Romance Fan Fiction / Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Waking Up in Vegas ❯ Things Can Only Get Better ( Chapter 1 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Shaking the glitter off of your clothes after a miss-spent night out never caused as big a headache as shaking the glitter off of your clothes after a miss-spent night out in Vegas...baby.

Miscellaneous: Romance Fan Fiction / Original Stories Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 06.20.2009 | Pages: 3 | Words: 6.3K | Visits: 544 | Status: Work In Progress

“Waking Up in Vegas” copyright Isla Kennedy; June 20 2009

This is an original piece of fiction featuring characters and plots copyrighted in the name of Isla Kennedy. This work is solely intended for posting on MediaMiner, for the benefit and enjoyment of its intended audience. Any unauthorised copying or redistribution of this work might subject the party responsible for such unauthorized copying or redistribution to legal action by the owners of the aforementioned copyrights and trademarks.

Waking Up in Vegas

Chapter One: Things Can Only Get Better

`Get up and shake the glitter off your clothes now
That's what you get for waking up in Vegas' - Katy Perry

----

She wasn't sure if it was the rays of that god damned sun peeking in the window through those bleak white curtains, or if it was the hammering sensation coursing through her skull that made her crack her eyes in the slightest way. Either way, she was now regretting it and wished that she'd just left it alone.

At the tender age of twenty-three years old, our beloved heroine, Emmerson Reinhardt, wasn't well experienced with the aftermath of hangovers.

Killer hangovers that were causing her to contemplate suicide.

Suicide seemed like the better option at this point instead of the pure pain and agony that she felt erupting through her veins. She just wanted to die.

What had made her drink until her body cracked under the pressure anyway? She drank herself into a bottomless pit the night prior, and now she was feeling the repercussions. She tried to wrap her foggy, fuzzy mind around a reasonable concept, trying to make the gears grind inside her head, to no avail. It only made the headache worse. She felt like someone was banging her head repeatedly on concrete.

She reached a hand up to her forehead, trailing it to the back as she ran it through her rugged curls, inspecting for blood. Luckily she found none or anything resembling it. At least she was still alive. Or so she thought.

It was only that fucking sun that wouldn't stop shining so damn brightly. That sadistic, bright, yellow bastard was probably up in the sky, beaming down a few special rays just for Emmerson. He was probably enjoying a couple of laughs over making her suffer more than she already was.

She felt a bit of a chill and instinctively pulled up the white sheets to cover her small, exhausted frame. She pulled, releasing a grunt when she found out that the sheet didn't budge. She furrowed her small brows and pulled again. Still no moving. Using all the strength she could get at that moment in time, she took a deep breath and pulled again, this time with so much force she almost tumbled off the side of the bed. Oh, and the sheets moved just a tad. She sighed in defeat and took what portion of the covers she had, trying to pull them over her shoulder. This time she was met with another noise...something more...vocal, if you will.

Vocal? Then that meant...

No.

Either she was hearing voices inside her head...cruel, high-pitched voices and shrieks of the people up there tormenting her, or she wasn't hearing anything at all.

She shot upright into a sitting position, only to fall back on the bed, lightly bouncing. Shock waves of pain and agony coursed through her body again. She made a mental note to never even think about thinking about taking another sip of alcohol ever again. Ever.

When the shooting pain somewhat subsided, she attempted rising again. She looked a little to the left and down and was met with the unmistakable, unforgettable figure of someone beside her.

A man. A man. A very well built man, at that.

"What the fuck?" Her hoarse voice whispered in disbelief. The figure next to her grunted and murmured something incomprehensible. She tried to make out some words in that familiar voice. It was almost too familiar. She leaned into the figure, eyebrows furrowed and in question.

"Emmy..." The voice said again, this time with a deep chuckle immediately after it. The voice was a melting pot of sarcasm, bass, boredom, contempt, and bewilderment all into one. Then she realized.

No one else called her Emmy. Except one person.

