Pranked (45 page)

A
lthough Chase stayed
in town for the week, as promised, he got his own room so as not to make Evelyn feel crowded or like we were pushing her out. I didn’t object because the hotel was close by and every time we had sex in my apartment with Eve around, I felt like I had to stay quiet and restrained. After the week we’d had together in Vegas where we could be as loud as we wanted, I felt spoiled and held back. So most nights would end in loud, passionate sex sessions at his hotel room, after a day of helping my roommate pack.

Although our packing sessions really only lasted a few hours each day - from when Evelyn got home from work until she determined that she’d had enough. Still, with Chase’s help the packing moved faster than she had anticipated anyway. And each night after we had called it quits, the three of us would have dinner together until Eve was tired, leaving Chase and me to retire back to his hotel.

I’m finally starting to see more of the benefits of a paid room from Chase’s point of view. Each day we come home to a tidy room, fresh sheets and towels, and no concerns about being too noisy. Although I do sometimes wonder whether any guests on either side of us can hear some of our more vocal sessions.

The only problem is, I still haven’t figured out what I want to do. Since that first night, Chase and I have been avoiding the topic of our near future by engrossing ourselves in our immediate future. Sleeping late, lounging at the hotel pool, sex, packing, eating, more sex, back to sleep. It only takes a couple of days for that to become a routine that lulls us away from thinking about what we will do when it all ends. Now that Friday has arrived, we have even less than usual to distract us. Evelyn is off work, staying at home to handle the movers, and Chase and I are headed over there later to keep her company. But the prospect of her leaving is impossible to ignore now that it’s finally upon us. Once she’s gone, there will be no more reason for the hotel, no more afternoon packing sessions or roommate to keep company, no more excuses for us to ignore the inevitable questions of what to do next.

Chase is sitting on one of the chairs by the window, the skyline of Toronto looming over his left shoulder as he scrolls through his phone. As the week has gone by, he’s been on it more and more, responding to questions about where he’s been and what he’s doing. Not only from friends or other poker players in Vegas, but from fans expecting to see him at yet more tournaments he’s cancelled to hang out with me instead.

He denies it, but I know he’s missing the action. I’m starting to worry that he’s soon going to realize that life with me will actually be terribly uninteresting, a fact that I’ve mentioned on more than one occasion.

“What are we going to do?” I ask, sitting down on the edge of the bed next to his chair. I reach out and put one hand down gently on his knee to get his attention.

“Did you want to go to the pool again?” he asks, not looking up from the tweet he’s writing.

“No, I mean in the grand sense. What are
we
going to
do
?”

Now I have his attention. His thumbs have paused mid-sentence and he looks up at me.

“I know you’re bored,” I continue. “Hanging around a home all day isn’t really your style. You’re all about the adventure. The gambling, the motorcycles, the skydiving, and whatever else it is that you spend your off hours doing.”

“Lila, as hard as it seems to be for you to believe, I appreciate my downtime as well. I’m enjoying this. Us. I’m not anxious to go back. I don’t have to go back. That’s part of this lifestyle. I don’t answer to anyone but myself and what I want to do. You’re who I want to spend my time with now.”

Now. But how long is that going to last? I’m not entirely convinced that a lifestyle like this can keep a man like Chase satisfied. Hell, after the taste of his lifestyle last week, I’m not sure I want to go back to a life like this either.

“Eventually we both have to go back to our lives,” I insist.

Chase shrugs, more with his eyes than his shoulders. “Why can’t our lives change? Why can’t this be our lives?”

“What’s this? We aren’t doing anything. We’re in a hotel.”

“I’ll have a house soon.”

“I don’t live in Vegas.”

Chase stands up and comes to the bed, pulling me up and into a hug. “You worry too much,” he says softly. “We’ll figure it all out. There’s no rush to do it right away. I know you don’t want to be dependent on me, and I get that, but at least for now don’t worry about money or anything like that. I have enough to go around, and the thing I’ve figured out about it is, it’s useless to have when you’re alone.”

