Chapter 16
When the plane landed she felt like an entirely new person. The city's skyline was beyond anything she'd ever seen before, even if she had only glimpsed a part of it when the plane had approached the airport.
The shops and restaurants were of no interest to her, especially since it was already a bit late in the evening. At least, it was for her. Usually, Ava was already fast asleep at this hour to get enough sleep in to start the new day fresh and well-rested.
While walking towards the exit a thought occurred to her, she had no idea how she'd get to his place.
There shouldn't be a shortage of taxis around, but she didn't have an address to get to.
Stress started building up while she grabbed her phone from the bag and she silently prayed that Mr. Chastain would pick up.
She had no idea at what time he'd go to sleep and there was nothing to do but hope he was still awake so he'd pick up his phone.
"Ava," someone called out just as she was about to press the call button.
Confused, she looked around. There were millions of people in this city, what were the chances someone knew her?
She got her answer when she spotted him. Mr. Chastain was casually approaching her from her left as if he'd been waiting for her. But why would he do that? Lately everything he did just confused her and she knew she wouldn't get that many answers.
"How was your flight?" he asked when he got close enough. Knots formed in her stomach as his face reminded her of the last time they'd spoken, and the reality of his opinion of her came back.
But she had to remain professional, so she put on a mask of neutrality before answering. "It went well, thank you," she replied with a polite smile.
He nodded before looking at the bag in her hands and then frowning at what he saw. "Where is the rest of your stuff?" he asked.
"This is all my stuff."
"Alright, but... You're going to be here for a while you should probably have brought more," he said while scratching his neck.
"I don't have more, this is all my stuff," she replied, repeating the last part.
He looked at her, and then at the small bag. And then at her again as if his mind couldn't process what he saw. Once he opened his mouth, but then thought better of it and closed it.
He seemed to land at acceptance when he nodded. "Alright. Let's go, then."
They walked back in the direction that he'd come from. The walk was longer than she'd expected, she'd never seen an airport as big as this one before. The hallways seemed endless and would only split into more at the end of each of them.
After a while, they reached a car park and it wasn't hard to spot which car was his.
It looked similar enough to the one back at the estate, yet different.
They were both black and shiny but this one was a bit lower than the other one.
The logo was different, too, but she couldn't tell what it meant.
"Here," he said as he reached out to get her bag, which she handed over to him. He opened the trunk and placed it in before closing it again.
Ava wasn't sure what to do next so she just waited for him to tell her, but he walked past and opened the passenger door. It opened in a wildly different way than the previous one. The shiny black door moved upwards instead of out, which she'd never seen before.
She'd been so busy admiring the strange door she almost missed him gesturing for her to get in the car. The inside also looked different, yet kind of the same. From memory, she couldn't tell exactly what was different, but she knew it was.
The door closed down again and she pressed herself into the seat while making sure no limbs were able to get caught in the mechanism. Mr. Chastain got in next to her and started the car before pulling out of the parking spot.
"Where do you live?" he asked suddenly. Where the question came from she had no idea, maybe it had been on his mind for a while.
"In the servant's quarters of the estate," she replied confusedly while looking back at him. He obviously already knew where she stayed so the question didn't make a lot of sense.
"No, I meant when you're not working," he clarified while focussing on the road in front of him.
"But I'm always working."
"You don't have a home?" he suddenly asked while glancing back at her.
"Home is wherever I work at the moment."
"You really don't have more stuff than this, then?"
"It's all I need," she said while patting the bag. It pretty much only held some clothes, underwear, and hygienic items but that was all she used on her daily basis.
He didn't say anything for a long time after that, making her wonder what was on his mind. Maybe it was just ridiculous to someone who owned multiple homes that she didn't really have anything. It seemed of great interest to him, at least.
"Where do you spend the money you make?" he asked after his long silence.
"I save it."
"For what?"
"For when I'm let go."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't have a place to stay at when I don't have a job, so when I'm let go I have to pay for a hotel, or a motel if that's available, until I find another job, which usually takes a while," she explained while reminiscing on the times it had happened.
"And hotel rooms don't usually have kitchens in them so I'd have to buy takeout every day.
And then I have to travel for job interviews and money just runs out really fast when that happens. "
She didn't want to tell him about the times money had run out before, or think back on the feeling of sleeping in a cold apartment hallway before someone would kick her out.
"So you work to save money for when you're looking for work?"
'Yeah, pretty much."
"And you're fine with that?"
"I have to be."
"I'm not letting you go, Ava. You know that, right?" The words were said with so much conviction that she believed him for a moment. But he could say anything. Reality had though her differently, and she couldn't afford to be foolish about these kinds of things.
"I always am, eventually."
"No," he ground out and she could feel that he was losing his temper.
She didn't know what she'd said that could piss him off but it didn't matter now.
Being in the car with an angry person was the last thing she wanted since she couldn't just get out.
And if she could, she'd be stranded without knowing where she was.
"Why would I even do that?" he finished as an afterthought.
She just shrugged, there were always reasons to fire her, she was expendable after all. She wasn't the only one who had trouble finding a job and she knew that there would be at least five other maids waiting for a job opening when she was fired.
"Maybe because of what I told you at the restaurant," she said blankly, making him look her way.
It was stupid to give him reasons to fire her, she knew that.
But he also couldn't pretend like nothing was going on and hurt her in the process.
"Maybe I'm not the person you thought I was and you just don't want someone like me in your house," she whispered afterwards.
It was easier if he let her go now, she decided. At least she could start fresh somewhere where she knew she wasn't a pest.
"What the fuck, Ava," he ground out. "Is that what you think? That I don't think you're good enough to work for me?"
"It's fine," she started before getting cut off by him.
"No, it's not. What did I do to make you think that?" Now he was definitely angry which intimidated her.
Good job Ava, you managed to make him mad within an hour of being here, she thought. Employee of the year, right here.
"Mr. Chastain, I'm sorry—"
"Don't fucking Mr. Chastain me, Ava. I'm called Sébastien and why are you apologizing now?"
"I didn't mean to anger you."
"You didn--," he started before stopping to take a deep breath to gather his composure. "You didn't anger me. I'm just upset that you think that. Because I don't, and it doesn't matter where you came from. Do you understand?"
"Yes, M—Sébastien."
"And I if think something I'll just say it, so don't go making things up in your mind that you think I might think. Because I think you're great and I wouldn't have asked you to come here if I didn't."
He thinks I'm great? she thought. In the past three weeks, she'd been so caught up in the idea that he saw her as nothing more than a pest she hadn't even considered that she'd misinterpreted his actions before he left.
And now she'd made him upset.
"Ava, stop thinking so hard about everything," he sighed, interrupting her hard thinking. He was right, she should probably stop overanalyzing his every word and take it as it was.
"Right, sorry."
He opened his mouth to say something but closed it and shook his head, making her wonder what he wanted to say. The atmosphere in the car wasn't as tense as it had been before and it relieved her to know that he wasn't actually angry at her.
Maybe staying with him wasn't going to be as awkward as she'd imagined after all.