It suddenly hit her. It hit her worse than the initial feeling of the hangover did.

"Freddie!" She screeched.

"Emmerson, please..." he said, throwing a pillow over his head. "My head could erupt at any minute now. Your fucking banshee-esque screaming isn't something I'd like to wake up to. Have a little respect for the people in my head."

Her mouth was wide open, in an 'O' shape, like she was ready to catch flies or whatever insect flew her way. She began sputtering nonsense when her mouth became dry, suddenly losing recount of all of her vocabulary, spitting out only monosyllable words and little squeaks. It was a mix, actually. The realization of her waking up to Freddie Waldgrave unceremoniously next to her (quite naked as well, but Emmerson had yet to realize) was more important than the insult he tossed at her. However, insulting each other was as natural as breathing was, the only thing they didn't do that was natural...was sleep together.

Ever. At any time.

"Oh God, I'm going to be sick." Emmerson finally uttered, placing a hand over her mouth.

"Can you be a darling and turn the other way, then?"

The bile that was about to eject from her insides was momentarily forgotten as she glared down at him in response to his comment, wanting nothing more than to bash his head into the wooden headboard above them until he was bleeding all over.

How did this happen? How did Freddie Waldgrave manage to get Emmerson Reinhardt unbearably drunk and drag her back to a...a motel that didn't look too shabby, but not five-star quality either? She thought, with all that money he has, he'd at least let her awaken to a nice room rather than one where there were more coffee and piss stains than there was paint on the walls.

"What the...you...and me...we...huh?" Emmerson just gave up and slammed a hand to her forehead, soon crying out in agony.

Big mistake. She couldn't comprehend why she was more upset with forming a comprehensible sentence with some sort of noun-verb agreement than she was with more...explicit matters at hand.

"Well, I can't say this isn't what it looks like, because then I'd be lying," Freddie began, sighing heavily. "Looks like we pretty much fucked each other's brains out." He added, sitting up as well. Emmerson felt a flush form on her cheeks as she pulled the now-loose sheet up over herself, hugging it as if it was the only thing she had left. She was infuriated that she had let someone have the ability to make her blush: something she hadn't done in the slightest way in over ten years.

Freddie Waldgrave would never have that power again.

"You...you monstrous, nauseating, obnoxious, repugnant-" Freddie held up a hand before she travelled farther in her mental thesaurus.

"Okay, Reinhardt," Freddie said, boredom lingering in his voice. "I get it. Do you really have the need to make this more horrendous scene even more...well, horrendous?" His propped his head up on his elbow. "It doesn't solve a thing."

"You...you..." Here comes that monosyllabic word again.

"Monstrous? Nauseating? Obnoxious? Repugnant?" He finished as his cobalt eyes shifted downwards from her worried face to... better things. It was that kind of morning, needless to say.

She felt his gaze burning, not comprehending the fact that the simple white cloth over her chest had slipped a lot more than she intended it to. She scowled at that pompous smirk on his lips and pulled the sheet back up. She found herself wishing that the world would just open up and swallow her whole without hesitation... or that she would wake up from this horrid nightmare. Whichever one would take her the farthest from Freddie, she wouldn't complain about.

"I don't think you recall how any of this," he gestured towards the bed, "came-" he paused again, realizing his pun, "...about."

"I don't have a clue, besides the fact that you got me all liquored up and brought me to this rat's nest against my will only to fulfil some weird sexual fantasy you could have had."

"Are you insinuating something?" Freddie asked. Emmerson sighed heavily before rubbing her temples, after securing the sheet tightly under her arms, of course.

"You...took advantage of me."

Freddie turned his nose and raised a curious eyebrow at her.

"That's. Fucking. Ridiculous."

Emmerson scoffed.

"How so, Waldgrave?"

"Although my memory hasn't completely been restored yet..." he yawned, cutting himself off.”I seriously doubt having you slung over my shoulder while you were whispering and nibbling rather harshly on my ear counts as me taking advantage of you." He finished with a suggestive smirk, pointing respectively to himself and her. Emmerson blinked wordlessly, and then paled at her epiphany. He was flirting with her.

