1 Chapter 1 - Masquerade

Flashes of lightning were flickering all around Jayson, some were coming dangerously close to hitting him... until one did. It looked an awful lot like a human being attempting to punch him and it made one of the loudest sounds he thinks he's ever heard.

Jayson shoots out of bed instantly, beads of sweat falling down his forehead and dripping onto his hands that were moving to cup his face. His knees starting to raise, pushing his hands harder and harder into his head.

His hands slowly moved away from his face, shaking and drenched in sweat, he's trying his hardest to breathe properly but all of his breaths are shallow and quick. His head slowly creaks towards the mirror in his room, revealing his left eye to be shining blue even though the rest of the room was pitch black.

He hears an extremely loud noise coming from his bedside table, his first alarm had just gone off.

"Five forty-five already?" He asks, nobody answering. He turns to his phone and grabs it, turning the alarm off and setting it back down.

He stands up and walks to the closet in his room, he opens it and grabs a black and white shirt from inside. He turns to the other side of his cupboard where he grabs a pair of pants, underwear, and a pair of socks. He takes the clothes he is wearing at the time off and puts his new ones on.

He walks into the barren kitchen and turns on the kettle, he also grabs a mug out of the cupboard and milk from the fridge. The kettle stops and he puts a few teaspoons of coffee into his mug, pouring the hot water in along with the milk. He stirs it all with a spoon and takes a sip, closing his eyes in the process.

The day crawls along at a snail's pace as he has nothing to do and nobody to talk to until his parents come back. His mum was the first one to come home, and he was ecstatic to talk to her.

Jayson's relationship with his parents was always a shaky one, his relationship with any of his family members was extremely unreliable. He always held them in high regard as a kid but as he grew up he started to see who they really were, or maybe it was just his view on the entire world as a whole changing? Finding the answer wasn't exactly Jayson's goal in life, he couldn't care less. He would grow up and leave them at some point, why not speed up the process?

"Hey mum, welcome home!" He walks over to her and reaches for the backpack on her shoulders.

"Hello Jayson," she takes the backpack off and hands it to him. He graciously accepts and walks into the living room to place it down. "You're still going to that party tonight right?" She walks into the living room as well and settles down on the black leather lounge.

"Of course I am, trust me, it won't be as bad as you think it's going to be." Jayson walks over to her and sits down on the edge of the lounge, looking over to her. She stares daggers straight into his eyes, causing Jayson to smile nervously look around the room.

"Just remember, if shit starts to go down, you get the hell out of dodge." She moves her arm to put her hand on his, the daggers grew blunt and her eyes became warm. Showing all of the love for her child just from one look. He looks down towards the floor and moves his hand away.

"I'm not your baby anymore, you don't have to look out for me all the time." He shifted in the seat, placing his hands down to support himself and standing up, "it's weird." His mother drops her head and stares at her empty hand, her vision blurring and a tear falling onto the lounge.

"I know that… I just don't know what I would do without you… you're just everything to me, Jayson." He turns around to look down at her and smiles. He leans down to give her a quick hug and walks back into his room. Jayson flops onto his bed and quickly falls asleep.

"Jayson! Wake up!" A large hand continuously shakes Jayson in his bed until he finally opens his eyes and rolls his body over to face the roof. "Thank god. You've gotta get dressed and ready for the party!" Jayson groans and barely lifts himself, releasing a yawn and stretching.

"Mornin' beautiful," Jayson's face shifts to a cocky grin. A voice calls from the hallway.

"I wouldn't exactly call your father beautiful." Evoking a laugh from Jayson and causing his father's jaw to drop.

"Ellaaaa!."

"Brunooo?" An awkward silence floods the room as Jayson cracks his knuckles before speaking up.

"Jaysoonnn?" The trio looks around at each other with plain faces. "Well then," Jayson jumps out of his bed. "Am I going to this party or not?" The two parents nod, "good." He grabs his shoes and slips them on.

Before walking out of his room Jayson grabs a masquerade mask from his TV stand, staring at it. A soft voice meets his ears, "It's best to take it, just in case." Ella was standing in the doorframe with her arms crossed, a goofy smile plastered on her face.

"What're you so chipper about?" Jayson asks while furrowing his eyebrows. She simply shakes her head and walks towards the front door, Jayson following suit.

They reach the car and Jayson opens the door to hop in, buckling his seatbelt and turning on his phone.

The drive is quick and silent, just like how Jayson prefers it to be. When the car pulls into the parking lot of a sports club Ella instantly recognizes it.

"Hey, I came here for my friend's twenty-third birthday!" She rubs the back of her neck, "it sure looks different though."

"Yeah, I'm sure it did look different," Jayson opens the car door and turns to her, "400 years ago." She lightly smacks him on the shoulder as he hops out of the car. He turns around and smiles at her while tilting his head, closing the door and walking towards the club. As he is walking he gets flanked from behind.

"Yoo!" The guy was considerably taller than Jayson and he had kempt blond hair, "Jayson Bernard an' his masquerade mask! How are ya man!?" He was also considerably more annoying than him.

"I'm alright, I guess," Jayson lightly pushes the guy off of him, "now I'm perfect!" The blond stops dead in his tracks and hangs his head. "Aww, don't take it too harshly, Marshal." Marshal's head looks up at Jayson straight away, the most shit-eating grin plastered on his face.

"You gon' get sum' puss' tonight?" Jayson slowly turns around so that his eye is barely showing through his mask, shaking his head.

"Yes, I will 𝘵𝘰𝘵𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 be getting some 'puss' at this party where I know 2 people." He turns his head around again, kicking up some gravel in his next step. The rest of the short walk was spent in awkward silence, a loud-mouthed idiot was finally silenced.

Jayson reaches the door first and looks back at Marshal, eyes flickering out of annoyance and twists the handle. Whatever waited for him in here couldn't possibly be worse than talking to Marshal right?