I start to shake my head but he squeezes me tightly. “Lila, I’m serious. We’ll figure out something that works for both of us, I promise. But for now, let’s just relax a bit. Consider this just being on vacation for a little while.”

I laugh lightly at the thought.

“I’m serious,” he says. “In fact, let’s make it a real vacation.”

“What do you mean?” I pull back from his embrace a bit to look at him. His eyes are serious, although they do have a little excited gleam to them.

“I mean, let’s go somewhere. You can’t have a proper vacation in your own city. So that means no Toronto or Vegas.”

“Chase,” I start to protest with a little shake of my head.

“I’m not taking no on this, Lila. We only had a week in Vegas with my issues with the house and Denise, and now we’re back here with your stresses of your apartment, best friend leaving and lack of job prospects. Let’s go someplace where the only baggage we take with us is whatever we can store under the plane.”

“I don’t know, it seems irresponsible of me to go somewhere when I don’t even have a job. I sent out a bunch of resumes this week, what if one of them calls me back?”

“If it’s that important to you, we’ll only be a flight away. We can come back if your dream job calls.”

“But-”

“Lila, trust me. Let’s do this. I want to go somewhere with you.”

I let out a long heavy breath. There’s no point arguing with him. He’s right. There’s no reason for me to stay here, and we both know my dream job isn’t going to be calling. I didn’t even apply to anywhere this week that I really even want to work at. “Where would we go?” I finally relent.

“Well,” he says, a smile splitting across his face, “we’re in Canada, so why not take advantage of it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Ever been to Cuba?”

S
aying
goodbye to Evelyn had been a tearful affair, and although we both promised we would still see each other as often as possible, and of course keep in touch via phone calls and texts, I wonder how realistic it is. She’ll be working for the CEO of a billion dollar company, likely putting in long hours and unable to get a lot of vacation. And I still have no job or prospects, so weekend trips to Chicago seem very unlikely. Of course, Chase was quick to offer to help with that, but I can’t keep asking for handouts from him.

I’m already feeling guilty enough for agreeing to go on this trip. It’s too late for second thoughts now, though, given that the pilot just announced that we’ve begun our descent. Chase reaches over and gives my hand a little squeeze, his eyes still focused on the magazine he’s reading. He’s given me the window seat, and I can already see the little green island looming larger by the minute.

If I don’t include Vegas as a vacation, this is really the first one I’ve been on in years. Not since Evelyn and I took a spring break trip to Cancun during our first year of University. I might be feeling a little bit guilty about going away when I’m broke and jobless, having my wealthy new boyfriend pay for me, but I’d be lying if I don’t admit to a little excitement as well. I’ve never been to Cuba, but more importantly, I’m looking forward to spending some time with Chase where both of us are out of our own comfort zones, completely left to ourselves in an unfamiliar world.

Unfamiliar to me, anyway. Chase told me he’s been here a couple of times, usually as a quick forbidden vacation after playing a tournament in Niagara Falls. The man loves to bend the rules whenever he can, but I can hardly fault him. I’ve never really understood the whole American embargo thing, and I’m glad that lately the rules seem to finally be loosening. Chase seems to think it will be a while before travel is completely free and unrestricted. I wonder if, when it is, he’ll no longer be interested in coming here.

I watch the plane curve over the lush green hills and trees that are sparely dotted with small houses all built deliberately close to the Atlantic. It’s already beautiful, and my misgivings about coming are quickly fading. I slip my hand out from under Chase’s and put it on top, giving his a squeeze of thanks. I catch his eye and smile at him.

“It’s starting to rain,” he notes. It’s true, there are light drops on my window. “Don’t worry, though. It never lasts long.”

By the time we land and disembark, the shower is already over and the sun is shining through the windows of the small terminal. It’s already very hot as we wait in line to pass through customs.

“You can go through first,” he motions as our turn arrives. There’s a small door in front of our line that I have to go through, but the man behind the counter seems pleasant enough. He gives my passport and tourist card a stamp, and then I’m through and waiting for Chase.

He comes through the door right after me and speaks to the official. When he hands him his passport and card, though, I see that he also slips some paper money along with them. He exchanges words with the official and then gets his documents back before joining me.

