She’s So European.

Thank you for reading. I wrote this one using multiple POV's. I thought it worked better than using a narrator. Let me know your thoughts.

********

Alan

I woke up with a hangover and it was horrible. The headache, the stomach ache, the knee ache. Wait, Why did my knee hurt?

The previous night was my 21st birthday and my dad took me, my mom, and my two older sisters to Las Vegas in honor of it.

It's a family tradition, one in which both of my sisters were treated before me. Dad isn't naive enough to think that it's our first time drinking, but he insists that our first drink as legal adults are with him.

My dad is a financial planner. He's usually as straight an arrow as they come. He's got a ton of certifications and more initials on his business cards than doctors. His only vice is an ironic one for a financial planner, gambling.

He's not a degenerate or anything, but he's on a first-name basis with the dealers at the riverboat near home.

So there I was with a pounding headache and a pounding at the door. I stumbled out of bed and saw it was 2 pm. "At least they let me sleep in," I thought.

"There's my amateur," my dad bellowed as he and my mom walked in the room.

"What's in the bag?" I asked Mom, who had stopped at Walgreens.

"Well drunky, I've got some Gatorade, pain killers, and a warm Diet Pepsi."

"Ok, I get the pain killers, and thank you, but the rest?" I asked.

Dad said, "So right now your stomach feels like crap right?"

"Yep."

"Chug the Diet Pepsi."

"Huh?"

"These are my hangover cures. Chug it."

I figured, what the hell, and did as he demanded.

As soon as I was halfway done, my stomach erupted. I barely made it into the bathroom.

I finished the nasty, washed my face and brushed my teeth. "Jesus, Dad."

"That's step one. You have to get that out of the way. Now, take some pain killers for the headache and drink the Gatorade to help rehydrate. We all woke up late, but let you sleep through breakfast. We're going to a late lunch at Giada's restaurant now, so shit, shower, shave and meet us in the lobby in a half-hour."

Laughing, I said, "Okay."

**********

Nowhere near 100%, but feeling somewhat human, I met everyone as requested.

"There's Alan," my oldest sister Shelly called out. Dad was on the blackjack table nearest the door and Mom was playing the slots with Erin, my other sister a few yards away.

I waved as I walked over, hating the layout of casinos. It's never a straight shot from the elevator to the entrance.

The floor was busy. It's June and a Saturday afternoon so the hotel is packed. I weaved around the crowd and gave hugs to my sisters and hit the parking lot to get our rented SUV.

The lunch was amazing, but the conversation sucked. I was ribbed mercilessly by everyone for partying too much, for being hungover, and for not having a direction in life.

After a thorough thrashing for dropping out of school, I had enough.

"Look guys. I love what I'm doing. Building guitars is more than a hobby. It takes serious skills to carve the wood, to paint the body as I do and I can charge more than the big boys for custom hand made work. I could really have a nice business."

"Fine. Have a go at it, but promise you'll finish school at some point. That business degree will help running your new business, Mr. Entrepreneur. It's not all about making products. Hell, you're almost done anyway." Dad said.

"Agreed." I relented.

"Okay then, let's hit the pool," Mom said.

**********

Still not feeling 100%, I stayed in my room that night. I was flipping channels when I saw the PowerBall drawing come on.

Erin gave me some tickets for my birthday so I grabbed the tickets and watched it.

"The first number is 5," the announcer said. Good start on one of the tickets.

"The second number is 11," that was two for two.

"The third number is 28," I was feeling better since that was three for three.

"The fourth lucky number is 35." That made me stand up. Four for Four.

"C'mon 44," I said to the man on the TV.

"And the fifth number is 44."

"Holy shit!" I screamed.

"Be a 7, be a 7 c'mon 7!" I shouted.

"And the PowerBall is 7."

"Yes!" I screamed as loud as I could.

**********

Erin

I sat in the bar with Shelly, getting free drinks from these cute guys from Chicago. We met them at the pool earlier and had to ditch Mom and Dad so we could meet up with them, without parental supervision.

That was easier than I thought, I think Mom wanted some alone time with Dad, so she was on board with us splitting up.

My phone buzzed and I noticed Shelly's go off at the same time. The text was from Alan to all of us.

"Come to my room now. Emergency!"

"Shit, Shelly something happened to Alan."

She said, "What?"

"Alan's text. Let's go!"

