The Hero + Vegas = No Regrets

As I close my hotel room door, I finally allow myself to drop the fake smile I’ve worn since boarding the plane from New York to Vegas.

There’s no way I can tell my best friend, who is about to start married life, that my father has had a secret second family for the last twenty-five years. No bride wants to hear about a seemingly fairy-tale marriage actually being a total sham. So I’ve been practicing my best fake smiles for the last week—since I learned my parents weren’t who I thought they were. That they are secret keepers. Cover-uppers. Liars.

I don’t know what’s real anymore.

I need my best friend. I want to cry and crawl under the covers and never come out. I long for something real. Something sure.

But my best friend is getting married, so it’s fake smiles, short skirts, and celebrations.

I abandon my suitcase in the hallway, kick off my shoes, and pull out my phone. I’ve been ignoring calls and texts from Noah and Oliver all week, but maybe my brothers are who I need. We’ve never been “group chat” siblings. Maybe it would be different if I’d had sisters, but with two brothers, the extent of our relationship when we’re not physically together is sharing jokes. Memes is where it begins and ends for us.

But no more.

I quickly create a group chat and type.

Hi, hope you’re both still alive.

It’s about as gushy as I get with my brothers.

Noah replies right away.

I’m avec pulse. Anyone heard from Dad?

My stomach twists. I don’t want to hear from Dad. I’m not sure when I’ll ever be able to speak to him.

Does he keep a schedule? Does he make sure he spends equal time with all of us? Or did we get him for more time because there were three of us and he only had two children in his other family? Or did he just spend more time with the family he preferred?

And was that us? Or them?

I think I’m going to vomit. I rush to the bathroom and grip the sides of the sink, trying to keep down everything threatening to spill out. If I don’t, I’m worried I’ll never stop vomiting.

There’s a knock at the door, but I ignore it. My mind is full of my dad and his other family and whether he’d chase his other kids around the yard with a hose, or paint them head to toe with the paint he was supposed to be using on the shiplap like he did to Oliver one summer. My tummy hurt from laughing so much when I saw Oliver completely covered in white paint.

Mom hadn’t been so amused. The paint was water-based, but he had paint in his hair for a week.

There’s more knocking at the door.

“Sophia!” Jules calls.

Shit.

I straighten, wipe my mouth with the back of my hand, and head to the door.

“Hey,” she says as I open the door, her eyes dancing and excited. “Can I get ready in here? Leo is on the phone and has the TV on, but I just want to listen to Taylor Swift and have some fun.” She’s wearing a robe with a towel on her head and pulling a carry-on suitcase.

“Absolutely!” I wonder if the words sound as fake as they feel. I just want to be left alone to disappear. “I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling twenty-two,” I say, trying to muster some enthusiasm.

She looks so happy. I can’t think of anyone who deserves it more. “Whoop! I brought champagne.”

Now that I can get enthusiastic about. Alcohol might help take the edge off my mood.

“You haven’t even unpacked,” she says, as she organizes glasses for our drinks.

“Oh yeah, I was just texting with Noah.”noveldrama

“Oh,” she says. “How is he?”

I don’t want to talk about my brothers. I don’t know why I brought up Noah.

“Good. Tell me what you’re wearing.”

She describes the options and I listen intently, because if I let my mind wander, it’s only going one way. I want to head a full one hundred and eighty degrees in the opposite direction.

We clink champagne glasses and I manage to glug down half a glass in two mouthfuls. And it does soften my edges a little.

Zip, zip, zip. Jules opens her makeup bag and sits in front of the full-length mirror opposite the bed. “I promise I’ll tidy up after myself,” she says. “Who knows who you might bring back tonight.”

I choke out a laugh. Exactly no one. Men clearly can’t be trusted.

“I think I’m still getting over Jamie,” I say. I know it’s not true, but I need a reason to not be looking for my soul mate as far as Jules is concerned. I’m not sure how it happened so quickly, but Jules has been turned into a lover of love. I don’t know if that makes her Aphrodite or Cupid. But she’s obsessed with the idea that I have to find the love of my life, just like she’s found the love of hers.

“Jamie? Really? I would have thought the fact that you two were long distance would make it easier to get over him.”

I sit on the edge of the bed and consider her statement. Jamie worked on superyachts and was based in Florida. We only saw each other every few months or so—he was always at sea and I have my life in New York. I thought we made it work because we loved each other. But maybe it was just familiar to me—a man who was never around.

“Do you think Jamie was cheating on me?” I ask her.

Jules snaps her head around. “What makes you think that?”

“He was away a lot of the time. He had every opportunity.”

“But so did you, and you never did.”

Just like my mom. I accepted the scraps.

“I’m not doing long distance again,” I say. I don’t want another man in my life who only wants to be there part of the time.

“I think that’s a smart decision,” Jules says. “It’s not sustainable in the long run. And anyway, you should want to be with each other for the everyday-life stuff.” She grins like she’s downed that entire bottle of champagne, and I can tell she’s thinking about Leo. All I can think about is my dad and how he can’t have liked being with us for the everyday-life stuff. Not enough to not be with someone else and have an entire family with them.

I try and swallow down the feeling of loneliness that washes over me.

“Well, Fisher lives in New York City, so you wouldn’t have that problem with him,” she says, grinning into the mirror.

I sigh. “I’m not sure Fisher’s my type.”

She frowns as she applies her brow pencil. “You two got along well at brunch, didn’t you? And on the plane.”

Brunch seems like such a long time ago. I don’t remember much of Fisher. I remember I was sitting next to him, but on the other side was Worth.

Worth is who I remember from brunch. Worth, with the cool blue eyes and intense stare. Worth, who was confident and oh-so-masculine with his stubbled jaw and deep voice that I felt between my thighs whenever he spoke.

Worth, who said I could call him anything I liked, and has me wondering if he really is a hero.

I could do with a hero right about now, but the only person I can rely on to save me is myself.

That’s when it hits me: Worth wasn’t on the plane. Is he not coming this weekend? Not that I should care. I don’t need any romantic entanglements. Ever. Again. I just felt so drawn to him… If not for the bombshell my mom dropped in Cincinnati, my mind would probably have stayed as full of him as it had been after brunch.

“I get along with most people, but I have a slightly higher bar for the people I want to share body fluids with.”

“Ha ha,” Jules says. She’s flitting between using the hair curler and applying her mascara. Her process is so haphazard, I can’t watch too closely or I’ll get stressed out.

“Are you okay?” I ask her.

“Of course. I’m excited about being here. And marrying Leo. Can you believe I’m getting married?”

I smile at her. She’s so happy. I don’t want to ruin that for her. “I can. You deserve all the happiness in the world.” I wonder if I’ll ever be able to tell her about my dad. Because the next thought in her head will be, Do you think Leo could do that to me? It’s a question she’ll ask herself before she eventually asks me.

And what can I say?

There’s only one answer: I never thought my dad could do that to our family.

The last thing I want to do is undermine Jules’ trust in Leo. Not ever. So maybe this is a secret I have to take to the grave.

“You’ll get to know him a little better on this trip,” she says.

For a moment I think she’s talking about Worth, but then I remember she doesn’t know that Worth starred in the dream I had the night after brunch. The one where he was bare-chested, wearing a blue-and-black flannel shirt—unbuttoned of course—and jeans tight to his muscular thighs.

Even now, despite what’s happened with my dad, I’m feeling like I need some air just thinking about how Worth might look with fewer clothes on than is polite for dinner.

Oh, but he wasn’t on the plane.

“Yeah,” I say. “I’ll get to know everyone a little better.” I’ll be fake-smiling my way through this entire weekend.