“About FCC stuff? Freedom of speech?”
Sophie laughed. “Why would I ask you that?”
“Beats me. Because I have strong opinions on freedom of expression, maybe?”
“Maybe. But no cigar. It’s personal.” She shut her notebook and gazed at it thoughtfully. “I have a friend…who has a friend…okay?”
“I guess it’s okay,” I teased. “Don’t roll your eyes, sweetie. Okay, it’s okay. Go on.”
“And this friend’s friend used to be going out with someone, and they broke up a while ago, like a month ago already. And now this friend’s friend’s ex-boyfriend asked out my friend. Not my friend’s friend, my friend.”
“Well then, do you want to go out with Tommy DuPree?” I asked Sophie.
“How’d you know?”
This time I rolled my eyes. “Because the friend beard is one of the oldest tricks in the book, and because I wasn’t born yesterday—and please don’t make any snippy quips about it.”
“Okay, so Tommy invited me to the Clash’s Christmas party, which is always this huge deal with a live band and really good food and stuff.”
And really good booze, too, I imagined. There had better not be really good drugs. Was the current crop of college kids as druggy as they were back in my day? I wasn’t sure I wanted to find out.
“And it’s sort of okay if I accept, because Carleen and I are best friends and she wants me to be happy. But I feel totally weird about going out with her ex. That’s where the sort-of part comes into play.”
“You don’t think it will compromise your friendship?”
Sophie mulled it over. “Well, I mean…if she says she’s cool with it, then I think she really is. I told her about it right after Tommy asked me, and she didn’t punch me out or pitch anything at my head.”
My poor kid was in such consternation. Her expression, so often enigmatic, betrayed nothing. It was as though she were steeling herself against disappointment. Solomon had an easier decision with the baby. I smiled encouragingly at her. “Then I think you should go to the party.”
She let out an excited yelp. “Really?!” followed immediately by a deeply furrowed brow. “Oh my God, I have nothing to wear!” She jumped up and strode over to her closet. A bit of rummaging through the rack produced the skirt I had privately pronounced dowdy when I’d first surveyed her wardrobe back in September. “I mean, look at this!”
Actually, about a third of Sophie’s closet was devoted to my own clothes. Storage space is always at a premium in a Manhattan apartment. Sophie began to finger the fabrics lovingly. “For the first time in my life, I wish I had stuff more like this.” Her eyes lit upon a custom-made leather minidress that laced up the bodice. I owned over-the-thigh boots to match, with a three-inch heel.
“Why don’t you try it on?” I suggested.
“Can I?”
Our figures were totally different. If she stretched out the leather there was probably no way the dress would ever fit me again. Still, such a sacrifice was a no-brainer; my Cinderella would go to the ball in the dress of her dreams, even if it killed me to part with it.
Of course when she asked to drive my vanilla-colored Alfa-Romeo vintage convertible to the party instead of saddling up her Toyota, I almost had a coronary.
“Please-oh-please, I’ll be extra careful with it. I won’t park near anyone else so it can’t get nicked by some drunk on their way home—”
“Excuse me? I know I’d be a naïve dolt to assume that there won’t be alcohol at the Clash’s bash, even if the coach has banned it—but if I ever catch you inebriated, I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” Sophie demanded.
Come to think of it, I have no idea what I would do. I’d love to think I’d kick her butt over it, or let her wallow in her own vomit until she promises never to get pissing drunk again, but I don’t think I’d have it in me to do either one of those things, if push came to shove.
“I don’t drink, Livy. Not really. A beer every now and then with Carleen and the Kumquats when we go out after practice sometimes. No one checks IDs.”
“Swell,” I said sarcastically.
“But you don’t have to worry about me. I got through three years of college without you, you know. I can take care of myself.”
Nothing like feeling unneeded when you’re trying to be helpful. Sophie seemed pretty bold in her breeches for someone trying to shoehorn herself into my leather dress.
“Maybe if I give up carbs until the party,” she muttered.