We excused ourselves and ran to the elevators. As we were getting on Mom and Dad showed up.

"I tried calling. He didn't answer," Mom said. "We told a security guard to come, but he called someone that will meet us there."

"God, I hope he's ok," I said.

We ran down the hall to his room and security was already there with a manager.

"Alan? Alan?" Dad called out as we entered the room.

"Everything's cool. These guys are on their way out." Alan said.

"Congratulations again, Mr. Parker. Let me know if you want that credit line." The manager said.

"I will, thanks. Sorry for the trouble," Alan said.

"No worries. Enjoy the rest of your stay."

He shook his hand and said, "I've seen just about everything, but this is a first for me," as he left.

Alan grabbed me in a spinning hug that lifted me off of the floor.

"I love you, Erin. Your my favorite sister."

"What the hell is going on, Alan?" Dad said.

He put me down and pointed at the TV. Paused was the lottery drawing showing the winning numbers, I gasped.

"No way? How much?" I said as the confused room looked at the TV.

"What's it say?" He said.

"452 million. No fucking way?" I answered.

He handed Dad the ticket. Dad looked back and forth between the ticket and the TV several times and sat down in stunned silence.

Mom said, "Terry?"

"He won the god damn PowerBall sitting in his room at a Las Vegas casino," Dad said.

Mom started crying, Shelly was standing there lost and confused, and I started jumping up and down. "We're rich!" I screamed. "Holy shit! We're rich."

**********

Alan

Five years after winning the PowerBall, I was fully understanding lottery winner curses. I hadn't blown the money, Dad set up several trusts to make sure of that, but everyone was a vulture.

Not my family, though. I without hesitation gave my parents and sisters enough to never worry about money again. I set up a trust that paid for college for any family member no matter how distantly related. I set up a fund that made sure that any family member that needed help, got it.

My dad retired and managed it all with my mom's help. He told me that he set up the various trusts in a way that the interest kept feeding them and they'd last for generations. I didn't understand it and didn't care. That was Dad's thing and he did it well. Every quarter we met and he'd give us all a rundown of how disgustingly wealthy we all were.

I kept making custom guitars. I loved doing it and made some money at it. I could actually live off of those earnings alone, if I needed to. I hardly touched the monthly checks that the trust paid to me. I had it set up where I was paid five grand a month. That plus my guitar business and I was living pretty well.

I bought a modest house, drove a Chevy SUV, and lived a fairly middle-class life. My problem was finding a woman to love.

Every single relationship was a disaster immediately following the lottery win I decided that I would try to hide my money from the girls I was interested in, but with Google and social media, it was an impossible secret to keep.

Five relationships in a row went down in flames because they were gold diggers. I had lost my ability to trust anyone and for years didn't date.

That all changed on a sunny Wednesday morning.

I had been working on a Flying V body guitar. The customer wanted an exact replica of Randy Roads' polka dot guitar. It's a pretty common request. I do a couple every year.

This one wanted as many of the original spec parts as I could dig up. I liked that challenge. That guitar was built in the late 70s and the parts were getting hard to find in good enough condition.

The order was placed by a Mary Simpson. It's rare for a lady to order a custom guitar. I figured she was probably a mom with bucks, spoiling her kid, but it didn't matter to me as long as her credit card went through.

I was polishing the body when the bell rang. I had a shop in an industrial park and I never had any walk-in business, it was all online orders. There was also no storefront, so I figured someone had the wrong unit.

I opened the door and was floored by the most beautiful blue-eyed blonde I'd ever seen. Her eyes seemed translucent and I couldn't take my eyes off of them. I didn't even look at her body.

"Can I help you?"

"Hi, I'm looking for Alan Parker or Magic Touch Guitars."

"That's me. What can I do for you."

"I ordered a guitar from you and I live in town, so I thought I might get a look at it in progress."

"Are you Mary?"

"Yep."

"Okay, come on in. I'm actually done and was putting a final polish on it to ship tomorrow."

"Oh cool."

We walked back into the shop area and I showed her some of the models I made for pictures on the website.

I had a version of the Rhoads V, Eddie Van Halen's Frankenstein, and half a dozen hand made MTG original designs.

She seemed genuinely interested in each of them and asked some technical questions.

"So is the V for you? Gift for your husband?" Yes I was fishing.

"For my fiancé actually. It's a wedding gift."

"Nice gift."

