The Baddest Girl on the Planet

by Heather Frese

  I turn away, digging my cell phone out of my purse as I walk under the blown-glass flowers on the ceiling. I call Charlotte. “Guess who’s staying at New York New York?” I ask her before she can say a word.

  “Mike Tyson?” Charlotte asks.

  I jostle around a group of blond tourists in flowered shirts. “Shut up,” I say. “You’re supposed to say who so I can yell MIKE TYSON.”

  “He’s seriously there? I was just making that up,” Charlotte says.

  “He’s seriously here.” I wander past upscale shops and go in to look at a pair of python Prada boots.

  “You should get him to beat up Eamon,” she says. I’d been updating Charlotte about the Eamon debacle via text message.

  “I’m going to make this a double revenge night,” I say. “Just call me the Revenging Avenger.”

  “It’s a revenge-o-rama,” Charlotte says. “So what’s your plan?”

  I walk out of the Prada store. The boots cost more than I make in two months. “I don’t know,” I say, and I head toward the penny slot machines. I was so disappointed when I realized that penny slots didn’t actually take pennies. I’d been saving them up and brought a Ziploc-baggie-full with me. Every time I saw a penny on the ground when I took Walter for a walk I’d pick it up in case it was the penny that would make me a gazillionaire.

  “Let’s think about this,” Charlotte says. “The punishment has to fit the crime.”

  I sit down, hold the phone between my shoulder and chin, and dig out five dollars. “And his crime was twofold,” I say. I slide the money into a slot machine and pull the handle; cherries and bells and plums and number sevens roll and whirr. “He made me believe he was good, and then he ruined my reputation.”

  “So you have to ruin his?” Charlotte asks.

  The slot machine stops. A seven, a lemon, and a bar. I pull the handle again. “But how much worse can his rep get?”

  “What if you get him to buy you a drink and then slip him a roofie? That sounds like fun.”

  Cherry, cherry, bell. Dammit. I pull again. “He’d probably just absorb the roofie into his face tattoo,” I say.

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” Charlotte says. “Are you drunk?”

  Plum, cherry, bar. And my money is gone. That was not entertaining. That was not worth five dollars. “No, but that’s brilliant. I’m going to get a giant bong-looking drink and walk down the street with it.” I shoulder through the crowd and head to the door.

  “I’ll be up late on a grading marathon,” Charlotte says. “Call me if you find Kid Dynamite.”

  I put my phone back in my purse. Outside, the dry air rasps over my skin. The absence of water bothers me, the thirstiness of the night sky in this shithole desert. Mike Tyson. How am I supposed to find Mike Tyson? And where do I get a bong-looking drink? I walk up the stairs and go over a crosswalk bridge, resisting the urge to go inside the Flamingo and see if Eamon’s discovered that I’m gone yet. I decide to walk to New York New York, and on the way I find a bar that’s advertising one-dollar margaritas, so I get in line. It’s not a bong-looking drink, but it’s cheap, and it’ll do to get my courage up. Someone bumps into me, and I turn. It’s a short little gray-haired lady who immediately reminds me of Aunt Fay. “Sorry, hon,” she says. She pats my arm. I think she’s soused.

  “No problem,” I say. Then I decide to do some recon. “Have you happened to see Mike Tyson around here anywhere?” My mother always says it’s best to be direct.

  She says no and hiccups. Aunt Fay would never hiccup; she could hold her liquor. She would also never give up. I scribble my phone number on the back of my drugstore receipt for maxi pads and hand it to her. “If you do run into him, could you give me a call?” My margarita tastes like a slushie and doesn’t even smell like tequila, so it doesn’t feel as illicit as I want it to, to walk around with it, but I go outside and start walking anyway. There’s a place past fake Paris that has mojitos for three dollars, so I get one to make up for the lousy margarita. I sip it and tell the businessman next to me that I’m looking for Mike Tyson.

  He raises his eyebrows. “Why’s a girl like you looking for a man like that?” He swirls his drink, and I imagine him as a 1950s husband who expects his wife to have a steaming green bean casserole on the table for him when he gets home from work.

  “I’m going to get revenge on him for ruining my life, but I don’t know how to find him.”

