Page 43 of The Pursuit of Happiness

“For what? You didn’t do anything,” he shakes his head in disbelief.

I feel my hands shaking as I try to run my hands over the denim of my jeans to steady myself, “This is my fault. He was talking aboutme, I should’ve-”

“Stop,” he cuts me off. He grabs my face with his hand and leans in, “This wasnotyour fault. That was my fault. Do not blame yourself for any of that.”

I squeeze my eyes shut and fresh tears stream down my cheeks. I taste the saltiness of the warm tears in my mouth. “Slater, where am I going?” The driver calls to the back.

“My house,” Sly answers, never taking his eyes off of me.

My body wracks with tears and Sly grabs me, pulling me into his body. I sob into his chest, my tears absorbing into the fabric of his bloody t-shirt. “Shhh.” He rubs my back, “I’m so sorry, Aria. I never wanted to scare you. I just couldn’t handle him talking about you like that.”

“I’m not scared of you, Sly. I’m scared of what’s going to happen to you because of this.” I realize that Sly could go to jail. He could be arrested. My insides twist up and pain erupts in my chest.

He kisses the crown of my head and continues rubbing circles on my back to calm me, “Don’t worry about me.”

I laugh through my tears, “It’s too late for that.”

His voice is dark as he speaks into my hair, “Aria Kane, I willneverallow someone to disrespect you or speak about you in that way, especially when what they say about you isn’t true.”

The limo stops and I realize we must be at Sly’s house. Our phones both start buzzing like crazy and Sly releases me from his arms. I make a move to look at my phone but Sly stops me by placing a hand over mine, “Don’t look at it right now. We’ll deal with this later.”

I see the worried look in his eyes and nod, shutting my phone off and putting it back in my purse. I’m not sure if the worry in his eyes is for my current state or for the situation we’re now in, but either way, he brushes it off and gives me one of his signature smiles though it comes out weak.

Sly exits the limo and helps me out as usual. He keeps a hold of my hand as he leads me up the stone walkway to the front of his luxurious, villa style home that I fall in love with immediately. It has a warm feeling to it and I’m not sure if the messy yet natural looking landscaping is responsible or the person who lives here. I didn’t expect Sly to have a villa style home. I expected him to have a modern style home with no personality and a sterile feel to it. I’m not sure why I expected that considering Sly has one of the best personalities I’ve ever encountered in another person. I just assumed because he was a wealthy male star in Hollywood that he’d have a basic house just like the rest of them.

Once we make it to the porch he unlocks his door and holds it open for me to step inside behind him. I take in the cleanliness of his home first and then the warmth that seems to continue from the outside of the home. He has photos all over of his friends, family, everyone he holds dear. I smile as my eyes land on an image of Sly and a woman that must be his mother. It’s a graduation photo, most likely from highschool and hismother squeezes his face in her hands and kisses his cheek affectionately. “Is this your mom?” I ask, my voice low.

Sly nods, taking a few steps closer to me to get a better look at the image in question. His lips curve into what looks like a nostalgic smile. “Yeah,” he says, affection in his voice.

“Are you guys close?” I assumed already that the answer was yes and that’s due to the many times he’s brought her up around me along with the fact this picture is hung up in his house at all.

“I’m close with both of my parents.”

I feel the bitterness of jealousy on my tongue and in the depths of my stomach. I wonder what it must be like to have that kind of bond with your parents. I’m happy for Sly that he got to experience it, but also jealous because I didn’t. I never got to feel that level of happiness from the people who created me. “That’s nice,” I speak so quietly, I’m not sure I spoke at all.

He tilts his head at me, “Are you close with your parents? I didn’t see any pictures in your house. Well I did, but only of you and the girls.”

I laugh, a sarcastic and very ominous laugh as I take a step around him and continue into his home, peeking around at everything to get more insight into the parts of his life that don’t involve me. I toy with the leaves of a plant on the foyer table as I tease, “Trust me, you don’t wanna unpack all my childhood trauma.”

“Try me,” he responds, a sternness to his tone. I turn to find him with his arms crossed, his hip propped against the wall as he leans his weight into it.

I raise a mocking brow at him, knowing I’m about to prove my point. Sly is so used to having a perfect, loving family, I’m about to knock his socks off with this. “My father left when I was a kid and moved to Russia to start a new family. He never paid a penny in child support and I haven’t seen or heard from him since he left.”

He frowns, his brows knotting in the middle. “And your mother?”

I huff to myself. I was sure that would scare him off, prove my point and give me the win over him. Maybe he takes a little bit more trauma to back down, “My mom and I aren’t close. She’s very…complicated.” I think about the best way to describe my mother before deciding on, “She was very hands off when I was growing up and chose to leave me for long periods of time so she could be with her girlfriend. She had moments where she could be pretty cruel.”

He pushes off the wall and walks over to me slowly, “You talk about her in the past tense.”

“She isn’t as bad now,” I shrug.

“But she’s still bad?” He asks, a confused look on his face as if he’s trying to figure something out.

I shake my head, “She’s better now. We aren’t super close, but we talk from time to time like civilized humans. It’s an improvement from the way things used to be.”

He reaches for one of my blue streaks of hair and twirls it around his fingers, his eyes glued to the strands and the way the blue catches on the light. I watch him, mystified that he’s within such short proximity. “How could anyone not want to be close to you?” He whispers almost to himself as if he’s genuinely curious.

“I-” I hesitate, “What?”

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