Vegas Baby

by Winter Renshaw

  He’s so annoying.

  ***

  Demi, Age 13

  {three years later}

  “Oh, my goodness…” My mother’s making a fuss down the hall. The front door slams. “It’s so good to see you again. How’ve you been, sweetheart?”

  I yank my earphones and cock my head. Sounds like a stampede of winter boots downstairs. I pick up a boy’s voice but it’s not Derek.

  Popping up from my bed, I peer out my bedroom window to the driveway below. I don’t see any cars. I dog-ear my page and fold my book across a pillow before tiptoeing down the hall and peeking down the stairs.

  One careful step. Then another. And another. I’m halfway down when I see my mother with her arms wrapped around someone. She pulls away a second later, and then I see him.

  Royal Lockhart.

  I hold my breath, flatten myself against the stair wall, and pray he doesn’t notice me.

  “I’m so glad you were placed back in Rixton Falls,” Mom says, running her hand along his cheek like he’s a little boy. “Are you liking your new foster parents?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He doesn’t seem excited. Royal folds his hands in front. He stands up straight. I think he’s taller now. His hair is longer. He looks older.

  A year ago, he had to move in with a different family in the northeast part of the state. Derek went to visit a few times, but Royal’s new family could never drive him here for some reason.

  “You’ll spend Christmas with us, won’t you, Royal?” Mom asks. “Christmas dinner is tomorrow. You’re welcome to stay the night. Derek told me you were coming. I hope it’s okay, I went ahead and put some gifts under the tree for you. Just because you went away for a while, doesn’t mean you’re not still an honorary Rosewood.”

  Royal’s face lights when my mom says that. I know he doesn’t have a family like we do. I know it means a lot that we include him. Just wish he wasn’t so annoying.

  He’s pretty cute now though. Like the kind of boy I’d pass a note to in school if he were anyone but Royal Lockhart.

  I’m not sure how long I’ve been staring at him, but the second his eyes lift to the stairs my heart leaps into my throat.

  “Hi, Demi,” he says.

  Mom and Derek turn to see me trip down one of the steps.

  “Hi, Royal.” I turn around and march back up the stairs. He hasn’t seen me since I had braces put on, and I’m nursing a breakout on my chin. I’m in sweats and an old t-shirt from seventh grade volleyball.

  Not that I care what he thinks of me.

  I don’t.

  I mean it.

  I lock my door. I’ll hide in here all night if I have to.

  My stomach growls when the smell of Christmas Eve supper wafts upstairs.

  Ten minutes later, three quick knocks send a sweat to my palms.

  I clear my throat and smooth my ponytail.

  “Who is it?”

  “It’s me.” Delilah’s voice is a Godsend.

  “Come in.”

  My babiest sister, who acts older than all of us most of the time, barges in.

  “Why are you hiding up here?” She tucks a strand of pale blonde hair behind her ear. “You know Royal’s downstairs, right?”

  I roll my eyes. “Yeah, so?”

  “You look cute. Did you just change?” she asks.

  Busted.

  “Nope. Been wearing this all day.” I tug on my cozy pink sweater and run my hand down my leggings until I reach the top of my chunky socks. I saw a girl on Instagram wearing a similar outfit. She was older than me, but I think I can pull this off.

  For some reason, I feel the need to look older. Like Royal does now.

  Delilah scrunches her perfect nose at me. “Anyway, come downstairs. We’re playing Mario Kart and we need another player.”

  I stare at my waiting book that clearly isn’t going anywhere and rack my brain for an excuse.

  “I have homework,” I say.

  “It’s Christmas break.”

  “I hate Mario Kart.”

  “No you don’t. You’re better than all of us.”

  “I’ll be down later.”

  Delilah frowns. “It’s because of Royal, isn’t it? You always act weird around him. Everyone sees it.”

  “Not true,” I lie.

  “Fine. You can just stay up here like some stuck up princess in a tower. Maybe I’ll send Royal up to rescue you.”

  My cheeks burn. Before I get a chance to say anything, Delilah slams my door.

  I pace my room for a solid thirty minutes, dabbing concealer on my chin each time I pass my mirror.

