Dangerous Games

by Selene Chardou

  Monika, Clive, Finn and I drove back to our Charlestown house after lunch. I knew my best friend was pretty strait-laced but I wondered if she knew of her boyfriend’s notorious reputation when we were in high school. It was common knowledge he’d been a major pothead and rumor was he’d moved on to Special K and cocaine though no one in the crowd he ran with would confirm nor deny therefore it proved to be common gossip and not much else.

  Therefore it was much too easy to ply him with the best chronic on the market while us ladies drank an expensive bottle of Pinot Grigio. I waited until Monika was past the point of no return before I slipped her an Oxy twenty-milligram tablet.

  “What’s this?” she inquired with irritated detachment as she watched her boyfriend share a bong with Finn.

  “Something that will help you stop being so uptight and allow you to relax,” I responded before I smiled.

  Monika’s ice blue eyes stared into mine with genuine annoyance. “I am already calm. I just didn’t want to see Clive fall into the whole ‘marijuana’ scene again. I thought he was over all of this. It’s all so disconcerting to me!”

  “Honey, they aren’t just doing bong-hits from seed-filled dope. They are smokin’ Chronic and by the time he is through, he is going to want to take you to a quiet corner, and have his way with you. Don’t you want to be relaxed enough to enjoy it?”

  “Fuck it,” she responded, and I almost gasped at her language. Monika was a properly raised woman and didn’t use bad language. Ever. She was drop dead gorgeous, and next to her, I looked average at best but if you asked her, she would probably rate herself as attractive but not beautiful.

  She had such a lovely, warm, and caring personality, I worried about her and the potential men she could get involved with because underneath it all, she was terribly sheltered. Her mother didn’t want her to see all the evil in the world and I could barely blame her but at the same time, my best friend seemed innocent and incredibly naïve compared to someone that was completely jaded as me.

  Monika slipped the pill in her mouth and swallowed it with a swig from her white wine. “Down the hatch it goes.”

  “I’ll be right back.”

  I slipped upstairs with Finn quickly, and he prepared a couple of lines of grade-A cocaine for me. I didn’t want any Oxy this time; I had enough alcohol in my system to work as a depressant. I definitely wanted to be stimulated.

  I snorted a line and left the mirror on his bureau. “I’ll come back for that later.”

  “Where do you think you’re going?” he inquired as he snatched me by the waist and took me into his strong arms. “Happy birthday, baby.”

  We kissed one another hungrily but I couldn’t concentrate on having sex with my boyfriend at this point. Part of me still worried about Monika. He knew this innately, and thus after our passion-filled kiss, he let me go.

  “We better get back downstairs. I just wanted you to know I bought you something but I wanted to give it to you later.”

  I smiled before I grabbed his hand before we both left his bedroom together. “Oh my…a present for little ole moi? Don’t you think you have given me enough gifts to last a lifetime? We’re back together and that’s all that matters, right?”

  His crystal blue eyes stared into mine for a long time before he responded, “Not quite.”

  I followed him downstairs and the pill had taken its desired effect. Dylan had come back home accompanied by Fiona and Brandon. I wondered where his druggie girlfriend was but thought about it, and realized I didn’t care. I would rather not see her at all, and since she wasn’t here to ruin my special day, it was all good.

  “Happy birthday, cousin,” Dylan announced as he walked over and embraced me. “We are gonna have so much fun but…tell me somethin’ first. Who the hell is that hot blonde chick there? She looks really familiar.”

  Of course he was talking about Monika who gyrated to Rihanna’s “Roc Me Out” in a sexually suggestive manner. She’d always been a great dancer and although she wore a preppy, knee-length lace and mesh floral dress courtesy of Valentino, and a pair of pale blue Christian Louboutin wedge sandals, she still looked quite seductive in a very rich girl way.

  “If you touch her, Dylan, I will kill you myself. She’s my best friend and she’s not into losers from Boston. You are looking at one hundred percent Hollywood royalty from the City of Angels right there. Her mother is a former superstar turned agent, her late stepfather was one of the biggest superstars on earth, and her current stepfather belongs to one of the oldest families in the film industry. The man’s grandfather founded his own studio for God’s sake,” I explained.

  Fiona was less impressed. “She’s gorgeous and she would be perfect for my brother. Much better than that skank he is dating now. Hey—who’s the lump passed out on the sofa?”

  “Her boyfriend, Clive.”

  Brandon laughed though he did not do drugs and rarely drank. “Fuckin’ lightweight. Someone get grandpa over there a rockin’ chair.”

  Once the song ended, Monika waltzed over to me where I sat on the sofa—the very one Clive had been relocated from by Dylan and Brandon who had taken him up to a guest bedroom to sleep it off—and breathed deeply.

  “What was that pill? I feel so alive and so…relaxed. It is the best feeling of my life, and can I make a confession to you since you’re my best friend?”

  “Of course,” I replied as I turned my body toward hers.