  He sips his scotch. It absolutely has to be scotch. Or maybe whiskey. Whiskey would do. “Easy there, tiger,” he says.

  “Don’t easy there, tiger, me,” I say. I finish my mojito—it’s good and rummy—and head straight to New York New York. I sit down in an Irish pub inside fake New York and order some French fries. They cost nine dollars, so I don’t get a drink to go with them. I talk to two guys with Greek letters on their sweatshirts who love Mike Tyson but haven’t seen him. In the bathroom a girl with a pink Mohawk says she’ll help me kick him in the balls if I do find him. A motherly looking woman in capri pants and Crocs saw a guy who sort of looked like Mike Tyson going into the Bellagio earlier tonight, but she’s not sure it was him. I tell her she’s a rock star, then head back down to the Bellagio. It’s hot, and I’m tipsy, but I stand with a crowd of people and watch the fountains for a minute. The streams of water waltz and twirl and spin like dancers. I want to go dancing, but I have to find Mike Tyson.

  I don’t know what else to do, so I go to the bar and take a seat beside a guy who looks like a bodybuilder. I like a man with shoulders, but these things are out of control. I’m about to lean forward and push my arms together to create cleavage and get the bartender’s attention, but then I remember two things: one, I’m still dressed in my Eamon-revenge clothes—a short skirt, heels, and a plunging-necked top with a push-up bra—so I don’t need to push my arms together to create cleavage; and two, I’m dressed like this in Las Vegas. What was I thinking? There’s no way I’m buying my own drink. I cross my legs and turn to the bodybuilder, tossing my hair over my shoulder. “Come here often?” I ask. I actually say that.

  The bodybuilder says something in return, but the music has changed to a thumping bass, and I can’t hear him. I lean in toward him and cock my head. “I live here,” he says. The cadence of his speech reminds me of an old-school gangster. “I’m Vonny,” he says. Or maybe he says Donny; I can’t really tell, but I decide that Vonny is more interesting. He holds out his thick hand.

  “Evie,” I say, shaking it. His grip is surprisingly weak. Maybe he sprained something lifting too many barbells. “It’s my first time here.”

  Vonny beckons the bartender. “What’ll you have?” he asks me. Whaddaya have?

  “Anything with tequila in it,” I say.

  The bartender brings two shots, lime, and salt. I lick the curve between my thumb and forefinger. I can never remember which comes first, the lime or the salt or the tequila, so I wait for Vonny to drink first. He salts, shoots, and limes, and I do the same.

  Vonny says something that sounds like liggaslammasucka. I lean in closer and he says, “Lick it, slam it, suck it,” into my ear. His breath smells like tequila with a hint of vomit. Classy.

  “I’ve got to go find Mike Tyson,” I say. I stand up.

  “Why do you want to find Mike Tyson for?” Vonny says. He stands, too, and his legs are twig-tiny. I wonder how he doesn’t topple over.

  “To get revenge,” I say. I walk toward the front desk. “He ruined my life. Do you want to come?” I figure it can’t hurt to have a little company, and he did buy me that shot.

  I spot Claire at the desk and wave, and she beckons me over. She leans over the front desk conspiratorially. “I found out Mike Tyson is doing interviews tonight,” she says. “In this hidden back press room in the Venetian. I don’t know if you could find it, though.”

  The hallway tilts slightly; the tequila’s kicking in. “I can totally find it. Totally.”

  Vonny snaps his fingers. “I know the room you mean.” I should
have known to ask Vonny more questions. Locals are the best resource.

  “Will you take me there? Please? I’ll buy you a bong-looking drink.”

  “I’m not in the habit of helping random ladies with revenge.”

  “I am not a random lady. I am Evie Austin Oden Austin. And I did not name my son Austin Austin.” I wave goodbye to Claire and walk toward the front door. Vonny, despite his protests, follows me.

  “I didn’t say you did,” he says.

  “So you’ll take me to Mike Tyson?”

  “No.”

  Dammit. “Please?”

  Vonny pats my back, right between my shoulder blades. “I’m awful sorry, Evie Austin Oden Austin.”

  We walk outside. The fountains spray up to “All That Jazz,” and my hips sway in time to the music as I walk, almost of their own accord. “You have to take me to that room.”

