Happy Birthday to Me Again (Birthday Trilogy, Book 2)

by Rowe, Brian

  “Sure,” the Asian girl next to Hannah said.

  “Here you go,” the Kimber look-a-like added, as she handed the joint to Hannah.

  She took a few hits and then passed it to me. I felt embarrassed that, despite my popularity in high school, I had only tried pot twice, and both times I had been too drunk to really enjoy the experience. I felt confident that I wouldn’t look like an idiot taking a few puffs, but I wasn’t entirely sure.

  “I probably shouldn’t,” I said, pushing the joint away. “I have a big day tomorrow, and—”

  “Oh, come on, Cameron. Live a little.”

  All three girls looked at me like they wanted to gang up on me and start scratching my face off if I didn’t at least try it. So I did. I took a small hit and passed it back to Hannah.

  “That doesn’t count!” she shouted. “Take a real hit. Suck it in. Come on.”

  I licked my lips and nodded. I decided to really go for it. I took the joint and sucked in the smoke as hard as I could, for five seconds or more, and then let the smoke enter my lungs like I never wanted it to leave. I nodded, the three girls smiling at me, my eyes watering up, the smoke entering every crevice in my body.

  Finally I breathed out. Then I started coughing. And then I felt like I wanted to die.

  “Oh… Oh, God… water…”

  “Cameron? Are you OK?”

  I just shook my head as I stood up and raced over to the bar, my coughing accelerating at an alarming rate. I felt like I was dying. Everyone just stared at me, confused, like I was putting on a show. I needed water. But I couldn’t find a bottle of water anywhere. I made my way to the sink, but there were no cups anywhere.

  “Where…” I couldn’t stop coughing. “Cups?”

  “Cameron!” Hannah shouted. “In the pantry!”

  I turned to my left to see a pantry door halfway open, the light on, a pack of bottled waters in the back. I slammed my arm over my mouth as I continued to cough, wondering if I could make it the fifteen steps into the closet.

  But I did. I slashed the plastic off the pack of twenty-four bottled waters and grabbed the first bottle to the left, downing it like I hadn’t taken a sip of water in days. I finished it, and then started chugging a second bottle. I spit up some of the water and coughed some more. But I finally felt like I would survive the ordeal. Don’t die, Cameron. Not here. Especially not here.

  As I grabbed for a third bottle, I heard the door lock behind me, followed by an odd tapping sound. I turned around to see Hannah, looking a bit devilish under the one bright light bulb on the ceiling, staring at me with wanting, feverish eyes, her elongated fingernails tapping against the locked pantry door.

  “Feeling any better?” she asked.

  “Umm… umm, yeah.” I walked up to her. “We should get back.” I brought my hand toward the doorknob, but she slapped it away.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Back to the party?”

  “I don’t think so.” She shook her head, and then started licking her lips.

  “What are you doing?”

  She looked down and brought her hands toward my rib cage.

  “What are you—”

  “You want me to stop?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Then why aren’t you moving?”

  She had a point. I wasn’t exactly rushing to get out of the pantry. Here I was, somehow alone with this dangerous, sultry, breathtakingly beautiful woman. And she wanted me. Every part of me.

  “I can’t do this,” I said. “I have a girlfriend.”

  “So?”

  “So? I’m taken!”

  I tried to reach for the door again, but Hannah pushed against my chest. I took a few steps back, all the way against the cases of food behind the bottled waters. I realized I wasn’t getting out of this pantry alive.

  “You’re not really getting married, are you?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Come on. You’re so young, Cameron. Think of all that you’d miss…”

  She rushed up to me so fast I could barely react. She grabbed my ass with both her hands and planted her lips against mine. This chick was strong.

  “Don’t fight it,” Hannah said, pulling her lips away for a quick second. Then she kissed me again, this time sticking her tongue in my mouth.

  This sensual, mind-blowing kiss lasted for five or six seconds, before I finally managed to push her away.

  “You don’t really want her, do you, Cameron?” she asked with a chilling smile on her face.

