Divas Las Vegas (2 page)

"Ditto," Glenda chimed in. "Out with it."

"You're not going to be too happy with me for the
bad news, so wait until the good news before you start
screaming."

"No promises," I warned him.

There was a pregnant pause before he continued. Whatever he was about to tell us must've been really awful because
Brian was usually cool as a pack of menthols. "Okay, here
goes," he began. Glenda reached for my hand and I gratefully squeezed it as we heard the bad news first.

"Well, you guys know that business has been really good
lately."

We nodded our assent, though how that would be the
bad news I couldn't begin to imagine.

"Actually, our revenues have almost doubled compared
to last year," he informed us, but he wasn't smiling as clearly
he should've been.

"And this is bad why?" Glenda asked.

"Oh, for us this is great, but for the Edges store down
the street..." he trailed off, and we both knew what he was
getting at.

"Let me guess," I said. "The competition is none too
happy with our success."

"That would be putting it mildly. Though they were nice
as they could be about it, they would prefer it if we were no
longer in the picture. Damn chain stores."

"So, again, this is bad why?" Glenda asked, yet again.

Brian looked at us with a pitifully sad expression. He
reached over, grabbed our free hands, and blurted out, "I
sold them our store."

Drop went my heart. Drop went my stomach. And drop
went that floor I was telling you about. We had been sold
out and I was about to lose a job I dearly loved. And, truth
be told, I wasn't exactly qualified to do much else. That
degree in English lit wasn't about to open any big doors for
me. Visions of restaurant aprons and brief romances with
busboys ran through my already addled brain.

"But why?" I moaned. "If business was so good, why did
you agree to sell it to them?"

Brian reached into his back pocket and pulled out a copy
of a check with the Edges logo neatly printed in the lefthand corner. He handed it to me.

"Holy shit," I gasped, and dropped the paper onto the
table.

Glenda picked it up, took one look at the amount, and echoed my sentiment. "Holy shit."

"That much?" I asked in disbelief.

"That much," he answered. "And I know I should've
filled you guys in sooner, but I needed to work this out on
my own. I'm really sorry. I know how shocked you both are
and I know how unfair this all must seem, but-"

He pushed the suitcases toward us. "The good news."

I had an inkling that Brian was about to assuage his guilt
with some cold, hard cash, but neither one of us was ready
for what we were about to behold. What lay before our
gaping mouths and bulging eyes went way beyond what I
had expected. It turned out there were mounds and mounds
of cash in those lovely cases.

"Dude, there must be, there must be thousands of dollars
in these," I sputtered.

"Thirty thousand each, to be exact," Brian informed us,
and allowed himself the slightest grin. "Am I forgiven?"

Glenda and I looked at each other, then looked at him,
paused for a few seconds to be cruel-what are friends for?and then nodded a vigorous and heartfelt yes. We jumped
up from our seats and ran around to hug our newfound
sugar daddy.

He looked incredibly relieved-which was great for him,
but I was rich, and that was even better. Thirty thousand was
a lot for a lowly bookstore manager. That was almost what I
cleared in a year. And Glenda made a lot less than I did, so I
was pretty sure that she was just as excited as I was.

"Oh, my God," she screamed, "I just wet my pants."

Yep, she was just as excited.

"Now, one more question," I stopped jumping up and
down just long enough to ask. "When is our last day?"

"Next Friday. And they're buying our entire inventory. I
made that part of the bargain so that we don't even have to
pack up. As simple a transition as we could've hoped for,"
he replied, though even through his smile I could clearly detect a note of sorrow. Brian had put many years into
making the store successful, and what did he get for it? His
reward would be to lose it all. Bitter irony. I hoped he would
take those lemons and make some lemonade. And with all
the money he was getting, I hoped the lemonade would be
heavily spiked. Least that's what I was planning to do with
mine. (Planning and doing are two totally separate things,
mind you.)

Ten minutes later, Glenda and I were once again alone.