  Mom calls my name from downstairs. Dinner must be ready. I holler down that I’ll be there in a minute, and then run back to my dresser to fix my hair one last time. I can never get these topknots to lay the right way.

  “Need help?” A boy’s voice startles me.

  I whip around to see Royal in my doorway. I kick myself for leaving the door open.

  “What are you doing up here?” I spit.

  “Everyone’s waiting on you downstairs. Dinner’s ready.”

  Great. Now I’m going to walk downstairs and my whole family’s going to be staring at me. They’re going to see that I changed my clothes and put on makeup.

  God, I feel so stupid now.

  “I’ll be down in a minute,” I say.

  “You said that twenty minutes ago.” He takes another step into my room. How rude. “They told me to come rescue you. Now come on. I’ll personally escort you to the dinner table, princess.”

  Royal grabs my arm, and butterflies swarm my stomach.

  Was. Not. Expecting. That.

  I get lightheaded. I think my heart’s racing too fast. I need to sit down. I need him to go away.

  Yanking my elbow from his grip, I roll my eyes.

  “Don’t.” I swallow hard.

  He smirks, and I notice a dimple in his right cheek. Was it always there? Royal’s lashes are long and dark, and they frame his baby blues perfectly. He has the girliest eyes I’ve ever seen. Why am I just now noticing these things?

  “You coming or what?” He’s in the hallway now. “Saved you a place.”

  Royal winks. I release the smile I’ve been biting away as soon as his back is turned.

  ***

  Demi, Age 15

  {two years later}

  “Derek was supposed to teach me how to drive.” I’m seated in the front of Royal’s beat up Chevy. It’s rusty and the exhaust is super loud. I’ve seen him drive around town in this thing before, and he acts like he’s so hot. Girls hang off the tailgate in the high school parking lot after school like it’s some hot nightclub.

  Just so happened my parents decided to take their Jamaican anniversary cruise during my fifteenth birthday. My learner’s permit is burning a hole in my wallet. Two weeks is a long time to wait when you’re fifteen.

  “Yeah, well, Derek chose summer break to get mono, so you get me instead.” Royal jingles the keys. “Put your left foot on the clutch and your right one on the brake.”

  “This is a stick?” My voice cracks. I grip the skinny steering wheel of the old blue beater.

  He shoves the key in the ignition, cranks it to the right, and grabs my right hand. He moves it to the black gear shifter. I can’t read the letters or numbers. They’re all worn off. I only see a funny looking grid.

  Royal’s hand grips mine as his truck roars to life.

  “This is first gear,” he says as our hands move forward. He pulls the knob down, my hand trapped under his, and it feels looser now. “This is neutral.” He wiggles it back and forth so I can see, and then he brings the stick toward us. “This is second.”

  He goes through all the gears with me two more times, then makes me show him on my own.

  “Okay. I get it now,” I say.

  “Shift into first,” he says. “Carefully take your right foot off the brake and move it to the gas. Let the clutch out slow-”

  The clutch is sprin
gy. The second I left up on it, it pops all the way out and his truck goes lurching forward. It bounces to a stop and the engine dies.

  “Damn it.” I pound my fist on the steering wheel and curse Derek under my breath. Why’d he have to go and get mono right now?

  “Demi, it’s fine. Let’s try again. Shift into neutral. Stick your left on the clutch and your right on the break and start it up again.”

  It only takes four tries before we’re barreling down the side street that runs past my neighborhood. In the distance, a red octagon comes into view.

  “I don’t know how to stop. How do I stop? Royal? What do I do?” I white-knuckle the steering wheel like no one’s business.

  He laughs. I’d slap him, but I’m busy holding on like my life depends on it.

  “Left on the clutch, right foot gentle on the brake. Give yourself plenty of time. Come to a slow stop.”

  He reaches for the radio, and I momentarily release my grip on the wheel to swat his hand.

  “I don’t want music yet. I’m not ready.” I realize I sound like a baby, but I’m driving this two-ton, stick-shift, beast of a truck and I don’t think I’m to the place where I can sit back and listen to music like we’re on some kind of joy ride.

