Zenon's Game Chapter 233

By this town, I knew he meant back home. It's true. I want to get off Dupont Avenue as fast as I can. I want to be working in a big city somewhere, able to pay my bills and not worry about the electricity going out on my kids. I don't want social services to be hovering around the corner.

I want a better life than the one I grew up in.

"You're ambitious Zenon," I said, "I feel like your ambitions are on another level to mine."

He wants to be in the NBA. He's aiming to be the top 0.03% of basketball players. At least, I think that's the NBA drafting rate. I've been googling it ever since he told me his dream.

"Why put yourself down, Candy?" he asked, raising my hand to his lips and kissing it, "You do it subconsciously sometimes. You're going to smash your goals and aim high. I know you. One day in the future, you'll tell me I was right."

Ten years from now, how will I remember this night? Would Zenon and I still be together, or would this be an old memory? I hoped it was the former. I want us to be together through it all.

Suddenly, we heard shouting behind us.

"What happened?" I asked, twisting round on the box to see what was happening.

Zenon did the same. We looked to see two bouncers carrying Axel out of the backstage area.

This escalated fast.

We were sitting on sound equipment. Hand in hand, I mindlessly traced his fingers as my hand rested on his open palm. I was happier here than back in the beach club party. I could still hear the music and felt zero desire to return.

All my desire was locked in the shape of Zenon Albert.

A handsome shape that left me in a dreamlike state.

Song lyric maybe? Suddenly, we heard shouting behind us.

Two bouncers were carrying Axel out of the backstage area. He was yelling something, and I looked back to see DJ Pumpa T himself, standing there and looking amped.

"How did you even get in here, dawg?!" the DJ yelled out, "I thought we had good security here for real!"

His blue tipped spiky hair created a weird halo effect around him. He was wearing a hoodie with cartoons and a mad splattering of color on it. It felt strange seeing him up close after watching him on stage for two hours.

Axel yelled back, "You lay another hand on-"

The bodyguards wrestled him back and one wrapped an arm around his neck, preventing him from talking.

"Stop, you're hurting him!" I yelled out.

Zenon reacted faster than me. He was already walking towards them.

He passed Oma and said, "You filming?"

She quickly took her phone up and pressed 'record' in case anything went wrong. Documentation was a defense.

"Put the flash on," Cynthia said, so it'd be obvious they were on camera.

I ran up after them, wondering what I could do to help.

Zenon started talking to the bodyguards, but they yelled at him to back off. He didn't. And when they took a more aggressive stance against Zenon, that relaxed their grip on Axel, who ducked out of the chokehold and danced back to the rope separating him from backstage access.

He continued to taunt the DJ. The bodyguards tried to go back to Axel, but Zenon got involved, creating a scuffle that I couldn't quite see.

"There!" Oma said, pointing her phone in the direction of an opening door.

The phone's flashlight followed the movement and cast a spotlight on Lara as she stepped outside.

Lara flicked her dark hair over her shoulder and raised her hand over her eyes, trying to see through the scuffle that was happening at the entrance. She held a wine glass in her other hand.

"Axel?" she asked, and her expression became alarmed when she saw the violence escalate, "Axel!"

She approached the velvet rope, where the DJ was busy raising his fists in random motions against us. He was boxing the air and protected by a rope that separated him from all of us.

"Try to get a piece of this!" DJ Pumpa T yelled out.

"What are you playing at?" Lara asked him, pointing at his 'boxing hands'. She lowered them so she could pass him by, and then said, "I'm leaving with them."

Lara unclipped the velvet rope, though the DJ tried to stop her with words that sounded like lyrical flow. Zenon helped her undo the rope, stop the DJ and lead her across.

DJ Pumpa T tried to intervene again, but Zenon told him, "This rope doesn't protect you from anything."

"Get off of me!" Axel yelled, shrugging the bouncers off.

The DJ reached out for Lara to convince her to stay, but Zenon pressed his hand on DJ Pumpa T's shoulder to stop him.

Touching the DJ was not a good move. That set off a whole new chain reaction. A bodyguard grabbed Zenon, but Axel shoved him off.

"Public space!" Axel argued, "You're going to let that guy harass a girl?! What's wrong with you, man?"

"I'm doing my job," the bodyguard replied, trying to grab him in another clinch.

"Yeah, that's what every guy working for an assh*le says," Axel said.

"You're the assh*le trying to ruin everyone's new years'," the bodyguard answered, while they were both stuck in this bear hug.

Lara still held her glass of wine while she argued with the DJ.

He finally flipped his nail polished middle finger at the rest of us, "Let these losers go. You're lucky I don't get you locked up for trespassing."

Zenon replied, "Higher chance you'll be behind bars for going after teenage girls."

We were banned from the beach club for life. All of us. Banished.