But not for long. "What's up? You two look like you
just won the lottery." It was Justin, swishing in and looking
fabulous as ever. I had hoped that age would take its toll
on his almost-perfect being, but alas, he got more and
more devastating with each passing year. Was it wrong of
me to think such nasty thoughts? Well, probably, but I'm
sure Justin's thoughts were even more wretched, so I didn't
worry about it too much. Besides, I did love him, jealous
as I was and all. Plus, I was temporarily rich and seriously
thinking about some nips and tucks to try and keep up with
the Joneses.

Justin walked over to our table and took a seat. "Well,
Miss Things, what on earth caused this outbreak of jocularity at such an ungodly early hour?" (To Justin, any time
before noon was too early. Unless, of course, Mimosas or
Bloody Marys, or both, were involved.)

We answered by pushing our suitcases toward him and
nodded for him to lift the lids.

"Um, I take it that I should open these up?" he asked,
with a tilt of his head and just a touch of curiosity to his
voice.

"Open 'em," I said.

"What's in 'em?" he asked.

"Just lift the lids and see," I replied, starting to get
testy.

"Big old snakes aren't going to pop out, are they?" He
pushed his chair slightly away from us in mock fear.

"Bitch, just open the damn things." Typical Justin to
turn the tables on us.

"You know how I hate snakes," he said, grimacing.

"Oh, for God's sake," Glenda shouted, and then jumped
up and threw the lids wide up, revealing our joyous loads
of wampum.

"Ah, cash," he purred, drawing the word out. "Whose?"

"Ours," we told him.

"Nuh-uh," he nuh-uhed.

"Yuh-huh," we yuh-huhed.

"No way."

"Dude, it's ours," I asserted.

"Well, I seriously doubt it, all things considered." Man,
he was aggravating.

"Fine, you're right," Glenda replied. "It's just sitting
here waiting for its owner to come pick it up. There, happy
now?" Glenda's minute-ago good humor was now replaced
by hostility, which Justin simply adored.

"Okay, okay, no need to get huffy. Man, you guys should
really lay off those double mochas. Te-ense."

"You are one big fucking fuck fucker, you know that?" I
spat, and slammed the lids down in front of him.

I locked the suitcases and started to leave him there while
I went to my office for some much-needed peace and quiet,
but as usual I was stymied.

"Know what you're gonna do with all that cash?" he
asked. I stood there motionless. Glenda stopped her getaway
as well to turn around and stare at him. His Cheshire cat
grin was disturbing if not completely intoxicating. Too bad
for us.

"We just now got the damn things," I answered. "How
on earth could we know how we're gonna use it?" Which
was true, but Justin wasn't from this earth. "Do you know?" I asked, though I should have known better.

"Maybe, but tell me how you got it first," he
commanded.

So we told him. It was a short story, and by the end he
had that look that I had grown to both adore and be utterly
terrified of. And rightly so, I might add.

"Well?" I asked, with just a bit of trepidation.

"I'll tell you at the party on Thursday. Let me work it
over in my head a bit."

Oh, Lord, we were in some deep shit now that Justin
was involved. I know it, you surely know it, and Glenda
knew it; but we also knew better than to tell Justin to just
forget about it. Never tell a child no; it's better to let him
make his own mistakes and learn from them. Of course,
Justin was no child and none of us ever really learned from
our mistakes, so we just tried to enjoy what good fortune
we had until the police, the ambulance, the press, or the
preacher showed up.

"What party?" Glenda thought to ask, but Justin's mind
was already far, far away.

Needless to say, by the end of that fateful day, I was depressed
as hell over losing my job and just wanted to go home and
slip into something comfortable-like a bowl of chocolatechip ice cream covered in hot fudge and Kahlua. So when
seven-thirty rolled around, I locked up, said my goodnights
to Glenda, and lumbered on home.

I made it just in time to catch my all-time favorite
program: Antiques Roadshow. I love watching those inbred
hicks bring in an heirloom that they normally keep on the
back shelf of a cupboard because they think it's so hideous.
Then they find out that it's worth a small fortune, and claim
that they don't care how valuable it is because they would
never part with a piece of their family's history.

Yeah, right. As if. You know as well as I do that they turn around and hock that piece of crap the very next day.

