GLASS: A Standalone Novel

by Arianne Richmonde

Hmm, yes.

  “Edible body paint, or maybe just some sort of melted chocolate.” Oh, yes please.

  “Black, lace, crotchless panties, and bra to match . . . better be extra small,” he added as an afterthought.

  Wait, hang on . . . that’s a bit intimate . . . who the hell is he speaking to anyway? One of his minions? Daniel was used to people running around for him. Embarrassing . . . I only hoped I didn’t have to come face to face with this person.

  I lay there, still half dreaming, too tired from last night to get up. Daniel obviously had more kinky stuff planned and, despite my cross face, mock rebellion, and threat of claws, I now welcomed ‘playtime’ with relish. Rehearsals, here we come! I couldn’t wait. I’d always loved working with Daniel, but this would be the most thrilling experience of all.

  I slipped back into slumber, expecting Daniel to wake me in an hour or so.

  But when I did finally haul myself out of bed, he was gone.

  The smell of freshly brewed coffee stirred my senses. I found a note by the coffee machine.

  Janie,

  I saw the fire in your eyes last night after our extraordinary tryst. I can only see what happened as a beautiful thing, and it seemed you loved every second of it, although I fear you now feel compromised in some way. I admit, it seemed like an act of domination on my part, of male conquest. But it was more than that. Far more. “Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.” Aristotle said that, and it’s true.

  Janie, I cannot deny I want each, tiny part of you to be mine. You inspire me in a way no woman has. Ever. You desire me in a way that no woman has. Ever. I was a broken man and you are piecing me together, little by little. Shattered pieces of Daniel Glass, that’s who I was . . .I had lost all faith in women, all trust, and you, Janie, have given me hope.

  Let me show you all the ways I can love you.

  Don’t eschew the inevitable.

  Because it is . . . inevitable . . .

  You. And. Me.

  Me. And. You.

  Always yours,

  Daniel

  P.S. I’m out for the day. I have business to attend to and a little space does always seem to make the heart grow fonder. And I’m sure you’ll secretly miss me.

  P.P.S. Took the liberty of ordering a few props for our “rehearsal.” I do believe, Miss Cole, after the way you so obviously enjoyed our scenario in the limo, you’re definitely ready for more, even if you are sharpening those shrew-like claws. Your bites and scratches won’t faze me one bit, though. In fact, I rather relish the idea of a bit of S&M.

  Clever man. He always knew the right moment to hold back. Not having him here, not having him in my face alarmed me.

  What ‘business?’ Where had he gone? Why couldn’t he be more specific? I held the note in my hands, my pulse racing. “Inevitable.” “Domination.” “Shattered pieces of Daniel Glass.” The words he chose were somehow shocking. It was true, he had been shattered by Natasha’s cheating. Shattered too, I supposed, by her death, even if they were about to get divorced, even though he’d known the baby wasn’t his.

  Daniel loved me. Why did this terrify me? Would I lose myself in him completely if I submitted? Too late, I had submitted. This man was a powerhouse in every way. Persuasive, dominating. He could own me completely if I wasn’t careful.

  It was easy to revere someone from afar. Easy, when Daniel had been unattainable. But knowing the feeling was now mutual, and the relationship was changing from distant adoration to reciprocal, the present dynamic threw everything I had come to know out of balance.

  And I had been so obsessed with Daniel for so long, and put him on such a high pedestal—used to being in a position of unrequited love—that now that true love was being offered to me—our relationship on an equal footing—I was flabbergasted.

  Mainly because when something seems too good to be true, it usually is.

  AFTER SHOWERING I called room service and ordered a hearty breakfast of cereal, toast, eggs, and hash browns. And fresh orange juice to wash it all down. I was ravenous. Daniel had depleted me. It had been that way in rehearsals for As The Wind Blows, too. His exacting, demanding character never letting up for a minute. His intense, blue-eyed gaze always on me, as if judging me, sizing me up. And now that there was sex in the equation, it was even harder to hold my own. My resolve of fighting for my independence was already waning. The ache between my legs, the throb of wanting him inside me, holding me in his arms, his breath on my face, his tongue in my mouth, had already picked up pace. And it wasn’t even midday.

