Hollywood Prince

by Kim Karr

  Those vibrant green eyes of hers lock on mine. Vanessa is beautiful. Tall and thin, with long, dark hair and a confidence about her that brings men to their knees.

  Seriously, I don’t get it. I mean as soon as she opens her mouth, that snotty personality has to snap men out of her hypnotic spell.

  Yet it doesn’t.

  Like I said, I don’t get it.

  The club is lit in lines of silver and gold. Confetti is being thrown everywhere. I think the room might be spinning. No, that’s my head. Needing to catch my breath, I tap Landon on the shoulder. When he turns around, I tell him I have to use the ladies’ room. Leading me there, he stops at the end of the hallway and leans against the wall. I give him a smile and a peck on the cheek, and then make my way toward my destination.

  Seeing Vanessa with another guy is opening up the closet full of memories I want to keep shut. Reminding me of my reality.

  That Camden is gone.

  That Brandon is dead.

  That my parents are divorced.

  That I hardly speak to my mother.

  And that I really don’t like my job. The fact is that took the job working for my father because I don’t want to disappoint him, not because I want to be there. I had to do it, though. My father had already lost so much, there was no way I was about to let him down and do something other than work for The Waters Group.

  Inside the glitzy walls of the restroom, I take one breath, two, three, and four. After having calmed myself, I splash water on my cheeks, my throat, the insides of my wrists.

  Rolling on some lip gloss and powdering my nose doesn’t change much. I’m one hot mess. Trying to fix my hair, which at this point in the night is completely unfixable, also doesn’t change much.

  Frizz is in style, or so I’ve heard anyway.

  I fuss for a few seconds with the part that is far over to the right and tuck some of my shoulder-length hair behind my ears. I’ve thought about cutting my hair even shorter, like Twiggy once did, but with the amount of volume and natural curl I have, I might look more like a chia pet than a girl.

  Giving up on my appearance, I place my palms flat upon the vanity and look at my flushed reflection in the mirror.

  This is the face of a woman who is lost. Looking for something at every turn that she very well may never find.

  Do happy endings even exist?

  Glancing at myself again, I catch sight of that one place that once held a strand of turquoise hair. It was my long forgotten quest to be who I wanted to be.

  Sad. Really freaking sad.

  I’ve always been of the school of thought that resolutions are not special. If you are the kind of person who waits for a new calendar year to make changes to your life, then that’s unfortunate. After all, the reason you always give up on said resolution is directly correlated to the fact that you made one in the first place. If you want to go to the gym more, or be more confident and speak up at work more often, or travel more, just start doing it now. I think my point is that New Year’s resolutions don’t mean crap because it’s the doing that matters, not the making.

  And yet, I find myself about to make one.

  I look into my own eyes, the pupils dilated so wide the black almost overtakes the normal gray. My tongue sneaks out to lick my lips and then I find my mouth moving on its own, silently making my resolution: This year I vow to figure out what makes me happy. What I want out of life. And to live my life the way I want to live it.

  Another glance in the mirror, and I feel better already.

  After I use the facilities, I approach the vanity again, this time to wash my hands, before I return to my date and see what the night brings.

  “Bad hair day?”

  Just as I’m pumping soap into my palms, the hairs on my neck stand up. The haughty tone is a dead giveaway as to who has joined me in the restroom. I don’t even have to turn around.

  Sashaying next to me, Vanessa sets her red crystal clutch on the counter and opens it up.

  Already washing my hands, I try to hurry.

  “You know, my stylist offers a treatment to help control curly hair,” she continues as if we are actually having a conversation about my hair.

  With daggers in my eyes, I turn in her direction. “I like my hair the way it is, thank you very much.”

  Grabbing her lipstick, she applies the red like she’s the devil herself. “I’m trying to be nice, Amelia. It’s an olive branch.”

  Rinsing the soap from my skin, I turn the water off and twist toward her. “An olive branch?” I laugh. “What on earth for?”