Fucking flirting? At a time like this?! Unacceptable. She wanted to smack that damn smug look off his face. This was a completely exigent predicament they were in, now was not the time.

"Wait," she said, raising her pointer finger in the air. "If you don't remember...and I don't remember...then how am I sure you didn't bring me here against my will?" She said, crossing her arms over her chest, subconsciously giving Freddie a better view.

"Please tell me you're not seriously considering that I raped you." Freddie said to her. Emmerson noticed his careless tone, but there was true hurt underneath it. As much as she didn't want to admit it, she knew Freddie Waldgrave. And she knew pretty damn well that he wouldn't lay a harmful finger on a woman if she didn't want...or beg him to.

Or he was just extremely loaded, and lost all brain functions. Despite that, she immediately began feeling guilty.

"No."

Freddie nodded before swinging his legs over the other side of the bed, sighing heavily. He looked for his clothes and found his, and hers, in an assorted mess near the door...and the television...and the window. He managed to pull his sore, lethargic body out of bed and grab his clothes.

Emmerson, however, was simply frozen in her spot, not daring to move. It's not like she didn't want to...she wanted to, but she was transfixed in watching Freddie's simple movements across the carpeted floor. Her mind was still too foggy for her to even fathom that she was staring at him. She watched like a hawk how he moved with such feline grace, even though she knew he was just as hung-over- possibly more- than she was. His hair was tousled, but it looked like it was meant to be that way. Like he just woke up, shook his hair once, and set out for the day.

"Were you going to stare all day, Reinhardt?" Freddie's husky voice sliced through the air, thus knocking Emmerson from a fantasy of her own. She was speechless, so she just shook her head and blushed, again goddamnit, when Freddie laughed at her. She brought a hand up to rub her eyes when that bastard from before- that being the Sun- shone in again, reflecting off a small object on her ring finger. Emmerson frowned, shutting her eyes and soon reopening them to look at the sight before her.

"A ring..." she whispered to no one in particular."Silver. Wedding. Rings. Oh my God..." Freddie noticed her raspy rant behind him, pulling his boxers and pants over his hips, ignoring her. "You have one too, Freddie!" Freddie cringed at the sound of her voice. He put a mental sticky-note up to remind himself to rip out her vocal box. Soon. He froze and turned around to face her with a peculiar expression.

"Look at your ring finger." She instructed. He followed and looked at his left wedding finger, seeing that he had a similar silver band around it, not as eye-catching as Emmerson's, but shiny nonetheless. He must have been the one to pick it out, remembering that Emmerson couldn't have possibly rid herself of her uncanny bad taste over the years.

"That's...interesting." He cringed again. Emmerson lifted herself off the bed in a flurry of motions, trying to locate her clothing that was strewn across the room. She made a point to clutch the white sheet even tighter. She didn't want to expose herself to Freddie more than she already had that morning...and night before. She rubbed her eyes, wishing her previous wish, that this all would just be a horrible nightmare, would hurry up and come true already.

Freddie speculated to himself. When the hell had they gotten married? That was his first question, until he thought of a better one.

Why the hell had they gotten married?

Only sheer stupidity...or sheer intoxication...was the reasoning behind this...coupling, if they could even call it that.

"Interesting?! What the hell?! Freddie, we're married!" Emmerson said, flashing her ring finger. As if her screeching wasn't enough to make him realize. He thought about her vocal box again. "Married! Why are you so calm and completely nonchalant about this?! You're completely unaffected by the fact that we're married!" He watched her wordlessly as she scurried like a squirrel around the room as she muttered angrily, moving throughout the room.