Unfortunately, the problem couldn’t be solved that easily; she was just broader across the back and thicker through the torso.
“You see why I don’t wear dresses,” she fretted helplessly.
I found my sewing kit and took out the tape measure. A pal of mine in the garment district owed me a favor. I didn’t know what I was going to do about the boots, though.
I made a mental checklist of the other necessary preparations. Small talk wouldn’t be a problem for Sophie; at a jock party, she’d be in her element, conversationally. In fact, there’d probably be very little talking, since they’d all go hoarse trying to be heard above the band.
So the next hurdle was the art of makeup application. Sophie’s idea. I took her to a Sephora and let her play. Cosmetics aside, you’re never too young to develop a good skin-care regimen, I told her. She agreed I looked pretty good for my age. I almost slapped her.
I let her drive the Alfa Romeo up to Westchester, since I wanted to be certain she could handle it safely and competently. “The clutch is a bit wonky,” I warned, as she sped past the Cloisters, taking the curves on the Henry Hudson Parkway faster than I thought she should. “And don’t pretend you’re at a NASCAR rally!”
A mile or so from Clarendon, she pulled over to the curb, killed the engine, and frowned.
“You looked pained, Soph. Is something the matter?”
“I think I might need to stop at a drugstore.”
I rested my hand on her forearm. “Sweetie, are you feeling okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Sophie lapsed into a lengthy silence. Those impenetrable eyes were working on something, something that eventually turned her face a lovely shade of burgundy—perfect for the upholstery in an opera house, but not as a skin tone.
“Ummm… I never told anybody this…I mean even Carleen doesn’t know. Joy knows, but that was before I started college.” Her color deepened even further. “Livy…? I’m still a virgin.”
She gave me this woeful look as though I could lift the weight of the world from her shoulders. “And…well…I thought I should buy some condoms…because…”
I was a bit stunned by her revelation. “Because you’re counting on hopping into bed with a guy you hardly know?”
“That’s not true! I’ve known him since freshman year—just as long as Carleen has.”
“Honey, I think you ought to think things through. I mean, I’m happy to suggest which condoms might make the experience more enjoyable, but I’m far from convinced you should just jump—”
Her eyes flashed. Finally, a spark of something! “I never should have said anything to you. I thought you were cool, Livy, which is why I confided in you, but you’re just as judgmental as Joy would have been.”
“I’m your mother. I get that privilege.”
“No, you gave up that privilege twenty years ago!”
“Damn it, Soph, I also gave up my future husband to make it up to you—and it was the second-toughest decision of my life.”
Her voice rose. “I never asked you to do that—don’t you dare put that shit on me, Livy! Why don’t you just leave and go back to him, then?”
“Believe me, kid, there are times when I wish I could do just that. But you’re hell-bent on my ‘closing the circle.’ You don’t always make things easy, you know.”
“Well, you can be pretty fucking impossible yourself, sometimes, too.”
I came this close to smacking her across the mouth. But in a way, sh
e was right, or as right as I was, so I fought to hold my redheaded temper in check. “Get out of the car, Sophie. We’re trading places. I’m driving us home.”
“Can we still stop at a pharmacy or a convenience store, or something?” she muttered.
“I’ll think about it.”
In the end, I relented. I pulled up in front of the drugstore right off campus. I figured it would have a higher turnover of product. If Sophie was hell-bent on losing her virginity, despite my attempts to dissuade her from throwing herself at Tommy DuPree, I wanted to at least be relatively certain that the Trojans hadn’t been sitting on the shelf since Hector was a baby.
Well, of course she had no idea of the length and girth of Tommy DuPree’s equipment, though Carleen had once told her that just because a man wields a Louisville Slugger, it didn’t mean he was capable of hitting homers. I took the metaphor to mean that perhaps we should buy a box of “larges,” though Sophie wasn’t entirely certain Carleen had been referring to Tommy, and in any event, she became so confused over the array of choices—ribbed or not, lubricated or not, flavored or not—that she bought a box of everything (well, I put it on my credit card).
