by Gina LaManna
“Wow.”
“You remind me a little of myself when I was your age,” Kate said. “So please don’t be mad at your mom because I volunteered to talk to you—it was my idea. I was only trying to help. When I was your age, I wish someone had told me it was okay to wait and do my own thing. There’s plenty of sex to be had post-college.”
Elsie shuddered and averted her face. “Thanks, I guess.”
“I think you should talk to your mom about what actually happened,” Kate suggested. “It sounds like a big misunderstanding. She really does love you. I promise.”
“Then why would she accuse me of things I didn’t do without even asking? She waved that strip of”—Elsie shuddered—“you know, the…”
“Condoms,” Kate filled in.
“Yeah,” Elsie said. “She dangled them in plain sight on the plane. Everyone could see her. It was the worst! I would have been happy reading my book and letting the flight pass, but the whole time, she kept trying to talk without stopping to listen.”
“Moms,” Kate said. “I had one. I know.”
Almost as if on cue, Elsie’s phone dinged in her hand, and she looked down, blanching at the message on the screen. Her shoulders began to shake; her fingers trembled. Kate wondered what could possibly have been said that was ruining their perfect mother-daughter (but not really) bonding moment.
“What is it?” Kate asked. “What happened?”
“Nothing,” Elsie said, bringing the phone toward her face to presumably study the message closer. “My mom ruins everything!”
“Elsie, what happened?”
Elsie flipped the phone around and showed Kate the message.
“Well,” Kate said, trying and likely failing to mask her surprise. “Yes, that’s certainly not ideal.”
* * *
Detective Ramone: Who was present under the pergola when the victim was killed?
Emily Brown: Me. I was alone. And Sydney, I guess, but she wasn’t very helpful.
Detective Ramone: I have three other reports—and I’m sure more to come—that state at least five people were there.
Emily Brown: Sure, maybe they were outside, but I wasn’t looking around for them, and they certainly weren’t with me.
Detective Ramone: Why are you all lying? What happened out there, Ms. Brown?
Emily Brown: I refuse to answer any more questions.
Detective Ramone: Ms. Brown—
Emily Brown: I don’t know what more you want me to say.
Detective Ramone: Do you have any regret for what you did?
Emily Brown: No, Detective. With all due respect, it felt great.
Twenty-Three
Ginger kept her eye on Elsie and Kate from a distance as her daughter and old friend walked and talked. A surge of pride had hit her when she’d seen Elsie gently hand Lydia back to Sydney.
“Mom, pay attention!” A Nerf football hurtled at Ginger. “Duck!”
Ginger was too busy watching a smile light Elsie’s face to react in time, so she took a smack to the back of the noggin. “Ow, Tom! Don’t throw it if I’m not looking.”
“Well, what are you looking at?” Tom called. “The game is over here.”
“Tom, apologize to your mother,” Frank said. “You’ve messed up her lovely hair.”
“Mommy, can I get ice cream? Can you walk me there?” Poppy tugged on her mother’s shirt. “The one that swirls. It’s free, you know. There’s no reason I can’t have it.”
Ginger suppressed an eye roll, thinking the scariest thought of all was that she had to go through this again. At Poppy’s age, Elsie had been a sweet, completely innocent, unargumentative, happy little girl. Poppy was already a manipulative little trickster who had picked up some moves from her older sister and brother. She just might be the death of Ginger.
“Throw the ball with your brother for a few minutes,” Ginger said as she watched Elsie from across the sand. Ginger sensed a shift in the conversation between Kate and Elsie. “I have to take care of something quickly. Don’t wander away from your dad, and we can get some ice cream when I come back.”
Poppy gave a stomp of her foot, mostly to prove she wasn’t happy. Ginger made a sign to Frank that she was going over to Elsie. He saw her, nodded, and gave her the thumbs-up, as if that’d help arm her for battle. Ginger would need a lot more than a thumbs-up to get through this war.