"First off, I'm a calm kind of guy. Worrying doesn't solve the problem," he began, staying in his spot as he put his shirt on. She was still searching frantically for some article of clothing that just wouldn't show up. "Secondly, nonchalant is a bit of an exaggeration," he spotted her red lace thong hanging from the television antenna and smirked. "Thirdly, if that's a word," he questioned. "Let me assure your pretty little head that I am not unaffected by this," he reached upwards, dangling her underwear from his pointer finger above her head. She spotted them and gasped in embarrassment, reaching up as his went up farther, her tiny hands gripping at nothing but air. "Sweetheart" He finished, letting her grab her underwear. There was a little bit of a spark when their fingers brushed against each other.

Maybe it was just coming from the carpet.

"So, what do you want to do first?" She said, sighing and running a hand through her hair. Freddie smirked.

"Breakfast would be nice," he answered smugly. Emmerson's face softened as she gave him a deadpanned look. "I want some... pancakes... and some bacon. Maybe we could squeeze in a shower?" Emmerson's face remained straight as she looked her husband, feeling amused and a little insulted at his implications.

"Oh, get your mind out of the gutter, Reinhardt," he said, snapping her from her reverie. "I mean separately, of course, unless you'd like to save some water with your ideas." He raised a suggestive eyebrow at her, and Emmerson rolled her eyes at his mocking. Or was it even mocking? She wasn't sure with Freddie at times. She made a dash for the bathroom, clumsily slipping over the long sheet in the process and he unsuccessfully stifled a laugh. She slammed the door shut behind her after glaring as he continued picking up items around the room. He heard the jets of the shower from outside along with the occasional clattering of things and muttering coming from the likes of little Miss Reinhardt.

Or would it be Mrs. Waldgrave, now? Freddie shook off the thought as he sat at the foot of the bed, toying with the silver band that now occupied his ring finger. He noticed that the Irish side of her was coming out and how terribly it was acting up. He wondered how many generations removed that Emmerson descended from. Apparently, the time spent in London, England wasn't enough.

He looked at the heap of sheets he sat in, remembering that they weren't exactly that clean, or that they may not have been so sanitary to begin with. He looked around the room in disgust, scrunching up his nose in Emmerson-esque fashion and suddenly felt...dirty. He toyed with the silver ring more. He glanced back up at the room. Brown wasn't too much of a nice colour anymore, he decided. He sighed and got up from his spot on the bed, knocking down the bedside wastebasket in the process. He groaned and bent over swiftly to pick it up, something he would soon regret, remembering that damn hangover. He muttered in agony as he observed the contents of the trash can that were in a heap on the rather dirty carpets.

There was the usual, a bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos, a water bottle, a used coffee filter, eight condoms...

Freddie froze. He wasn't sure if he was seeing things, or... nothing else, really. He quickly counted the condoms before him again... a second time...and a third time (it is the charm, right?).

Eight condoms? Really?

He and Emmerson... eight times? In one night?

Damn.

At least they were protected. That had to count for something, right? Even in their highly inebriated demeanour, they were smart enough to remember to wrap it up. He knew there was no possibility of a screaming runt- two screaming runts actually, Emmerson being the main one- running around.

"Oh my God!" He heard Emmerson's shriek from the bathroom, followed by a clutter of more things. His head snapped back and forth between the condoms and the door, unsure whether he should get up or not. He used his hand to scoop up the wastebasket trash, reminding himself to soak that same hand later, and turned his head to the door. The door flashed open, heat immediately entering the room, but it wasn't due to the shower.

It was because Freddie caught sight of a dripping wet Emmerson, hair soaked and tousled, wrapped in a fluffy white towel that didn't leave much to the imagination. Did she ever wear clothes? He thought.

But he wasn't complaining.

"What is it?" He finally spoke. He was praying to the heavens above that there weren't more condoms in the bathroom trash can.

"Frederick?"

"Emmerson."

"Do you have... a tattoo, perhaps?"

A what?

"Of what, exactly?"

"...my name?"

Freddie shrugged carelessly when he felt a stinging pain on the back of his shoulder that wasn't there before.

Oh God...

Things have to get worse before they get better, right?