Anyway, the show usually keeps me riveted for the full
hour. But even though they had some nifty things to display
on that particular episode-a thirty-thousand-dollar
Tiffany lamp, bought at a yard sale for twenty-five dollars;
a dresser purchased at Barbra Streisand's home auction (I
know, I had goose bumps just looking at it); and a signed,
original Rembrandt that had been hanging in a child's bathroom (are people really that stupid?)-I just couldn't get it
out of my head that I was about to lose the only real job I
ever had and one that I truly and deeply loved.

And then, boy howdy, fate stepped its big, fat, stinky foot
in, and I nearly fell off my chair. For there, on the screen
before me, was my dear departed grandmother's favorite
vase. It had sat in her home for as long as I could remember,
and she constantly warned us not to go near it and never,
ever to touch it. When she passed away, it was left to my
mother.

Now, normally, my mother would've cherished anything
her mother gave her, but this vase was the bane of her youth.
Up until the time she married my father and moved away
from home, she was told to stay clear of it. Even as a child, I
had noticed that she completely avoided the side of the room
that the vase was on. Hell, I couldn't even look at the damn
thing without getting nervous myself.

So, when it came into my mom's possession, it was no
great surprise that she sold it at a garage sale and was glad
to finally be rid of it. Or at least she thought she'd be glad.
The very same night she sold it, the guilt started to creep
in. By morning my mom was a big old miserable mess. She
felt horrible that she'd sold something her mother valued
so dearly. Plus, she had sold it for a mere two dollars and
fifty cents. Grandma must've been rolling over in her grave.
(Well, except for the fact that we cremated her, but you get
the gist.)

To try and get it back she posted reward signs all over
the neighborhood. There was no response; she felt worse
and worse with each passing day. She even took out classified ads in all our hometown papers to try and locate the
damn thing. Again nothing. All these years later, my mother
still rues the day she let that vase out of her sight. And now,
large as life, that very object was staring at me right through
my television screen.

That particular episode was being televised from the Las
Vegas Convention Center. Mary, the lovely older woman
chatting away about Grandma's vase, was explaining how
she had found the item at a garage sale and knew it must
be worth a great deal more than what it was being sold
for. The television appraiser was nodding her head and said
that Mary was right in her quick assessment. (Well, duh,
she bought it for less than three dollars.) She went on to
ask what Mary thought the vase might actually be worth.
I leaned in to within a foot of the television screen, holding
my breath, anxiously waiting for her response.

"Urn, maybe a hundred dollars," came the timid reply.

What an idiot. They never put you in front of the camera
unless you have something truly valuable.

"Well, Mary, I'd say it was worth a considerable amount
more than that. Your vase"-my grandma's vase!-"is a
good two hundred years old. Possibly made by one of this
country's earliest china makers and extremely rare to find
in such pristine condition. The original owners must have
taken impeccable care of it. It looks almost new." (That's
because no one was allowed to touch it for fifty years.)
"Would you like to know what I think your vase is actually worth, Mary?" she asked, and my heart started racing.
I was also getting awfully pissed at hearing the appraiser
repeat "your vase" when it was clearly not her vase, but my
family's vase, accidentally lost in a moment of temporary
insanity.

"Yes, please," Mary chirped, clearly eager to hear what
her two-dollar-plus bargain was actually worth.

"Well, Mary, conservatively, I'd say that your garage
sale vase would sell today, in a well-advertised auction, for
about twenty-five thousand dollars."

When I saw the photo of the vase flash across the screen
with the appraised value printed beneath it, I knew then and
there what I had to do-besides fix myself a strong cocktail
and take a pretty blue pill to relax my extremely frazzled
nerves. (Yes, I'm aware that you shouldn't mix booze and
pills, but there are exceptions to every rule. Naturally, I've
memorized all of them.)

The next day, I decided to do some research. First thing I
had to do was find Mary. Shouldn't have been too difficult,
right? How many Marys could there be in the greater Las
Vegas area? So I locked myself in my office with my morning
coffee and set out to search. And really, I had only one place
to look. Yep, that was to the good people at Antiques Roadshow. Naturally, they were much less enthusiastic to talk to
me than I was to talk to them.