Press Your Luck 42

The truth weighed on Harlow for several days after he learned the truth. That first night he wallowed in his abandonment until he had dehydrated himself of tears and finally fallen into a deep sleep. The next day he was angry, he wanted nothing more than to rush out and find his dad and demand satisfaction for the pain he put him and his mother through at the business end of a baseball bat, or very large men wielding blunt and heavy objects. The next day he imagined various scenarios of meeting his still living dad. How he would just run up to him like he used to do when he was a little boy and giggle happily when his dad would pick him up. The fantasy brought more tears to his eyes as he imagined his warm smile and strong embrace. But the terrible, imagining the anger and disgust he might feel towards his son filled him once again with anger and resentment. A worse thought came after if he no longer recognized him and hit on him like every other man he came across would just kill Harlow outright from the sheer overwhelming embarrassment!

By the end of the week he had buried the ideas of revenge and reunion against the man who had been a ghost for the majority of his life. Nothing had changed. He still needed to get back to being Harlow again, or at least a man with a new name, and to do that he first had to make a phone call. Harlow stared at his phone for several hours. He wasn't scrolling through endless media posts, texting his bestie Elana, or even playing online poker. No, this particular afternoon he stared at a singular phone number he hadn't called in nearly three weeks now. He had let himself get lost and ignored everything else he needed to worry about for the last week. Imagining revenge and reunion since he learned the truth. If he were honest however he let himself get lost in Lucy’s life far longer than that. He would need copious amounts of booze to block out all that he allowed himself to do, justifying it as what Lucy would have done, but first he needed to make things right before he left.

The first he called was Daniel, “Hold on.” He said when he answered the phone, the sound of chatty customers and musac fading from the background as Daniel stepped outside and into Emma’s town car. “Lucy? What’s up? Is everything okay?” He asked quickly.

“I’m fiiiine.” He said drawing out the word in his soft breathy voice, completely lying to his friend. Pressing his long nailed index finger to his lip he thought about telling Daniel what he learned about his dad, he wanted Daniel to lie to him and tell him that everything would be alright and that his dad had a really good reason for leaving like he did. But that wasn’t why he was calling, he would deal with his dad stuff later. Clearing his throat, sounding very much like a girl wanting attention he pushed on. “I mean, like, I was talking with…someone and he told me about these, um, like, open tryouts the Cardinals were having. I was thinking about football and then I, like, thought of you.”

“Yeah?” Danny smiled wistfully. “That’s cool.”

“No, like, the coolest part is he said you could try out!” Lucy said cheerfully, as she bounced on the balls of her feet.

“What?” Danny chuckled disbelievingly, not really sure how to take what his long time friend was saying.

“Yeah!” Lucy could feel her own smile trying to take over her face. The idea of giving Daniel a chance at one of his dreams just made her feel giddy, the troubles in her mind at least temporarily forgotten. “He told me what he does and I totally made him watch some of your videos from high school!”

“High School? You know it has been… wait, how did you show him videos of me?”

Rolling her eyes at the question Lucy thought about Carl saying how he was still just a big dumb football player and had to hold in a giggle as she put Daniel in the same box, at least for this one instance. Plopping herself down on the edge of the bed, crossing her legs without a thought. “Between your dad filming, like, everything you did, Harry showing off, and your mom’s old social media, there’s a ton of videos online of you playing. He saw the video of that one time you hit someone and they did like a somersault in the air and he totally looked to be hooked, so I told him you are taller and super stronger now. ” He had left out that the man in question was the assistant coach and that they had watched the videos in bed together.

“Are you for real?!” Danny shouted, his eyes wide as he looked out past the windshield.

“I am! I totally am!” Harlow giggled, Daniel’s excitement was infectious enough to keep the genuine smile on his face. Talking to Daniel gave Lucy the first real smile he had felt in days.

“Holy shit.” Danny gasped, “Serious?”

“Super, seriously.” Lucy’s breathy voice tittered as she giggled.

Hearing the girly giggled on the other end of the phone he couldn’t tell if that was a I’m just getting your riled up playful laugh or just the normal happy laugh that he hadn’t heard from his friend in some time. “You’re not messing with me, right?”

“Dan…Daniel, I would, like, never do that.” Harlow pouted, “I know how much this, like, means to you.”

