Play Me Right (Play Me 5)

I steer him toward them and he finally relaxes, his left hand trembling in his lap from the effort of holding it up for so long. I have to admit, even though the fountains aren’t doing their musical performances at the moment, it’s still nice to walk by them. Peaceful.

My father doesn’t attempt any more conversation until we get close to a bench on the far side of the fountains. Then he starts pointing again, and making sounds deep in his throat.

“You want to stop and sit here for a while?” I ask him, bending down to look him in the eye again.

Once again he gives that same uncoordinated nod.

And so we sit for long, awkward minutes. Him in his chair and me on the bench. I still don’t have a clue what to say to him.

It’s not that there is nothing to say—I’m practically suffocating under the weight of all the things I want to say to him. All the things I want to call him on after all this time. But when he’s in a wheelchair, recovering from a series of mini-strokes that have taken almost everything from him, isn’t exactly the time. He might be cruel enough not to care about shit like that, but I’m not. I don’t believe in hitting people when they’re down, even if they deserve it.

Except Aria. I had no trouble hurting Aria when she was at her most vulnerable. The thought makes me sick. Makes me furious. At myself for being such a goddamn control freak. At my father for making me that way with his lies and games and million different subterfuges that only got worse after my mother died when I was five. At the fucking universe for helping to create the perfect storm of circumstances whereby I hurt the only woman I’ve ever really given a damn about.

“I met a woman.” The words tumble out of my mouth without my consent.

My father doesn’t make a sound, but I can tell by the way his shoulders stiffen and his head tilts that he heard me. That he’s listening.

“She’s great. Smart. Funny. Tough as hell on the outside but a complete marshmallow underneath. Her name’s Aria and she’s one of our cocktail waitresses.”

My father does make a sound then, and it doesn’t sound like he’s pleased. Which pisses me off all over again, because who the fuck is he to tell me anything? About Aria, about my life, about anything? He’s lucky I haven’t left him and his empire to die a painful, bloated, very public death. It’s no more than he deserves.

“This was a bad idea,” I tell him, getting to my feet. “Let’s go back to the hotel.” What goes unspoken are the words, “before I’m tempted to dump you headfirst into the fountain and leave you there.”

He grabs my hand then, tries to push it off his wheelchair. But he’s so weak now that he can’t even budge me, let alone get me to let go. He makes another unintelligible noise, though. One that sounds a little bit like stop. And there’s an “f” sound in there somewhere, too.

So, against my better judgment, I do stop. And this time, instead of sitting down, I walk around until I’m standing directly in front of him. And then I crouch down and look him straight in the eyes.

“I’m done,” I tell him, meaning it more than I’ve meant anything I’ve ever said. “I’ve spent my life listening to you and your archaic ideas about class and money and people. I hid my best friend from you for years because you wouldn’t like him. I went to Harvard because you wanted me to, and was too far away to save Dylan when he needed it. I took a job with an international charity because I knew it would drive you crazy. I’ve hated Las Vegas and everything associated with this city because of you.

“I’ve lived so much of my life doing either exactly what you wanted me to do or doing the exact opposite of it just to spite you. And in doing that, I’ve ended up just like you. Bitter. Angry. A control freak who hurts those closest to me because I can’t control them any more than you’ve ever been able to control me.

“And I’m done. I’m done living my life to spite you. I’m done trying to control everything because I’ve never felt like I’m in control of my own fucking life. I’m done trying to be someone I’m not. All that shit ends right here, right now. Because I love her, Dad. I love her and this is one relationship I’m not going to let you fuck up.” I pause as the truth settles in. The fact that I do love Aria. The fact that I don’t want to give her up. “No. Not you. Me. I’m not going to fuck this up. Not now. Not this time. Aria is too damn important to me.”

At that moment, the fountains erupt behind me, water shooting into the sky to the rhythm of “It Must Have Been Love” by Roxette. For a moment I’m frozen in shock. Because the fountains shouldn’t be erupting now. Because this isn’t one of their standard performance pieces anyway. Because it’s like the universe—and my goddamned father—are conspiring to tell me something I’ve been too stupid and too stubborn to see.

I turn back to my father then, a little shell-shocked and a lot confused. “Did you know about…?”

He nods, and the left half of his face twists up into the closest thing he can make to a smile right now.

“I’m sorry.” It’s garbled and weird sounding but I swear that’s what he said.

Still, I can’t believe it. “What did you say?” I demand.

He says it again, a little more clearly this time. “I’m sorry.” The two words I’ve never heard from him before. The two words I’ve wanted to hear for ten years but never thought I actually would.

And now that they’re here in front of me, I realize they don’t matter. Not really. Not nearly as much as I always thought they would. Because they don’t change anything. Not the past and not the future. Not who I am or who he is or what we’ve both done to hurt each other. But maybe they make it better. Maybe they make it easier for me to see that in letting go, in trusting something bigger than myself for once, maybe I really am making the right decision.

Because I really am done living my life to get back at my father. It’s time for me to live it the way I want to. Loving Aria.

Chapter Two

Aria

“I’ve changed my mind,” Lucy says. “I don’t want that color. Can we do blue instead?”

I glance down at her hand, at the three nails I’ve already painted a bright, outrageous orange. And with an indulgent sigh, reach for the nail polish remover. “Blue it is.”

She giggles. “Or maybe green? Or turquoise. I kind of like that turquoise color.” She points at one of the cheap polishes I picked up on my way over here today. It cost ninety-nine cents and came from the corner drugstore while most of her polishes are from the makeup counters at Nordstrom or Neiman Marcus. But that’s the one she wants.