Status: I'm baaack...
The Chronicles of City Lights and Modern Love
Vol.3
The apartment block we live in is not exactly an apartment block; the top six floors are permanent apartments and the rest are hotel rooms. We live in the penthouse that takes up the top two floors and due to the nature of the establishment, there is a bar and restaurant on the ground floor.
I guess our family are quiet well-to-do, but fortune probably smiled upon the wrong people. My family are some of the most easy-going people you will ever meet; we enjoy the simple things in life, like a campfire, an old wooden Malibu and some decent surf or a north easterly wind to fill our sails. We don’t need the hustle and bustle of the city, but living in the city, surrounded by the people in suits, I was beginning to feel as though the expectations for me to settle into college and pursue a corporate career were high. In honesty, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I still wanted to backpack across Europe, surf in Teahupoo and do so many other things, before I settled down to be responsible.
Growing up where I did kept me from getting inflated; the whole family is fairly well rounded considering…everything. “Everything” meaning my low life grandfather, or my dad’s father. Some may beg to differ; many people wouldn’t call him a low life because he lives the high life, he just doesn't do this honestly. He is a mobster, one of the most notorious in Australia…or he was. He’s not dead (I don’t think), he just hasn’t been seen around for quiet a while. It’s not like him to just up and die though, he’s pretty sharp. Now, that may seem like a strange thing to say, but you don’t know my grandfather; he’s probably living it up in Venice or Sicily or maybe even Portofino where I lived all those years ago. He was able to keep his own nose pretty clean while he worked from Melbourne, one of the worlds’ most renowned areas of organised crime, as he employed men more stupid than himself to do the dirty work. Old gramps is probably living in a big old mansion somewhere and running the “family business” from home.
All of this, I felt, was a perfectly fine excuse for sitting in a bar on a Friday night when I was barely seventeen.
"Alessandra, you know you’re not supposed to be down here," Tim, the twenty-one year old Irish bartender, told me.
"You wouldn’t tell me to go back upstairs would you?" I asked in my most enchanting voice.
"I wish I could, but you’re just too damn cute to say no to," he said. He smiled at me before going to serve a customer.
I looked down and contemplated the colour of the skin on my arms. The relative paleness of them saddened me, given that they had been a golden brown when we had left the last of the Australian Summer behind a month prior. I definitely wasn't a city girl, and the change in my appearance reflected this, although perhaps the change was only apparent to me.
At home, my long hair was always sun kissed and wavy with salt, and my limbs were always toned. I felt as if my hair was dull, and my limbs a little skinnier and a little less strong from the lack of outdoor activity. To me, even my eyes looked different. They were no longer the bright blueish green they had always been, but rather a dull, dark blue. I didn't know if it was the polluted city air, or the lack of salt water in my system that prompted the change. Maybe there was no change on the outside; maybe the change was only on the inside.
Suddenly I heard a shattering sound and turned around to see a guy raising a glass off the bar. Underneath was a piece of smashed ice.
"‘Now that I’ve broken the ice, will you sleep with me?" he said with a cheeky grin.
I chuckled at his wit but politely declined and turned back to the bar where Tim stood with his eyebrows raised.
"That was original," he stated simply, in his thick Irish accent. "Are people this mental around you all the time?"
"Not really, I’ve heard my fair share of bizarre pick up lines, but the guys around here are not shy at all. They’re very…straight to the point," I laughed.
He chuckled "Beautiful girls and alcohol can only lead to embarrassment."
I blushed and he gave me a wink before going off to serve some more customers.
"Excuse me," a male voice said from behind me. I didn’t turn around so he continued, "My boys over there bet that I wouldn't be able to start a conversation with the most beautiful girl in the room. Want to buy some drinks with their money?"
I turned around, deciding that it was a pickup line that deserved a bit of attention, and came face to face with Carmine.
"I’m underage," was all I had to say before swiveling my chair back around. He sat down next to me.
"So am I," he replied with a grin, fixing me with his sparkling navy blue gaze.
"I’ll be fine," I replied.