  Running her fingers through her dark hair, she looks at me in the mirror. “You are so clueless.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  She shakes her head and snaps her clutch closed. “Nothing.”

  The towels are next to me and I grab one. “No, Vanessa, don’t say nothing. Why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind?”

  Those Louboutin pumps, which she is never without, slap against the marble floor as she moves for the door.

  Normally, I’d let it go. Confrontation is not my thing. Not tonight. I could blame it on the alcohol or the skeletons this place has brought out of the closet, but the plain truth is I just don’t like her. “Come on, Vanessa, talk to me. Wait. I know why you’re leaving. After all this time, you’re still upset about the way my brother dumped you, aren’t you?”

  She whirls around with the eeriest of smiles on her face. “No, Amelia, I wasn’t leaving because of Camden. I was leaving so I wouldn’t tell you the truth about your family.”

  With narrowed eyes, I practically dare her to continue. “Truth? What truth could you possibly know?” I laugh.

  She takes a step toward me. “The truth that your father had been cheating on your mother since the day they married. Or the fact that your mother finally left your father because—”

  I cut her off. There’s a good chance I’m in an alternate universe right now. “Liar!” I shout. “My father never cheated on my mother. In case you are unaware, she left him . . . for another man. You’re just upset over the fact that my brother didn’t want you anymore, and I was happy about it.”

  She shakes her head calmly. “You are so delusional, Amelia. It was I who didn’t want him anymore.”

  I give her a haughty laugh, similar to one of her own.

  Her smile grows wicked. “Poor little Amelia. You have always been so clueless.”

  Outrage burns in my blood. “You’re the delusional one. And now you’re making things up to get under my skin.”

  Vanessa is suddenly in front of me, frowning. “That’s just it, I’m not. You’re the one who has always lived in your own world. Up high in your tower. You’re the one who all the Waters men consider to be a princess. Poor little Amelia, so fragile she might break.”

  “That’s not true,” I say in a flat voice because if I really think about it, that might just be true.

  “Open your eyes for once, Amelia. See what you’re missing. Your life isn’t the picture your family has painted for you. I promise.”

  Emotion rises in my belly. There’s something not untrue about what she is saying. I blink away tears and swallow them as I try to sort through her lies.

  Standing taller than me, she glares down. “Haven’t you ever wondered why your parents broke up so soon after Brandon’s death? I mean they’d been together for so many years, so why then? Why, when the family was already so fractured?”

  There’s a pause as if it is my turn to speak. I don’t. I have wondered that, but I know why—my mother strayed from their relationship. Found another man.

  “It’s because your mother blamed your father for Brandon’s death. She might have lived with your father’s philandering for all those years, but Brandon, that was too much.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  There’s a wicked gleam in her eyes. “Your father was the one who introduced Brandon to this scene. Got him in the clubs. Hooked h
im up with the ladies, and I guess in a roundabout way, the drugs. Of course he never thought Brandon would take it as far as he did.”

  My vision is swimming and all I can do is shake my head no.

  “Come on, little A, you can’t be that naïve.”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “Right. The ABCs. That term of affection was only meant for the three of you. Your little club. Amelia, Brandon, and Camden. But I guess that’s all gone.”

  “Stop it!” I shout.

  She shakes her head no. “There’s one more thing you should know.”

  I want to cover my ears.

  “Haven’t you wondered what could have been so bad between us that Camden felt he had to leave New York?”

  Clutching the edge of the vanity, I’m finally able to speak reasonably. “I know what was so bad—the thought of seeing you every day.”

  She laughs. “No, not me, but your father, yes. You see, he caught your father and me together—fucking on the dining room table at Thanksgiving.”

  “Liar!” I scream.

  The cold-hearted bitch laughs. “But I’m not.”

  “You are.”

  “Then tell me—haven’t you ever wondered why we don’t see each other at work?”

  I stare at her.