  “Clive is absolutely awful in bed. When he goes…down on me, he has absolutely no idea what he is doing. He can’t make love, and he’s never given me an orgasm. Isn’t that sad? I mean, where are the fireworks? I look at you and Finn, and I know you two have such an awesome sex life. Mine, on the other hand, completely and irrevocably sucks ass, and I am really pissed off about it,” she explained before she sipped from her wine glass.

  “Well, if he can’t have sex properly, you know you have to dump him, right?”

  Monika looked at me as if I suggested she commit murder. “Oh no, I can’t do that, Evie. I can’t just dump him because he’s bad in bed. We’ll just work on it, and get some Blu-rays on how to make love or something. Besides, my parents think he is perfect, and they really like him.”

  “So, you’re going to stay with him because your parents like him, and not because he can do anything for you in the bedroom? You do realize how screwed up that is, right?”

  “How so?” she inquired completely clueless.

  I smiled wryly before I glanced over at Dylan. He walked over immediately. “Dylan, this is Monika, my best friend. She’s just confessed to me her boyfriend can’t fuck. Isn’t that reason enough for her to dump him?”

  Dylan’s steel blue eyes lit up. “Absolutely. You do not stay with a man who can not perform in the bedroom. It’s a prerequisite for a lasting relationship.”

  Monika’s blue eyes softened. “You know you have the sexiest accent I have heard in a really long time. And I totally dig your tats. You’re so not what my parents would approve of but I don’t care. Can you…fuck?”

  I almost spit out my Pinot Grigio.

  “Well, I don’t like to toot my own horn but let’s just say I’ve had no complaints.”

  He glared at me quickly, and I looked away just as fast. We were only half-cousins but it was still a blood relationship, and I was ashamed about what happened between us. I had gone to Catholic school and was brought up Catholic—shame came part and parcel with everything wrong I did in my life.

  Every time I did drugs, drank or slept with Finn, a part of me felt like I was an awful human being. It made no difference I had never hurt anyone as much as I harmed myself, I still didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as the righteous amongst us.

  “Monika, what are you doing or suggesting for that matter?”

  “Well, I haven’t slept with anyone other than…Clive…and if I am going to cheat, it should probably be now before he puts a ring on my finger, right?” Her eyes were bright and her pupils, dilated. She
was high as a kite and it was entirely my fault.

  “Think about what you are saying. You really want to sleep with Dylan? What’s wrong with you? He has a girlfriend.”

  “Not anymore,” he interrupted in a bitter tone. “Finn told me about Lita freebasing on Oxy and coke. No can do. I use because it’s fun, not because I need to be high or drunk. I won’t put up with a druggie for a girlfriend.”

  “Well, that is quite the birthday present, cousin dearest,” I replied in a flippant tone. “In that case, you two are free, and white—though Monika isn’t twenty-one yet…you can do what you like.”

  My best friend slipped her delicate right hand into Dylan’s much larger one and she stood to her feet. I expected to see her wobble or at least stumble a bit but she still had perfect posture.

  Dylan lifted her into his arms as if she weighed nothing and she squealed. “We’ll see you all a bit later.”

  I watched in mock-horror as the two disappeared upstairs while Finn took a seat next to me.

  He grabbed my right thigh and squeezed. “What’s the matter, babe? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “Please tell me she’s going to be okay with him. I mean…if something happened to her and he…did something, I would never forgive myself.”

  “You slipped her a twenty-milligram tablet, honey. She’s still very much in her right mind, and she isn’t doing anything she doesn’t want to do. Why don’t you focus on us for a change? Your best friend is a big girl, and she can take care of herself.”

  “I have a question for you,” I began, changing the subject. “Why do you think my mom is so insistent I see her and Etienne off tomorrow?”

  “Well, you are her daughter. Why wouldn’t she want to see you again before she flies back to Montreal?”

  “I think she brought Monika and Clive along because it’s an ambush. They don’t trust me and if she has her way, I will never start Boston University. She wants me to go back to L.A. even if I don’t want to…what am I supposed to do?”

  Finn gazed at me while he continued to stroke my thigh. “You’re a grown woman, Evie. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do—”

  “That’s where you’re wrong.” I stood and began to pace nervously before I walked out of the house and sat outside in the small backyard.

  Moments later, my boyfriend followed and sat directly beside me. He grabbed my hand closest to his and held it within both his hands gently yet possessively. “What’s going on? What aren’t you telling me?”

  I bit my bottom lip almost hard enough to draw blood before I opened my mouth and exhaled. “When my parents’ divorce went through, my dad turned over my ‘share’ of what I am supposed to inherit to my mother. Her attorney acts as the trustee and he pays for my college fees and gives me a small stipend. Well, not so small to regular people but it’s only ten thousand dollars per month. Not exactly enough to keep me in Tributes and Birkins if you know what I mean. I also have access to an account with a hundred thousand dollars but that is only open to me during the school year.

  “Most of the expensive clothing and handbags I have were given to me by my father…birthday gifts and what not. Guilt presents for never being around. When he comes to the States, instead of visiting, he might send me a text or leave a voicemail message to let me know he’s opened a credit line for me at Chanel or Christian Dior and I am allowed to purchase a certain amount of clothes, shoes, perfume—whatever.”

