In this book within a book, plunge into the escapades of Satine Fontaine, who's on the run from her tumultuous past. The vibrant streets of New York beckon her, and fate conspires as she stumbles into Brooklyn's dingiest bar, encountering the enigma...
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STAR: AVOIDING PROBLEMS
Mingyu was only twelve when he witnessed the death of his mother. Gruesome, untimely, suspicious - all the words that sprung to mind about the incident... Well, 'accident'.
His dad wasn't a nice guy, plain and simple. A man partial to beer, TV, women, and beating his only son - all in no particular order of course. It meant Mingyu had to shuffle around school with layers of clothing, sometimes in the middle of a heatwave, just to avoid questions about his peculiar bruises or the mixture of blood and puss seeping through his white shirts. Did he care? No, not particularly. See when you're condemned to a life of torture from birth, you tend to turn off any essence of pain or hardship - it's just life.
He knew one day he'd leave Chicago, create a new life, watch his father die from a distance with a subtle frown that didn't quite meet his eyes. It wouldn't exactly happen that way, but that's what he'd pictured from a young age.
Another thing he was sure to do upon leaving, was to avoid all problems. He had done well so far, ran into a few mishaps with Dominique but that was about it. He was somewhat happy: making music with friends, fucking one of the most incredible girls he had ever met, and living life so simply. It's all he'd ever wanted.
Until a five-foot-nothing brunette with eyes like emeralds buried beneath the soil of spring, waltzed into his life unannounced. She was a problem, and an unavoidable one at that.
Avoiding. It's all he'd been doing since getting home from Dynaco that night, after Diana's little escapade on the bar top. A flicker of something burned inside of him and it would have been easier if it was obvious what. Humour, lust, intrigue? Whichever one it was, it was sure to cause a lot of problems because she'd taken up a large portion of his brain ever since.
The weekend had flown by quickly and another week of an absent Satine approached. Mingyu rarely had time to spend with her anymore and found himself circling deeper and deeper into his own depressive company. The problem was, he was right back where he started - looking for that distraction again.
He survived days one and two, biting the bullet and escaping the house at nine each morning to chill at DK's until Satine was due home. But that was half the problem, her shifts got later and later leaving him with a woman he was terrified of spending more than twenty minutes with.
On Wednesday morning, Satine had gotten up for work like usual, pottering around in the kitchen and making too much noise for one girl. Of course, two girls were occupying his residence now but the smaller one rarely awoke before noon. In fact, he'd found himself creeping around the house not wanting to wake her - go figure. He soon realised that Diana could sleep through a literal volcanic eruption/earthquake/tsunami mix and not even bat an eyelid. Mingyu supposed Satine had to make enough noise for the both of them.
Satine had left him with a kiss in bed and then was off to be worked to death again by that hoity-toity boss of hers. Mingyu didn't know much about him and didn't wish to; he was wealthy and arrogant and therefore they had nothing in common.
