The Alpha Bet

Authors note: This is the sequence of chapter one, but also can be read as a separate story. Although I think you should read it for background.

Feel free to comment in a constructive way.

I'm always open to suggestions, and appreciate the feedback.

Hope you enjoy it.

~~~~~~~~~~

Part one

The joke is on you

The penthouse stood only three stories high, above the pool, like what you would expect in a small town hotel and casino, so the nose dive, only lasted a few seconds, but before hitting the body of water, he still had the reflex of bringing the hands to cover his face, but otherwise the whole body hit flat on the surface, making a huge splash.

As he hit the water, he fell unconscious, and just laid there in the middle of the blue rectangle, for a couple of seconds, until he opened his eyes and realized he was lying on the floor of his bedroom soaking wet on his sweat and water from a glass which was now shattered around over him.

He was still trying to make sense of it all, when his mother burst into the room.

"What happened here!? Are you ok?" her mouth remained open, as she looked down to the site where her boy lays in his boxers, covered in a mix of water and glass.

"Umm...mom...what...what...what..." he was still a bit groggy and rubbing his eyes.

"That's what I want to know? Look at you! What in heavens sake happened?" she frowned.

"It seems I had a nightmare...a terrible nightmare...which...is fortunately over." he sighed with relief.

"Well ok, then let me get a mop to clean up that mess, and be careful with the glass." and she went to the kitchen.

"Sure mom." he picked up a sock and gently brushed the tiny pieces of glass off his body.

After that he lifted back onto the bed, and just sit there gathering his thoughts.

His mother came back with a broom, a mop and a bucket. She wondered what kind of nightmare had caused that.

"What were you dreaming about?" she was now on her knees picking glass with plastic gloves.

"Well it was a nightmare, I'm glad it's over, and I don't want to think about again, OK!" and let out another sigh.

"Ok then, it's almost lunch time, are you coming down or do you have other plans?" she was now mopping up.

"You can count me in for lunch, I don't have any plans for now." he stretched back on the bed, realizing it was drenched in sweat.

"By the way mom, the bed also needs a change." he grinned.

"You can help me with that after lunch, but the sheets can go to the washing machine. Bring them when you come down." she looked around to see if she missed any pieces of glass.

"Ok mom, I'll be down in a jiffy" he start to pull the sheets onto a pile.

"Put your slippers on, this room isn't safe until I vacuum." she squeezed the mop, and left.

After a quick shower, he changed and went down to lunch.

~~~~~~~~~~

He looked at his phone to see the date, it was April 1st, which meant that the nightmare was just is mind playing a April fools' trick on him, and that was it.

He grinned at that thought, and supposed the bet was also a figment of his imagination. So after lunch he went straight to his jacket pocket and took the little black book.

He hoped for a blank page, but instead he found a set of rules in the casino owner's handwriting.

RULES

1st- You can only bring one girl per day,

2nd- You can't play with her money, only her,

3rd- You can only play one game per day, (ex: Poker, Blackjack, Roulette, Slots, Dice),

4th- You must fuck them all in our private penthouse and we'll tape it, just to make sure, and finally,

5th- You have to follow the order of the alphabet, and bring only one for each letter, and it ends only when our cashier receives the 1000$ chip they won.

This was for real, so he frowned and decided to get to work and started to call girls to set the dates. Of course the first he called was April, since he wanted to find out how she would react to him.

So he dialed and waited, the phone gave a couple of beeps and then voice mail answered, he left a message and continued to booty call.

After he set up a couple of dates in alphabetical order, the phone rang.

"Hi April, how'd you been!" he was trying to sound natural, disguising his nervousness, but instead of a warm welcome she immediately started shouting at him so hard, he had to move the phone away from his ear.

"Ok then, I'll cut trough the chase, I want to make it up to you." at that the shouting stopped.

"Look I want to take you out on a date and right the wrong, can I have a second chance?" the silence was only disturbed when she started to cry.

"I'm sorry, I know I was an asshole, but I want to make amends." after a deep breath she said ok in a very timid voice.

"Today, are you free" he knew it was spring break so he was expecting a positive answer. He heard her mumble.