  “It’s because your father has asked me to avoid you. He doesn’t want you to know about us. He doesn’t want you to know about a lot of things. But protecting you from the truth was Camden and Brandon’s job, not mine.”

  My mind drifts to the man I saw her with less than five minutes ago. The salt-and-pepper hair of the man kissing her. The fact that I thought Landon’s cologne got stronger for that one moment I was passing by her. Was that man my father? Or just someone who looked like him? Oh, God, I’m going to be sick. I run into the bathroom stall and slam the door closed.

  “Happy New Year, Amelia,” Vanessa coos, and as I drop to my knees on the floor, I hear the door shut behind her.

  My heart is pounding.

  My head is spinning.

  Outrage burns hot and heavy in my blood.

  Liar. She is such a liar.

  Isn’t she?

  Pulling my shit together, I rush to go after her. To see for myself that the man she is with tonight is not my father.

  Right at the end of the hallway is my worst nightmare. A man I can’t see with his arms outstretched as Vanessa falls into his embrace and kisses him right on the mouth.

  Bitch.

  Skank.

  Whore.

  I suck in a huge breath, trying to ease the tightness compressing my chest.

  This isn’t real.

  I’m imagining it.

  It’s not him.

  He looks taller than my father. Slimmer. And much more casually dressed than my father ever would be.

  To be certain it’s not him, I decide to take a step forward. Another. One more.

  Suddenly, a large torso blurs my line of sight. Move it, buddy, I think. I have to be certain, and besides, I have a lot more names to call her. Trying to push the big body out of my way, I don’t succeed. When he doesn’t move, I look up and see who it is.

  “Are you okay?” Landon asks, staring at me with concern in his chocolate-brown eyes.

  On tiptoes, I look over his shoulder. They are gone. And I’m left wondering if it was my father. If her words are true. Something tells me they are, and the thought is too much to bear.

  “Are you okay?” Landon asks again.

  No, I’m not okay. My world is crumbling around me in the most unexpected way. Yet, I keep that fact to myself and instead say, “Yes, I’m fine.”

  Just as he takes my hand to lead me back into the club the crowd starts to shout, “Five, four, three, two, one. Happy New Year!”

  With that I stop and push Landon up against the wall and then throw my arms around his neck so I can kiss him right on the mouth.

  Confetti streams through the air. Noisemakers are loud in my ears. And people are still screaming Happy New Year.

  Landon’s lips are soft and warm and when he pushes me against the wall, his eagerness has my heart beating faster. Our teeth bump and our tongues clash as our mouths move fast, and faster still.

  Certain that if we weren’t in a public place his hand would be under the hem of the dress, I feel a jolt of excitement at the thought of him diving between my legs.

  Delirious, or maybe drunk, or maybe just needing a distraction, I kiss him for a long time before I pull away and look up at him, wondering if he is the one.

  Breathing hard, Landon presses his forehead to mine, wordless.

  With what has to be the cheesiest line in the book, I murmur, “Why don’t we get out of here and make our own fireworks.”

  And just like that I have officially obliterated the last two stages of a blind date, and all my rules, too.

  Fuck it.

  Who needs rules?

  All they seem to do is break you.

  With that cold, hard truth, I pull back and look into his eyes. Yes, I might be about to turn this night into more of a one-night stand than an everlasting love affair, but I don’t care right now.

  Hey, love everlasting might be way overrated, anyway.

  ROMAN HOLIDAY

  Amelia

  Pajama bottoms are so 2009.

  Wearing nothing more than a T-shirt and the wisp of lace I dare to call panties, I roll over and squint as the sunlight streams through my bedroom window.

  Landon is beside me with a cup of coffee in one hand and a plane ticket to California in the other. “Time to rise and shine, sleeping beauty. You have an hour before you have to be at the airport.”

  Sitting up, I rub the sleep from my eyes and try to remember what happened last night, and how the hell I decided to fly out to see my brother.

