Her Dad's Friend

After dragging my body into the shower and brushing the dead animal off my teeth, Emily takes me out for a manicure. I try to stay mad at her for hitting send on that text in the first place, but it’s impossible while having my hands massaged. Sitting in the chair, getting my nails painted a bright shade of teal, I ask her, “Do you think it’s strange my parents haven’t called to wish me happy birthday yet?”

They always call first thing in the morning to wake me up on my birthday, Mom singing terribly out of key while my dad mumbles his happy birthday in the background. I was going to mention Paul not sending a birthday text either, but was afraid it sounded too pathetic.

“Em?” I say when she doesn’t respond. The entire time I’ve been with her this morning, she’s been on her phone. She has makeup on and her hair curled. I don’t know how she manages to pull her shit together after a night of drinking when I feel like a child’s beaten doll dragged through the mud.

“Oh, sorry.” She takes one last look at the screen before she puts the phone in her pocket. “It’s not even noon yet. I’m sure they’re still in bed … Maybe your dad took your mom over to pound town, if you know what I mean,” she says, thrusting her hips while sitting in the chair. Our manicurists look at her, then at each other and say something in a language I’m not familiar with.

I lean my head back in the chair and look up at the ceiling, trying to calm my roiling stomach. “Thanks for that visual. I just puked in my mouth.”

After manicures, we grab hangover smoothies and Emily is back on her phone. I’m like the Hulk when I feel like shit and right now I’m fighting the urge to rip that phone out of her hand. I’m getting so sick of the clicking sound as she speed-types. Seriously, hasn’t she heard of Swype? I don’t know why she even bothers taking me out if she’s just going to ignore me.

She says she wants to go out to lunch too, but at this point I’m fed up and don’t even want to go. Plus, my stomach is still a witch’s cauldron about to spew forth some black hell if I’m not careful.

How is it that every time I drink heavily and feel like shit the next day, I’m always ready to do it all over again by the time the next weekend rolls around? It’s starting to feel like I signed up for college just to not learn lessons.

“Look, Em, I’m tired,” I say, trying to tamp down the inner dragon lady I feel starting to rage up inside of me. “Maybe we can go to lunch some other time.”

“Are you sure?” She sounds somewhat relieved, which only pisses me off more.

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Can I drop you off at your parent’s house? Your apartment is out of the way and there’s kind of this guy—”

“Fine, I don’t care.”

There’s always “this guy” with Emily.

We head toward my parents’ house. It’s more of a mansion than a house, really. Eight bedrooms, five baths, a pool house. When I tell my friends where I grew up, they automatically think I’m some trust fund baby. A latchkey kid with a bottomless platinum card. But that’s not how it is. Yes, my parents are wealthy, but I don’t get anything from them. Hell, I don’t even own a car because I can’t afford the insurance and gas bill. My dad had to work for everything he has and he expects me to do the same. He thinks I’ll appreciate things more, and so far he’s been right. Everything I own I’ve had to bust my ass to get. I’ve scrimped and saved, and worked my fingers to the bone. Even if I wanted something from him, he’d never give it freely.

We go through the open gate, up the long driveway. There are clusters of cars parked off to the side. Emily parks in front.

“Who are all these people?” Emily asks. Instead of just dropping me off, she gets out of her Saab and follows me as I make my way to the front door.

“I don’t know. Maybe my mom’s having some kind of brunch for her friends.”

That must be why she was too busy to call me on my birthday, I think bitterly.

As we approach the front door, I hear music playing, but it’s not coming from inside, it’s coming from around back by the pool. My parent’s never use the pool. They spent a fortune on the damn thing, but they aren’t exactly outdoors people. It’s an Olympic sized lagoon style pool made out of rock—or something that’s make to look like rock. There’s a waterfall, natural slide, and a large cave for those who want to lounge around in the water without getting a sunburn, or if they just want a little privacy.

We head to the side of the house and go through the gate. When we get to the pool area, there’s a large gathering of people holding champagne glasses and looking in our direction. The barbeque is going, the smell of cooking meat and garlic salt wage war with my stomach. It gurgles and I can’t tell if I’m just really hungry or getting ready to projectile vomit.

I see my mom and dad in the crowd and I stop. Takes me a second to gather all the faces in my sleepy brain and realize I recognize most of them. There are friends from my old high school, and friends from college. Some of the guys here I recognize from the frat party last night.

“Surprise!” They all yell in unison, and my headache hates them for it.

“How pissed at me are you right now?” Emily says, smirking and shaking her phone. This whole time she’s been in cahoots with my parents, planning this thing, and I’m genuinely surprised. Especially when I see Paul standing among my friends and family.

Chapter 2

Paul is here.

Paul, the king of my wet dreams. The man I want so badly it hurts both physically and mentally when I think I might not ever be able to have him. The guy who didn’t return my text.

Shit.

Believe me, I’ve been ghosted a time or three, but never by someone I cared to see the next day. And not by someone who also just happens to be my dad’s best friend, someone I will eventually have to face in person. I just didn’t think I’d have to face him so soon after such an embarrassing text. I know my face is fifty shades of red right now and I want to jump in the pool to cool it off. I mean, what do you say to someone after a text like that?

I weave my way through the throng of guests. I say hi to my mom and try to avoid looking over by the pool where Paul and my dad are talking. It’s difficult because Paul looks edible. He’s wearing blue and white board shorts, chest smooth and tan, arms taut with muscle, showing off all his ink. And not blotchy ugly tattoos left over from his youth either. These are genuinely amazing art pieces he spent a fortune on. It’s so shocking to see because he’s always so put together around my parents, wearing suits, and designer clothes. Sometimes I forget he even has tattoos.

He turns to toss a ball to one of my cousins in the pool and on his back there’s an entire ocean scene with sharks and coral. The details are flawless, right down to the drop shadows and sun ripples in th

e water. That is a body I want to explore. I want to walk right over there and lick every square inch of him.

My dad is also a handsome man and manages to look elegant even in swim trunks. It’s the way he holds himself. Straight posture, shoulders back, his chin just a little higher in the air than everyone else. Maybe that’s why he seems so much older than Paul even though they’re the same age. Paul is so much more laid back.

I manage to kind of not stare at Paul, but once in a while I forget myself and glance over. His eyes latch onto mine. Even after I look away, I feel him watching me and my heart drums in my chest as I make my way to the bar for a glass of champagne. I’m going to need it.

I try to ignore the heaviness of his gaze while I sip Dom—though, at the moment, I’d prefer an ice-cold beer, but that’s not on the menu. Hair of the dog. I still feel like shit from the night before. Except now I can add humiliation to it. Which pisses me off because this is the first surprise party I’ve ever had and I want to enjoy myself.

Nursing my drink, I make my rounds, catching up with people and thanking them for coming. I smile and nod as my high school friends tell me about their new jobs and plans for marriage, and all the other stuff I’ve always dreamed about for myself. I do my best to share in their happiness, but I’m having a hell of a time trying to concentrate when Paul is nearby.

“Rachael,” I hear my dad call out to me. “Come over here and say hi to your Uncle Pauly. He drove all night to be at your party.”

He drove all night? Maybe he didn’t get my text after all. Or maybe he drove all night to be at my party because of the text. I try not to get my hopes up. Relax and don’t say or do anything stupid, I tell myself.

There’s something skeevy about my dad calling Paul my uncle. And yet, in some perverse way, I kind of like it. Don’t get me wrong, if past royals taught us anything with their clubbed feet and genetic deformities, it’s that incest is bad. But a little bit of kinky fantasy never hurt anyone.