Long Shot

C
opyright
© 2016 by Kayti McGee

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

F
or the brave
women who survived The Hustler Club at RT16. I see you. And I honor your sacrifice.

T
here is
a brief moment between waking and opening my eyes that is utter perfection. The sound of the neighbors filters gently in, even though it sounds like they might be drunk too.

“For fuck’s sake, dude. Just take it out.”

“It’s stuck!”

“Well unstick it. I can’t stay in this position all day. I have to go to work!”

Haha
, I think. I bet I’m not supposed to hear that. Then the hangover dawns as gloriously and irreversibly as the sun, and the drunk neighbors aren’t quite as amusing to me anymore.

“I’m
trying
. I can’t pull it out.”

“Pull harder!”

“Do you want me to break it off? Do you want to kill me? Because it sounds like you want to kill me.”

It’s possible they want to kill
me
. I moan and pull a pillow over my head. This headache is going to be a doozy, I can already tell, mostly because my mouth tastes like a dead hooker and that never bodes well for the rest of my day.

“You don’t need it that bad, just fucking pull!”

“Did you hear yourself right now? Think about what you’re saying. I am
not
breaking it off.”

I groan louder and try to sit up to yell at them through the window, when the full weight of my head catches up with me and I fall backwards. Nope. Getting up is a big fat nope.

Maybe they are still drunk. That’s the only reason I can imagine why Ramsay Bolton over there is discussing castration so loudly on a—what day is it? Well, a morning of some sort anyways.

My stomach starts to gurgle just slightly, reminding me that I clearly overdid it last night. And then, horror of horrors, memories start to creep up on me. Small ones—someone suggesting shots, taking more shots, did I—oh god yes. I did. I made bets on how many shots I could drink.

Spoiler: a lot. I can take a ton of shots. Let’s overlook the part where I am paying for it, in spades. I just hate losing bets.

Related: I also hate my life right now. I hate the sun, I hate these stupid neighbors, I hate their damn dog, I hate this thin pillow…

Wait.

Wait.

Oh.
Shit
.

My
asshole neighbors don’t have a dog.
My
pillows smell like jasmine. These smell like possibly a cat sleeps on them. Dear god in heaven, where
am
I?

“Okay, listen, I’m not saying I don’t
care
about it. We just need to get this unstuck, you know, yesterday. It is starting to hurt.”

“
You’re
starting to hurt? I’m carrying the brunt of this!”

I really want to peek out the window and spy them stuck in some sort of complicated sex position, but I also really don’t want to move my head right now. Priorities, I have them. Instead, I sprawl out on my bed and try to remember what the hell happened last night. I’m still coming up with holes, which means I was betting with the wrong people. Or maybe the right people. Hard to say.

Where could I possibly be? I fumble around and determine I am, in fact, the only person in the bed, so that’s a good thing. I am also still fully clothed, including—I check—yes, my boots.

For the love of Pete, I really need to brush my teeth. What’s worse than dead hooker? Because the taste is morphing into that. Dead hooker skunk, perhaps.

A huge
bang
sounds off outside my window, and I jump three feet into the air.

“And now you broke it.”

“I wouldn’t have broken it if you would have just listened to me…”

Wait a tic—I know that voice. I pull the pillow off my head and really look around the room I’m in.

Oh. Thank. God.

I’m at my sister’s house. Of course, because I’ve been living here for the last week because of reasons I don’t want to even think about. My jasmine pillows are in storage, and I’m stuck on a lumpy hand-me-down in their spare room.

Life suddenly makes sense again.

Little by little, I pull myself up to peer out the window. For all the shambles my morning is in, at least I can have a homemade porno. But alas! No. My very dressed neighbors are fighting over some piece of furniture that now lies in six pieces on the driveway. I guess I read that situation all wrong.

To be fair, anyone would have.

The alarm on my phone goes off from somewhere in the room, my daily reminder to take my birth control. Okay, so it’s eleven in the morning. Well, as long as I take it, I can still pretend I am responsibly adulting, right? Adulting is a dumb word. But I’ll claim it.

I manage to sit up and clutch my pounding head in my hands. I need water. So much water. I need to drown in a trough of water.

Another slip of memories trickles down and I freeze. Oh, god. Jane dragged me out to the strip club last night. “Dragged”. Whatever.