It was hard to suppress a laugh. “Honey, if you’re planning on bringing this entire stash to the party, you’ll need a much bigger purse!”
I’m not entirely sure which genius had the idea to schedule the baseball team’s holiday bash and intramural batting contest on the night before finals week began. I suppose there was some guy-logic involved, perhaps that people might get the heck out of town as soon as their exams were over, which could severely reduce the guest list. Maybe they figured jocks didn’t hit the books nearly as hard as they hit the speed bag, so there wouldn’t be too much studying going on, anyway. Sophie’s study habits were impeccable, however. Knowing she had a test on the first day of finals week, she holed up in her room, or at the Clarendon library, cramming like crazy so that she would be fully prepared to ace the exam, despite being out late the night before.
Her boots and leather minidress arrived three days before the party. “Oh my God, I can’t wait to try these on! You are the most amazing person, Livy!” She launched herself into my arms and nearly tackled me. “Thank you so much! Oh my God, this is so awesome! I have to show Carleen.”
She thought better of it, though. Too much like rubbing salt into a wound. Besides, she wanted to make a grand entrance and not spoil it by having a dress rehearsal beforehand. I’d taken her to my stylist for a good haircut, and now her face was framed by subtle layers which enhanced the glossiness and natural lowlights in her dark hair, revealed that she had cheekbones, and softened the line of her strong jaw—though now she worried that her locks might not be long enough to pull into her usual ponytail.
Sophie had been diligently practicing with her new makeup, too, yet she didn’t trust herself not to make a mess of it. “Every time I try to do it myself, I come out looking like a clown. Or Joan Collins on Dynasty,” she fretted. “Would you mind doing my makeup for the party?”
So of course I agreed, though I’ve never understood how some women can lack the gene for applying cosmetics. I thought we were all born with it, the same way we gals, unlike most straight men, have an instinct for what colors flatter us.
Before she departed for the party, we went back over the basics. “Drive carefully or I will kill you, Soph. Don’t drink and drive or it will. If you have a drink, have a friend drive you back here. Do not—I repeat, do not—give my car keys to anyone at that party, regardless of sobriety. Got that, sweetheart?”
“Got it!” I could see that she was jittery. She kept checking herself out in the mirror. “I can’t believe it…I look so…pretty.” There were tears in her eyes.
“You are pretty, Sophie.”
“But not like you.”
“Different. Every woman has her own beauty.” Oh, boy. Joy Ashe must have missed a spot. Then again, I got a little happy pang thinking that there was still something left for me to cover. Ever since I’d met Sophie, I’d been searching for ways to be useful, helpful, to be a true mom to her.
“Sophie, my girl, you are gorgeous—with and without the leather and the makeup.” Playfully, I rapped on her freshly coiffed hair. “If you can get that through your skull—and keep it there, you will make both of us very happy.”
“But still—this is exactly how I wanted to look! She regarded her reflection one last time. “Tommy DuPree’d better appreciate it,” she muttered.
I enfolded her in my arms. “If he doesn’t, my darling—remember this—he’s toast!” Kissing her cheek, I added, “Have a wonderful time, Sophie.”
“I will,” she beamed, and I thought I caught her wiping away a tear. “Don’t wait up for me.”
But I knew I would.
I rode my Vespa up to Larchmont to have dinner with the Ashes. They’d received subpoenas to testify in court on behalf of the petitioners and were understandably nervous about it.
“We’ve never been sued,” Joy said anxiously.
“You’re not being sued; I am,” I said. I was nervous because Sherman Weinstock had gotten to them before Cap Gaines had. Obviously they’d be cross-examined by my attorney, but they would be there to testify for the other side.
“What are we supposed to say?” Glenn wondered.
Joy frowned. “I’m not afraid to tell you that I don’t like this, Livy. Are we supposed to say that you’re a bad mom or something?”
“Or that you are closer to Sophie than you really are?” Glenn added.