Making her way across the sandy path, Ginger raised an arm and wiped the sweat from her brow thanks to the scorching afternoon heat. So much for the relaxing massage! Then again, it hadn’t been all that relaxing in the first place. The masseuse had taken one look at Ginger’s back, rested her hands on her shoulders, and made a sound of dismay.
“Tense?” she had asked.
“Yep,” Ginger had said.
“It’s not good to be so tense all the time.”
“Yeah, thanks,” Ginger had said. “That’s helpful.”
The woman had proceeded to take out all her frustration on Ginger’s back, leaving Ginger sore and achy and popping an aspirin borrowed from the ever-prepared Kate.
Ginger closed in on her daughter and Kate, feeling a sense of trepidation in the air. Something had gone awfully, horribly wrong. What had Kate said to Elsie? How could Ginger have let this happen?
“Hey, you two,” Ginger said carefully, purposefully stepping in front of her daughter. “How’s it going? Looks like the baby really loved you. You were great with Lydia, and I’m sure Sydney really appreciated all the attention you gave her.”
“It’s a good thing someone loves me,” Elsie retorted. “Because you certainly don’t seem to even like me!”
Kate hovered in the background, pretending to order a drink from a nearby beverage cart, quite obviously watching the show through her huge dark glasses. Ginger gritted her teeth against her daughter’s resentment and ignored Kate. If Kate had children, they probably wouldn’t grow up to hate her. They’d have cute little shopping dates and manicure nights, and if Kate ever needed a break, she could hire a nanny and have a week full of massages.
“Don’t talk to me like that. I am your mother, Elsie. Of course I love you. That should never be a question.”
“Then why are you going behind my back?” Elsie held her phone up, and on it was a screenshot from Phoebe Brimhall. “Did you message Phoebe from my phone? On Facebook?”
Ginger felt a flush rising in her neck. “I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry, but, Elsie, you are obviously keeping secrets from me. I’m your mother.”
“That’s not the point. You peeked at my stuff!”
“Hey, your phone is public property to me,” Ginger said with a low growl in her tone. “I am your mother. Your father and I pay all your bills. We agreed when you got the phone that anything on it was subject to parental inspection without warning. I didn’t overstep any boundaries.”
“Clearly, you don’t trust me!” Elsie shouted. “You don’t even listen to me!”
“I do too listen to you,” Ginger said, feeling her blood pressure rise. “But it’s sure hard to listen when I ask you a question and you give me a one-word answer. I don’t get all that much information from you.”
“I’m stringing at least ten words together right now! How do you like them apples?”
“Don’t quote movies at me, Elsie. I’m trying to have a serious conversation with you. This isn’t a joke.”
“No, of course not. You wouldn’t actually want to have fun with me, God forbid.”
“What has gotten into you?” Ginger positively shook with emotion. Frustration, despair, sadness. “You used to be my little girl—me and you. We’d talk and play all day long, and we’d go for walks to the park, and now, I can’t even get you to look at me. Where did I go wrong?”
“You’re still not listening to me,” Elsie said. “I would have explaine
d the situation if you’d freaking asked—and then shut up long enough to hear it.”
Ginger started in surprise. “Explained what?”
“It’s too late.” Elsie waggled the phone with the confused message from Phoebe on it. “You’ve already done your damage.”
Ginger glared at the screen. “I saw your phone last night when you were sleeping. You don’t even talk to Phoebe Brimhall. Isn’t she a senior? I only read it to see what she’d said. She was asking if you’d used the condoms yet! What was I supposed to think? I won’t stand for other girls pressuring my daughter to have sex.”
“She wasn’t pressuring me to do anything! You don’t even know half the story. And worst of all, you most certainly didn’t have to respond with ‘This is Elsie’s mother’!” Elsie cringed. “I can’t even bear to look at the rest of your note. That alone is plenty embarrassing. Now everyone on the cheerleading squad will know you monitor my phone. Scratch that, the whole school. Nobody will ever text me again.”
