The Denver Cereal (9 page)

“
My sister’s a pricey
date,” Steve laughed.

“
I’d rather buy Christian
Louboutins,” Jacob said.

Steve laughed. “Lots of
guys try to get with Jill. If she’s willing to go on a non-date
with you, she must be pretty interested.”

“
Or desperate to get to
the zoo,” Jacob said.

“
I think she likes you,”
Steve said.

Approaching the hospital,
Jacob saw Jill talking to Dr. Drayson outside the hospital. When
she saw Jacob, she beamed. Jacob grinned in response. Even with his
hands full of food, he managed to hug her hello.

“
Katy’s going to be all
right,” Jill said into his chest.

“
I’m so glad,” Jacob said.
He kissed her cheek.

“
Me too,” Jill
said.

“
We brought dinner,” Steve
said. “Your tea and Chocolate-Raspberry Decadence, sir.”

“
Thanks,” Dr. Drayson
laughed.

“
Would you like to eat?”
Jacob asked.

Jill nodded.

Stepping back from Jacob,
Jill was about to kiss him when Steve said, “Come on, Jilly. No
making out on the sidewalk.”

Jill laughed. She caressed
Jacob’s cheek and then followed the men inside for
dinner.

~~~~~~~~

Valerie Lipson opened the
door of her Malibu condominium —
their
Malibu condo — and walked into
the hall. Standing at the door, she gazed across the apartment to
the pounding surf. She would miss this view.

Her eyes shifted to her
engagement ring tucked into its Harry Winston box on the
floor.
People
magazine said Ronald Winston, Harry’s son, had personally
selected the yellow diamond. Wes paid a cool three and a half
million dollars for perfection in a size seven. Valerie tugged her
note from under the ring box and set it in front. Wes would see the
note first.

One last check. Yep, she
had everything.

Valerie pulled the door to
the condo closed and locked the bolt. Holding the keys in her hand,
she closed her eyes. If she had keys, she could always come
back.

In one swift motion, she
shoved the keys through the mail slot.

Standing, she picked up
her suitcase and walked to the elevator. A trip home to Denver to
reset her life. A fresh start. That’s exactly what she needed. Her
BMW M3 convertible roared to life in response to the
thought.

Flicking on her blinker,
she felt real regret. She wished she could be what Wes needed. With
a sigh, she merged into Pacific Coast Highway traffic.

How long had she been she
engaged this time?

Longer than the last
two . . . Valerie counted the months on her fingers.
Five months. Valerie shook her head. Three engagements, hundreds of
men, and the red-headed witch was still right.

Wes’s face flushed red
when he asked, “Please marry me, Val. All I want to do is take care
of you for the rest of my life.”

And the only thought in
Valerie’s head was “See Delphie, you were wrong! I can love someone
other than Michael Roper.”

She squealed when he gave
her the ring. They made Viagra love for hours. When Wes fell
asleep, Valerie cried into her pillow.

She would make this work.
She was going to make this work. She had to make this work. She was
going to love Wes.

The day her engagement to
Hollywood producer Wesford Kapanski was announced, the blogosphere
vibrated with nasty comments and vicious opinions. Perez Hilton
posted a photo of Val and Wes with a huge white X over them. Every
night,
Entertainment Tonight
did the “Val Count” for the number of days they
were engaged. Vegas set the line at fifty to one that Val would
marry Wes.

Valerie worked to love
this man.

But no amount of
lovemaking, ocean views, or expensive gifts removed her
ever-present thoughts of Mike. Caffeine helped. Alcohol was better.
But nothing ever really washed that man from her mind. This
morning, she realized that becoming the seventh Mrs. Wesford
Kapanski wasn’t going to cure her.

“
You will only have one
love, Val,” Delphie had said to a sobbing Val. Mike had left for
basic training ten minutes before. “You will cause yourself great
hardship if you can’t allow yourself to love him, marry him, and
make him your world. He is your true love. Children born of love,
like your parents’, are only satisfied with true love. There’s no
more powerful force in this world.”

True love?

God. No one believed in
true love anymore. After six years of starring on a popular soap
opera, Valerie knew everything there was to know about love. Men
cheat. Men lie. And women suffer.

Not that she hadn’t
learned that from her father.

Delphie was wrong about
her parents. She had to be wrong about Mike.

“
Where you going, hon?”
the clerk at the Frontier Airlines ticket counter asked.

“
Denver. The soonest
available,” Valerie said.

“
You’re Valerie Lipson,”
the clerk said.

Valerie smiled her movie
star smile. “Do you watch
Our Loves, Our
Lives
?”

Surprised by the question,
the clerk looked up from her typing. She shook her head. “My
husband works for your father. Lipson Construction. You look like
your brother, Jacob.”

Valerie’s smile dimmed. Of
course. Frontier Airlines was based in Denver, home of Lipson
Construction.

“
I bumped you to first
class, on me,” the clerk said. “Your father’s been really great to
us. He gave my husband a month off when our babies were born. He
even cosigned on a loan so we could get into our house. My
husband’s never been happier at a job. I . . . I
just wanted to say, ‘thanks.’”

Valerie smiled at the
woman. Everyone loved her scumbag father. This woman couldn’t help
it if she were fooled by the bastard. Valerie paid for her ticket
and thanked the woman. She wasn’t going to go diva on a poor stupid
airline clerk.

Looking at her ticket,
Valerie realized she had a few hours before her flight. Walking
toward security, Valerie waved to the bank of paparazzi
photographers.

“
Val! Val!” they screamed.
“Over here Val.”

“
Val!
TMZ
! Where you goin’?” the
videographer for TMZ.com asked.

Valerie waved and started
up the escalator.

“
Where you going,
Val?”

“
I’m going home, boys,”
she said. Then, without even realizing what she was saying, she
murmured, “I’m going home to my husband.”

Like any great actress,
Valerie didn’t respond to her own words. She smiled and waved again
as if she hadn’t said a thing.

While her stilettos
pounded the concrete passageway, her mind returned to
Mike.

“
I can’t just work for
your father!” the seventeen year-old Mike had screamed. “I take a
job with your father, and I’ll never be my own person. You need a
real man. Day by day, you’ll lose respect for me. I can’t live with
that.”

“
Please don’t go,” the
fifteen year-old Valerie begged. “I’ll work for my father! I can
take care of your family. Let me take care of your family. Please
don’t leave me.”

“
Oh, Val,” Mike said. “Oh,
honey.”

He wrapped her in his arms
and they cried together. When morning came, he left for basic
training. That was the morning Delphie pronounced her fate, her
curse.

Valerie ordered a
cosmopolitan at the LAX bar. Finding a spot near the back, she
opened a magazine. She slipped in her iPod earbuds so no one would
bother her and her memories.

She was “Mike’s girl” to
everyone in Denver. UCLA had given her a fresh slate. She started
with UCLA boys, then graduated to producers and movie stars. One
after another, she tried to find love again.

Mike would arrive at her
dorm room in his dress uniform. He never cared who was there. He
just wanted Val. More than once, he found her in bed with some
random guy, and still he didn’t care. He’d shrug and say, “What can
I expect? I’m the one who left.” But her promiscuity hurt him. He
flaunted his own liaisons in return.

They went back and forth,
hurting each other until the summer between her junior and senior
year, the summer everything went bad.

Her precious mother was
diagnosed with terminal cancer. And her mother’s true love? He
fucked his secretary and was stupid enough to get the whore
pregnant. Her childhood home was sold before she had time to
retrieve her things. Mom and Delphie moved into that tenement on
Race Street. Jake, her funny, kind, lovable, partner-in-crime
little brother, had managed to transform himself into a complete
jock asshole.

And Mike was stationed at
Fort Irwin in Barstow.

For six months of sheer
bliss, she had Mike every weekend. Her parents’ divorce settlement
included a fourth of the construction company. Jake bought her
portion the very next day. With her new-found millions, she and
Mike bought a tiny house in Monterey. They were married on the
beach by a minister. Jake and Mom received a picture of Mr. and
Mrs. Roper kissing on the beach.

Valerie was in heaven. She
didn’t make Mike her world. He was her world — her morning, noon,
and night. She graduated a term early to be with him, near him.
While her childhood family burned to the ground, Valerie and Mike
rose like the phoenix from its ashes.

“
Valerie Lipson?” A short,
thin Hispanic man stood next to Val’s table. “Raphael Acosa
from
US
magazine.
I’m wondering what you meant when you said you were going home to
see your . . . We couldn’t quite catch the last
word.
TMZ
is
saying that you are going home to your husband. Ma’am, everyone
knows you are marrying Wes. Are you and Wes already married? Are
you married to someone other than Wes?
US
magazine would love to have an
exclusive interview . . .”

Valerie stood so quickly
that the man was forced to take a step back. Smiling her movie star
smile, she said, “My brother lives in Denver. I have a family
business meeting tomorrow. Gosh, I’m not sure what
TMZ
heard.” She
shrugged. “If you’ll excuse me. I need to freshen up before the
flight.”

“
We’re sitting together on
your flight, Val,” the reporter said. “We at
US
magazine wanted to show you our
commitment to telling your true story.”

“
Thanks. I’ll see you on
the plane,” Valerie said.

She made a beeline for the
restroom. Locking herself in a stall, she called her publicist. It
was time to tell the truth.