  I replayed the limo scene in my mind and heard a low wistful whimper coming from my throat. I needed this man, for better or worse.

  And boy, was I ready to start “rehearsals.”

  My cellphone caught me out of my reverie. It was Will. What had he done last night? It didn’t bear thinking about, but I needed to let him have his freedom. Even if he was my little brother, Will was now twenty-one, and had shown us that he had a mind of his own. He was a man now—his body alone, not to mention his sexual appetite—had turned him into a new person.

  “Will, what happened last night, how come you never showed?”

  “I did, but you’d gone. You’d gone. Janie. Your guy’s name is Daniel Glass, right? Right? The director you like? The director? The one who bought you that dress and took you to the party?”

  “Yeah,” I said, my voice tentative.

  “The fuck!” Will shouted. “I met a couple blondes who told me—”

  “No, Will, it’s all gossip, don’t believe—”

  “How could he do that to you?”

  “Will! Listen, it’s all . . . Will, are you there? Hello . . ooo?” But he’d hung up.

  I called my father. It took him a while to pick up. My gaze wandered to the Strip from the penthouse window: cars passing, people wandering in an out of hotels and casinos, the bright lights and neon signs of Vegas twinkling and flashing, the pale purple mountains in the distance, reminding you that this was nothing more than a massive patch of uncompromising desert.

  “Janie,” Dad said breathlessly. “Great to hear your voice. How was the party? Are you in your room, I’ll come over. Or we can meet for breakfast, by the pool.”

  “I . . . ” –I was a big girl, there was no reason why I should pretend that I’d spent the night in my room—that I had not been at Daniel’s—but I found it hard to come out and say it. “Sure, but I have a few things to do first, how about lunch instead? Is Will with you?”

  “No, he just went out in a rush but will be back later.”

  “Where did he go?”

  “I have no idea, but seemed pissed at something. Janie, Will is taking on a whole other persona now, taking things into his own hands—it’s all new to me, and I don’t know how to handle it.”

  “I know, but I guess we have to let him be his own person.”

  “He’s just a boy,” he said, “just my little boy.”

  “I’ll call you around noon and we can grab a bite to eat and have a chat about all this, okay?”

  But lunch never happened. Just as I was walking out the door, my cell rang. It was the Vegas police.

  Both Daniel and Will were in the hospital.

  7

  “WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?” My eyes were so full of tears, I could hardly see. Will was lying in the hospital bed; one leg elevated in a contraption, an arm encased in a sling, and his split lips the size of a bruised peach, his jaw maroon and purple. Frankenstein stitches along his jaw. They had refused to let me in to see Daniel. He was in ER. Plus, I wasn’t next of kin.

  “I’m orry, anie. orry, orry.” Will could hardly move his mouth.

  I came up to his bed. He was in a sad state, but at least he was able to communicate, at least he was conscious.

  “Why?” I wailed, hardly able to form a sentence. “Why couldn’t you have just waited for me to explain?”

  “Aniel’s a ’ollywood player.”

  “You got the wrong guy, W
ill! Mistaken identity! Not a player, actually. And I can fight my own battles, I don’t need . . .”—my breath hitched up an octave, I sucked in some air to get the sentence out –“my younger brother acting like a crazed vigilante on my behalf!” I was too upset to have this conversation. The damage had been done: Daniel was in ‘Neuro, ICU’ on life support, in a coma. And they wouldn’t let me see him. I was a nobody as far as the hospital was concerned, with no rights whatsoever because I wasn’t family.

  I collapsed on a chair and sobbed my heart out, my body convulsing in heaving waves. Will lay there motionless, bandaged like a mummy, doing no more than flinching, his mouth finding it hard to form words because of the obvious pain he was in—all I heard were his low moans.