“Why did you give him money?” I ask, as we walk toward the baggage carousel.

“It can cause complications when I go back home if I have a Cuban stamp on my passport,” he replies.

“So that was a bribe?”

“I prefer to think of it more as a thank you for not stamping my passport.”

I give him a little sidelong glance and he winks at me. “I thought restrictions were easing for you guys. Do they still care about that?”

“I don’t know,” he admits with a shrug. “But why take the chance. Besides, everyone here can use a little something extra anyway. I don’t mind.”

I’ve heard that, and in fact, despite the fact that Chase didn’t bring a lot of clothes of his own since he hadn’t packed for Cuba initially, he brought two big suitcases on the trip after filling one entirely with hundreds of dollars’ worth of sundry items he picked up at the dollar and drugstore. I was happy to see him do that. It’s common knowledge in Canada that Cubans have very little and what is available to them is very expensive, so travelers often bring toiletries or clothes to hand out to the locals, but I didn’t know if Chase was aware of that custom.

Within minutes we have our bags and are outside the airport looking for a taxi.

“Look at these cars,” I gasp in surprise. All of a sudden I have a weird feeling like I’ve been transported into a movie from the 1950s. There seems to be classic cars everywhere and all of them in amazingly good shape. No signs of rust or dents, polished and washed as if they’d just come off the showroom floor.

Chase laughs and leads me to one of them. A dark and weathered man smiles at us and opens his trunk before grabbing our bags and putting them in.

I give Chase a questioning look.

“This is our taxi,” he grins.

The man opens the door and Chase says something to him quickly in Spanish before we both get in. “This is a taxi?” It’s odd that a people that have so little would use expensive classic cars as taxis.

“The embargo started around 1960,” Chase explains as the driver makes his way around the front of the car to his still open door. “Before that, Cuba would import lots of cars from the US. But since then, they’ve had nothing new. They have to just maintain everything they already had.”

“But… how do they get parts to keep them running?” I ask. The car seems to be in great shape for something more than 60 years old.

“They have to make them. There aren’t really any junkyards filled with old cars in Cuba. Everything is reused and rebuilt by hand. You will see newer cars here, but not from the States.”

He’s right. As we drive, there are other cars. Some from Europe, many from Asia. I see a lot of Hyundais. But at the same time, we also pass plenty of horse drawn carts. It’s an odd contrast to see the mix of classic American cars, newer Asia ones, and then horse powered wagons all being used at the same time for day to day activities.

I stare out the window in wonder as we drive. I’ve never seen so much green.

“What do they grow here?”

“Lots of stuff. Sugar cane used to be their primary industry. It’s still their biggest export. Canada and China are their biggest trading partners these days.”

“You said it used to be their primary industry? What is it now?”

“Tourism. At this point it employs more workers than sugar cane.”

We drive for a little while and I’m in awe at the surrounding countryside. “It’s beautiful,” I breathe.

“It really is. The resort we’re going to is beautiful as well, it’s made for tourists. I booked us there because I thought it would be nice to have a getaway where we can be pampered, but I do want to take you off resort to see the real Cuba.”

“Definitely,” I nod.

We finally pull through tall gates with the driver stopping only briefly to say something to the guard before pulling us through. He pulls around to an open front desk and we get out while he brings our bags around to us. Chase hands him a few bills and thanks him in Spanish before leading us to the smiling faces of the hotel staff. They greet us with drinks and I sit down on a comfortable couch while Chase checks us in. Within ten minutes we’re standing in front of a small, private, beachfront cabana. As soon as Chase opens the door I can tell it’s perfect. The walls are white, and sunlight is streaming through the curtains onto a big king size bed that is covered in rose petals. There’s a bottle of champagne on ice on the nightstand next to it.

“What do you think?” he asks. It’s a stupid question, so I don’t waste time answering it. Instead, I spin on my heel and pull him towards me and into a kiss as I continue to back up until I feel the edge of the bed behind me. My only concern is making sure that Chase’s body lands firmly on top of me as I fall backwards amongst the red petals.