  Vonny’s hips don’t sway as he walks. His scrawny legs move side to side like a bulldog’s. “I can’t do that,” he says. We merge out into a crowd of people on the sidewalk and move up the Strip.

  A half-block down, I pull Vonny through the open doors of a bar and lean over to wave down the bartender. “I’m buying us bong-looking drinks.”

  Vonny looks confused, but he goes up to the bar with me. I point at a lady wearing a long, plastic, bong-shaped daiquiri around her neck and hold up two fingers, and the bartender brings them. I loop mine over my head, take a sip out of the long straw, hand Vonny his, and we go back out to the Strip.

  “Maybe I’m overstating this revenge element,” I say. “I already met Mike Tyson once, and I just want to say hello.”

  I think Vonny realizes I’m lying, but when I look over at him, he’s just trundling along on his twig-legs. I take a drink. Strawberry-y.

  Vonny shakes his head. It seems like he shakes his head sadly, but I’m also tipsy. “I gotta get home, Evie Austin Oden Austin.”

  I try to make myself cry, because that always works in movies when a woman wants something, but I’ve never been an on-demand crier. I look up at him with big eyes. I think about biting my lip to make myself well up, but I’m not into the idea of having a bit-up lip.

  Vonny stops walking. We’re across the street from fake Paris, and I look up at the fake hot-air balloon. Dang. That’s way up in the air. Way up there. And it’s strawberry time. I do a little happy shimmy drinking dance. Strawberry time. Strawberry time. Wait. Focus. Mike Tyson. I turn to ask Vonny how his drink is, but Vonny’s not there. I take the straw out of my mouth, shocked. I turn to a tall man standing beside me taking pictures of the fake hot-air balloon. “Have you seen a giant-shouldered man with tiny, tiny legs?” He smiles but doesn’t answer. “No, really. It’s like he was two people mashed into one. Big giant dude on top, eleven-year-old boy on bottom.” I mimic Vonny’s bulldog walk. The man points up the Strip, and there goes Vonny, trundling away as fast as his tiny legs can carry him.

  I thank the man and start to run. I feel like those horror movie girls, tottering along in my high heels. “Vonny!” I yell as loud as I can, which might be a little louder than usual since my decibel level tends to hike perceptibly when I’ve been drinking. Vonny doesn’t turn around. He dodges behind a crowd of bachelorette party girls, and then I lose him. I stop running but try yelling again. “Vonny! Get your twig legs back here and take me to Mike Tyson!”

  The bachelorette party girls stumble toward me. One of them grabs my arm. “What are you shouting about?” I feel my face reddening. I’m embarrassing myself. If I were home on the Outer Banks and hollered something down the street, at least eight people I know would’ve heard me. I’d have been related to four of them, and within two minutes, it’d be all over the island that Evie Austin was making a spectacle of herself. Again.

  I call Charlotte. “I just made a spectacle of myself,” I tell her. “Again.”

  “I don’t think that’s possible in Las Vegas, unless you set yourself on fire. You didn’t set Mike Tyson on fire, did you?”

  I sit down on the sidewalk and drink some more. It doesn’t taste like strawberry anymore. It just tastes like rum. “My new friend Claire told me where to go, and I found a guy who knows the right room, but I lost him because I was drinking and making a spectacle of myself.”

  Charlotte says, “That’s a lot of new people. I’m confused.”

  Rum rum rum. “His name was Vonny Twig-Legs. The guy. Not my new friend.”

  “Can you find him again? What are you drinking?”

  I fiddle with something on the sidewalk. “Gross, a cigarette butt.” Before Charlotte can ask me if I’m drinking cigarette butts, I toss it down and tell her that I’m drinking something that was once strawberry goodness but is now mostly rum and maybe more rum. I wipe my fingers on my skirt and stand up. Spinny.

  “Just go in the direction you last saw the room guy,” Charlotte says.

  I start to tear up. Where the hell were those tears when I needed them? “No, I screwed up. I always screw everything up. Or I screw people, and that screws everything up. The bottom line is, I’m a screwup, and I ruined my chance to get revenge on Mike Tyson.”

  Charlotte sighs. “You’re not a screwup, Evie.”