"I know it's a little short notice, but I don't want to wait any more time to do something I should have done along time ago." he was now more confident and that showed, his listener was going along.

"I'll make it a date you'll never forget, including a penthouse and massage, so what do you say, do you wanna be my date?" again the silence filled the air, until she dropped a bomb. "I'm pregnant, you bastard! Do you even love me?" he froze.

Suddenly he was in the eye of the storm, but not for long.

As she insisted. "Do you love me or not?"

His brain was a vacant place, nothing roamed that wilderness. Until his mind played another trick on him. Like a rider of the apocalypse a phrase stormed in and charged out of his mouth.

"I do! Do you want to marry me?" he couldn't believe he just said that and stood there mouth wide open in awe.

She was now sobbing, but mumbled a soft and loving, "I do! I love you too!"

"It's a date then, I'll pick you up at seven. Dear fiancee!" and he dropped the phone and fell in the bed like as if he had been shot in the head.

The young man was mesmerized with what just had happened. His mind was playing tricks on him. So he went in the bathroom and decided to cool things off.

He put his head in the shower, opened the cold water and let it run, until he started to shiver, turned off the water and just sat on the edge of the tub, holding his head.

He went to get his stash of pot, to trip out and forget what just had happened.

He lit the joint and hold it there, staring at it, he realized that could be the reason was turning into a trickster, and without hesitation flushed it and all the weed that was left.

As he watched it down the whirlpool, he felt relief.

He needed to sleep but was afraid to have another nightmare, so he thought getting drunk would take care of that.

He went to the liquor cabinet, and took a bottle of vodka, and another one of tequila and an ice bucket which he filled up in the fridge and headed to his room.

He closed the door, sat on the edge of the bed then poured both bottles into the bucket and drank till he passed out.

When his mother entered the bedroom, the smell of alcohol was enough to make anyone tipsy, so when she saw her boy on the mattress and found the empty bottles lying on the floor was like someone had ripped her heart out off her chest.

The horror of the scene was stamped on her face, "Oh no Zack, what have you done?!?" she cried as she launched herself on the bed slapping his face.

But he wasn't giving any signs of life, so she grabbed the phone from the ground and frantically dialed 911.

As soon as the paramedics got there they rushed him to the Hospital, and left him there in alcoholic coma.

Fortunately his mother had found shortly after he blacked out, so he would be fine in a couple of days.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Part two

The other life

He saw his father waving at him from the distance, he had a fishermen hat and jacket and light blue jeans.

He started walking towards him and picked up the pace as he got closer, throwing himself in his arms in an everlasting hug that was long overdue.

He cried, " I've missed you so much Dad!"

"I Know son, I Know!" he whispered in his ear, and then gave him a kiss on cheek.

"Where are we?" the room was very bright like if it was filled with floodlights.

"The only thing I can tell you is that your life is not over yet, cause now you've got another life to take care of, and remember if you think only about yourself, you'll end up alone facing the mirror and wishing that you've done things another way. Goodbye son, I'll be watching over you" the lights suddenly shut down and he felt a chill up his spine.

A flash of light lit up the room and then it was dark again, another flash and darkness, another flash and a thumping on his chest and the room got flooded with light again, but a vortex was now pulling him away from that room and lights fade until they were just a bright spot in a far away distance.

Then he started to ear some voices, but he couldn't understand what they were saying, slowly he recognized one, an anguished feminine voice was calling his name, "Zach, Zach, Thank God! I thought I lost you!" she hold his face kissed his forehead and then cried for a while with her head on her hands.

