Chapter 401: How To Deal With A Depressed Friend? Be More Depressed! [I]

"I don’t understand women! I don’t understand women!"

"Hey, at least you’ve got a woman

to

understand..."

I gave Michael a flat look.

We were on a sofa in the main living room of my estate. I was slouched back, head clutched tightly in my hands, while he was lying prone with his face buried in my lap.

Yes. In my lap.

"Hey, buddy?" I said to him.

"Yeah?" came his muffled reply.

"Please get up. My servants might mistake this for something deeply inappropriate, and I am not emotionally prepared to defend my honor this early in the morning."

"It’s not early," Michael didn’t move, simply mumbling into my thigh. "And if anything, this just proves how low I’ve fallen."

"That’s not the direction I meant," I said dryly. "Also, you’re drooling."

"I have nothing left to lose."

"You have my trousers to lose, and I’m quite fond of these."

He let out a drawn-out groan full of teen suffering and despair, but still made no effort to move.

I stared down at the back of his head for a heartbeat or two, then sighed and leaned further back into the cushions.

"...You’re heavy."

"I’m burdened."

Just in time, a flustered maid entered the living room to set down a tray containing two cups on the center table in front of us.

Her face was already flushed in a vivid shade of pink, but when she saw the state Michael and I were in, she blushed even harder and rushed out of the room.

...Damn it.

Now there’d be rumors.

Struggling to move due to the dead weight half-sprawled onto me, I reached out and grabbed one of the two cups.

It was filled with a thick smoothie that was

supposed

to help with the hangover.

I took a cautious sip. It tasted bitter and citrusy and like whatever divine mercy the kitchen staff could bottle at eleven in the morning.

"...Not bad," I lied. I don’t know why. It

was

bad.

Michael made a weak, dying noise against my thigh. "Me too..."

"You have hands."

"I forfeited my rights to basic human functions when she broke up with me."

"That’s... not at all how rights work."

"It should be."

I nudged his shoulder with my elbow. "Sit up before you asphyxiate yourself and I get blamed for manslaughter."

"No court would convict you," he muttered. "They’d see my life and call it a mercy killing."

"Get up."

"No."

"Michael."

"No."

"Mikey!"

"Nooo!"

I calmly took another sip of my smoothie, then casually tilted the glass.

A cold droplet slid down the rim and landed directly on the back of his neck. He twitched. I let another drop fall. This time he flinched.

So, with no choice left, I decided to stop holding back and tipped the glass just enough to pour a small splash down his collar.

"AAH—!" he jolted upright and clutched his now-wet neck. "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?!"

"To hydrate you," I said coolly.

He stared at me in betrayal, greenish-blue liquid dripping from his hairline. "...You’re a monster."

I chuckled as he wiped his face, then grabbed the second glass off the table and chugged half of it in one go. We sat there in silence for a moment.

He stared into the distance and I stared at his side profile.

"...So," I started, "can we discuss my problem first before you start crying into me again?"

"Aghh," Michael made a sound. "What you have is not a problem. I passed out before the rave began, so I didn’t see what happened. But if she’s not talking to you,

you

must have definitely done something."

I spread my hands wide. "No, that’s the thing! I’m telling you, I did literally nothing this time!"

Yeah, so...

After returning from the club yesterday, Juliana went back to giving me the cold shoulder. She didn’t exactly seem angry, just... distant.

Distant, but not in her usual way. It wasn’t anything like that sharp, cutting indifference she used to subtly direct at me.

This one was different. It felt a touch more deliberate. And the worst part was that I had no idea what I’d done this time to set her off.

It was driving me absolutely nuts!

"Sure," Michael said, his tone making it clear he didn’t believe a word I was saying. "Still though, between the two of us, you’re the womanizer. You have way more experience with women than me, don’t you? So why are you asking me?"

Womanizer...

I’ve never liked that label.

It wasn’t as if I actively went out of my way to sleep with every girl I met.

Now I know how much of a pretentious jerk I’m going to sound by telling you about this, but just bear with me for a second, okay?

On top of being born into one of the most prestigious families in the history of our world, I had always been rich and, admittedly, handsome.

Growing up in a family like mine, I realized much earlier than most that your worth is almost entirely determined by what you can provide.

There is no such thing as unconditional love. That is the hard truth.

Everything has a price and a purpose. You could call it an exchange rate.

If you look around, you’ll see people trading loyalty for status, obedience for power, favors for favors, and smiles for something far less pleasant beneath the surface.

Even affection comes with strings attached. And if you have nothing to offer, then you have nothing worth keeping.

Useless people get discarded, after all.

So no, I never chased women. But that’s because I didn’t need to.

They

came to me.

They came to me for my name and my face and a small taste of my lavish lifestyle.

But the thing is... I also had nothing to give them except exactly that: my name and my face and my money. So I gave them that, because that was all that I could.

No one was ever going to stay with me for my personality... not that I would’ve ever let anyone inside the walls I’d built, to begin with.

So to those women, I wasn’t a person. I was a prize.

They would sleep with me, or perhaps date me for a while if they were lucky (and pretty), just so they could brag about the experience later.

Some were obviously foolish enough to think they could lock me down. Obviously, none succeeded.

And more than once, I even overheard many of their comments.

—

"Yeah, I slept with him. Girl, you’ve gotta try him, too! You’ll be amazed."

—"God, he’s so rich! He gifted me that pendant. Yeah, that one! I just looked at it once and he bought it. I’ll be set for life if I can settle down with him. I don’t mind being a third or fourth wife, even!"

—"Yeah, he’s hot but totally characterless. I just wanted to see what the hype was about. Guess I’ll bleed his purse as much as I can before he moves on to some other poor girl."

That was the gist of how most of them viewed me. I wasn’t even a human being.

...Now, just to be clear, this isn’t some sob story.

Obviously, I never had a problem with the arrangement. I’m just clarifying that I never hunted.

I was the one

being

hunted.

Girls approached

me

. Girls flirted with

me

. Girls confessed and chased after

me

.

And if I was ever bored, or curious, or just in the mood to feel something, I entertained them until either they got what they wanted or I got bored first. It was as simple as that.

Or at least... it used to be.

Because now, for the first time in a long time, I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d felt that specific kind of boredom.

I exhaled slowly and leaned back further into the couch until I was all but slumping, staring at the ceiling.

Then, I started dumping the whole thing on Michael.

I know, I know! Unloading my own emotional baggage onto an already depressed, heartbroken teenager was not exactly a genius move, but cut me some slack!

He was the only friend I had nearby.

Believe me, I much preferred it when Alexia was around. She always had some sort of sagely advice hidden under her impish demeanor whenever any of us needed actual guidance.

But since she wasn’t here, I had to make do with what I had on hand.

Anyway, Michael, now properly upright and still slightly damp, squinted at me. "Sam, that was depressing."

"It wasn’t," I said immediately, maybe a bit defensively.

"It was."

"Dude, I just told you how much I used to get laid. Don’t call it depressing."

"But it was! It was just you trying very hard to sound like you don’t have feelings when you were obviously hurt by those experiences."

I laughed. "Yeah, no. I don’t. And I wasn’t."

He hummed in pure skepticism. Then, after a pause, he added, "So, what changed?"