Rubbing his stubble, Danny nodded to himself. He could recall Harlow pulling pranks on people long ago, but his friend had also been the type to spend what money he got on others, so they could enjoy it just as much as he did, or now she did. “I’m sorry.”

“Nooo I’m sorry.” Harlow dabbed the tears away from his eyes, he had just finished his makeup and didn’t want to have to redo it just because he was being so emotional lately, it almost felt like he was having mood swings.

Sitting in the car, gripping the steering wheel in one hand, Danny could feel both of his palms growing sweaty at the idea of getting to go to pro-ball tryouts. “You have nothing to be sorry for. This…is amazing.”

“I do though. Daniel, I mean like… ” Lucy could feel it in her chest, what she had done, it may not have done it on purpose but he had hurt Daniel and no matter how much he told Harlow it was okay and he was over it, he still needed to at least try to make it right with him.

Danny couldn’t help feel his heart strings being pulled as he listened to Lucy’s breath voice drift off, her obviously haven taken to heart what had happened and considering the person he grew up with, Harlow, and how he didn’t do any introspection it showed a lot of growth, not just in becoming Lucy, but to be a better person. “...Lucy…that…it’s in the–”

“I’ll text you the details.” Lucy interrupted and hung up before Daniel could respond and before the waterworks that threatened to start took hold. She sank her head into her hands as she regathered herself before her next call.

After composing himself Harlow attempted to call Dr. Crane. After three days of trying and leaving messages with his secretary before he finally caught Crane when he wasn’t with a patient, about to go into surgery, or taking an extended lunch. "Hello?"

"Dr. Crane? It's Lucy."

"Ah yes. Hello Ms. Hill. I trust everything is okay? I know we had you scheduled for a follow up appointment for later this month."

"It's not about that…well…like, I mean I guess, like, it is." Harlow stood walking around the empty living room.

"Is everything alright?"

"...doc…I'm calling in your chip."

"My what?" He could hear the sound of his office door closing. Either he just walked in or shooed someone out.

"For your botched plan."

"My plan?!"

"Yes yours. You said the anestm..the, the, gas would be all I would get and I woke up with tits! As far as I can see you owe me!" Still sitting on the bed Harlow held out his foot, looking at it in the five inch stiletto heel, knowing his foot was daintier… that was the word to use thinking back to how Harlow’s foot looked compared to his own after the surgery, a surgery Harlow did not remember agreeing to.

"If you'll recall I got screwed in that deal as well." The doctor said with a stern voice.

With the surgery actually done it meant the money the two would’ve split had been used for its intended purpose. "Yeah, well that doesn't change the fact you said you would fix this." Harlow found his own voice growing shrill at the idea the quack was going to screw him and not in the fun way.

"I did and I will. But it's not safe to perform another surgery so soon.”

“I’m not talking about surgery. I need…” Harlow took a deep breath, feeling his bosom heave in his corset. “I, like, need to get rid of Harlow Elwynn for good.”

“What are you asking me?” Crane’s voice changed to a partial whisper.

“I don’t want…,like, I can’t ever go back to being Harlow, doc. I need him to be dead and buried.” Feeling flustered at the entire situation Harlow…Lucy wished there wasn’t some stupid waiting period to have surgery again. So if Dr Quack couldn’t fix what happened to her body then at least he could make Harlow legally dead and then she could just get surgery later and live a male life, just not one that was tied to Harlow.

“That will cost money.”

“You owe me.” Lucy replied quickly, reminding the man of the debt he owed.

“I know who to talk to and what to do to help you but they’ll still need to be compensated….paid.” He corrected himself, remembering the airheaded bimbo he was talking to.

“Can’t you call in a favor?”

“I don’t associate with people who screw up and neither do they. So no one owes me any favors.”

Lucy thought for a moment, after working the last month and saving all the money she could, there would be enough to get out of town but she still needed more time to buy a new identity once she was out, and could stop having to prance around in cute heels. If the good doctor wasn’t willing to budge on what he owed then her plan would be dead in the water. “How much were you thinking?”

“A double mastectomy alone would cost anywhere around ten to fifteen thousand dollars. I’m assuming you still don’t have insurance.”

“Obviously not.” Lucy said, her breathy voice having a slight growl to it as Lucy pouted.

“And, I’ll remind you, your body still needs time to recover from your initial surgery anyway.”

