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There it is again! I’m definitely hallucinating. This is much better than that one time I did acid my senior year of high school and started crying and hiding under a coffee table because there was a polar bear standing next to it trying to eat me. I know this because the polar bear spoke to me that night and told me he wanted to eat me. He had a very kind voice, and I was kind of surprised he wanted to do something so mean.
All of a sudden, I feel myself being lifted up in the air. I really wish I could open my eyes, but I’m pretty sure someone glued them shut. I snuggle into the warmth of whatever is holding me, and when I breathe in, whatever this is smells so good that for some reason, it makes me want to cry.
“You smell like Eric. But I know you’re not Eric because I broke up with him and he hates me now. Are you going to eat my face, Mr. Polar Bear? You’re so soft and warm and cuddly,” I mutter, wrapping my arms around the polar bear’s neck, wondering why he doesn’t have any fur. “I can’t believe someone shaved you. What a trajectory . . . travemesty . . . TRAVESTY! I think I’m drunk.”
The polar bear laughs and my skin breaks out in goose bumps when I hear the sound, even though I’m not cold at all because he’s making me feel so warm, with his arms wrapped around me.
I think I fall asleep, but maybe I died from alcohol poisoning. Who’s to know at this point? I feel my body being lowered onto a soft, fluffy cloud, and then more clouds are pulled up over my shoulders until I snuggle down into them and sigh contentedly. I try to open my eyes, but all I see is darkness, and when the darkness starts to spin and I feel like I might throw up, I squeeze them shut and burrow my face into the cloud.
I feel something soft and wet against my temple, and I’m pretty sure an angel just kissed me, which makes me smile.
“Come home, princess,” the angel whispers in my ear.
Yep, I’m definitely dead and this is definitely heaven, because that angel sounded just like Eric. But heaven isn’t supposed to make you sad, and when all that nice warmth and yummy smell suddenly disappears, all I want to do is cry.
Chapter 30: Can I Kiss the Girl?
“And as you’ll see on the spreadsheets in front of you, the expected growth of the Naughty Princess Club in the next six months is staggering for a new business and would bring in top tax dollars for the county.”
My leg bounces nervously and I smack my hand down on my knee to get it to stop moving as I listen to Cindy speak to the board a few feet away, standing at a lectern in the middle of the room. Belle reaches over from next to me and grabs my hand, giving it a squeeze as Cindy continues flipping through the stack of papers in front of her and explaining why it would be beneficial for the board to grant our license.
The board comprises fifteen members, and they are all sitting behind a long table at the front of the room. None of them has looked even remotely interested in what Cindy has been saying for the last forty minutes, and honestly, I don’t blame them. She’s doing an amazing job going through all the figures I put together over the last few days, after our debauched night at Charming’s. I printed everything for her and she’s explaining all of the graphs and pie charts I made all neat and pretty and stapled together in packets for the board, but she’s just reciting facts. I’m bored, and this is our fucking company that’s on the line.
We decided yesterday that Cindy should be the one to speak in front of the board. With her PTA-president experience, homeowners-association experience, and all the charity work she organized and events she spoke at during her marriage, she knew how to be commanding and professional in front of an audience.
I glance up at the table in the front of the room to Ursula, sitting right smack in the center, and find her staring at me with a look of irritation on her face, like she didn’t expect us to show up today. Like I would defy her and pick her son over my friends and our business. I don’t get it. This is what she wanted. I did exactly what she asked, and I just have this feeling in my gut that it doesn’t even matter. That she’s still going to deny us, even after the hell I put myself through. That she quite possibly told us to come to this board meeting tonight just to make us beg and plead so she could humiliate us in front of everyone.