"Yeah. I'm going to be paying for it for a long time."

"When's the wedding?"

"Next month."

"Congrats," I said half meaning it.

"Your ax is over here."

"Wow! It's amazing. You nailed it."

The only thing not period correct is the fret wire. I was able to find the hardware and it's all in really good condition."

"You did a great job. He's going to love it."

"Is he in a band?"

"Yeah, his name is Jimmy Wales."

"No shit? I love Liquid Friction. Ah! You're THE Mary?"

Laughing she said, "The one and only."

"When 'Mary's Eyes' was on the charts, I must've heard that song a hundred times."

She blushed and smiled while saying, "Yeah top ten hits get played a lot."

"It's true though. Your eyes are amazing."

"Thanks." She said.

"So can I take it with me?"

"Yeah. Give me a minute to finish it up."

"Thanks. You really did an incredible job."

"If Jimmy ever comes into town with the guitar, he may want to stop in. I'm kind of a Rhoads nut myself and I set up a copy of his rig with all of the same pedals and amps he used back there. The wah pedal isn't exact because I couldn't find the guy that did his modifications to get the specs, but I got it real damn close."

"I'll tell him. Thanks again."

**********

The next day, I was starting on a guitar for myself when the bell rang again, and much to my surprise it was Jimmy and Mary.

"Mother Fucker, this guitar is awesome. You fucking nailed it bro," Jimmy said as soon as I opened the door.

"You said I can play it on his rig?"

"Yeah sure, I'm Alan."

Ignoring my introduction and hand out, he said, "Is it back there?"

"Yeah come on in."

He plugged into the pedalboard and fired up the Marshall Amps. Once they were humming, he started playing.

Mary sat down to watch him and I went back to building my guitar. "Fucking prick," I thought to myself. "He's wasted already." I took a picture of him playing and got to work.

After about ten minutes of him playing, Mary walked over.

"Sorry about that. He didn't have to be so rude," she said.

"Don't worry about it. He's not the first rock star I've met."

"What are you working on?"

"Something for myself, actually. I'm hand carving an intricate design, here look."

She took the paper with my drawing and said, "Wow, you can carve this design?"

"Yeah, I couldn't make something like it for sale though. It would take way too long."

"Wow! You've got my email from the order, send me a picture of it when you're done. I'd love to see it."

"Sure." A loud crackle and pop came out of the back. Jimmy blew one of the speakers.

I walked back as he was unplugging his guitar. He was putting it in the case and said, "Fried it. It was great though. Almost perfect. Let's go babe," he said as he walked to the front of the shop.

"Is it expensive?" She asked.

"Don't worry about it. It'll be a great story for my kids someday."

"Ha, yeah. Jimmy Wales broke my amp," she said.

"No, not that. I meant that I met Mary, from 'Mary's Eyes'."

She looked at me funny and smiled. "Take care, Alan. Don't forget to send me that picture."

"You got it."

**********

Mary

"You were a real asshole to that guy, Jimmy," I said, still pissed off.

"Huh? Oh, whatever. He's lucky I stopped in."

"You broke his amp and didn't even offer to pay for it."

"Hey! It's old shit. That crap breaks. It's no big deal. What time's the flight?"

"Noon."

"What's the wedding date again?" He said as he did a line of coke.

"July 15th. You're back from Australia on the 10th."

"Sounds good, babe. Wanna hit?"

"No, you know I don't do that shit and I wish you'd stop."

"Yeah, yeah. Not even married yet and nagging already."

I loved the guy but he was a real asshole sometimes.

**********

Alan

I finished the guitar about 2 months later and remembered to email pictures of it to Mary a while after that.

It was unnecessary though because it earned me a cover story in Guitar Player magazine. I'm sure she probably saw it since Jimmy was featured in an interview in the same issue.

I was in the shop doing some bookkeeping when my bell rang.

I opened the door to see Mary standing there with the guitar case for the V.

"Hi, Mary. Come on in and have a seat."

"What are you working on today?"

"The books."

"Businesses don't run themselves right?" I nodded. "The guitar turned out beautiful. In the magazine you said you named it 'Mary.' I was wondering why?"

"The blue I used on the body was based on your eyes."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I told you, they're amazing." She blushed and looked at the wall.

"What's wrong with the V?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah. It sort of broke," She said as she opened the case on the floor.

The neck was cracked at the body and there were gouges across the top.