"So, you definitely are clever Bella. I’m not easy to give the slip, but you succeeded," he said before saying something so quietly I wasn’t sure if I’d heard at all. I inhaled my mineral water nonetheless.
I guess our family are quiet well-to-do, but fortune probably smiled upon the wrong people. My family are some of the most easy-going people you will ever meet; we enjoy the simple things in life, like a campfire, an old wooden Malibu and some decent surf or a north easterly wind to fill our sails. We don’t need the hustle and bustle of the city, but living in the city, surrounded by the people in suits, I was beginning to feel as though the expectations for me to settle into college and pursue a corporate career were high. In honesty, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I still wanted to backpack across Europe, surf in Teahupoo and do so many other things, before I settled down to be responsible.
Growing up where I did kept me from getting inflated; the whole family is fairly well rounded considering…everything. “Everything” meaning my low life grandfather, or my dad’s father. Some may beg to differ; many people wouldn’t call him a low life because he lives the high life, he just doesn't do this honestly. He is a mobster, one of the most notorious in Australia…or he was. He’s not dead (I don’t think), he just hasn’t been seen around for quiet a while. It’s not like him to just up and die though, he’s pretty sharp. Now, that may seem like a strange thing to say, but you don’t know my grandfather; he’s probably living it up in Venice or Sicily or maybe even Portofino where I lived all those years ago. He was able to keep his own nose pretty clean while he worked from Melbourne, one of the worlds’ most renowned areas of organised crime, as he employed men more stupid than himself to do the dirty work. Old gramps is probably living in a big old mansion somewhere and running the “family business” from home.
All of this, I felt, was a perfectly fine excuse for sitting in a bar on a Friday night when I was barely seventeen.
"Alessandra, you know you’re not supposed to be down here," Tim, the twenty-one year old Irish bartender, told me.
"You wouldn’t tell me to go back upstairs would you?" I asked in my most enchanting voice.
"I wish I could, but you’re just too damn cute to say no to," he said. He smiled at me before going to serve a customer.
I looked down and contemplated the colour of the skin on my arms. The relative paleness of them saddened me, given that they had been a golden brown when we had left the last of the Australian Summer behind a month prior. I definitely wasn't a city girl, and the change in my appearance reflected this, although perhaps the change was only apparent to me.
At home, my long hair was always sun kissed and wavy with salt, and my limbs were always toned. I felt as if my hair was dull, and my limbs a little skinnier and a little less strong from the lack of outdoor activity. To me, even my eyes looked different. They were no longer the bright blueish green they had always been, but rather a dull, dark blue. I didn't know if it was the polluted city air, or the lack of salt water in my system that prompted the change. Maybe there was no change on the outside; maybe the change was only on the inside.
Suddenly I heard a shattering sound and turned around to see a guy raising a glass off the bar. Underneath was a piece of smashed ice.
"‘Now that I’ve broken the ice, will you sleep with me?" he said with a cheeky grin.
I chuckled at his wit but politely declined and turned back to the bar where Tim stood with his eyebrows raised.
"That was original," he stated simply, in his thick Irish accent. "Are people this mental around you all the time?"
"Not really, I’ve heard my fair share of bizarre pick up lines, but the guys around here are not shy at all. They’re very…straight to the point," I laughed.
He chuckled "Beautiful girls and alcohol can only lead to embarrassment."
I blushed and he gave me a wink before going off to serve some more customers.
"Excuse me," a male voice said from behind me. I didn’t turn around so he continued, "My boys over there bet that I wouldn't be able to start a conversation with the most beautiful girl in the room. Want to buy some drinks with their money?"
I turned around, deciding that it was a pickup line that deserved a bit of attention, and came face to face with Carmine.
"I’m underage," was all I had to say before swiveling my chair back around. He sat down next to me.
"So am I," he replied with a grin, fixing me with his sparkling navy blue gaze.
"I’ll be fine," I replied.
"So, you definitely are clever Bella. I’m not easy to give the slip, but you succeeded," he said before saying something so quietly I wasn’t sure if I’d heard at all. I inhaled my mineral water nonetheless.