35. Sunny

I ranout of the engagement party, but the memory of Cole"s proposal continued to haunt me.

Especially late at night, when there was nothing else to occupy my mind while I tried to fall asleep on Tony and Cherenity"s fashionable-but-rock-hard couch.

Also in the morning, when I woke up alone.

And during the day, when I ate a protein bar for lunch instead of joining Cole at the Benton Golf Club.

Okay, I might have also sobbed through the season finale of Rap Star Wives for reasons that had nothing to do with C Mello"s drag queen son getting married in Vegas. At the Tourmaline. But still...

Cole"s marriage proposal looped in my head. Why had he done that? To keep me from leaving before the jig was up? To make sure I remained his sexual plaything? Of all the chess moves he'd pulled, pretending like he really wanted to marry me was the thing that haunted me the worst.

"I can"t figure out if this is allyship or emotional fallout," Cherenity said over my audible sobbing. "Either way, please get yourself together. I have exclusive Main Character rights in this apartment, not you."

She was right. Also, I still had to get through the Glo Johnson Spring Recital before I could leave for New York.

"Not going to lie, mi amor, I think me dancing in your show is going to be a disaster. Are you sure you don"t want Cherenity to do this instead of me?" Tony asked as he and his totally-not-fake (if you didn"t count the wig, eyelashes, and boobs) fiancée helped me carry boxes filled with awards and accessories for tonight"s recital out to his hatchback.

"Baby, you know I don"t believe in volunteering," Cherenity answered before I could. "You"re lucky I"m helping your overstaying ex-beard with these boxes."

My stomach squeezed with guilt, but Cherenity pulled me in for a one-arm hug before I could apologize again. "Just kidding, Sunny. You know I love you." She kissed me on the top of my head. "But honey, I cannot handle another crying jag before you finally sashay away to New York. You"ve got my nerves snatched with the constant bursting into tears over getting dickmatized by the billionaire."

Somehow, Cherenity managed to sound like she both loved me dearly and genuinely couldn"t wait for me to be gone. Either way, she was right. I"d been on their couch for three weeks now, disrupting their for-real-not-fake engaged bliss. And I didn"t want to call myself a total wreck, but I hadn"t stopped randomly tearing up over how things ended with Cole until...

Well, a few hours ago, when I realized I needed to pull it together for the dance recital the girls had spent months preparing for. It wasn"t my students" fault their teacher was an idiot who"d gone and gotten her heart broken—or, as Cherenity so colorfully put it, dickmatized.

"You know a good way to make sure she doesn"t start crying again, baby?" Tony regarded the love of his life with a pleading look. "Take my place in the show. I had a nightmare that I messed up the steps and lifts so many times that Sunny came out of the audience and started beating me with her dance stick."

"Baby, I saw yesterday"s dry run. That dream was probably a portent of things to come," Cherenity answered with her trademark complete lack of sympathy.

"I won"t beat you," I assured Tony.

"Yeah, she needs our couch until next week, so she"ll just keep her thoughts about your sucktastic lack of rhythm or any other dance skill to herself," Cherenity added, like the bitchiest real feelings translator.

"Baby, can you please just do this one thing for me? Hesus Kristo!"Tony exploded. "Bakit hindi mo ba ako kailanman masuportahan nang walang drama?"

"I don"t even know the choreography!" Cherenity shouted back. "Just like I don"t know Filipino. At least lemme go get my red wig if you"re gonna turn this into a bad episode of I Love Lucy! Do you want me to start yelling in Armenian? Cuz I"ll do it. Try me! Try me!"

And they were off. Again. One of what seemed to be a minimum of three top-of-their-lung fights per day that usually ended with a noisy round of make-up sex.

At our bachelorduetto planning party, Pru had taken bets for them getting into a screaming match at the wedding, with odds placed on where, what time, and how many.

