-eldorado (m.)

Part - 2

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”

A loud screech echoes through the whole valley, walls of the cave definitely remembering Adam and Eva with its age seem to wobble with the sheer impact. Even the birds sitting on nearby trees has decided to leave their previous spots and flown away from the scene.

Leaving the cave, second or third in a row you have visisted here, you let out a sigh of frustration, narrowing your eyes as soon as they are met with the blinding sun. You adjust your thatch hat, a memory of your short (but very profitable) escapade to Hawaii last Spring. Ah, you still remember vividly the clang and weight of gold you were carrying in your leather bag. Its shine, presious value and all those luxurious products you bought with the money you got from finding it.

What a lovely time it was, truly, walking through Vieille du Temple in Paris, stepping to every shop and not caring about your bank account’s status. But the thing you remember the most are the faces of your competitors, when you came back with a generous amount of gold after choosing not so obvious route, where no one expected the treasure to be. Except for you.

In times like these, you like drowning in your own memories, thinking about your previous victories that stroke your ego and make you feel like a big fish. You need it especially now because, frankly speaking, you’re screwed.

With a heavy sigh, you pull out the compass from the confines of your shorts and stare blankly at it. “Nearly six years of experience and I still don’t know how to use that shit.” you mutter, placing it in the pocket again.

There isn’t probably a lot of people on this damn planet who are trained and experienced in the field like you are (except in using a compass, that old trash is just not for you). Your history starts in the ripe age of twenty at Oxford University, when you had been studying medicine for a year before you decided to drop it. It took you few sleepless nights and exactly two crying sessions to realize that it just wasn’t your cup of tea. Your dreams weren’t about healing people. They always reached higher, further, to the unexplored lands where no one’s foot really stood; to the mysterious, old, hidden under the surface of the ground troves and exotic landscapes, which you had known only from aesthetically pleasing Instagram posts before.

That’s why, giving completly zero fucks, you packed everything you owned into your luggage, sent Great Britain and their gloomy weather a middle finger as a final goodbye and got on a ferry to France.

Paris. Eiffle Tower, Moulin Rouge, Champs-Elysees and the smell of stale garlic baguettes sold by elderly women on every single street. You learnt pretty quickly one thing: Hundred Years’ War that has ended 600 years ago apparently was far more fateful when your English knowledge has become utterly useless among fellow citizens. With a bag on your shoulder and very excessive french vocabulary consiting of ‘bonjour’ and ‘merci’, you managed to get to the address you had found beforehand on Facebook’s Flatearthers Support group. Soon, you were standing in front of the gate to the most famous parisian museum, Louvre, where works no one other than Kim Namjoon, known among other people from your industry as GM, Golden Master.

Someone may ask: why the hell gold diggers are dealing with their buissness on Flatearthers Support group? Believe it or not, the group is actually a well-covered guise for the small community of gold-diggers. You heard about it during one, boring and very unproductive morning at the university’s library, listening to some students’ conversation instead of memorising the construction of the respiratory system. Truth to be told, they weren’t quite subtle about exchanging informations quietly.

You were much thankful to your divided attention back then for its amazing abilities. What a shame it didn’t work like that when you were watching Game of Thrones and studying for the anatomy test at the same time.

Louvre welcomed you with the smell of oily paint and dozens of tourists pacing around the museum. Are they renovating Mona Lisa or something? you thought to yourself, getting closer to the centre of the building and looking around in every direction, trying to spot the person you were looking for.

And then, you saw him.

Kim Namjoon, standing beside no one other than Mona Lisa herself (it looked like she wasn’t being renovated though). With friendly grin plastered on his face, Namjoon was telling something about the portrait to the group of Asian tourists. He was dressed in an elegant, navy suit. It wasn’t a bad alternation, you decided, still remembering his cowboy hat and aztec shirt in which he proudly poses on his Facebook profile picture.

You stood in a safe distance away from Namjoon, so you could wait for him to stop touring the people around museum and have a few words with you instead. Patience however, was never one of your virtures or strong points. That’s why you sprung into action quicker than you had anticipated.

“Psst,” you half-whispered, gaining a few unfriendly looks from everyone, but Namjoon. “Psst, Namjoon,” you repeated, louder this time, desperately trying to avert his attention to you.

To your misery, the man was complety unbothered by your uneffective attempts or simply didn’t hear you at all. You sighed, before deciding on your one last final try.

“Hey, Golden Master!”

The color drained from Namjoon’s tanned face almost immadietly. He turned around into the direction of the goddamn voice where he saw you, casually sitting on one of the sofas, staring at some painting with fake interest like nothing ever happened. He said a few words to his group and then he came up to your spot with a frown.

“Oh, boy, da Vinci. He really knew how to capture raw beauty of the sunflowers*,” you mused. ‘’The colors. The composition. A true masterpiece.”

“Well, I do agree that Sunflowers are without a doubt a masterpiece but unfortunately, it was Van Gogh who painted them, not da Vinci.” Namjoon corrected you.

“That’s why I have never thought about pursuing liberal arts.” you said, shrugging your shoulders.

Turning around to face him properly, you were met with his face from such a close proximity for the first time. Namjoon was a good looking man. Tall, smart and dare you say sexy. And, once again, he looked so much better in a suit.

“Anyway, I didn’t come here all the way from bloody Oxford to talk about paintings.”

Namjoon nodded his head. “Then what brings you here?” he asked.

“Business,” you answered simply. “The kind of business you don’t talk about in the company of tourists and Mona Lisa.” You pointed at the woman and her coy, innocent smile.

Your sense of humor was never spectacular but this time you were actually disappointed there was not even a lopsided smile from Namjoon in response to your comment. Instead, he furrowed his eyebrows, like he was deliberating in his head what the hell was he supposed to do with you. You could practically hear how his brain cells were pacing back and forth, how he was making a list of pros and cons and transforming it into an Excel chart.

“So?” you pondered, nudging his side with your elbow and sending him a mischevious smile.

He took a deep breath, before he said, “Fine. We can talk about your ‘business’ but not here.” He reached to the pocket of his slacks and pulled out a small card with his name on it. “This is my pass card. Come back to the main hall and then turn right. When you see the door with the ‘pour travaillers’ sign down the hallway, just press the card and get inside. I will be there in twenty minutes after I’m finished with my group.” he explained, handing you the card.

He came back to his group, tripping on his foot in process and you saw him smiling sheepishly with two dimples adoring his pink cheeks. You smirked to yourself, seeing him apologize to the tourists and continuing where he had previously ended his rambling.

“Let the game begin.” you whispered to yourself, hiding the card in your cleavage.