It’s been over a year since Damien Ellis offered me a job and I packed up all my belongings and traveled across the border to move in to my new home-away-from-home—Los Angeles. Growing up in Canada, Vancouver to be specific, I never thought I’d call a big American city like LA home, but here I am, living and working and thriving.
Well, I was thriving, until I managed to put a prominent snag into my American dream dress and sew it up with a marriage pact patch, of all things. I mean, what world am I living in, and is it financed by the Hallmark Channel?
Ha. Not likely. The Hallmark Channel doesn’t showcase movies revolving around immigration fraud, and they certainly don’t include men who dirty-talk like Flynn.
I’ve been back from Vegas for less than forty-eight hours, and to say I’ve yet to wrap my mind around what went down in Sin City would be the understatement of the century. I’ve been like the Energizer Bunny, just pacing back and forth while I beat the same dang drum of truth over and over again.
I’m married now. I’m someone’s wife. Wedded. My knot is tied, my chain has a ball on the end of it, I’m as hitched as one of Gwen’s past flavor-of-the-month’s fifth-wheel camper.
Married. To someone I hardly know and who just so happened to make a pact with me that ended in us saying “I do” in front of a drag queen Marilyn Monroe.
And all of that doesn’t even consider the fact that we had the hottest sex of my life before parting ways.
I let out a sigh. Nope, not going there. No way in hell am I going to step foot in that minefield of sexual confusion.
Because, technically, I’m still illegally living and working in the United States, and correcting the type of problem that involves Uncle Sam definitely takes priority over the Flynn-inspired charley horse in my vagina.
There’s no time for excuses or procrastination. I have to do what I need to do to rectify my expired-visa situation, and I have to do it now—even if it has nothing to do with what I should be doing on a Tuesday in the middle of my workday.
Somehow, I’m going to have to pull a rabbit out of my hat and fit in my actual work to-do list, which is a mile long, at the very end of the day. It’ll be tough, but I’d look like shit in an orange jumpsuit and I’m certainly not photogenic enough to make a mugshot look good, so there’s really no other option.
Goodness, what has your life come to that prison is a potential outcome?
The mere idea of living a real-life Orange is the New Black situation urges my lungs to seize and short pants of air to burst out of my throat. Mentally, I feel as if I’m holding myself together by one single, already-shredded thread.
Knowing I need to talk to someone before it severs entirely, anyone who might be able to rationally talk me off this ledge, I grab my cell phone and call the one and only person who could fulfill that role—Gwen.
It rings four times before the line clicks open.
“Daisy!”
Oh, thank goodness. Relief fills my chest, but that’s quickly squashed when static hovers over the rest of her words.
“Darling! I’m…you…call…”
I squint and hold the phone as close to my ear as physically possible. “Where are you? I can hardly hear you.”
“…here…I…trip…it’s…”
“What?”
“I said…”
And then, nothing.
A few seconds later, the line clicks dead. Immediately, I try to call her back, but it goes straight to voice mail.
Well, shit. This certainly isn’t helping me work through my existential, I-got-married-for-a-green-card crisis. I try to call her back another three times, but eventually, I give up when a text message from an unknown number chimes through on my phone.
Unknown: Daisy, darling, it’s Gwen. My phone isn’t working on the boat. I think we’re too far out to sea for me to get service.
Too far out to sea? What the heck is she talking about?
Me: Huh? Where are you?
Unknown: Me and the girls found a half-off Groupon for an Alaskan cruise.
Me: You’re on a flipping discount cruise right now?
Unknown: Don’t worry, darling. It’s a Norwegian.
Like that’s supposed to make me feel better?
Unknown: I’ll be back in two weeks.
Oh, for Pete’s sake.
Unknown: Is everything okay?
Um, no. Everything is not okay, but there’s no way I’m going to unload all my drama on her while she’s supposed to be enjoying a cruise with her friends. And I’m certainly not going to do it via text message.