PROLOGUE
Holly
“Holly, come on, it’ll be fun,” my friend Katrina wheedled. I looked at my mom who lay on the floor of our apartment, her prone form stretched on the shabby floor.
“Go, go!” Kathy spoke weakly, gesturing with her free hand. “Go!”
“No Ma, I can’t,” was my hushed whisper, turning away from the computer screen where my friend waited impatiently. “I don’t want to leave you here.”
But Kathy wouldn’t hear of it. Her gray head turned towards me again, awkward given the angle of her twisted spine.
“Sweetheart, I’m just doing my back exercises on the floor with this instructor on the screen,” she said, pointing to our TV where an aged woman moved slowly, stretching her arms high towards the ceiling. “It’s nothing crazy. Go and have a good time.”
I sighed because Kathy is all I have, and I’m all Kathy has. It’s always been my mom and me against the world since the very beginning. My dad has never been in the picture, and we used to live with my grandma in a cramped one bedroom. But fortunately or unfortunately, my mom has a bad back. It causes her excruciating pain, and she gets disability for it. That money is what keeps us alive, as well as the rent-controlled apartment we have in Queens.
So I’m grateful for the small things. Usually it takes forever to land a cheap place like this, but because of my mom’s illness, we were pushed to the front of the line. So while our neighbors complain about dingy floors and ghastly fluorescent lighting, I’ve always been grateful. Otherwise, we’d still be squeezed into a tiny one-bedroom with my grandma, instead of our relatively spacious one-bedroom here at the LeBar projects.
But Kathy worries about me because I feel obligated to stay at home to make sure she’s okay. Going out isn’t a priority for me, not when my mom takes dozens of medications a day, unable to get out of bed sometimes. And so I’d rather make sure she’s as comfortable as possible, rather than partying and gossiping like a normal teen girl.
But my mom wasn’t having it.
“Go!” was her entreaty with a half-hearted smile that turned into a wince. “I’ll be fine, it’s only a few hours.”
“Besides,” wheedled Katrina from the screen, “My new boyfriend is going to meet us. Nick Ryver, you’ll like him,” she chortled. “I wish you could meet him too, Mrs. Nelson!” she sang, waving to my mom from the screen.
And both Kathy and I laughed then because Kat can be ridiculous. My friend’s just like us. Katrina’s family doesn’t have much and we make do most days. But Kat’s latched onto an idea. She wants to date wealthy seventy year-olds because after they get married, the old guy will die, and leave her their fortune. It’s morbid in my opinion, but it’s what Kat wants, and she’s determined.
“Come on,” the blonde entreated again. “You’ll like Nick, I promise.”
My mom and I giggled again. This Nick person was probably eighty years old and using a walker, but hey, who am I to judge? Besides, getting out could be fun. I hadn’t been social in at least a month, and this could be a much-needed change.
So I nodded.
“Okay Kat, where should I meet you?”
“The Firehouse,” she proclaimed proudly. “Nick’s taking us there.”
I gasped, eyes going wide.
“But that’s real expensive,” was my hesitant reply. “Drinks there are fifteen bucks a pop. You know I can’t afford that.”
Katrina laughed again. “Seriously Holly, you think I haven’t thought of that? I can’t afford it either. Nick’s going to take care of it all, we won’t have to spend a cent,” she proclaimed proudly.
And sighing, I agreed. Again, Kat has a way of dating guys who are old as Methuselah and rich as Midas. A fifteen dollar drink likely wasn’t going to make a difference to someone with a bulging wallet. So hanging up, I wandered into my room, staring into the tiny closet.
“Wear something pretty!” called my mom from the living room, wheezing as she did a series of slow leg lifts. Stretching and keeping conditioned is supposed to help her back, so Kathy’s meticulous about getting through her hours of physical therapy each day.
“I will,” was my low murmur. “I will.”
And slowly, I pulled on my one acceptable outfit. It was a plain purple cocktail dress that hugged my curves, emphasizing my hourglass figure.
Stay, I commanded my big Double Ds. Don’t embarrass me. Don’t wiggle and jiggle like marshmallows, like you always do.
But my body will always be my body, and I was born a big girl. Some ladies are thin as children, and blossom when they hit puberty. Not me. I’ve always been chunky, and now at eighteen it’s gotten to titanic proportions. I have girls that sway and hips that knock like they’re doing a constant rhumba.
But it’s okay. I don’t get out much, so it’s not like there are many guys pounding down my door asking me on dates. In fact, the opposite. There are no men period, it’s just me and my mom Friday nights. Thus, Kathy’s entreaties for me to get out of the house to meet people and socialize before I become a potato sprouting hairs.