That’s not the part freezing me in place, eyes wide and hand to my mouth.

Did I really give my number to a stripper?

Oh, no. No, no, no.

As if on cue, my phone begins to ring from wherever I evidently tossed it last night. Please, please let it be one of the million studios I have sent my resume to. Please don’t let it be the stripper.

The number comes up, nothing I recognize, but that doesn’t help me. I stare at it, knowing I have to make an important decision. Would I dare send Woods Photography to voicemail on the off-chance I really did what I fear I did?

I take a deep breath and slide my finger across the phone, praying it’s the job I want and also that my voice isn’t too Fireball-ravaged. “H-hello?”

“Meredith? It’s Rob from last night.”

I shriek and throw the phone across the room. It bounces off a leather-padded desk chair and settles into the seat.

Is it dead? Did I kill it? I inch towards it, and his voice emerges, tinny-sounding through the speaker. It clearly isn’t dead yet. I lean forward and prod with my pinkie extended to kill the call.

I breathe heavily at the edge of the bed for a moment. A Bloody would help to steady the nerves. But I have sworn off drinking as of my awakening, sadly. Tacos, that would do as a substitute. That would do. I try very hard to think of tacos and only tacos.

I definitely do not remember Rob and how he has dark hair and piercing blue eyes and hips that gyrated like—

Tacos!
Get your head out of the gutter, Meredith
.

Where’s my purse? Oh, no. No, no, no. If there is a god, it will be somewhere in this house. Let me throw my wants and desires into the universe, like my old yoga instructor told me, so the universe will receive it and make it so.

Breathe in, breathe out. Manifest that bitch.

I bet it’s totally in Jane’s car. Or the kitchen. I had to walk through the kitchen to get to my room, so yeah. I would have tossed it there. Totally.

I stand up and immediately fall down. So possibly I
am
still drunk. Once again, with feeling. I stand, and it takes.

I walk downstairs, grasping the railing because my headache is going to kill me, and smell coffee. Coffee! Yes! Baby steps to make this horrible morning all better.

My sister Jane is hunched over the sink, scarfing down eggs and slurping up coffee, her hair thrown into a weird bun-type situation. She looks like hell on wheels, without the wheels. It’s very reassuring to discover I’m not the only one facing down death today.

“Did you let me give my number to a stripper?” I ask.

“Oh, Mere!” She turns and flashes me a grin as she dumps her bowl in the sink and finishes off her coffee. “You look like shit on rye. There’s more coffee in the pot. I have to run next door. Miranda dropped some expensive dresser of hers, and she needs help putting it back together before she kills her man over there.”

“I thought they were banging in the driveway.”

“What?”

I hump the side of the kitchen island. “It’s stuck! Pull harder!”

Jane cracks up. “I knew they were moving furniture, but now I wish I hadn’t known! It’s better your way.”

“Most things are.”

“Minus last night. A shot competition?” She doesn’t look as scoldy as she sounds.

“I didn’t force you to participate, sis.” She shoots a flat look at me, and another memory fills in the blank, where I literally twisted her arm and, yes, forced her to participate. Hm. Well.

“Is Bobby working from home today?” I try to change the subject. My head feels like it’s going to explode, and I’m pretty sure I look like an idiot, tiptoeing around the kitchen so I don’t set off the bomb in my brain. “Should I be quiet?”

“Nah, he went in late. He wanted to take David to camp this morning.”

“Oh thank god.” I collapse against the counter and keep my hand over my nose. Her eggs are going to send me running to the nearest toilet. “I love my nephew, you know I do, but Auntie Mere cannot stomach small people right now. Auntie Mere’s stomach is too precarious for even aspirin at this point.”

“Daww.” Jane puts up a pouty face and reaches over to pat my cheek. The world starts swimming, and I grow concerned that I may fall over. “Poor wittle Aunt Meredith.”

“I will kill you.”

“You love me.” She tops off her coffee and eyes me. “I’d ask if you wanted to come over to help with Miranda, but...”

“Mmm.” I stumble toward the coffee pot, and it does not escape my notice that my purse is nowhere to be found. Balls. “They woke me up. Punch them for me.”

“It’s eleven.” She cocks an eyebrow at me. “The rest of the world is up by now.”