  Royal lifts his hands. “All right. No worries. Just trying to get you to relax.”

  I follow his directions and bring us to an easy stop. We’re at a highway intersection now. A semi barrels from the east.

  “Where should I go?” I ask.

  “Anywhere you want.” He lowers his window and a burst of mild summer air flows through. I didn’t realize how stuffy it was in here until now, so I do the same.

  I take a deep breath, shift into first, and concentrate on not popping the clutch so we don’t become road kill.

  He’s so patient with me. And he trusts me with his truck. I don’t know many guys at school who’d be this cool about letting me learn with their only mode of transportation.

  Every high-schooler in Rixton Falls knows vehicles equal freedom.

  I could easily wreck this thing, and Royal doesn’t make enough money doing landscaping to be able to replace it. His current foster family doesn’t have the means either, not that they’d be obligated.

  “Thanks for trusting me with this,” I say, releasing the clutch and pressing my toes against the gas pedal. This might be the only time in my fifteen years that I’ve ever thanked Royal Lockhart for anything.

  We ease forward, crossing the four lane highway and heading north.

  “Demi, watch out…” Royal grabs the steering wheel and jerks it in his direction as a fuel truck whirs past us so fast it shakes the cab.

  I jam my foot hard into the clutch and brake and bring us to a violent stop in a cloud of dust on the side of the highway.

  “I’m sorry. I…I didn’t see it coming.” My words shake and two fat tears drip down my cheeks. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

  “Demi.”

  Ignoring him, I pull on the door lever and climb out. He meets me halfway, at the tailgate. I cross my arms. He’s going to try and talk me out of it, but my mind’s made up.

  “I don’t like stick shifts,” I say. “I’ll just wait until my parents get back. Mom can teach me in the Suburban.”

  My chin trembles. He stares at me. I’m not sure how he stays this calm when two minutes ago I almost got us killed.

  I squeeze my eyelids so tight they hurt. I wish I could crawl into a hole and never come out. I wish Royal never would’ve offered to teach me how to drive. I wish–

  The warmth of his hands encapsulates mine, and I pull in a startled breath, opening my eyes.

  “Demi, it’s okay. Everyone has to learn somehow. You master this beast? You can drive anything. Automatics are for pussies and fraidy-cats. You’re fearless. I know you are. I’ve seen it.”

  His hands leave mine and slide up my arms, leaving a trail of tingles. I try to swallow, but my mouth is dry.

  “Remember when we were kids, and we were playing in that creek, and Delilah got bit by that snake?” he asks.

  I nod.

  “Everyone else took off running, and what’d you do? You went back and smashed its head with a rock.”

  I laugh through my nose, my damp eyes blinking.

  “That thing didn’t stand a chance when you were done with it,” he adds.

  Though it’s been years, the most vivid part of that memory is the fact that Royal chased after me. He let me do what I had to do, and he made sure I wasn’t alone.

  “So tell me, former child snake killer,” he says. “You going to get back in there and practice some more? Or am I taking you home now?”

  I wipe my drying tears on the back of my hand and stuff my pride deep down.

  “Yeah. Fine.” I sigh. He lets me go, and we linger for a moment. “Stop looking at me that way. It’s weird.”

  “How was I looking at you?”

  “I don’t know. Like…” Like you think I’m pretty.

  Derek would murder him if he made a move on me.

  The sky behind him morphs into a deep shade of stormy blue, and flashes of lightening precede a distant rumble of thunder.

  Quick, tiny droplets of water ping against the metal bed of his Chevy and the rain begins to kiss our faces.

  “Get in,” he nods toward the cabin.

  I move toward him, making my way to the passenger side, but he stops me with a palm on my shoulder.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa. You didn’t think you’d get out of driving just ‘cause there’s a little bit of rain, did you?” Royal smirks. “This is how you learn. Get in. You’re driving us home.”

  Halfway home, it occurs to me that Royal saved my life.

  ***

  Demi, Age 17

  {two years later}

  “Why are you sitting here in the dark?” Royal’s voice startles me at two in the morning on a Saturday.

