The Candy Bar Complete - 4 book box set: Candy Bar Series

by Patrice Wilton

  “How about, After the Loving?”

  “I don’t think I know that tune.”

  He softly sang a few lyrics and I tried to follow on the piano, and it was fun trying to piece together the song. He had a nice voice and a seductive smile that was hard to resist.

  When the song ended, his eyes locked with mine. And he said, “After the loving, Lydia, I’ll still be in love with you.”

  And then I knew. Fairy-tales do come true, and love does exist, and yes, even relationships can last, if you truly give everything that is in your heart, and risking all, you take the plunge.

  THE END

  Where Wishes Come True

  Patrice Wilton

  CHAPTER ONE

  I watched as my friend Candy, dressed in a skimpy-animal print dress, cowboy boots and a straw hat, stepped on stage. In a second or two, she’d introduce me. I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, and squelched my inner nerves.

  “Testing, testing.” The mic made one of those horrible screeching noises, and Candy playfully covered her ears. “Oops, sorry, folks.” She smiled at the people gathered around her and nodded to a few familiar faces. “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Candy Bar. Thank you for coming here tonight to pay tribute…”

  This was my big moment to step forward, but the timing couldn’t have been worse. I had a champagne glass in one hand and an appetizer in the other. Knowing I would be expected to shake hands, I popped the bite-size quiche into my mouth.

  Size does count. Trust me. Like so many good things in life, it was bigger than I’d expected. Bigger than the Hope diamond, bigger than my last’s guy’s whatever. I tried to swallow, but it made me gag.

  For most women that is a common enough complaint, but this was a more serious problem. I couldn’t breathe.

  My mouth was stuffed, causing my cheeks to pop out like a happy little chipmunk’s, but I nodded and wriggled my fingers at her as though everything was just fine.

  Candy continued, without missing a beat. “To one of our local artists. As you can see by the wonderful paintings on the wall, she is a very talented young lady, and gorgeous to boot. Susie Jensen, come on up here.”

  Oh, my God. I couldn’t swallow the darn thing, and everyone craned their necks to see me. I took a hesitant step toward the stage, and my mother decided right then to give me an encouraging nudge.

  The nudge was just enough to lodge the miniature spinach quiche in the back of my throat. I began to choke, terrified that at any second I might hurl. I pictured these elegant, somewhat snooty people, dressed in everything from Versace to J.Lo, ducking from the small green chunks as they floated through space.

  Panicking, I clamped my hand over my mouth and attempted to swallow the green lump that seemed determined to cut off my air supply. Unable to speak, I tried to convey with my eyes that I was in the midst of a full-blown quiche crisis.

  “What is the matter, Susie? Have you got something in your eye?” Mom leaned closer. “Can’t see anything.”

  Finally, I gave up sending her covert messages and spun around on my heels. I collided with someone and didn’t notice I’d sloshed his red wine because…well, because, quite honestly, my eyes were glued to the man behind him.

  Brett Hamilton, my first schoolgirl crush. I had been friends with his sister Kara, and spent a lot of time hanging around their home, partly to be with her, mostly to moon over him. He’d been a senior in high school while I’d been a flat-chested kid in sixth grade, but that hadn’t stopped me from dreaming that one day he’d say, Susie, you’re the only woman for me.

  Of course, that didn’t happen. He gave his football jersey to the homecoming queen and they were married a few years later. But now he was smiling at me, and my heart skipped a beat or two. He stepped toward me, and in my excitement I sucked in a deep breath that made me choke, freeing the obstruction in my throat. My mouth dropped open, and out flew the piece of green mush.

  A well-dressed elegant man with fine features and slicked-back silver hair stood between my dream and me, and he got quiched. A waiter cruised by carrying a silver tray loaded with drinks, and I grabbed several napkins to swipe the guck from the man’s Armani tux and murmured my apologies.

  “Are you all right, young lady?” the man asked, as I cleaned his tux and he gazed down my cleavage. A fair exchange, in my opinion. I shook my head, terrified that at any second I might crumble and dissolve into humiliating tears.

