LUXURY

＂ Ｔｈｅ Ｆａｋｅ Ａｎｄ Ｔｈｅ Ｃｒａｚｅｄ ＂ (4/5)

Damon Felix didn't dream much. Maybe it was because, according to all of America, his life was the dream that everyone wanted and aspired to have.

Either that or he just didn't have a very big imagination.

However, when he did dream, he always remembered them. Mostly because they weren't figments but actual memories. Random memories with a touch of imaginary 'What-the-fuck-was-that-ness'. Like standing as formally as possible at one of the annoying Beverly Hills event whilst listening to some washed-up billionaire talk about fundraisers - and then abruptly reciting the lyrics to a Kanye West song. Or playing a good game of Lacrosse on Alabaster Prep's lush field and injuring poor Connor Royce high off of Brett Richers' steroids, Coach Mitchells' whistle suddenly sounding like an underwater whale.

And then sometimes the dreams were more scary rather than random memories with a touch of imagination. Like arguing with Jac Lexington on the hot tub balcony and raising his fist over her - except in the dream, he actually hit her. Or crashing his father's favorite Corvette, except somehow, he actually died.

Or like the dream he was having now in which a twelve-year-old Damon whom he seemed to be following, squeezed through the crack in the doorway where his father stood; stony faced and still as marble. The maid, Griselda, had tried to pull him back along with every other staff that was on shift in the Felix estate that day but Damon was far too curious because making hoops in the large Basketball court in the backyard had become boring and Erika was being a bitch.

So Damon shrugged off the reaching hands of the Help and peered into the spacious master bathroom and there she was, his mother in the same soft pink Narciso Rodriguez slip dress she'd been wearing at their dinner in NYC earlier, the pure glass tub she laid in filled to the brim with sparkling water. At first, Damon had wondered why she was taking a bath with her clothes on because last time he checked, no one did that except for Jason Price - a complete weirdo who he sat next to at Weston Day School who ate hundred dollar bills at recess and loved to give TMI.

It took a few moments for him to realize that she was dead. Her ocean blue eyes were wide open and a hand hung off the sill of the bathtub, a bottle strewn on the marble tiled floor of peculiar white tablets that he'd seen her take during random moments of the day. Like after dinner, before a day out on Rodeo Drive, or after they were safely tucked in their Range Rover embellished with tinted windows.

And once he realized that she was gone, relief coursed through Damon like a wave because it meant 'no more.' No more slaps across the face whenever the wrong words were spoken, no more holding her hair as she threw up red blood that matched the color of her MAC lipstick, no more of the bullshit stories to explain away splotches of purple and Gucci sunglasses that seemed to be glued to her face.

It was over and she was free and inside, Damon breathed a sigh of solace.

Until Matthew Felix, his hard, stern-faced father, actually broke down and started to cry. He abruptly ran over to the tub and started to cradle his wife's head, crying into her damp, blonde hair and saying something under his breath that Damon couldn't hear.

Someone finally dialed 911 and the exhale of relief Damon had quickly turned into trepidation. Because this was the first time he'd ever seen his Dad actually love his mother, not the facade they put on in front of others with the perfect image of 'the-millionaire-and-his-lovely-trophy-wife,' but actually giving a damn for once.

Which meant despite everything, he might have really loved her.

And now she was gone.

Matthew must have finally realized Damon was standing in the doorway because he yelled at the peasants tending to his estate to escort him to his room.