“Those eggs smell like rank farts,” I change the subject again. Jane keeps making annoyingly good points. “Why didn’t you just make biscuits?”

“I was hungover and I wanted eggs! Leave me alone. Drink coffee. And dear god, take a shower. You smell like a giant jaeger bomb.”

“Love you too.” I make a face at her and grab the largest coffee mug in her stash. With any luck, this will steady my shaking hands. As I’m pouring, I nonchalantly ask, “You haven’t seen my purse around here, have you?”

It’s her turn to make a face, but this one is clearly mocking me. “I told you you’d leave it at the club last night.”

“What? No. No, I grabbed it. I’m certain. I just don’t remember where I put it.”

“Twenty bucks says you left it. You didn’t haul it in with you last night.” She looks absolutely smug as hell. “And it’s not in the car. I had to peek around in there earlier for my own purse.”

“Aha! I’m not the only one!”

Jane shakes her head. “Difference is, I found mine.”

“Dammit.” The coffee is hot and burns my throat. Finally, some normalcy in my day. “Are you sure mine isn’t in there? Under a seat, maybe?”

“You can certainly look under the seats, but I bet you won’t find it.” Jane sings this at me and finishes her coffee. “You should really eat something. There’s leftover eggs.”

“You are by far my least favorite sister.” I rest my face against the cool granite and flip her off. “By far.”

“Whatever makes you feel better, only sister.” She smirks at me and runs out the front door. “Tell that hottie from last night I said hello!”

I want to yell at her, but she’s gone and the merest thought of yelling makes me flinch, and honestly I did give my number to a stripper, so—I’ve got nothing. Balls. I sip the coffee gingerly and scour the downstairs slowly, and I find, much to my overwhelming dismay, my purse is nowhere to be found.

This isn’t going to end well for me, I can feel it. The only place left to look is a place I never want to see again.

I stumble into the shower and try to scrub the shame off. I’m going to have to return to the strip club. During daylight hours, no less. Has a greater tragedy ever befallen me? Not lately. Doing a walk of shame through a filthy sex den.

This is not how I pictured my early twenties going. At all.

I had imagined myself settling into my photography career, maybe growing a freelance business, or perhaps as part of a full-service wedding package company. Hell, taking school pics would be better than where I am now.

Namely: unemployed and unwilling to think about the reasons why any longer.

The hot water feels good on my skin, though. It’s enough to wake me up and shake off some of the funk. I’m already feeling like I’m bouncing back. Sort of. I’m another coffee and potentially a drive-through run away from salvation.

Maybe Taco Bell…nothing soothes a troubled soul like nachos.

I pull on my jeans from last night, which reek of other people’s smoke and bad decisions, and grab a tank top to slip on. I consider putting on a nice bra, but I wore one all night already. A girl can only be restricted for so long. A man was almost certainly the inventor of the bra.

A thorough sweep of my car confirms my purse is not there. Hope springs eternal, so they say, and I am no different. But no. I am purseless. Which means,
damn
, that I am also Taco Bell-less until I make my dreaded appearance at the club.

I haven’t felt this hot mess-y in
days
.

It’s obnoxiously hot outside and I hate everything. I hate the sun and the heat and the humidity and the lack of clouds or breeze and the fact that my car is a million degrees inside it when I open it. I hate the traffic, I hate the radio, I hate the DJs.

I just want my purse and my nachos and a nice iced drink.

If only I was fortified. I should have saved a little of that Fireball from last night for now. Ha! Ha! Just kidding! Ish! Kind of kidding. Not even kidding. The thought of facing down the scene of the crime is too much for me.

At a stoplight, I decide I need to talk myself down. In my limited bar experience, the people who close don’t usually turn around and open. Night shift and day shift are totally different worlds. Rob the Stripper will be home sleeping now and, with any luck, burning my number.

Because in my head I keep picturing this gorgeous, well-built sex machine, and like—beer goggles. Strippers never look that good in the cold, sober light of day. I never want to see it for myself; I shall simply enjoy a last look at these memories and then bury them forever.

Kansas City whizzes past me, everyone else on their way to lunch, or appointments, or you know. Places besides The Meow Club. Ah, the land of the employed. My phone, I notice, has remained silent since the Call of Horror earlier. It’s not good news. If I don’t get a job soon, Taco Bell will become a luxury item for me.