  Why couldn’t I be smooth and sophisticated, like my good friend Lydia or my sister Leanne. Why did I always have to be awkward and gauche?

  “Susie?” Candy still had the mic in her hand and was calling me. “Don’t be shy. Get up here.”

  I didn’t dare look at Brett. Frantically, I pushed past people, but they were everywhere, closing in. I was losing it—not necessarily a rare occurrence for me—but I fought the wave of humanity between me and the ladies’ room and plowed through.

  I could feel myself hyperventilating, and needed to chill. I stepped into a stall and took several slow measured breaths. In, out. In, out. I’d hoped tonight would be different. That I’d make my friends and family proud, and be the person they want me to be. But, as usual I let everyone down by making a ridiculous spectacle of myself.

  I bit back tears. I would not cry. Not tonight.

  After all, I was the star attraction, and those were my paintings that people came to see. I didn’t need to hide in a bathroom stall. Wonderful things were waiting for me just behind that door. I only needed the courage to open it.

  Aha! But that was the crux of the matter. I lacked courage. I hadn’t wanted this art show; I wasn’t ready to display my paintings to the world, but my well-meaning friends had talked me into it. In their defense, I must admit that they did all the work, sent out all the invitations, and told me that all I had to do was turn up. Which they had. Unfortunately, so did all the other people.

  Filled with renewed determination, I straightened my shoulders, stepped out of the stall, and headed for the mirrors. I stared at my reflection and spoke aloud.

  “You are talented,” I said sternly. “And you’re beautiful. You are…not…a…loser.” I glared at my image, daring it to refute me. Seeing the wild look in my eye, it wisely kept silent.

  I ran a brush through my long blonde hair, then tugged at the strapless top and straightened the red gown over my hips. I used a cool paper towel to pat my forehead and mop the perspiration from my brow.

  Suddenly, I stopped what I was doing. What the hell? What was wrong with my eye? One eyelid was drooping lower than the other. What was going on? My throat closing and then this lax feeling in my face? This wasn’t right. Botox! I must be having a bad reaction. All my symptoms were known side effects, but I’d never experienced anything like this before.

  I checked the mirror again and noticed a red itchy welt near the injection site, and my eyelid hanging loose like a flap of foreskin. My heart hammered inside my chest, and it became increasingly difficult to swallow. A sick panicky feeling crept over me and I knew I had to calm down.

  My breathing was fine; my heart rate steady. I was not going to keel over dead. I just felt like I had Novocain all over my face. It was similar to being in a dentist’s chair when your jaw is numb, only it was my entire face.

  It was sure to wear off. Still, maybe I should tell someone, just in case. But who to call?

  My three best friends were just outside the door, but they already thought I mistreated my body with all the surgery and liposuction I’d had. Good friends or not, they couldn’t possibly understand the importance of beauty to me. I mean, if I had the choice between, say, a beautiful face, a billion dollars, or Brad Pitt, beauty would win hands down.

  Since none of them had the same early childhood experiences as me, they could not understand my obsession. I didn’t dare tell my friends, and I certainly didn’t want my family to know. That left one person—Helga, my therapist.

  I hit speed-dial. After several rings her machine came on
. I was about to hang up when I heard her voice. It sounded hoarse, as if she’d been sound asleep.

  “Helga, it’s me. I’m sorry to be calling so late, but I need you.”

  She sighed. “Susie. I’m fast asleep. Call me in the morning.”

  “Don’t hang up. Please? It’s important.”

  Helga muttered something about me being too needy and that I should get a life.

  “Helga! Cut me some slack. This is serious.” Isn’t Helga an awful name for a therapist? Helga Wiese. The name makes you think of army boots and perhaps a swastika or two, but she’s cool. The problem is, when she retired I said I needed her, and therefore she continued to see me. Perhaps she had a point—I was too needy—but she could have chosen a better time to do it.

  “Susie, we have boundaries. You know you are not supposed to call me at all hours unless it’s an emergency.”

  “This is an emergency.” I dug my nails into the palms of my hands. “I think I messed up my face.” After telling her about the Botox, I checked the mirror again. “It’s getting worse,” I cried into the phone. “I have a big ugly red welt where my frown line used to be.”