"Shit, the rock star life huh?"

"Sort of. He was pissed and swung it at me. He was so wasted it slipped out of his hands and went flying across the studio."

"No shit. Flying V isn't meant to be literal. What was he pissed about?"

"I dumped him three days before the wedding."

"Oh."

"I caught him fucking a groupie in the recording studio. He wanted to record us having sex to be used in a new song. I told him no. Well, he did it anyway, except not with me. He actually blamed me because I said no."

"Wow!" I said. "How stupid."

"Yeah, no shit. It's already been done. He thought it was his own brilliant idea."

"Sorry that happened to you. You deserve better. So, do you want me to fix it for him?"

"For him? Fuck no. You put your heart into making it, I figured you could keep it for yourself. To be honest, I didn't think it could be fixed. I figured you could reuse the parts down the road."

"No, it's definitely fixable and I'll fix it for you. You can keep it then or resell it if you want the money."

"How much will it cost to fix?"

"I'll do it for nothing. My gift to you for your wedding blowing up. It's a shame that you had to go through all of that. I guess it's better finding out before the wedding though."

"Definitely."

"Can you give me a week for it?"

"Yeah, no problem. Take as long as you need it. Do you think I could see "The Mary?"

I smiled and said, "Sure. Come on back."

***********

"It's unreal. It's so beautiful." She said. "That blue is really my eyes?"

"Here look, I found took your Facebook profile pic and blew it up."

"Wow! It's so close. You're really, really good."

"Oh I didn't mix the paint myself. I have a guy that does custom paint colors."

"Okay, then he's really good," she said laughing.

"Can I play it?" She asked.

"Of course. I figured you must play. You're really knowledgeable."

"I teach guitar. It's how I met shit head."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah, he came into the shop looking for guitars."

"Go ahead and plug it into the Vox AC30 there."

"Good choice."

She noodled around for a while, playing some jazz and fusion stuff. She played beautifully. She had a really nice tone.

"You play great. So smooth."

"Thank you. I started when I was around 10. I teach the jazz style mostly as a specialty."

"Maybe you could give me lessons?"

"I'll make sure and leave a card." She said with a smirk.

**********

Mary

He had my guitar ready in a week. He called me and told me to pick it up whenever I was ready.

I was looking forward to seeing him again. He was cute in a scruffy way, with hand styled hair and a week-old beard.

He was tall, which I absolutely required in a man, with broad shoulders and big hands. I would love to take him for a ride.

Jimmy cheating on me didn't devastate me as much as I'd expected. I wasn't an idiot, I was sure he wasn't faithful on the road, but that's different than doing it in front of me. I couldn't let that kind of disrespect go. I was stupid to get involved with him anyway.

I was looking at his money more than his love for me, I guess, and I had to start all over because of it.

**********

Alan

I was getting really busy because of the Guitar Player Magazine buzz. Most of the orders were for my MTG design models, which suited me fine. That was much less work, since they aren't custom made bodies. The paint jobs are done to order so they weren't exactly assembly line built.

I was typing up an ad to place in the paper for an assistant. I was lagging behind and that's bad business. I'd do all of the custom bodywork, but anyone can learn to paint and put pieces together.

Then the doorbell rang.

"Hello, Mary."

"Hi, Alan. What are you working on today?" She asked, as usual.

"Right now an ad for an assistant. The magazine buzz has me busy."

"That's great!" She said.

"How much does it pay."

"$15 an hour to start, if they start doing more than assembly and painting, it could be double that on those jobs. It's part-time and flexible so I think I should get someone pretty fast."

"Experience?"

"Not needed. I can train them, but being a guitar player would be a plus."

"Would you interview me for it? I'm looking to make some extra cash, now that it's just me paying my bills."

"Done. You're hired. When can you start?"

"Wow, really?"

I felt like saying, "Duh, I will get to look at your eyes all day," but I said, "Yeah. You could do as good a job as anyone and you seem to have a real interest in what I do."

"I do, your work is very interesting to me. Maybe someday I could learn to sculpt bodies like you do?"

"We can work on that, if you want, but remember I don't sell those."

"You said due to the labor time, but if you had someone to help around here you'd be freed up."

"I guess I would."

"You're really talented and the world has seen it now. You're an artist with wood carving, that should be shared."

"You're right. I've had dozens of requests for it."

"See, I think this is going to be fun."