  “I have to go.”

  I stepped toward the pantry door, this time with all the physical prowess I needed to not only get out of the pantry, but get out of this mansion and party. Surprisingly, she didn’t stop me this time.

  But as I walked past her, she said this: “I want you, Cameron. I want you bad.”

  She slipped her phone number in my back pocket before I had a chance to stop her. I turned to her one more time.

  “Don’t be stupid,” she said. “Don’t throw your life away. Let the girl down easy. And call me, OK?”

  I just shook my head and stampeded out of the pantry. Everybody in the basement room stared at me as I ran up the stairs. I exited the mansion and safely made it to my car. It wasn’t until I was driving down the road and turning onto a quiet side street that I felt truly safe.

  Shit, I thought. Shit shit shit!

  I was so mad at myself for going to this party. I had Liesel’s birthday tomorrow, a wedding in a few short weeks. Everything had been going smoothly. And now… well… this girl had spoken to all my insecurities.

  That was weird. Really, really weird.

  But I had to admit. I liked it.

  As I drove home, checking my phone to see if Liesel had called or not—she hadn’t—I started wondering, really for the first time since I popped the question, if I truly loved Liesel because of who she was, or because of what she did for me last summer. Did I really want to spend the rest of my life with this girl?

  Marrying Liesel means forever, Cam. You understand? Forever.

  At this point I just wanted to get home and sleep it off. I knew I’d feel differently in the morning. By Liesel’s birthday dinner tomorrow night, I’d be back to normal. I knew it. I was sure of it.

  But I had one more thought about the evening as I pulled into my driveway, one that hadn’t even occurred to me until now.

  I told Hannah I had a girlfriend…

  But did I ever tell her I was getting married?

  ---

  “Hey stranger!”

  I was back in the car, back on the road, readying myself for one of the most expensive dinners of my life that I actually had to pay for. It was Liesel’s nineteenth birthday, and I decided to pull out all the stops. I was taking her to a charming little French bistro in downtown Reno called Boujois that offered three-course meals, authentic (and pricey) old-school French wines, and much more. Liesel had been telling me for the last few months that she really wanted to get out of Reno and travel more, see more of the world. She said she had felt semi-imprisoned for the last few years and wanted her life to change and open up more. Liesel, in a sense, wanted freedom.

  One of the reasons why she wants to marry me, I thought, before realizing I had just blanked on the last couple of sentences Wesley had been saying to me over the phone.

  “What was that, Wes?”

  “I was just curious where you were taking her tonight, that’s all.”

  “Oh. I’m taking her to that French restaurant Boujois.”

  “Can’t say I’ve ever been there,” he said.

  “It’s amazing. I’ll have my choice between orange-dusted rabbit and cinnamon noodle duckfat.”

  “Sounds delicious.”

  “Oh it will be. At only eighty bucks a dish, it better be!”

  He laughed, but it sounded forced. There was awkward silence for a few moments. I still hadn’t deciphered the reason for his call.

  “
So what’s up, Wes? You seem like you have something on your mind.”

  “Well, see, it’s about the wedding.”

  That reminds me. “Yeah, uhh, speaking of the wedding, I had something to ask you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I know we’ve had our differences, and I know we don’t see that much of each other anymore. But I’ve been doing some thinking, and it’d be my honor if…”

  Silence. Then: “If what?”

  “Wes, I want you to be my best man.”

  I turned to my left to see the Reno Sparks Convention Center, the sight of last year’s memorably awkward prom. I turned my eyes back toward the road.

  Wes didn’t say anything for a moment. I thought he was going to start crying or something. “Cam, that’s one of the nicest things you’ve ever said to me.”

  I smiled. “So you’ll do it?”

  I pulled off onto Kietzke Lane. Liesel’s apartment was just minutes away.

  “Cameron…” Wesley started. I could hear fear in his voice.

  “What?”

  “It’s just… classes have gotten insane these last few weeks, and I have finals coming up, you know, the week after your wedding…”

  My jaw dropped. “Yeah, so?”

