coffee table.

Me: Everything is beautiful William. You really shouldn't have done this.

I texted William and set my phone back down. Laura was looking through the boxes of jewelry. She looked back at me and seemed to be thinking about something.

"What?" I asked.

"How fancy did you say this was going to be?" She asked me.

"Um fancy enough to have reporters there to cover everything." I said shrugging. Her eyes widened and she began looking at her nails and examining her hair.

"We are going to need to get to the salon tomorrow morning." She said as my phone dinged again. I reached down and picked it up.

William: It's a special occasion. You two also have an appointment at Laura's favorite salon tomorrow morning at eight. Sean's suggestion, I told him earlier today.

Me: Well aren't you just full of surprises.

William: Anything for you brown eyes.

Me: Am I going to see you tonight?

William: No, sorry. My mother needs some last minute help with preparations for tomorrow. But Sean and I will pick you guys up at twelve tomorrow afternoon.

Me: Oh, okay.

Realistically I shouldn't be so disappointed it's not like I needed to be spending every minute with him. But my heart dropped when he said I wouldn't see him until tomorrow afternoon. It felt like a crazy whirlwind between us from the moment we met.

"Jessie did you hear me?" Laura asked and I looked over at her.

"Sorry no." I said holding up my phone. "William just texted. We have appointments at your favorite salon tomorrow morning at eight." I told her.

"Well that covers that problem. But you have a bigger one. If you end up on the news which undoubtedly you will tomorrow, your mother is going to see it." She said.

"Oh well. I don't really want to think about it right now." I said sighing.

I picked up the red dress I was to wear tomorrow. It was absolutely gorgeous. I took it to my room and hung it up behind the door before going back to the living room and grabbing the pair of silver stilettos and a silver clutch.

"Here, I have a feeling this is for you as well." Laura said handing me a large maroon velvet box.

I opened the box to see what was inside and found a beautiful, elegant and simple ruby necklace with silver intricately wrapping around it. A pair of matching ruby earring was with it. It was simple and beautiful, exactly what I liked when it came to jewelry.

"It's perfect." I said with a smile.

"Simple and elegant, just the way you like it." Laura said.

I brushed of her indifference towards simple jewelry and brought the last of my items to my room. I spent the rest of the evening fretting about my mother and what I would do about her moving here. It was something that I would have to discuss with William, I wasn't ready to do so just yet however. I wasn't ready to reveal the amount of messed up that was my family.

Compared to his loving family life, my family would scare him. Yes he'd seen a little of how my mother could be but that was just the tip of the iceberg. My mother was cruel and selfish always doing what would benefit her most, including getting married and divorced as many times as she felt necessary as well as always leaving me behind. I guess her leaving me behind was a blessing in disguise though. I got the an amazing best friend who's family became my family too.

As I got out of the shower and got ready for the night my phone pinged with the familiar text message ringtone. I went over to get it not surprised when I saw Williams name pop up.

William: Goodnight brown eyes. I can't wait to see you tomorrow.

I smiled at the text, he was so sweet and caring. I felt like I could ruin everything and any given moment. Brushing aside my fears I texted him back.

Me: Goodnight handsome. Can't wait to see you tomorrow either.

I set my phone on the nightstand and plugged it in before crawling into bed. Tomorrow was going to be a very long day and I couldn't shake the feeling of nervousness that washed over me when I thought of my mother. Hopefully she didn't come by tomorrow.