Tough Guy: A Hero Club Novel

a few more days before my mother pissed all over it. I could hear the sneer in her voice now.
If you’re not on Broadway, you might as well be doing community theater.
“I haven’t spoken to her in a month and a half.” My mother ranted on, oblivious to the argument I was having with her in my head. “She sends a terse text every week. How do I even know it’s her?”
“Was Lisa whining or feeling sorry for herself?” That slipped out before I could stop it. It would have been fair game, except in my sister’s last starring role—yes, on Broadway—she tore the hell out of her ACL and the doctors didn’t think she was ever going to dance professionally again.
Since that had been her identity for her entire life, Lisa was taking it understandably hard. She had aced her physical therapy, but the moment she could walk again without crutches, she was on the plane to Vegas. I guess New York City had too many memories for her.
“She tells me she’s fine and not to worry. And then I ask her if she went on any auditions this week and she doesn’t answer. I haven’t even gotten a text from her in two weeks. Nothing.”
“Last I heard she was bartending at a strip”—I coughed to cover my slipup—“er, high-end club on the Strip.” Actually, it was a gentlemen’s club called the Spearmint Rhino about five miles from the Strip, but who’s counting?
My mother would. She’d probably think that if it wasn’t on the Las Vegas Strip, Lisa might as well be mixing drinks in her apartment.
“Have you heard from her?”
I squinted and scrolled through my messages. “No, not for over a month.”
“You girls don’t keep in touch? Aren’t you supposed to be booking her for jobs?”
The accusation in her tone stiffened my back. “Her contract is on hiatus with the Zimmerman Agency.” It was a long-term hiatus, considering my sister’s knee couldn’t take the strain of a show at this time. Maybe even never. I pushed down the pity. I knew what it was like to have your dream snatched from you. But no one ever coddled me or even thought twice about my feelings.
I pinched my nose. I thought I had worked through all these feeling in therapy, but apparently not.
“Jaqueline Aida Mitchell, you are your sister’s advocate. That’s what we’re paying you to be.”
I wanted to hurl the phone into traffic. “Actually, I get fifteen percent of what she brings in, so if she doesn’t get paid neither do I.” And my mother knew that. She was trying to “motivate” me in that special way that she had. One that usually wound up with me doing something stupidly competitive to prove I was just as good a daughter as Lisa.
“So why aren’t you out there hustling for her?”
“Mom, she can’t dance.”
There was a horrified silence, and I hoped she’d hung up on me, but my luck was never that good.
“You shut your mouth,” she finally said. “You are not a doctor.”
“I’m hanging up now,” I told her.
“Wait,” she screeched.
“Be nice,” I warned.
“Your father and I are worried sick.” My mother lowered her voice. “He’s drinking again.”
“Damn it,” I said, leaning against the light post as I waited for the orange walk sign to come on. She was really firing all the guilt arrows today.
“It would mean the world to us—to him, if you could track your sister down and make sure she’s all right. These texts don’t even sound like her. What if she’s in trouble? I know in my gut something is wrong. It would ease our minds—your father’s mind—if you would go out there and see that she’s coping with the hiatus.”
I hated that she pulled the Dad card out. Dad, when he was sober, was the parent who always had my back instead of Lisa’s. From looking the other way when I broke curfew to lending me a hundred bucks when things were tough, he was the parent I went to when I needed one.
“I have a job.” I tried to keep the whine out of my voice. I was caving and I knew it. It made me so mad. Why do I let her do this to me every time Lisa flakes out? “I can’t just drop everything to look for Lisa. She obviously wants to be alone.”
“Or she’s been kidnapped or is on drugs or is being taken advantage of.”
“Did you call the police?” A wiggle of doubt crept in, despite my best efforts.
“Of course, I did. They laughed at me. They said trying to find one dancer in Las Vegas even when there was a verifiable crime was next to impossible. Without a suspicion of one, they’re not even going to look.”
“I’m sure there are more pressing matters for them.”
“Nothing is more important than your sister.”
And that was the story of my life. I was done trying to prove that I was just as important, wasn’t I? I wasn’t expecting that this time when I pulled off the impossible, my mother would smile at me proudly. I was twenty-six. Why did I still crave her approval? And yet, what if Lisa was in trouble and I ignored it? I’d never forgive myself.
I rubbed my hand over my face and let the crowd push me forward across the busy street when the light turned. “You’re overreacting. You know that, right?”
“What if I’m not?”
I was going to lose the bit dancing part that I had worked so hard for. I was going to have to put my life on hold because of Lisa. Again. It was the story of my life and I was sick of it. I should tell my mother that I was the better dancer now, and I was going to work my way up to be a Broadway star. But I was afraid of her laughter and her derision. I had survived it once when I was thirteen and she yanked me out of dance class. We could