  “I don’t think I’m gonna be able to make it, Cam.”

  If Wesley had been sitting in the passenger seat, I would’ve smacked him in the forehead. But unfortunately, he was hundreds of miles away, and the most I could do was scream into the phone.

  “WHAT?”

  “It’s nothing personal. It’s just—”

  “You’re not gonna come to my wedding, Wes? Seriously?”

  Silence ensued. Finally, I heard Wesley say simply, and softly, “I’m sorry.”

  I shook my head, so wrapped up in my emotions that I almost hit the street lamp outside Liesel’s complex. I pulled up to the curb and slammed on the brakes.

  I was about to hang up the phone when Wesley continued. “Come on, Cameron, let’s get serious.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You’re marrying Liesel because of what happened to you last year. You know it, and I know it. You don’t really love her. And you don’t really want to marry her. If you go through with this, you’re gonna make one of the biggest mistakes of your life, I swear.”

  I was so enraged I slammed my fist down against the dashboard. “How the hell would you know? How would you know what I feel? You haven’t even been—”

  “Cameron!”

  The L.A. transplant was serious. I had never heard him be this up front and honest with me since that last despairing night in the hospital when he showed me his video. This time, however, he was being honest with me in a way that was pissing me the hell off.

  “Cameron, listen to me,” Wesley continued. “You can’t marry her. You’re gonna regret it.”

  “This conversation’s over.” I turned off the power to my phone, feeling pretty proud of myself for not lashing every expletive at Wesley I could think of.

  I threw the phone harder than necessary into my glove compartment and slammed my head back against the headrest. I sat in the car completely still, the ignition, music, and AC turned off. I just wallowed in silence, for a minute or more, feeling my face turn red.

  What if he’s right? I couldn’t help but think. Have I rushed into this too quickly?

  It was at that moment I saw Liesel heading down the sidewalk, mere seconds away from the passenger side door. I didn’t have time to ponder the matter further. I simply stepped outside the car and shut my door.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey you.”

  “How did you know I was here?”

  “I saw you from my window. Oh, Cameron…”

  She rushed up to me and wrapped her arms around me. She looked more stunning than ever. She also smelled so sweet I wanted to start kissing her all over. Decked out in a dark red dress, with the color of her hair and lipstick matching, she looked like a devilish figure tonight—the most radiant devilish figure to have ever stepped inside the biggest little city in the world.

  She kissed me, and I kissed her back. All of my stresses and worries drained from my senses. All I could consider at this moment was how much love I felt for this special girl before me.

  “You look so pretty, Leese.”

  “Thanks, Cam.”

  I kissed her on her cheek. “Happy birthday, sweetheart.”

  She snickered. “Be careful with that phrase. You know it’s gotten us into trouble before.”

  I still couldn’t really joke about last year’s traumatic events, but I managed a laugh through my nose as I opened the passenger side door for Liesel.

  “Such a gentleman,” she said as she sat down. I slammed the door, re-adjusted my belt, took a deep breath, and made my way to the driver’s side.

  A gentleman who really doesn’t want to break your heart.

  ---

  “So did you do anything exciting last night?”

  I nearly choked on my water, the way comedians do in movies to get a cheap laugh from the audience. Except with me I not only swallowed the water down the wrong pipe, I literally had an ice cube stuck in my throat for a few seconds.

  “Cam? You all right?”

  I signaled that I was, and turned around, slammed my fist against my throat, and happily sighed as I felt the giant ice cube slide down my esophagus into my stomach. I coughed, twice, before smiling.

  “Fine.”

  “I had an amazing time with the girls last night,” she said. “We were out so late that when I got home the sun was coming out.”

  “You’re joking.” I took a sip of wine, which, while morbidly expensive, tasted tart, like a bitter fruit juice. I was just thankful the kooky waiter hadn’t asked for an ID. “What did you guys do so late?”