  I walk over to a drugstore. Its fluorescent-lit familiarity seems comforting, but I wonder if I’ll get in trouble for taking in my rum bong. I don’t care. I’m a screwup. I might as well get arrested in Las Vegas for rum violations. I swing the door open and browse through the vitamin aisle. “I couldn’t even finish pregnant without getting college.” That might have been backwards. Whatever.

  But Charlotte understands. “You didn’t get pregnant all by yourself.”

  I pick up some hair barrettes. “I wasn’t not taking birth control,” I say. I’ve never told anyone this, not even Charlotte. “I just threw up a few times from drinking too much. I must’ve thrown up the baby-stoppers. I just threw them right on up.” I make a barfing sound for Charlotte’s benefit.

  “It doesn’t matter, Evie. Anyone who’s going to judge you isn’t worth your time.”

  I try on some fake hair. It’s blond, and my hair is dark, but when I look in the wavy mirror on the sunglasses rack, I decide that it looks awesome. I look awesome. The fake hair is within my price range. “I’m buying some fake hair,” I tell Charlotte. This drugstore probably has some other things in my price range. I check out the sparkly nail polish. “I was kind of bad, though. But that was Mike Tyson’s influence. I blame Mike Tyson.”

  “You weren’t bad. You were human.”

  I chug the rest of my rum and stash the bong-looking plastic in a corner. I don’t want the cashier to hate me and arrest me. I’ve never even smoked a bong. I’ve only seen them. “But you agree that Mike Tyson has to pay, right?”

  Charlotte sighs again. She’s being so sigh-y. I start to tell her that, but she’s saying something about a chain of events that impacted your self-perception and undeniably contributed to your sense of what is and isn’t socially acceptable in terms of sexual mores. I paint each of my fingernails a different sparkly color while she talks. I’m not buying any polish, either. I’m that bad.

  I blow on my fingernails to dry them. I’m getting tired of this drugstore, but I don’t want to ruin my manicure when I get my wallet to pay for the fake hair. “I’m not so bad that I steal fake hair, though,” I say. “I’m not a stealer.”

  “Evie,” Charlotte says. “You have two choices.”

  I tap my sparkly fingernails together to test their dryness and wait for Charlotte to tell me my choices. Purple fingernail, green fingernail. Tap tap tap. Dry enough. I need more rum.

  “You can either forget about Mike Tyson and go have fun in Las Vegas, or you can go try to find that room on your own.”

  I cradle my phone in my neck and go pay for my fake hair. I really have to pee, but the cashier says there isn’t a public bathroom, so I leave. Outside, the Strip sparkles and flashes, a lurid neon night. “Just get on a plane and come here. It’s no fun without someone fun
.”

  “Why do you even need revenge, anyway?” Charlotte asks.

  “You sound like Vonny.” I walk through the jostling crowds. Why do I need revenge?

  “Just make the choices you need to make,” Charlotte says. I tell her I love her and hang up. I’m going to walk to the Venetian and decide why I need revenge.

  I join a pack of girls wearing different kinds of animal ears. One of them, I think she’s a cat, claws the air beside me. One of them yells, a high-pitched wooooo, and I tell her that yelling wooooo is not attractive, but she just wooooos again and stumbles into her girlfriends, and they veer off into a casino. “I was just being helpful and polite,” I shout after them. Why do I need revenge? Why don’t I have animal ears? What animal ears would I pick if I could pick any animal ears?

  I go in and out of a bunch more groups of people, an interloper, not belonging with any of them. I get in lines for drinks. Music thumps and everything sparkles and flashes, and a fake volcano explodes. I start to feel like one of those spinning pigeons Mike Tyson was talking about. Like I could smack right into a Mack truck and not even notice. I make sure I’m on the sidewalk. My animal ears would be pigeon ears, only, do pigeons have ears? I don’t want to think that it’s really sweet that he goes up there and drinks Kool-Aid and talks to the pigeons, but it’s really sweet that he goes up there and drinks Kool-Aid and talks to pigeons. Like, that’s something Austin would do. Austin would totally talk to a pigeon and drink blue Kool-Aid. I don’t want to think about how it would have formed Austin’s heart if someone had torn the head off his pet pigeon. It makes me cry. I sit down on a step and cry a little. I really want to call Austin and my mom, but I’m too drunk to figure out what time it is in Buxton.