The hall was radiant and brimming with the energy of a youthful night. People were chatting, discussing, mingling, and interacting. It was a party where no one wanted to be left behind. It was, after all, a gathering of the rich, powerful, and influential.
The party was yet to ripen as the celebrant was yet to arrive. Although he seemed to be late, no one complained. Parties like these sometimes started minutes to midnight; some even after. And the night was still young. It was hardly an hour past sunset.
In one corner of the hall, a certain group of people hidden within the darkness of the hall stood and discussed, all while glancing timely at the main entrance of the hall.
At one point, a groan escaped one of them and the rest turned to him, their attention diverted from whatever it was that had their prior focus.
"Allen," a female within the group called out, "What's the matter?"
Allen, the man in question, ran his fingers through his black locks in frustration without even answering the woman in question. To him, she wasn't worth looking at.
"Are you still thinking about what Alvise said before he left?" A guy asked and this time, Allen paid notice to him and cracked a sardonic smile.
"That bastard…" Allen said, "Zeke, what do you think that bastard meant when he said he was leaving?" Allen asked the blue eyes that directed the question to him.
Someone else spoke up instead, "You mean what he said about his woman?"
"Come on, Allen," Another guy spoke up, "Alvise couldn't be serious. And besides, he said a partner, not a woman."
"Are you insinuating that he might be bringing a dude as his partner or something?" Jon, the guy who spoke up earlier asked.
"I'm not insinuating anything, Jon." Jerry replied, "I'm just saying that it might be a close relation or something."
"Why are you fools even bothered about someone else's life when yours is a mess?" A baritone voice boomed and the rest turned to look at him.
Allen smirked while the rest just stared on. "Are you saying that we shouldn't feed our curiosity that has been raging by our friend's little stunt?"
The man who was directed the question puffed out the smoke within his lungs and then stubbed the cigarette in his hands onto an ashtray. His dark orbs were empty and almost unfocused, but that wasn't the reason that this thick aura of intimidation emanated from his very being; neither was it because of his big bear-like build that could cover the majority of them who were gathered in this corner.
"I'm not saying any of that," he started coldly as he stretched out his hand that was propped onto the armrest of the chair he lounged on. Immediately, a waiter came and handed him liquor in a diamond-cut glass.
Allen came and sat across him, the corner was like a lounge. There were lounge chairs and a wide marble lounge table neatly arranged with coasters, champagne bottles, and untouched glass cups with napkins within. There were even partition curtains that were decorated with fairy lights and a frame that was lined with fake vines and neon lights.
"Then what are you trying to say, brother?" Allen asked the man.
The man now had his head leaned over the head of the couch; his face turned upwards to the ceiling. He was huge, Allen registered. A gruff grunt left his lips at Allen's method of addressing him and he straightened his posture but didn't meet Allen's gaze. He leaned down to pick a cigarette from the pack on the table and put it in his mouth.
He dug his hand into his pocket for a lighter but someone beat him to it. It was Jon. He lit his cigarette and the one in his mouth before settling on the couch in the middle of the two men. Jerry and Zeke sat down with the rest of the ladies left awkwardly standing before they decided to excuse themselves.
"Change it." The man let out in a gruff voice.
"Change what, brother?" Allen asked, confused and off-guard.
"The way you address me. I'm not your relation."
"Sure thing, bro- I mean, Ezra," Ezra said nothing more and just continued his smoke that he complimented with a timely drink.
"So, Ezra… What are you trying to say?"
Ezra let out a small smirk and a husky gasp that seemed like he had remembered something interesting. "Why are you interested in whether he brought a woman, a man, or a beast as his partner?"
"But-"
"You're not his mother, are you?"
"What are you saying, Ezra?"
Ezra chuckled at his persistence and everyone seemed to straighten up unconsciously due to his act, "You can be curious, but curiosity kills the cat."
The statement knocked Allen off balance, "What?"
"You're like a cat, jumping and preying on what wasn't fed to you."