He dozed off.

~~~~~~~~~~~

The night was calm, a spring breeze danced among the leafs of the oak tree outside the window.

He sat on the bed and looked around. He was in a hospital room, and his mother was sitting beside his bed, sleeping.

He didn't knew the time but it was either dusk or dawn, cause the sky had a mix of colors from dark blue to soft pink.

He tried to get up to go to the bathroom, but found he was hooked to a bag of saline, and as he pulled an alarm went of waking up his mother.

Startled she looked to the bed and found her son wide awake and looking at her.

"Morning Mom, sorry bout that!" he wiggled his hand shaking the tube.

"Morning Zach! What were you trying to do?" she asked still a little sleepy.

"I was trying to go to the bathroom!" he grinned.

"Not that, I meant why you're in the hospital?" she straightened up in the chair. "I don't know!" and shrugged his shoulders.

"You were trying to kill yourself, and me in the process!" she argued.

"What?!?" a question mark formed in his face.

"You almost drowned in alcohol, if I had found you a couple of minutes later, we probably wouldn't be talking right now." she stood up and leaned on the bed.

"Why?" he asked with curiosity.

"That's what I would like to know?" she was now looking upset.

"Look Mom, I don't remember what happened, but while I was out I saw Dad!" he stared at her looking for a reaction.

"Who?!?" she leapt back from the bed with surprise.

"Dad. It was probably one of those near death experiences stuff." he now sat at the edge of the bed looking straight in her eyes.

"Oh, I see." she sighed.

"He told me that if I think only about myself, I'll end up alone facing the mirror and wishing that I've done things another way. Then he said goodbye , and that he'll be watching over me." he said it all with a very calm voice.

Those words hit a nerve on her and she thought for a while, but then she decided it was time to tell him the truth. She had almost lost him and she didn't knew why but bringing the truth out would probably clear things up.

So she closed her eyes and swallowed dry, and when she opened them said, "Look soon, I've got something I need to tell you" she paused to gather strength to break the seal of the Pandora's box.

"What's wrong?" he knew something was up and probably not a good thing.

"I want you to listen to all that I'm going to say, without questions, and don't judge until you ear it all, ok?" she said with a trembling voice.

"Ok Mom. Whatever it is, you know I love very Much!" he said with a soft smile.

"I know son, and that's why I want you to know that what I did was because I loved you very Much too" she cleared her throat and continued " Ok, here goes. Your father is not dead..."

"Not Dead!!!" his jaw fell.

"I told you to don't interrupt me." she warned.

"Like I was saying, he's not dead, well not that I know, and I don't know anything about him since the day I told him I was pregnant..."

"OH NO!!!" he took his hands to his astonished face.

"This is difficult as it is, without you keep interrupting me!" she raised her voice.

"Now let me finish. He abandoned me with bearing a child and to make matters worse my folks also kicked me out, saying I was a slut and more. So I had no other way out then to get out of that hell hole and restart my life somewhere else." she was now in tears, but continued, " The reason I built that image of that loving father was because, the real one had hurt me so deep that I made up that prince charming and fell in love with him, although he was nothing but a figment of my imagination, but when everyone around despise you, an imaginary friend seems a very valuable option."

Those words were said among many tears and sometimes not very clearly, but the message was clear. She ended by saying.

"And that is the truth, I'm sorry about that, but that's just how things happened." she cleaned her tears with a tissue and looking at him asked, "Did you want to say something?"

"Yes, I did." his face had gone from astonishment to resignation, and now was turning into a maze.

"Maybe Dad, is dead. I don't know, but now I understand what he told me. He was warning me not to follow his footsteps because that's exactly what I'm doing" he said bluntly.

"What you mean by that?!?" she was astonished.

"I mean you are going to be a grandmother, that's what I mean!" he sounded rhetorical.

"Oh my god! How is that possible? How did it happen? When? Why, why, why are you doing this to me!!!" she angrily shouted holding her head in her hands about to freak out.

"I'm sorry Mom! I didn't meant to get you so upset, but like the way you said before that's just how things happened, and I was clueless until I had that nightmare and called April. When she called back gave me the news, and that's how I ended up here." his face had become sad with the realization of the coincidence.

"April, isn't the girl you went to prom with?" she lifted her eyebrow.

"The one and only" he grinned.

"Do you love her?" her face turned serious.

"I guess, since I already proposed." he answered ironically.

"WHAT!!!" she stepped backwards like if someone had punched her.

"And she accepted, so...that means...we're engaged!" he said with a smirk.

"Well, I see you don't waste any time!" she was now beyond caring and just went with the flow.

"Yeah, just like my 'boys'!" he laughed.

"Like father, like son" she said shaking her head.

"Hey, not so fast. I'm gonna make a honest woman out of her!" he said pointing to the ring finger.

"You'll need a ring to make it official then." her face was suddenly filled with disappointment.

"What's with the face?" he was puzzled.

"I just wished your father was half the man you've turned into." she sighed.

"Well, I guess you'll have to thank my mother for that!" he smiled ironically at her.

"Oh, I guess so." she smiled back at him, and walked to the bed where they hugged until they could whispering " I love you" into one another.

There was an irony in all that had happened that day, April fools' was supposed to be the day people would fooled you with little lies, but it turned out to be the day the big truths have been discovered.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Part three

The date

April 2nd, was the day April would give him a second chance.

When he got back home from hospital, later that day his mother handed him the phone, and told him.

"There's someone that has been very worried about you, since you didn't showed up last night. Go ahead." her loving smile was all the encouragement he needed.

He was eager to ear her voice, just as much as she was, and when she picked up, the first words he said were, "I LOVE YOU!" she immediately started crying.

"Well, my mom already told you what happened, so I want to apologies about that, and I'll promise you that the old Zach died yesterday, and today you're talking to a new man, the man who is going to marry you, and build a family and a home with you, if you still want me." his voice was candid and truth was not so difficult to speak after all.

Her answer was short and sweet, "I'll love you till the day I die, dear fiance."

"I still owe you a date so why don't you come over and we'll make the best of it, and besides there is something I want to tell you face to face" his voice was now low and grave.

Somewhat surprised by the change of tone she answered a little unsure, "Ok honey, I'll be right over."