  But it had been an accident, they’d told me. One so crazy it might have featured in a Charlie Chaplin movie, or some slapstick comedy. One of the police officers had explained to me what eyewitnesses saw: Will flying at Daniel in the lobby of one of Daniel’s hotels, Will’s fists flailing. Floors that had just been polished to a high sheen. Daniel, not having ever met Will and taken by surprise, instinctively lashing out, his right leg kicking high in some martial arts move, catching Will hard under the jaw. Will flying through the air, Daniel’s leather-soled dress shoes losing purchase as he slipped backwards on the shiny surface, his head catching on the corner of a table and smashing on the marble floor. Will crashing onto his side, crushing his hip and arm on the marble, and breaking his leg in two places, his arm very badly sprained.

  Daniel unconscious, his head bleeding—concussion—followed by a coma, an hour later.

  History repeating itself: Natasha Jürgen dying from a silly fall. Would that happen to Daniel, too?

  It didn’t bear thinking about.

  His name was Daniel Glass. He was broken.

  And I didn’t have the power to fix him.

  8

  I HADN’T PLANNED on making Las Vegas my home, but there was no way I was going anywhere with Daniel in the hospital. Luckily, the manager who ran his hotel invited me to stay on, after Daniel had given him strict instructions to treat me “like a princess.” Those were the words Daniel had said as he sauntered out the door that fated morning. “Treat my girlfriend like a princess and give her anything she wants, when she wants.”

  It pained my heart to think of my sullen behavior before Daniel and I had gone to bed, and that I hadn’t even seen him slip away that morning, that my last words to him had been, “watch out these claws could strike”, the night before. It didn’t feel right to be in his penthouse without him now.

  Dad decided to stay on a few more days before going back to Vermont, until Will was in the clear. It was tricky for Dad—he needed to get back to work to pay for the mounting hospital bill. The insurance was fighting the claim. After all, attacking someone could not be construed as an “accident”, despite the too-slippery floors. All that money Will won on Blackjack, or whatever? Gone. Ending up “lending” it to Candy and his entourage of girls, who fed him some sob story about Candy’s ill mother. I should have known.

  A lawyer was on the case—poor Dad was hardly sleeping for worry, not to mention how badly he felt about Daniel. Both he and Will felt horrible, Will full of remorse, mortified by what he’d done. I remembered my twenty-five thousand dollar chip—sadly, that’s where the money would be going: on a goddamn hospital bill, probably.

  For the first twenty-four hours, the doctors wouldn’t let me anywhere near Daniel because he was in Intensive Care and I wasn’t “family,” but when they saw how persistent I was, and heard my story of how I was living with him, and working with him, they relented. However, they were pretty cagey about his condition, just letting me know that it was “a question of time.” I wasn’t in a legal position to make any decisions anyway, so they refused to discuss details with me. But the surgery, they assured me, had been a success. Except Daniel was still lying there with tubes in him, eyes closed.

  IT WAS NOW DAY THREE. After I left the hospital, to go home, take a shower and get something to eat, one of the nurses called me to let me know that Daniel had snapped out of the coma and even spoken, asking for some water, but then slipped back. It killed me that I hadn’t been by his side, but the fact that his brain was coherent, that he could speak—asking for a glass of water—filled me with renewed hope. But when I tried to pin the doctors down, later, and get a clear answer as to what his chances were of a hundred percent recovery, they would not commit themselves.

  None of his family had appeared. I didn’t know whom to call, except Pearl, and a few of his friends from New York. I needed his address book but couldn’t find it amongst his things at his apartment—I guessed it was all logged into his cellphone, which must have been on him when the ambulance brought him in.

  I had been right; the hospital staff did have his phone, but they wouldn’t give it to me, for privacy reasons, until they noticed—something I didn’t even know myself—that Daniel had a photo of me as his screensaver.

  His dad was dead, and Daniel had once told me that his mom lived in Geneva. His cell had a lock on it, but when I pressed 0000, miraculously it opened. I knew how much Daniel hated passwords—he’d told me as much—but still, I hardly expected 0000 to work.

  When I called his mother, she advised me she’d come to Vegas “when she could,” as if his condition was an inconvenience. My mind boggled at some people’s callous behavior. What a double whammy it must have been when Daniel realized his marriage was a sham. Poor guy, his note to me about not having had faith in women made even more sense now.

