C2 Why She Hid It From Him.

When Iris arrived at the club for work, she had the unrealistic expectation that David would show up. But after listening to the regular patrons, she found out that he had travelled for business. So she was disappointed.

She worked at the bar as a bartender because alternatively, she would have been accompanying these men in their private rooms. It was a job that offered a higher salary, however; she did not have the tolerance to sustain such a job.

At the bar, they knew that she was not obligated to flatter them. So, it was a much more comfortable working environment for her. She also earned even more than those girls who accompanied those men because of the sheer amount of tips she received when she was working.

“Iris!” a young man who was dressed in overpriced brand name clothes called to her while tapping on the counter of the bar. Iris looked at him with empty eyes as she walked in his direction.

“What can I get you?” Iris asked him.

“Can you at least smile at your customers, Iris? You might lose your job like this,” the young man complained. He was one of her biggest tippers, so she didn’t take him seriously.

“What are you having today?” Iris asked him again, her expression unchanging.

“I’ll have a whiskey, on the rocks,” he said, and his eyes closely followed her movements as she went to get the most expensive bottle of whiskey from the shelf in the back. After stuffing his glass with ice, she put a coaster on the counter before placing the glass on the coaster and finally poured him the drink.

“You really won’t consider my proposal?” he asked her for the nth time. Iris resisted the urge to roll her eyes as she looked at him.

“Actually, I said no because I already have someone I like,” Iris answered with a stiff smile. Although she was telling the truth, her stiff expression made it look like she was trying to let him down nicely.

“Fine, you don’t have to resort to such flimsy excuses. Just let me know when you change your mind,” he said and placed an amount that was five times the price of his drink.

“Buy yourself a drink at the end of the night,” he said, and gave her what he thought was a sexy wink before leaving. She counted the money she received and smiled as she pocketed 1200 hesa. She then watched as the man who was just hitting on her went to hit on some other girl who worked there.

“Even this guy knows to move on when the situation is hopeless. Something must be wrong with me,” she mumbled under her breath. As she maintained her poker face as she greeted some guests that came to order their drinks.

The night was incredibly slow, and she did not know why. On normal Friday nights, she would be on her toes from the moment she arrived to when she left.

“You heard Suzanne died?” one patron asked his friend. The two were drinking on the bar. When Iris heard Suzanne’s name, she became curious and unconsciously moved closer to them.

“I heard she fell off a yacht and drowned,” the friend answered.

“Mmmh, what you did not hear was who she was with on the yacht,” he said, his expression showing that he had found some juicy gossip. Even Iris’s ears perked up when she heard him.

“I thought she was partying with her fellow housewives,” the friend commented, but curiously looked at the man who was itching to tell him what happened.

“Do you think if it was her fellow housewives, she would need to hide it from David?” he asked his friend, his voice tinged with excitement. Both his friend and Iris’s eyes widened in surprise. He did not have to say it explicitly, just that sentence was enough for anyone with a brain cell to understand what he was implying.

“So you are saying…” the friend shouted in his surprise but was cut off mid-sentence.

“Shh, calm yourself, are you seeking death?” the gossiper said after physically blocking his friend’s mouth with his hand.

“Sorry,” he apologized after calming down.

Iris felt her mood become even worse once she heard this. How could Suzanne find someone better than her husband? She wondered. She even wanted to meet the person she was with on the yacht out of curiosity.

She felt worried that maybe he was heartbroken, because news like this could not be kept a secret for too long, and even if it was not announced in the tabloids, it’s going to be an open secret in high society.

Iris glanced at the two men for a bit before moving away from them. She didn’t want to hear any more gossip. She had had enough for the day. She was even tempted to not come to work until the following week but her rent and the second instalment of her fees were due soon so she had to work whenever she had the chance to.

Just as she was thinking about leaving, the phone in her back pocket rang.

“Yes?” Iris responded.

“Iris, can you take over my shift? My son is admitted in the hospital and he is still unconscious, I don’t want to leave him here alone,” Sara her coworker asked in tears.

“It’s not a problem, I’ll take over for you, you just take care of him, okay?” Iris answered after an inaudible sigh. As tired as she was after a long day of classes and coming to work right after, she still couldn’t compare herself to Sara, who was a single mother and worked three jobs.

“Thank you, I owe you one,” Sara said with relief.

“Don’t worry about it, just take care of yourself,” Iris answered and quickly cut the call. It would have been better if the night was busier, but with Suzanne’s death, she was sure that the majority of the people had gone to see her family give them their condolences. Now that she was stuck at the bar with this new information and no source of distraction, she felt that it was very torturous.