“Hasn’t it already been, like, enough time already?!” Lucy felt fine, her body no longer felt swollen and her feet didn’t hurt anymore, well except after a long day. Days she couldn’t keep men from pinching her rear were more painful than others.

There was a momentary pause before the doctor responded, “No. I told you it would take about six months to recover during our first meeting.”

“But, like, that was when I wasn’t going to, like, act…acksh, like really have the surgery!”

“I know, but you did and your body still needs time to heal.”

“Well how long will that take?!” Lucy whined.

“Possibly another four months. Three if you’ve been taking good care of your health.”

“Cheese and crackers, you’ve got to be kidding me!” Lucy snapped and stamped her heeled foot watching her cleavage jiggle in the mirror. ‘Three more stupid months?!’ Lucy thought with a pout, ‘I, soooo, can’t stick around here that long! I guess I’ll just have to enjoy I mean live with them a bit longer. But I’m getting the heck outta here!’ Then another ran through Lucy’s mind. Things were fine now, but when she was first kicked out, a lot of meals had been skipped and she had been donating plasma. ‘Did that like count as healthy? GRRR! It is totally going to take longer because of Val kicking me out.’ “Fine, but you still owe me.”

“I told you surgery right now would be imp–”

“Not surgery.” Lucy huffed, not sure why the oh so smart doctor man wasn’t following. “I still need to, like, disappear and you’re gonna help me. You at least owe me that much.”

Another moment of silence passed by the doctor before he said, “I suppose that’s true.” Once Harlow/Lucy was officially dead and out of town it would at least be easier to avoid her. She would move on to some other doctor and be his or her headache. “I’ll need a few things from you.” They spent the next several minutes discussing payment and what dental and medical records Dr. Crane would need to believably fake Harlow’s death when suddenly there was a heavy pounding on her door causing Lucy to jump.

The cruel and terrifying thought that Jefferson’s men had somehow found her, now, after all this time, flooded her mind as she slowly crept to the window. Pulling the heavy drape back she tried to peek at whoever was at the door but was startled by Valerie’s face staring back at her.

“Honey I’m home!” Val called out with a gleeful smile.

“What are you doing here?” Lucy shouted through the window.

“Is that anyway to greet an old friend?”

“Hi!” Lucy rolled her eyes before smiling and filling her voice with fake cheer, “So, like, what are you doing here?”

“First off, much better. Second off, like,–” Valerie grimaced as she snapped the rubberband on her wrist–“open the door so I don’t have to shout.”

Harlow slowly opened the door before letting Valerie in. “Jeeze, finally.” She scoffed as she walked in. Valerie quickly took in the cramped motel room for the first time, clothes piled in a small basket under the sink, makeup and facial scrubs and cleansers placed in order of usage on the counter and a freshly made bed and high heels in what could graciously be called a closet cubby between the bed and the shower were all kept together. The fact the small room was kept cleaned was less impressive than the fact that Lucyhad seemed to keep up the routine of cleaning even on her own. She had half expected to walk into a disaster area filled with empty beer cans and an explosion of dirty laundry for all the trouble Harlow had first given her when it came to cleaning. But clearly he she had changed.

“Did Daniel send you?” She asked, pouting angrily.

Valerie turned back to Lucy and took in Lucy’s outfit and shook her head. Lucy wore a glittering gold corset with black lace at the tops of her cleavage and a black skirt to match her black heels on her otherwise bare legs. “Danny doesn’t know I’m here. I just wanted to see how you were doing.” Lucy pouted with a small grunt, almost appearing disappointed that Danny hadn’t sent her to check in on the girl. The diamond ring on Lucy’s finger glinted in the harsh lamp light caught Valerie’s eye immediately. “But I see you’re doing well. Who’s the lucky guy?” She asked simply.

“Oh.” Lucy giggled as she pulled the ring off and tossed it onto the kitchen counter, “One of the girls at work wears a fake engagement ring to keep the guys away. It works…for most guys.” Lucy shrugged, recalling the few men who were too drunk or simply didn’t care enough to let a ring stop them.

“That’s…actually pretty clever.” Valerie giggled back. “So you have a job? How is that going?” She asked, clearing her throat.