Ginger’s gut flooded with shame. “Maybe I shouldn’t have done that. But I don’t think you should be hanging out with girls who are talking about condoms like they’re, I don’t know, sticks of gum to be handed out willy-nilly.”
“You don’t know what’s going on! Phoebe was trying to help me. She wasn’t pressuring me to do anything.”
“I’m only saying, it’s not as if you have a committed, loving boyfriend to use them with,” Ginger continued. “If you did, I might think differently about the situation, and we could talk about that too. Don’t you know you can talk to me about anything?”
“You are not freaking listening!” Elsie cried again. “Just go away. I am going to the room to read. Can I have the room key? I—I can’t be around you.”
“Elsie!”
“Can I have the room key?” Elsie jutted her chin forward and stuck out her hand. “If you make me stay out here, I’ll be miserable, and I will make the rest of the family miserable. I only want to read and be away from you.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Ginger saw Kate approaching, but she didn’t register it. “No. This is a family vacation, and—”
“What if you let Elsie have the key to my room for an hour or two?” Kate barged in, taking control as she always did. “I have a room on the ninth floor with a fabulous view. You can read out on the balcony in quiet, Elsie. Hell, order room service. My ex-boyfriend is footing the bill.”
“I’d like that,” Elsie said quietly. “Thank you, Kate.”
Ginger felt weak as she looked at this woman, a stranger to Elsie, winning favor with her child while Elsie couldn’t bear to have a conversation with her own mother. “Elsie, you can’t run away from this. It’s not going to disappear.”
“I don’t think she’s running,” Kate interrupted, driving up Ginger’s blood pressure even more. “She needs a bit of time to cool down. What do you say, Elsie? Cool down, then have a chat with your mom before the rehearsal dinner tonight. Final offer.”
“Fine,” Elsie snarled.
“Fine,” Ginger said, knowing if she denied Elsie this, she would be hard-pressed to speak to her daughter all trip. “What’s the room number? I’ll walk you there.”
“I’ll walk her there,” Kate said, “since I have to shower anyway. Elsie, do you have some things you need to grab? Ginger, I will be with her all afternoon. Come up to 913 whenever you’re ready for a chat. I won’t let her out of my sight, I swear.”
Elsie nodded. “My dad’s hanging onto my bag. I have my book in there.”
“Go get your things and meet me back here.” Kate directed traffic like it was her job. “I want a word with your mother.”
Elsie slouched away to pick up the small Nike backpack that likely contained a book and her signature bottle of Diet Coke.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Ginger rounded on Kate the second Elsie was out of earshot. “How dare you come between me and my daughter when we’re trying to have a difficult conversation. It’s not like you have any experience with your own children.”
Kate’s eyes widened, the biting remark hitting its spot in the sore, aching crevice that would surely have existed because Kate wanted children, and Ginger had them, and she’d rubbed it in.
Ginger massaged her forehead and immediately felt multitudes of guilt. “Oh, Kate. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean that. I’m—”
“It’s fine,” Kate said crisply, dismissively, as if she didn’t have time for an apology. “It was probably wrong of me to interfere, but I thought you should know something. If you’ll just listen for one second.”
Ginger’s legs and arms felt shaky, as if she’d binged on espresso all morning and was approaching the crash. “You have to let me apologize to you,” Ginger said. “I’m so sorry. I’m jealous. You talked to her for longer than I have in the past year. At least, that’s what it feels like.”
“I don’t need an apology,” Kate said, her words still chilly. “I don’t have children—it’s true. But my experience with children aside, I’m not actually here to talk about Elsie this time.”
“Who are you here to talk about?”
“You,” Kate said, her eyes landing on Ginger. “You aren’t listening to her.”
“But—”
“You’re doing it right now. If you want my honest opinion, shut the hell up, Ginger.” Kate’s eyes flashed with frustration. “You have a good kid, and Elsie told me some things I think you should hear. So, I’d suggest giving her some time to cool down and then ask her to explain the situation—and then give her time to talk. You might be surprised. I’ll take Elsie up to my room, and I’ll be there with her—I need a shower and a nap. Here’s an extra key to get in whenever you’re ready.”