"Are you trying to say I'll get myself killed?" Allen asked. Rage simmering within him.
Ezra raised an eyebrow coldly at his reaction. His face was still cold and expressionless despite it all. Everyone silently hoped nothing happened. If it did, it wouldn't be good for Allen.
Ezra eyed Allen for a bit and then moved his gaze to his drink, "Whatever you want to think, that's on you. I told you what I had to."
Contrary to everyone's belief, Allen just suddenly chuckled, as though he were never angry in the first place. He then brushed back a stray lock of hair from his face and picked up a deck of cards from under the marble table.
"Who wants to play cards?"
***
"Where is she? Why isn't she here yet? What's taking them so long?"
Terry watched his wife, Rebecca, speak to herself and prance around as though she were possessed. This had been currently going on for a while now and it was making him internally restless despite his calm disposition.
"Are you being calm right now, darling?" Rebecca asked.
Terry, knowing that any answer he gives his military strategist wife would put him in a sick bed, embraced her from behind with his huge build in an attempt to comfort her, "My lovely, she'll be just fine."
"How are you so sure?" She asked defiantly, but he could see that she needed assurance, and that was what he would give her. For his peace of mind and sanity.
"Our little girl isn't so little anymore. She can now defend herself and keep her own. She'll be just fine." He assured her.
"But-" Rebecca said wanting to argue some more.
"And besides," he cut her off and stared deeply into her eyes, obsidian meeting cobalt, "She's our daughter, have some fate that the b*st*rd in her company can't do anything to her. She's our little tiger."
Rebecca laughed, "I thought you said she's not so little, Terrion?"
"That's for others, my love. For us, she's our little darling."
"Yes…" Rebecca said, but soon she wore a sad smile, and her aura seemed dampened all of a sudden.
Terrion noticed and was immediately concerned, "What's wrong, my love."
"No…" She said in a fluster, "I'm just worried that our little girl has grown all of a sudden. She might soon leave us. She seems so distant ever since that incident at the study."
"I'm not complaining about it. Or saying it's a bad thing." She suddenly added in a flurry and Terrion thought she was cute. "I just wish she'd lean more and depend on us more often."
"I know what you mean, love," Terrion said as he kissed one of her eyes. "Sometimes, I feel like she might disappear right in front of me; I feel like she's grown and changed from who she was; I feel like she's in pain; like she might be using her cold exterior as a shield to hide her pain."
The revelation shocked Rebecca and she instantly turned to face him, "Then shouldn't we talk to her? Ask her to spend more time with us or maybe keep her home for a year before college…"
"You know deep down that if you do that, she might accept but her soul would never truly be with us." Terrion sighed as though he had encountered a dead end in his thinking.
Rebecca was disheartened as she knew her husband spoke truths and not lies, "Then…?" She asked heartbroken, looking for a logical solution to the problem of their daughter.
"Perhaps, we'll get her to visit once in a while and ask her to spend more time with her family. She won't be able to reject."
"How are you so sure, darling?"
"Because that child may be cold and distant on the outside, but she'll do anything if not everything, her family asks. It's as though she's avoiding something by being close." Terrion said.
"As though she had faced something that had made her like that: cold, distant, and inexpressive yet afraid, anxious, and alone. That child…" He said grimly, 'She's drowning.' He said in his mind and not outside, for fear that he might make his wife any more unstable than she was already.
"Anyway," He continued as he brought himself out of those thoughts for fear of his sensitive wife catching on to something, "We'll help her before she can go any further. We'll catch her before she falls."
"Like when she was younger?" He heard his wife say and he looked at her and caught her gaze. She was lovely beyond expression, he thought.
"Yes, my love." He said as he gave her a light peck on the forehead and then met them with his, "Just as before when she was our little princess." He said with a smile and she hummed in agreement with him, her tears spilling in happiness.
They'll save her, she thought. They'll save her little Tanya, just as before and not when she was injured but way before that. Way before any bad guy or bullet can catch up. Just like before.