  “Calm down, Susie. Take a deep breath.”

  “I’m breathing. Okay? Now, what am I supposed to do?” I sucked in a painful breath. “Don’t tell me to go to Emergency, because I can’t. I let a friend give me the Botox as a special favor. He’s young and starting up his own clinic, and I promised to be his guinea pig, so I got the treatment free.”

  “Call your father. He’ll help you.”

  “No way. Not my dad.” I touched my welt gently with my fingers, hoping it would stop itching. “He already thinks I’m a screw-up.”

  “Then he won’t be disappointed, will he?” she said sweetly.

  Just as I was trying to think up a smart retort the door cracked open.

  “Hey, there you are.” It was my friend, Fran. We work in the same law firm and everybody thinks she’s frumpy and makes a joke of her, but not around me. “Don’t be hiding in here,” she said. “Everybody wants to meet you. Your paintings are creating quite a buzz.”

  I kept my head averted, and mumbled, “I’ll be right out. Thanks, Fran.”

  I got back to Helga on the cell phone. “Look, Dad would drop-kick me if he found out about this, so that’s not an option.”

  “Perhaps you should have thought about that before you allowed a new doctor to inject botulism into your face,” Helga suggested in a sing-song manner.

  I started to say, bite me, but controlled the urge. I really did think the world of Helga. She accepts me, flawed and all, and is normally quite supportive. “Yeah, well, I didn’t know I’d have an allergic reaction, now did I? And besides, I wanted to look especially good tonight.”

  “And how did that work out for you?”

  Her support system was failing me right about now, and I was getting a bit ticked off. “Look, don’t worry. Go back to sleep. I’ll call you tomorrow.” I hung up on her just as a group of young, attractive girls came in, laughing as though they were having a wonderful time. I was the one who should be out there drinking champagne, flirting with hot guys in tuxes, wowing the art world, wowing Brett, instead of hiding out in the ladies’ room with a drooping eyelid, and a blotchy red welt.

  I knew I had to leave before anyone saw me, so I walked past the girls and back into the bar. In the corner I saw Lydia at the piano with her boyfriend, Jed. He was sitting next to her, they were gazing romantically at each other, and didn’t notice me. Candy poured flutes of champagne, and Fran walked around with a silver platter filled with the delicious mini crab cakes she’d made. Brett sat at the bar chatting up one of the pretty cocktail waitresses.

  And me? I ducked behind some people and bee-lined it toward the exit. The lights began to flicker, and the brick walls were slick with sweat. I heard Candy laugh, and shout to her customers that magic was in the air.

  As I pushed through the door, I felt a tinkling pass through me. It was so quick and fleeting that it might have been nothing. I would describe the sensation like a champagne fizz, a light airy sparkle, nothing more. I do remember thinking how I’d like to be truly beautiful from the inside out. Any other thought I may have had was whisked away when I stepped outside.

  Thunder rumbled in the black sky, and then a flash of lightning came bolting down toward me. I jumped and shrieked. The sky lit up like the Fourth of July as electricity sparked and flashed and danced, reminding me of rock concerts, magic mushrooms, and light shows.

  Running to the car I’d half expected to get zapped, but somehow I managed to get the door open and slide inside. I was drenched and shaken. From my place of safety I watched the lightning rip open the sky and thought how incredibly beautiful it looked in all of its menacing, malevolent glory.

  I’d never seen the night as eerie before, and my fingers itched to paint it. With a final flash of lightning came the wish—to view the world as I was seeing it tonight—vividly, with passion and depth, so I could be the greatest painter ever.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The moment I opened my apartment door, Merrybell,my Persian cat, wrapped herself around my legs. I could feel her tiny whiskers tickle my ankle bone, and the sensation caused the fine hairs to stand up on my arms.

  “Not now, kitty.” Gently, I pushed her away and headed for the bathroom mirror. I turned on the light and used the magnifying mirror to study my face.

  The injection site was much worse—the itchy welt had spread along my forehead into my hairline, and my vision was impaired. When I looked at myself, all I could see was the ugly mug I’d been born with. I ran a shaky finger over my mouth, convinced my cleft lip was back again.