  Oh, yes, right. Me being me, I started crying before Landon and I even got in the cab. And before we even made it to my apartment in the Village, I had told him everything.

  Even though he had his hands all over me at the club last night, once I had broken down, he turned into a perfect gentleman. The whole damsel-in-distress thing does it to men. Kills the desire, that is.

  Anyway, he listened to me.

  Talked to me.

  Even gave me the quarter I used to decide what to do.

  Alcohol raging in my blood, I resorted to the age-old way of deciding what to do. Heads, I was going to California to talk to my brother. In person. Find out what the hell was going on. Tails, I would stay in New York and call him. Once I’d sobered up, of course.

  As crazy as it sounds, I left my fate in the hands of that coin. Tossed it high in the air, caught it, and covered it with my other hand. Then slowly I lifted my palm. Heads it was. And as fast as I tossed the coin, I bought my ticket.

  Landon didn’t make a move on me, but he did sleep beside me. Such a change from earlier that night when he was all hands and mouth. Then again, letting your skeletons out of the closet is like pouring ice water over someone else’s libido.

  I told you so.

  Yet, as I sit here right now, in a flimsy T-shirt and no panties to speak of, his gaze roams hungrily, and I have to say, I like it.

  With a secret smile, I take the cup from his hands and sip the hot liquid, and then I groan.

  “Head hurt?” he asks.

  I nod. Normally, I’m not much of a drinker, although after last night, I’m not sure he’d believe me.

  In the blink of an eye, he’s handing me a glass of water from my bedside table and a couple of aspirin. “Here, I thought you might need these.”

  “Thank you,” I say, and look at him. And think how gorgeous he is. How hot he is. How perfect he is.

  Wow!

  How cruel life can be?

  I finally find someone who might have turned out to be my prince, and I’m not sticking around to find out.

  I can’t.

  Now isn’t the right time for my happy ending. There is a lot about my life I have to figure out.
Starting with what the hell has my family been keeping from me?

  I never thought of myself as naïve—boy, was I wrong. I feel like I’ve been living in an alternate universe. Perhaps a delusional one.

  Tossing back the pills, I drink the water and grab my old camera. After snapping Landon’s photo, I look at him and smile. “You’re definitely not a toad.”

  Landon moves a little closer, caging me in. “If you didn’t have to leave right now, I’d have you on your back, showing you just how much of a toad I’m not.”

  The camera falls beside me, and I find myself breathing heavily. “Can you hold that thought?”

  “I’m not sure,” he breathes.

  It happens all at once, so smoothly, how he pulls me close to him, like he is going to kiss me again. But at the last second, I turn my face, unable to allow things to move any faster when I’m leaving. “We shouldn’t,” I whisper.

  Landon smiles and everything inside me melts. Then he pulls me closer anyway and kisses my neck. Loving the way his no longer clean-shaven face rubs against me, I thread my fingers through his hair and give in to this one small moment of intimacy. “I feel like you’re saying goodbye,” he says between kisses against my throat.

  I toss my head. “Not goodbye, really.”

  He pauses his kisses, and his breath is hot on my cheek. “For some reason I feel like you’re never coming back to the city.”

  “Oh, I’ll be back.”

  His mouth slides up, and he kisses me on the forehead. “I’ll call you because I like you, and I want to see where this goes, but I have to tell you I’m not so sure you’ll be back.”

  And it’s then I think, with the feel of this man on my skin, this man who I really want to get to know, this man who might be my Mr. Right, that neither am I.

  Neither am I.

  WHEN HARRY MET SALLY

  Brooklyn

  I’m easily seduced—by places, that is, not women.

  Backgrounds draw my attention. Growing up as Hollywood royalty, I have to admit it’s in my blood. I’m always looking for the perfect location to set a movie. I film different settings to look at later. Search for inspiration I don’t even know I’m looking for. Find the perfect this or that to fit in with my story.