~~~~~~~~

“
Okay, well, this has been
fun,” Mike said. “I’ve got to get to work. Jill, you know how to
get ahold of me, right?”

Jill hugged her older
brother. “Thanks, Mikey.”

“
Candy? You’ll remember to
do that thing we talked about?” Mike asked.

“
I watch ‘Val Count’ every
night. We are up to one hundred and forty-nine engaged days.” Candy
smiled to reassure her brother.

“
Great. And you.” Mike
pointed at Jacob. “I’d like a word.”

Jill shot a surprised look
at Mike, then to Jacob. Jacob just smiled. Leaning to kiss her
cheek, he said, “I’ll be right back.”

Jacob followed Mike
through the hospital to the front door.

“
Jill said you’re paying
for everything,” Mike said. “And that the money lady asked Jill if
she was trading sex for the hospital bill.”

Jacob took a step back. He
shook his head slightly. “What?”

“
I want to know how you’re
going to expect repayment.”

“
I . . . I
never thought about it.” Jacob flushed bright red.
“I . . .”

“
Good, that’s what I told
Jill,” Mike said. “You haven’t heard from Val, have
you?”

Jacob shook his
head.

“
She’s been engaged a long
time this time . . . You
think . . .”

“
Honestly?” Jacob
asked.

Mike nodded.

“
No,” Jacob said. “Val’s
still Val inside.”

“
I hope you’re right,”
Mike said.

With a nod of his head,
Mike walked toward the parking lot.

~~~~~~~~

“
What’s ‘Val Count’?” Jill
asked Candy.

“
Mike is obsessed with
this soap opera actress,” Candy said. “She’s engaged for like, the
third time.
Entertainment Tonight
is doing an engagement watch. I watch it every
night and call him with what they say.”

“
Who’s the girl?” Megan
asked.

“
Valerie
Lipson.”

Megan jumped up from her
seat and walked to the water cooler where Steve was standing. They
shared a long look.