  A teardrop fell onto my hand. I looked at it, frowned, and flicked it away. I had to get a grip. This could not be happening. Bad Botox couldn’t mess up years of corrective surgery.

  Of course it couldn’t. I was okay. My deformity was gone forever, never to return. Dad had corrected my harelip when I was a wee baby, and nothing could bring that back. The mirrors were wrong. All of them.

  I picked up a hairbrush and threw it, hoping to shatter the image reflected there, to break it into a million pieces, but it didn’t even crack. My heart was heavy as I turned away and headed toward my bedroom’s walk-in closet.

  I hung up my gorgeous new dress that I bought from MaxMara for tonight, slipped on my nightgown, removed my makeup, and snuggled on the sofa with my cat. She purred as I stroked her and confided my darkest secrets.

  “I didn’t belong at the art show, ’Bell. I was out of place, just as I’ve been most of my life.” The cat licked my face and purred in agreement. “You know me. I always thought I had mixed-up genes, or there was a mistake in the hospital. Someone fucked up, either upstairs or down. I never belonged with my family, that’s for sure.”

  My father, a plastic surgeon, was tall and handsome, with perfect silver hair. Mother used his skills to retain her youthful, stunning good looks. Leanne, too, was tall, slim, and attractive, and so far had avoided going under the knife.

  As for me, not only was I born with a cleft lip, but I never grew taller than five feet four, my teeth had needed straightening, and my nose didn’t tilt the right way—and those were just a few of my crimes.

  Dad had fixed me a little at a time, and now on the outside I was a very attractive girl. I was, I repeated firmly.

  An allergic reaction to Botox could make my face go slack but it couldn’t bring a harelip back.

  I heard the phone ring but didn’t get up to answer it. My answering machine picked up and I heard my friends’ concerned voices. “Susie? Where the hell are you?” That was Candy. “People wanted to meet you and you’d disappeared.”

  The next was Fran. “What happened to you? We are worried. Give one of us a call, okay, hon?”

  Lydia was the final call. “Hey, girlfriend. Just checking in to make sure you got home safe and sound. Give us a jingle.”

  I would have liked to reassure them,
but I couldn’t. If I explained about the Botox they’d drag my ass off to the emergency room, and then my inexperienced doctor friend might lose his practice. I had to protect him.

  I did call him up and ask if I was going to die. He said I’d be all right, but that it could take a few months for the paralysis to go away completely. I wouldn’t be able to go to work looking like this, and I definitely didn’t want my friends seeing me. I had to get out of Dodge.

  * * *

  Leaving South Beach in the wee hours of the morning, I drove to the end of the line.

  Next stop, Cuba.

  It was hot and muggy, the sun was shining, and nobody gave me a second look. Key West had enough kooky characters that I blended right in.

  The first thing I did was search for affordable lodging. I wasn’t sure how long I’d be staying, but possibly a week, maybe more.

  Someone suggested a B&B on the fringe of town, and to my delight it had a lovely shaded garden, which was ideal for me to relax if I wanted, or to work when I got the urge.

  After I unpacked my bag, I called my sister.

  “Yes, I’ll be glad to look after Merrybell, but you’ve got to tell me where you are,” Leanne wheedled. “Come on. I’m worried about you. You left right in the middle of your show. What happened? Did you panic, honey? Is that it?”

  “Yes, yes, that’s what happened.” I jumped on the excuse. “I’ll be all right in a couple of days. Please, don’t worry about me. I just need a little R&R. You know how I get under stress.”

  “Yes, you’ve had a lot on your plate lately, what with work and this show. The whole family is so proud of you for sticking with the law firm. It seems as if you’ve finally found your calling as a paralegal.”

  “Well, it has been two years, and I do like it. I enjoy the girls I work with.”

  “Excellent. I’m so happy for you, Suz.”

  I’m really a receptionist for the law firm, but for some reason my family thought I was a paralegal and I never corrected them. When I was first hired, the firm promised to promote me if I took a paralegal course. I was gung-ho and started night school, but I just couldn’t keep up the hectic schedule.