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when we arrive at the airport, I stuff the bottle into my purse—probably just like Adam, too, if he carried a purse.
I focus on the feeling of my legs moving as they carry me from the limousine to the blue and grey Boeing Dad bought when I was in high school. I pay attention to my arms as they clutch my luggage. I clench my stomach underneath my shirt. I think about my ovaries below my stomach.
What’s wrong with me? So far, nobody knows. Maybe I don’t care, I think as I hike up the plane’s fold-out stairs. Maybe I’ll be an old maid with a hundred cats. Or dogs, because cats are just difficult.
Even the thought of a hundred darling dogs depresses me, and as soon as I see our family’s long-term flight attendant, Esmerelda, I realize that, just like at Julian’s earlier, I must be wearing my mood all over my face. She throws her arms around me and leads me to the most comfy, recliner-style seat on the jet, and starts a movie on the flatscreen right in front of me: Finding Nemo .
“You need something fun today,” she declares.
I just nod, because really, what else can I say? Nemo is perfect. He’s got the little fin; I’ve got the broken ovaries.
“Would you like a drink?”
I must look like shit. I laugh and pull out the bottle of Pinot Noir from my Belkin bag.
She laughs, too. “Oh, so it’s a bad, bad day.”
I nod again, feeling too tired to think of anything to say, and she takes the bottle and brings me a glass filled with the crimson liquid.
For the next two hours, Esmerelda refills my glass…a lot of times. Every time I finish, she refills it. I toss them back just like Adam, and watch the little orange fish swim around the screen with a strange, dull feeling—like I’m living inside an empty aquarium.
When we touch down at the private airport behind the Wynn Casino, in downtown Vegas, Esmerelda laughs at me, and ruffles my newly styled, short hair. “I never seen you drunk, Suri Dalton.”
I blink blearily at her. “I don’t ever get drunk.”
“I didn’t think you did.” She squeezes my arm. “Would you like me or Lonnie—” that’s the pilot— “to walk with you?”
I shake my head, feeling the plane tilt around me. I wonder if we’ve landed yet. “Um, no. I’m fine.”
“If you’re sure,” she says.
Apparently, the plane is landed. I catch a glimpse of lights outside the window, then point weakly to the bags, and Esmerelda nods. “We’ll get them to Mr. West’s room. Don’t worry.”
“Thank you.”
As I float toward the plane’s door, she says, “Go have some fun!”
I tell her I will, and hold on tightly to the railing as I make my way down the stairs in my sexiest jeans, red Lanvin ballet flats, and a flowy white Marc Jacobs blouse I got last time I went shopping on Rodeo Drive.
I wander toward the glossy-looking high-rises with only my purse on my shoulder, and it’s then I realize I have no idea where I’m going. I’ve only been to Hunter’s penthouse once, and in my drunken state, I can’t seem to understand how the trees and grass around me will lead me back there.
I look around. I’m past the airport now and on a…golf course? I giggle. This is not good. I suck at golf. I can’t see Hunter West in a golf shirt. Pretentious Casual—that’s what I’ll call his style. Lizzy sold her clubs when her dad left so she can’t play, either. Golf sucks! I twirl around. There are palm trees strung with lights. So many lights! They make me dizzy!
I ended up sitting on one of the greens, but a rescuer arrives! A golf cart is here. There’s a man in a suit. He’s saying, “Can I help you?”
I blink up at him and grin. “My prince charming!”
We strike a deal, and he says he will take me out of the palm tree forest, to the Wynn.
“And you work here?” I ask him for the first—or second?—time.
“Yes, miss. I’m a ball boy.”
I giggle. Balls.
“ Golf balls.”
He chuckles. “ Golf balls.”
He presses the pedal, and I get dropped into the rabbit hole.