  “I thought you were downstairs with Derek?” I sit up on our living room sofa, and Royal plops down beside me.

  “Derek’s passed out,” he said. “And I can’t sleep.”

  “You too, huh?”

  “I never sleep. Can never get comfortable,” he says. “I’m like fucking Goldilocks or some shit. Each bed is too hard or too soft. Haven’t found the right one yet.”

  Would probably help if he ever had a bed of his own.

  “So what are you going to do?” I ask.

  He shrugs. “Came up here to check out the Rosewood ‘fridge. See what kind of leftovers Bliss has all Tupperware’d up in there.”

  Royal doesn’t move. Apparently he’d rather sit here with me now than rummage.

  “There should be some leftover lasagna,” I say.

  “Cool. Bliss makes good food.”

  “Yep.”

  The living room curtains are pulled wide behind us, and the half moon in the sky provides just enough of a glow I can make out the outline of his face in the dark. Not only can I tell he’s looking at me, I feel it too.

  I squirm and play with a loose thread in the throw pillow in my lap.

  “Go out with me, Demi.” His voice is slightly more than a whisper, and his question is a paddle shock to my heart.

  “What are you talking about?” I play dumb.

  “I’m graduating in May,” he says. “And we’ve never been on a date.”

  “You’re like a brother to me. Ew. That’s gross. I would never. And Derek would kill us.”

  “Psh. I’ll deal with Derek.” He inches closer. “Don’t act like you’ve never thought about it. I have.”

  My body burns from head to toe. I don’t know how he can be so straightforward. Most guys at school are vague. They play mind games. Or they’re too chicken to make the first move.

  “I can honestly say I don’t look at you that way.” I clear my throat and look away.

  Liar, liar, pants on fire. I’m going to hell. I am so going to hell.

  I stare ahead at a family portrait of smiling Rosewoods hanging
above the fireplace mantle. I’ve always thought Royal should be included in those. He’s more or less one of us; maybe not by blood, but blood doesn’t always make you a family.

  Royal snickers. “Come on, Demi. I don’t believe you for one second.”

  I roll my eyes. “Really not interested in becoming a flavor of the week.”

  He licks his lips as they spread wide. “That’s cute you pay attention to my social life.”

  Kind of hard not to notice when he’s strutting down the hall like a peacock with a flock of spray-tanned cheerleaders hanging off his baseball pitcher arms.

  “One date,” he says. “Per week. For two months.”

  My face scrunches. “What? No. That’s dumb.”

  “Just trying to prove that you wouldn’t be a flavor of the week.”

  “Fine. One date,” he says. “Per week. Until you decide you’re sick of me.”

  “Which would probably be after the first date, if I’m being honest,” I lie again. Pretty sure the devil’s reserving a special spot with DEMI ROSEWOOD etched across it in flashing neon lights. “So it’s pretty pointless to even entertain anything involving you and me.”

  “I don’t think it’s pointless at all,” he says. I glance at him. He’s not smiling or teasing for once. “I’m seriously asking you out on a date, Demi.”

  I exhale and slink back against the sofa, twirling a dark strand of hair between my fingers over and over, the smooth, soft strands distracting me from this moment.

  We sit in silence for a minute or two. Once again, Royal has the patience of a saint that runs perfectly perpendicular to his lips made for sin.

  “Derek’s going to feed your balls to Milo. You know that, right?” I lift my brows and purse my lips to keep from smirking.

  “Nah. Derek’s cool. He’ll get over it.”

  “Not if you hurt me, he won’t.”

  “If anyone’s going to get hurt here, it’s going to be me.”

  I scoff. “Why’s that?”

  “’Cause I’ve waited years for a date with Demi Rosewood. Pretty sure it’s going to be epic. Pretty sure I’m never going to want to let you go.”

  “Stop being weird. I don’t like it. Go back to being…you.”

  I yawn and rise, tossing the throw pillow back on the seat behind me. Reaching over, I ruffle my fingers through his messy chocolate hair. If I treat him like a puppy, maybe I can ignore the fact that my heart’s beating a hundred miles per hour and my lips are tingling at the thought of touching his.