  “They took me to some bars downtown. You know they’re both, like, twenty-four, so they could actually sneak me in everywhere. I’m thankful I don’t look super young for my age. It might’ve made things more difficult.”

  “So did you get drunk?”

  She shrugged. “I had a few drinks. I don’t know. Didn’t really feel much.”

  “Hmm. Let’s see how you do with your wine there.” Liesel and I were sharing the expensive bottle, which was still half full.

  The bottle was nearly empty, however, when we finally got our food over an hour later. It was Saturday night, definitely loud and crowded inside the posh, intimate restaurant, but I was particularly shocked with the food delay. To make matters worse, we hadn’t ordered appetizers. I wasn’t just hungry; I was famished. Famished and irritable.

  “Oooooh, this looks delicious,” Liesel said, licking her lips as she marveled at her filet mignon in port wine truffle sauce.

  As the not-French-at-all waiter set down my beef bourguignon, I turned to him, as calm as can be, and said: “May I just ask, what took so long with the food?”

  “We’re not like every restaurant in Reno, monsieur,” the plump, middle-aged waiter said, noticeably pronouncing ‘monsieur’ as ‘mon-syer.’ “We make our food here from scratch, only organic, only from the finest ingredients. You’ll only find—”

  “There’s like ten tables in this restaurant,” I interrupted. “How many chefs you have back there? One, plus a talented rat?”

  The man didn’t seem to understand my Ratatouille reference. “Monsieur, I promise you, you will not be disappointed. You ordered our finest dish.”

  He pointed at my beef dish, which I thought would look like the finest slabs of meat on top of warm, buttered noodles. Instead, I was met with dried strips of black char, surrounded by soupy red wine sauce.

  This is what the Devil’s vomit would look like, I thought.

  “Honey,” Liesel said, already annihilating her dish, “just take a bite. If it’s half as good as this, you’ll be happy.”

  Speaking of the Devil…

  I peered up at my fiancée, who appeared entirely red. Even her face had taken on a rou
ge quality in the last hour sitting in this uncomfortably warm restaurant. As I tinkered with my fork to take the first bite of my dish, I watched as Liesel continued to eat with her mouth open, talking about her exciting escapades from last night, a large piece of filet squirting a bloody substance out from her mouth to the side of the table.

  “Soooo good,” Liesel said. “This is amazing. Take a bite.”

  I veered my attention down to my plate of death. As I dragged my fork through the steaming hot red wine sauce, I could see the six pieces of beef forming into the haunting visage of Mrs. Gordon.

  “Let her down easy, Cameron!” the librarian shouted at me from the dish. “Easy, now!”

  I knew I needed to destroy the sight of her. I slashed both my fork and knife through the beef and reluctantly took a bite.

  “Good, huh?” Liesel asked.

  “Mmm hmm…”

  “Cameron…”

  “Yeah?”

  I lifted my head up to see Liesel smiling at me in a sincere manner. She took another sip of her wine and brought her shoulders down to the table. “Nothing. I just… I just wanted to say, there’s nowhere I’d rather be right now… on my birthday… than here with you.”

  I leaned forward. I was going to say something similar, when a strange sight caught my eye.

  I didn’t need to turn my head at all. The figure moved after a quick second, but I was almost sure I had seen her. I could’ve sworn I saw Hannah, of all people, staring at the two of us from outside a small window across the room. I blinked and looked again, seeing nothing but an ominous street lamp shining light against the window. But I felt positive I’d seen her.

  That’s when I looked back at my dinner plate, still seeing Mrs. Gordon’s hideous face. She was raising her eyebrows, the way she always did when she caught me macking on Charisma’s face in the library during my senior year of high school.

  “Don’t make her angry,” Mrs. Gordon whispered.

  “Cam?” Liesel asked. “Are you feeling all right?”

  I looked up at my bride-to-be. “Yeah, I just need to use the restroom. I’ll be right back, OK?”

  “OK.”

  I stood up and turned once again to the waiter. “Excuse me, where’s the bathroom?”