Though, I had to admit, Cherenity had told no lies. Tony was a truly terrible sub-in, even after two weeks of rehearsal. His clumsy lack of grace made Cole look like Patrick Swayze.But I"d re-choreographed the Saturday class"s performance around Cole being there—mainly because he"d promised the girls he would be, even though it was after our relationship contract"s expiration date.

Just another of the truly, epically stupid things I"d done and believed when it came to Cole "Triple Ice" Benton.

"Hey, you two. Can we not?" I intervened. "The recital"s in less than an hour, and we have to make sure the girls get their ears and tails."

If Tony and Cherenity could hear me, it didn"t show. They kept arguing with each other in a mix of Filipino and Armenian on the street beside Tony"s car.

My phone rang before I could try again. And I scrunched my brow when I saw the 310 number with "Malibu Haven" written underneath.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Sunny Bunny. Do you have time to talk?"

"Mom?" I stopped walking. "Everything okay? Why are you calling me from Malibu?"

"Actually, that"s what I wanted to talk with you about. We"re having family days in two weeks, and I was hoping you could come out for a talk with my counselor and me?"

"A talk? Is this some kind of outpatient thing now that you"re finished with rehab?"

Long pause. Then, "Did he not tell you?"

"Who not tell me what?" I asked

"The Benton heir, who said you two were engaged? He came to visit me in Los Angeles and found me in a bad place."

I"d dealt with my mother"s addiction for long enough now to know that "in a bad place" was her euphemism for using again.

"But you just got out of rehab last month!"

"Sunny. Oh, Sunny Bunny." My mother"s voice cracked. "I love that you believed in me. That you always believed me. But I never went to rehab. I"ve been using for years."

"Years?" I repeated. "But you live in L.A. You have a job."

"Jobs," she corrected. "I"ve been a functioning addict for years. And I haven"t been honest with you. But I guess your Benton heir figured it out because he showed up out of the blue at my apartment and offered me an open-ended stay at Malibu Haven. If I got clean."

My mind reeled with all this new information. "I don"t understand. Why would he do that?"

"I"m guessing because he"s as rich as Midas, and he loves you."

"But we"re not—that"s not..." Every explanation I could come up with was too complicated. I had to settle for, "We"re not together anymore."

And then, I started crying. Again. Just like Cherenity warned me not to do.

"Oh, Sunny Bunny." For once, my mother sounded like the nurturing parent I'd always wanted. "What happened?"

And that"s how I ended up plopping down on a Vegas curb, sobbing my heart out as I told my mother everything while she gasped and uttered increasingly emphatic, "No, he didn"t!"s.

However, her sympathetic murmurs stopped when I told her about the contract. "Wait, he asked you to marry him?"

"He offered me a contract. He doesn"t love me."

"Oh, that man loves you. Trust. I would not be finally making breakthroughs and healing in a three-month 360-rehab program that costs twice as much as I stole if he wasn"t head over heels in love with you."

"No, Mom, you don"t understand." Tears brimmed in my eyes. "If that was true, he would have said that."

"Girl, do you know how many times your father claimed he loved me? More than his wife. Once, more than the kids, he actually acknowledged. They"ve got a saying here at Malibu Haven: It"s not about the words; it"s about the do. What did he do before he offered you that contract?"

Memories suddenly exploded in my head. Cole removing me from that horrible apartment...Cole taking off work whenever I wanted to play with him...Cole listening—really listening—to me and insisting it wasn"t my fault when I finally confessed what happened with my mother...Early that last morning, when Cole cut the fun and games and moved inside of me with a look so tender, I couldn"t help but burst out with what was truly on my heart.

"Sunny? Sunny?" my mother asked on the other side of the phone. "Are you still there?"

"Sunny, mi amor? What are you doing sitting on the dirty-ass curb?" Another voice asked.

I turned to see Tony and Cherenity standing over me with arms slung around each other"s waists. Apparently, they'd made up.

"See, I told you!" Cherenity extended both arms toward me while flaring her eyes at Tony. "She was going to start crying again whether or not I took your place!"