But now, standing in front of the Firehouse, intimidation made my knees weak. We live in a little corner of Queens, New York, so this wasn’t the big city. But partying isn’t my normal thing, and the blaze of flashing lights and line of people out front unsettled me. A man pushed by, making me grab my purse strap in fear. Had I just been robbed? But no, it’s just how people are in a club environment, rude and pushy as they barrel towards the front of the line.
Suddenly, Kat’s voice cut in.
“Hey Holly,” she sang, prancing up to where I stood behind the velvet rope. “Come on out from behind there, Nick’s a VIP and can get us in.”
Tentatively, my hand reached for the velvet rope, but a bouncer beat me to it. Believe it or not, he wasn’t here to kick me out. He was here to help me skip the line.
“After you, ladies,” the bear-like man growled. “Courtesy of Mr. Ryver.”
My heart pumped. Who was Katrina’s new boyfriend? Clearly, he knew people, seeing the envious gazes of the club-goers around us.
But even the darkness inside the Firehouse couldn’t conceal the fact that Katrina’s new guy was seventy if a day. Doddering and bent over, he nursed a whiskey alone at a table.
“Hellooooo!” the man sang, swinging a frail arm around my friend and pressing a kiss to her cheek. Uck. His lips were cracked and dry, shriveled with age, whereas my friend was in the full bloom of youth, her cheek soft as a petal.
“Hi,” I murmured, pasting a smile on my face. “I’m Holly Nelson, Katrina’s friend.”
The old man nodded, blue eyes alight. Well, at least the guy was alive and kicking because there was a spark in there.
“Nick Ryver,” he chortled with a hint of a British accent. “Nice to meet one of my best girl’s best friends. Get it? Best and best.”
I smiled politely.
“Yes, Kat and I have known each other since we were six,” was my obliging reply. “Thank you for getting us into the Firehouse,” I said, nodding into the dark interior. “We would have been waiting outside forever if you hadn’t.”
“Oh that!” wheezed the elderly Mr. Ryver. “It’s nothing! I develop these places so putting a name on the VIP list is nothing.”
And at that, Kat plunked herself into her new boyfriend’s lap, which wasn’t a good idea if you ask me. The man was frail and small, likely with the osteoporosis that hits old people. My friend had probably just crushed him with her sassy weight.
But Kat is Kat and the woman threw her arms around Mr. Ryver enthusiastically.
“Nick is big in construction,” she purred, pressing her cheek to his wizened one. “He owns so many important and famous buildings in New York. This is just a tiny venture by comparison, isn’t that right?”
The white-haired man nodded feebly.
“That’s right, sweets. The Firehouse is a foray into Queens because you’re here. We want to do more in the borough, so long as that asshole Thorn Evans doesn’t get in the way.”
And for the first time that night, I saw Mr. Ryver shed his frail, wimpy exterior. Sure, the guy was shriveled with tufts of white hair, but suddenly those eyes were filled with competitive fire, the gleam harsh and unrelenting.
“Fucking Thorn Evans,” he spat, tiny bits of saliva hitting the tabletop. “A total asshole.”
“Oh Nick!” wailed Katrina, hugging his wiry form tighter to her bosom. “It’s not that bad. We’ll figure it out together.”
I chose to keep my mouth closed, figuring that one, I knew nothing about construction. Two, I had no idea who this Thorn Evans person was. And three, it’s not like Nick and Kat cared. The two of them were in their own world, my young, scheming friend and her much-older lover gazing into each other’s eyes, a feedback loop of churning emotion.
And that’s how things stayed for the rest of the night. The music pounded around us, strobe lights painting dancers with flashes of red, green, and blue, and Katrina in Nick’s lap, their foreheads practically pressed together.
“Yeah, I hate that Thorn Evans guy,” Mr. Ryver wheezed unsteadily again. “He’s a heartless bastard.”
“Oh, poor baby,” cooed Katrina into his ear, her blonde hair brushing his nose. “Poor baby.”
After an hour of two of hearing this over and over again, I’d had enough.
“Thanks for the lovely night,” I said with a fake smile on my face. “Thank you Mr. Ryver, I appreciate the trouble you went to.”
But did they hear me? No. Katrina kept cooing in her new boyfriend’s ear, the wizened guy listening and laughing, on top of the world with a pretty blonde to do his bidding.
Sighing, I gave up, making my way out of the club. Because this night had been a bust for sure. I’d met Katrina’s elderly companion, and he was ancient with yellowed teeth and wrinkled, papery skin. I’d gone out on the town to party, but it hadn’t been fun. There had been loud music blasting in my ears, making my head ring, and now my feet hurt from the high arch of the stiletto heels.
But that’s life, and I smiled ruefully to myself. If only Prince Charming had shown up to drop a kiss on my cheek. If only Prince Charming could be found at places called the Firehouse with cheesy crowds out front and octogenarians inside. Yeah, right. It was unlikely he’d ever materialize, and in the meantime … there was just shy, sweet Holly Nelson, boring and chubby with nary a man in sight.