The grin – which was all she was wearing – slowly slipped from her face when she realized there was another woman in the apartment to see her like that. Although, she hadn’t seemed to mind sharing with another woman the night before. Maybe she only shared with people she knew personally? It was something to keep in mind for a future plot point in one of my stories. I wish it wouldn’t seem rude to jot that down because I’d probably forget later.

“Shit!” Sam huffed from somewhere behind me after closing the door. “Ariel, what are you still doing here?”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s Aria, and you told me if I was still here when you got back from your little business deal that we’d continue the party.”

I turned to look at Sam, because let’s be honest, I didn’t want the image in my head when the woman finally had to move that bottle. When I turned, my eyes met his, and I swore for an instant, there was an apology there. Then it flickered away just as fast. What did I care if he was sincere about anything though? I was literally only here to humor my own morbid curiosity, if I was being honest with myself. As far as I was concerned, this was already a blown deal, but something I might be able to pull from for a future story idea. Maybe that made me a horrible person, but let’s face it, my life wasn’t exactly filled with shining examples of humanity’s finest.

“Who is she?” Aria managed to snip out at Sam, which I thought was an oddly territorial thing to do considering he didn’t even remember her name.

“She is none of your business, now get dressed and get gone, I have things to do.” He glanced back at me just in time to see the disgust written all over my face at how he treated this woman.

“Do you not know how to treat people with respect?”

He laughed. “She’s just some chick I brought home to fuck last night, and she wasn’t even the only one,” he argued. It wasn’t quiet, so I knew the woman could hear him.

“She’s some chick who agreed to have sex with you, and then wait around for you to get home, so whether or not you intended it to go any further, the least you could do is be a decent human being to her when it’s over.”

“I don’t need you to be womankind’s hero for me,” Aria huffed out from behind me as the swish and rustle of fabric indicated she was in the process of getting dressed. “I knew the score,” she insisted, though without doing a good enough job of hiding her annoyance.

“That’s not the point. Even if you were a paid hooker, you performed your services, and shouldn’t be treated as less than from someone who was in need of what you offered. And truthfully, you should demand better for yourself too. You will continue to be treated the way you allow people to treat you. If all you want is to be used and discarded like trash, then so be it. If you want more out of life, you have to demand it.”