Ginger stood stock-still, reeling from the shock of it all, as Kate brushed past her and met Elsie with a smile. Ginger watched as Kate began to talk, probably issuing orders, and by some miracle, Elsie listened. By the time they rounded the corner, Ginger caught a glimpse of Elsie smiling.
Watching the two walk away, smiling and laughing, Ginger was suddenly thrust into a vicious time loop that sent her back to college. She was struck by the way Elsie was maturing so quickly, as if before her very eyes. Some of the awkward gangliness of her limbs had seeped out and left her looking elegantly tall and thin, especially when she lifted her chin and straightened her shoulders like she did now, walking beside Kate.
Ginger could almost imagine herself and Kate twenty years younger, back when Ginger had probably done the same thing—straightened her shoulders, flipped her hair, pretended to be a new level of sophisticated while hanging with Kate.
Ginger remembered one particular morning in college shortly after her breakup with Frank. Kate had stormed into Ginger’s bedroom and yanked the sheets off the upper bed, demanding she get ready for brunch. It didn’t matter that it was a Wednesday, or that finals were the next week, or that Kate was skipping her internship to rescue Ginger.
It also didn’t matter that Ginger had shoved an entire box of Oreos down her throat the night before and had a stress pimple the size of Pompeii across her forehead. All that mattered was that Kate had drawn Ginger out of a funk, and while sluffing it to brunch in pajamas hadn’t solved all her problems, there was something cathartic about having a woman like Kate in one’s life. Kate always knew best, and there was no possibility of ignoring her once she’d made up her mind.
That was the power of Kate Cross. And now, it seemed, her daughter had learned the very same lesson that she had, once upon a time.
Another pang of jealousy wormed its way through Ginger, hot and toxic. How had Kate managed to get Elsie to talk when Ginger had been prying at her daughter for months with zero success? And what did Kate mean when she told Ginger to listen? Of course Ginger listened! She tried to ask her daughter questions—
Ginger stopped.
Is Kate
right? Now that she thought about it, Ginger couldn’t remember if she had actually asked Elsie about the condoms or if she’d leapt to conclusions in a public place. Conclusions that were based on Ginger’s own past behavior instead of the way she knew Elsie to be. As much as they were similar, Elsie wasn’t Ginger.
Ginger knew that Elsie had turned down a boy named Brendan for a winter dance. (It wasn’t really snooping to peek in Elsie’s journal if it was for safety purposes, was it?) Brendan was a nice kid, popular too, and frankly, Ginger would have understood if Elsie wanted to spend some alone time with him, to explore the confusing hormones sending messages shooting in every direction through her body.
But instead, Elsie’s journals had contained pages of musings on books, of beginner attempts at poetry and song lyrics (oh, the teenage angst), and some general grumblings about her brother, sister, and parents.
How could Ginger have been so stupid? What had she missed that Kate hadn’t? Ginger took a step toward the disappearing duo, thinking maybe she should offer Elsie an apology, but she hesitated. Maybe Kate was right. Maybe Elsie needed some time to cool off—especially if she was anything like Ginger after a fight.
The rehearsal dinner was only a few hours away, and Elsie had promised to talk beforehand in exchange for some space. In the meantime, Ginger had a son who wanted to throw footballs at her head and a daughter who “needed” ice cream this very second.
And so it was with a combination of sadness and hope that Ginger approached her family minus one. When had Elsie grown up? When had she become her own person, an almost adult who was far more responsible than Ginger had been at that age? With a sigh, Ginger looked at her husband and finally returned his thumbs-up.
“All is well? Great! Elsie is hanging out with your old college gal pals?” Frank called over. “How neat. Catch, Mom!”
Ginger ducked, missed the ball, and was tackled by her son. Then Poppy came over and sat on her chest.