  I frantically looked up online anything I could find out about TBI—traumatic brain injury. The main nurse looking after him, Barbara, warmed to me and was very friendly. I had been hanging around pretty much all day, every day, lurking in the corridors, hovering around, asking questions, until she finally let me into his room. It was a strange situation to be in. I was the sister of the guy who’d put Daniel here in the first place. They couldn’t be sure, at first, I wasn’t some whack-job out to finish him off, smother him with a pillow, or pull out his tubes.

  “I’ve seen patients in worse condition who’ve pulled through,” the nurse assured me, busying herself with his bed change. “He’s already woken up twice for brief periods of time, so I’m hopeful.” Her ample arms jiggled as she adjusted the stark white sheets, and her smiley face lit up the pristine room, full of tulips and roses, sent by several of his work colleagues.

  I nodded like an automaton. Both times that Daniel had woken up happened to be when I wasn’t around. Daniel looked like a Greek statue, so handsome and chiseled, his lips curved into an-almost smile, which gave me solace; perhaps he was dreaming of something sweet. Me? Wishful thinking.

  I tried to stay upbeat, send him rays of healing light, and not let my fears get in the way of his recovery. Of all people, I knew the power of my thoughts. My simple wish of wanting Daniel and Natasha to split up, had manifested in a way I had never imagined, so I was careful to force my imagination to now focus on happy thoughts and not allow it to wander into dark ominous corridors, where doors could slam shut and leave me locked up—a prisoner of my negativity.

  The nurse made to leave the room, with a pile of changed sheets in her arms. “Well, Janie, I know you’ll keep an eagle eye on Daniel. I’m off to check my patient in room 303.”

  “The horny old man? The one that grabbed your behind and proposed marriage?” I’d heard her mention this to a friend while she was on her cellphone.

  She winked at me. “Patient confidentiality, I’m not allowed to discuss my patients, you know that.”

  I laughed. “Good luck, see you later, Barbara.”

  I couldn’t resist surfing on my iPad again. I needed to prepare myself. I read:

  Immediately following TBI, two types of effects are seen. First, brain tissue reacts to trauma and to tissue damage, with a series of biochemical and other physiological responses. Substances that once were safely encased within the cells now
flood the brain. These processes further damage and destroy brain cells, in what is called secondary cell death.

  I glugged down my soda—the burn of the bubbles prickled my nose—the word “death” made me feel sick to my stomach. I read on:

  As an individual regains consciousness (those with the severest injuries may never do so), a variety of neurologically based symptoms may occur: irritability, aggression and other problems. Post-traumatic amnesia (PTA) is also typically experienced when an injured person regains consciousness. PTA refers to the period when the individual feels a sense of confusion and disorientation – Where am I? What happened? – and an inability to remember recent events.

  What if Daniel wouldn’t be able to remember me? That was, if he even pulled through.

  Stop it, Janie, of course he’s going to pull through!

  As time passes, these responses typically subside, and the brain and other body systems again approach physiological stability. But, unlike tissues such as bone or muscle, the neurons in the brain do not mend themselves. New nerves do not grow in ways that lead to full recovery.

  I snapped my tablet shut. It was fruitless to worry and project about the future. I needed to get some sleep; I was driving myself crazy.

  I spent the next few hours just holding Daniel’s hand, squeezing it a little, hoping, in vain, he’d squeeze it back when I asked him if he could hear me, or if he wanted me to kiss him.

  No luck.

  I finally left Daniel’s side to visit my other patient: Will. Dad was there, and both were laughing and joking. Will was on the mend and would be returning home very soon. I only wished I felt as free-spirited. Things could have been worse, though . . . I had to keep reminding myself that.

  But however hard I tried all I felt was anger. Anger at myself. At Will. And oh yes, let’s not forget Cal . . . the biggest sinner of us all.

  In a furious fit of rage, as I strode along the street, trying to hail a cab to take me back to Daniel’s hotel, I phoned Cal. Damn him, if it hadn’t been for his ridiculous shenanigans, none of us would be in this horrific situation.