vetitum amoris

chapter one

It was a lovely feeling when you looked at your alarm clock and realized you still had more time to sleep. Pearl glared through her squinted eyes and just about managed to see the little red digits of her alarm clock. It read: 05:31a.m. Pearl didn't have to be awake for four hours at least. She stretched and rolled over onto her right side, curled up and fell back asleep within seconds.

Four hours later, the alarm clock went off, wailing like a siren. "Mmf." Pearl opened her eyes, groaned and smacked her alarm clock with the back of her hand, rather more forcefully than she'd anticipated. The sharp pain now throbbing away in her hand caused her to curse aloud as she kicked off her duvet and stood up. She looked into the mirror that was hanging on her wall, and her first thought was that it needed dusting. Pearl wiped it with a used face wipe that was lying on the side of her desk, and finally took a proper look at her own reflection.

She was dressed in the same clothes she had worn last night - a white t-shirt, a pair of short, light blue dungarees, and her underwear. Her long coffee-coloured hair was sticky, and Pearl knew it was some form of alcohol that had been spilled last night. Her face wasn't as bad as she had feared - apparently she had taken some of her makeup off last night, but the faintest shade of black remained on her eyelids. "Goddamn it," Pearl grumbled as she took a fresh face wipe from the packet and cleaned her face properly. Glancing down at her body, she saw several new bruises had began to form on her legs, especially near her knees and upper thighs. That was nothing new to Pearl.

Deciding she'd had enough of her reflection for the time being, she turned on her heel and scanned her bedroom. Her phone was resting on the edge of her bedside table, and she unlocked it and quickly checked her texts. She had a few new texts from an unrecognised number, and one from her best friend, Pez. 'Have you died? Let me know. P, xxxxx'. Pearl grinned as she typed out a reply on her white iPhone: 'Nope, not dead yet. Ha-ha. What happened last night? Want to meet for coffee, 20mins, the usual place? xxxx'. Pez replied within seconds, agreeing to meet her for coffee.

Pearl didn't bother putting any makeup on. She didn't have time to have a shower, so she quickly washed her hair over the bath and left it to air dry. She knew she probably looked like the world's biggest hobo, but as she currently had the hangover from hell, she decided she didn't really care. Changing into a pair of ripped boyfriend jeans and an oversized black jumper, Pearl shoved her feet into her black biker boots and grabbed her phone. She grabbed her red bag and swung it over her shoulder. She threw her keys into her bag, went downstairs and left the house.

***

The Cabin was the local town's coffee shop, and one of Pearl's favourite day haunts. Inside was heaven. To begin with, the smell of freshly made coffee welcomed you as soon as the door opened. There was only one floor, the ground, but there was plenty of space for lots of customers. Dotted all over the place were little tables and chairs, and there was a special area called 'The Den'. This area was towards the back of the room, and was a place where people could go to relax, to get lost in a book, and to spend their time in peace, away from the hustle and bustle of the main area.

The Cabin also had beanbags to sit on, and a few vintage chairs that customers always fought over to sit on. A tall, dark oak bookshelf stood tall against the right wall near the front door. There was a small collection of books, all donated, all dog-eared, all with coffee stained pages and spines. They were free to read, and varied from the works of Shakespeare to a Spot the Dog book for children. Mostly the books were just old classics such as Pride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.

The walls of The Cabin were mocha coloured, and canvasses with different photos of different types of coffee were hung all round. The main coffee station was to the left and on the back wall. There was a small fridge, which contained fresh sandwiches, wraps, fruit and cold drinks; and above the fridge there was a shelf, full of different coffee packs customers could buy to use at home. Near the coffee-making station was a glass counter, full of cakes and biscuits and all things sweet and probably bad for your teeth.