  I paused and tried to stop the tears from falling. They would mess up my perfectly applied mascara. “He didn’t even call me today. He just texted me to let me know he opened a credit line for me at Hermès here in Back Bay. I could go in and get anything I wanted and he would pay for it. It’s a birthday gift so he recommended one of their new smaller sized Birkins in crocodile or perhaps I would prefer something exotic like ostrich.”

  “I can see how this would be an issue for you, baby, but…your parents have never been here for you. Don’t you give that son of a bitch one of your tears because he isn’t worth it—he never is. We saw the people who count most in your life this morning, your grandparents. Sure, they might not have given you much—we know a one hundred dollar gift card means nothing at a place like Bloomingdales but it’s the thought that counts,” Finn explained in a calm voice.

  “I know, and that’s why I want to stay here with you and my grandparents. I believe it is important I am surrounded by people who love and give a damn about me. Alas, I also know my mother, and she isn’t going to want to let me stay here and she is going to use all the leverage she has…including my inheritance.”

  He looked at me with perplexity in his eyes. “I don’t understand. How can she just take away your inheritance?”

  “Well, it would be quite easy now…you see, she’s married, and now all she has to do is call her attorney. She can threaten to take away what she was going to give me and hand it over to her husband instead. They have a legal contract now they are married, and she counts her allegiance towards him over me. He is warming her bed, after all. Who do you think she would choose if I pushed her hard enough?”

  Finn stood and I followed his lead since he still held my hand. “Baby, are you afraid she would choose him over you?”

  “No, I’m not afraid because I know she would choose her new husband over me. My father does it with his new wife all the time. He spends all of his free time with her and I am just an after thought.” I sighed as we faced one another, holding hands. “I seriously believe they never loved one another, and the only reason why they went through their sham of a marriage was because it helped both their careers. I have never been anything more than an after thought, and you think the situation changes just because I am an adult now?”

  “No, of course not.” I allowed him to embrace me and accepted the warmth and safety he provided. “However, you’re forgetting something very important. I love you so much, and I would happily pay for your college courses. I would take care of you…it’s why I wanted us to get married once and for all. You need to get from underneath their thumb. You need to become your own person.”

  Finn spoke the truth but it didn’t change my situation. As long as my mother held control over my trust and could wield it as she saw fit, I would never be my own person. Freedom wasn’t free, and without money I had no power, prestige or way to take care of myself and that was scarier than anything else I could think of in the world.

  Finn sensed Evie’s reluctance immediately. He knew she felt like her life would spin out of control if she had no way of controlling her own finances and this caused him to panic.

  The woman was stubborn as hell and always had her pride. If she didn’t think there was a way for her to somehow make it out of her current predicament, she wouldn’t marry him. She’d be too afraid he’d think the only reason why she agreed was due to her financial situation.

  He knew she’d grown up in a situation similar to his until her eighth birthday but she’d never know what it was like to have been born poor. Her grandparents still raised her in a fairly comfortable—though certainly not wealthy—manner. She had enough food to eat, extracurricular activities, attended a local Catholic private school and had friends. Her life had been normal until her parents had come back into the picture, and whisked her away to California.

  Finn knew poverty because he’d lived it first hand in Omagh. He knew what it was like to go without proper clothing and food. He had first hand knowledge of growing up in a rodent-filled dump with a mother who barely had two pennies to scrape together. It didn’t help his father was an American citizen who did not bother to send child support, and she had to raise him all on her own.

  After everything they’d been through, they should have been close but he hadn’t spoken to his mother in nearly two years. She’d been quite young when she’d had him and although he was now an adult, his mother was barely forty years old.

  She’d remarried and relocated to Vermont. Her husband and their two children�
�Padraig, age three and Constance, age eighteen months—didn’t think it was kosher to have a drug dealer in and out of their happy home. Finn faced the fact he had no family other than the one he’d created for himself: Brandon, Dylan, Fiona, and Evie.

  Although he hadn’t seen her in years until she’d recently moved back to Boston, she would always be part of his family because they shared a child together. One they were allowed to have nothing to do with but their son was still on this earth, and being raised in a home full of love and warmth instead of by two adults who weren’t prepared to have a child in their life.

  The thought of Kieran made Finn love Evie more, not less, and he desperately wanted her to be his wife. If he didn’t find a way to get a ring on her finger, she would move on, and that was unacceptable.

  He knew she loved him but Evie was damaged and like all damaged people, she could learn to live without anything or anyone. She cried and talked about how much her inheritance meant to her because without it, she couldn’t just get up and go. She would have no freedom and therefore, she’d be trapped in a situation not of her choosing.

  Everything about Elvira boiled down to choice. If she didn’t make it then she would resent the situation, and life would not be pleasant for either one of them. He could accept that but he also knew he had to help her and make sure she received her inheritance so she would say yes to marriage with him. It was the only way.

  “Listen, when you go see your mother tomorrow, I’ll come with you,” he finally said after a long silence.

  Her steel blue eyes lit up. “Really? You’re not saying that just to say it?”

  “Course not. It doesn’t do either of us a bit of good if you aren’t happy.”