~~~~~~~~~~

About a half an hour later she parked her minivan on his driveway.

He greeted her at the door with a soft and sweet kiss, that turned into a deep passionate embrace, turning two into 1.

That was interrupted by the sound of his mother clearing her throat.

"Hi Ms.Thompson!" an embarrassed smiled filled her face.

"Hi April, I was looking forward to see you! Come in." she swayed the door wide open and kissed her as she walked in. "Let me look at you!" she grabbed her hands and just stood there a while admiring the young beauty her son had found.

The young girl was really beautiful, her light brown hair cascaded to her shoulder and down her back, her hazelnut eyes sparkled and her pale skin glowed. She had a V neck sleeveless shirt, and a short black skirt, black stockings and shinny black shoes with low heels.

Zach felt like the odd man out and slammed the door to bring her out off her trance.

"Zach! Watch your manners!" she gave him a disapproving look.

"Sorry mom, but you're looking at her like she was like a Tussauds wax figure!" he grinned.

"Sorry bout that April, but I was trying to figure how my granddaughter would look like" she said with a spark in her eyes and a smile on her face.

"Not so fast Mom. How do you know it's not going to be a boy?" he pouted.

"You know Zach, women have a sixth sense, and they're hardly wrong!" she pouted back.

"Well Mom, if you'll excuse me I've something important to tell my fiancee" he grabbed her hands and headed upstairs.

"Will you stay over for dinner April" she asked following them to the top of the stairs.

"Probably!" she managed to blurt out before Zach slammed his bedroom door shut.

"YOUNG MAN!!!" she yelled.

He opened the door again just enough to stick his head out saying "Sorry Mom, I know!" and closed back the door and turned the key.

~~~~~~~~~~

April was siting on the edge of the bed, hands on her lap and an intrigued face.

"So, what did you want to tell me face to face?" her eyes got wide with curiosity. He walked to the bed and sat beside her, grabbed her hands and looked straight into her eyes, "What I'm about to tell you is very serious and there's no way around it. Although I'm the same person as yesterday the moment you told me you were pregnant my life changed, I think it happens to everyone, but for me it meant that a piece of me died and I'm somewhat relieved, because the Zach who died was selfish, self centered in a few words a spoiled brat. So its no surprise he did some things without caring for the consequences, but now its time for the new Zach to deal with them." he stood up and picked up his black book from his jacket.

She was listening to it all silently and with apprehension.

He sat back beside her and was now shaking, he took a deep breath and continued, "I've done some very stupid things in my life, but this one tops them all" he opened the book on the page displaying the rules of the bet, and handed it for her to read. "Go on read it and weep."