“It’s great. I’m making, like, good money and great tips. And they even give us a voucher for one trip to the buffet on our lunch break.” She had considered telling Valerie the truth, that the job and the customers were a pain in his ass, of how much she had struggled to save money and not starve at the same time, and how as a result she had resorted to being an escort to drive home just how wrong she was to kick her out so cruelly. But then she would no doubt tell Daniel and he would swoop in like the shining knight he was to save Lucy. And Lucy already felt bad enough that she had to ignore Daniel’s calls for the last several days.

“Are you a stripper?” Valerie asked.

“What? So not! Like, why would you think that?” Valerie waved a hand at Lucy’s corset and skirt. “I wish!” Lucy huffed, imagining the quick and easy cash she could’ve raked in as a stripper. The thought of a room full of men looking at her with lust warmed her cheeks. “No. I’m a cocktail waitress.” She clarified, shutting out the thoughts bubbling forth.

Valerie nodded, noticing Lucy unconsciously biting her lip before claiming to be a waitress rather than a stripper before continuing, “Anywho. Like I said I wanted to check on you and see how you were doing because,li–, well when we last talked you sounded upset and then Danny told me about your guys’ phone call.”  she grimaced again at her usage of the word ‘like’ but managed to stop herself from using the airheaded term like Lucy.

After Lucy had left her the struggle to think about anything beyond clothes, sex, and trashy reality shows became impossible. Especially during times when she should have been studying for a major test. Worse was when these thoughts infected her school life, judging the girls in her classes based on their clothes and make up, or imagining her teachers naked during an important lecture. The last straw had been when she asked another girl to borrow notes on the lecture she had spent daydreaming through which only resulted in her dragging the cute coed into the bathroom where the notes and the lecture were entirely forgotten.

“So he did send you?” Lucy accused.

“He didn’t…but he is worried about you.”

“Then why isn’t he here?” Lucy absentmindedly attempted to twist the ring, still feeling the weight of it on her finger even though it was gone.

“He tried calling you a bunch and said you kept ignoring him so I figured it would be better if I came instead.”

“Why?”

“It took a lot of convincing to give you space. I thought maybe there must be something you might not want him to see.” Lucy pouted but nodded in agreement. Valerie continued, “I also didn’t want him to influence your decision.”

“What’s that mean?”

“I know how important it is for you to save money in your…situation. So, I thought, if you wanted you could come stay with us again until you’re on better footing.”

“Are you, like, feeling guilty or something?” Lucy crossed her arms over her chest as her lips formed a thin line.

“Honestly? Yes.” Valerie’s honesty surprised Lucy, leaving her wide-eyed in stunned silence. “You’re, like, obviously not the same girl I used to know. To that end, I wanted to help you out.”

Lucy felt her lips curling into a smile but forced them back to the angry pout, not wanting to appear too eager, “Just come back? What’s the catch this time?”

“No catch. I mean…you would still have to work and you’d, like, have to contribute around the house.”

“I’m, so, not cleaning your room.” Lucy giggled anxiously. As much as she wanted to jump at the chance to return to a soft bed and warm showers and…she shook her head.

“I can manage my own room.” Valerie giggled back.

“...What about Daniel?” Lucy bit her lip. She had meant to ask about sleeping arrangements but before she could catch herself the question had escaped her lips.

Valerie’s smile faltered and she let out a deep sigh, “I don’t think you guys should get back together. This really is meant to be temporary. If you guys start up again…that would just confuse things and make it harder when you leave.”

Lucy bit harder on her lip, forcing back the tear already forming in her eye. She was right, Lucy, or whoever she was by then, was going to leave the state for good. It would be stupid to even pretend they were dating again. ‘S’not like we were really dating anyway.’ She thought even as she felt razor wire tightening around her heart. “Okay.” She nodded, licking her sore lip.

“Okay.” Valerie said faintly. Knowing no further explanation was needed. Taking pity on the hurting girl Valerie slowly took Lucy’s hand and pulled her into a hug. Lucy’s shoulders slacked as she leaned into the Val. The last time they spoke about Danny, Lucy blurted out that she did love him. She had half thought it was a ploy to manipulate them both further and as expected Lucy asked about Danny. She used to tease Danny that Harlow was his boyfriend, always following him around like a little love sick puppy. But now, after everything, it was obvious Harlow, or Lucy, did have a crush on Danny. And may even have been in love with him. But it seemed that Lucy at least understood that being in love alone isn’t enough to make for a good relationship. “It’s gonna be okay.” She said gently, “We’ll set you up in my old room so you’re not sleeping on the couch."