“You’ll be expected to answer their questions truthfully, and to the best of your ability.” I was grateful for the cocktail the Ashes offered as they ushered me into the den. “You know, I feel like we’re all being asked to take a test that’s so subjective it’s damn near impossible to pass it,” I said, sipping my whiskey. “You guys, I don’t know what I’m doing with Sophie half the time. Where do I draw the lines? What are the boundaries? Sometimes I tell her something and I feel like I’m treading on your toes, Joy. I mean, for example—did she pick up after herself when she was growing up?”
The Ashes exchanged a cryptic look and then burst out laughing. “Oh, please!” Joy exclaimed. “I could never get her to clean up!”
Glenn slapped his knee a couple of times. “Yes! We used to bribe her! A new glove if she’d straighten up her room; or a trip to the movies if she actually washed a dish or put her dirty clothes in the hamper. When she went away to college, Joy had to take her on a field trip to the basement and impart to her the arcane mysteries of that big white whirring machine because she’d never done her own laundry in her life.”
He’d made me laugh. “You spoiled her!”
“I knowww,” Joy confessed guiltily. “But that’s what you do with an only child.” She sipped her chardonnay and then stared into the glass. “I can’t conceive,” she said quietly. “Sophie was our blessing. And we didn’t mind the consequences if we were a bit indulgent when she was little.”
Glenn nodded. “And not so little, too. Yeah, we did kind of spoil her rotten, but she didn’t grow up so badly. She’s a good kid; doesn’t drink or do drugs…”
“Or listen to music we hate,” giggled Joy, more relaxed now that she’d shared her big secret with me. “There’s no hidden recipe to bonding with your daughter, you know. I mean, Glenn was always a lot closer to Sophie than I am. They both adore baseball, and after all these years I still can’t remember what a balk is! So I don’t know how the judge is going to render his decision.”
“Loving and listening. Those would be the top two things on my list,” said Glenn.
“You see—yes—but beyond, or in addition to that, how do you quantify, or qualify, the other stuff? My lawyer wants us to study each other like lab rats or something, learn each other’s little quirks—the favorite ice-cream flavor stuff, as he would put it. But that’s like having the sparkly ornaments before you have the Christmas tree. I started out by figuring that it was too late for
me to do most of the parental things you do with your daughter. So the best I could do was befriend her. But in some ways, your daughter can’t be your friend—not in the way that your friend-friends are. With your friends, you support them no matter how dopey they act, because that’s what friends do. But with your kid, you want to do everything in your power to prevent them from doing something dopey because the last thing you want is to see them get hurt.”
Glenn offered to refill my rocks glass, but I declined. After all, I had to drive home on a motor scooter. His seafood risotto was excellent, and the rest of the evening passed relatively amicably, although the tension between the Ashes and me remained pretty palpable. I could certainly sense that, au fond, they wished Sophie had never found me, but since she had, they would soldier on, chins skyward, and make the best of it.
They walked outside with me and wished me a safe ride home. “Just remember one thing,” Joy said, right before I donned my helmet. “You can’t be us, and you can’t give Sophie what we did.”
“What my wife is saying—although I’m sure she didn’t mean to put her Aerosole in her mouth—is to just be yourself, Livy. Believe me, I don’t want Marty deMarley or Dick Fernando or Peter Argent to end up calling the shots in the Cheers front office. Oh, shit—wait! Can you wait a sec before you take off?” Glenn dashed back inside.
Joy shook her head. “I have no idea what he’s up to. I’m sorry. Glenn has a way of doing things like that. Mr. Last Minute, I call him. I hope you didn’t think I was being rude just now,” she added. “I mean, I’m still…we’re still…not quite used to the fact that you exist—I mean, as a tangible being in our lives—and it hasn’t been an easy adjustment to lose Sophie.”
“You haven’t lost her,” I said softly. “She’ll always be your daughter, too.”
Glenn came running out of the house holding a black canvas backpack. It looked extremely heavy. “In here,” he said breathlessly. “Some of Sophie’s game tapes. I never quite got to transferring them to DVD. But…I thought you might want to watch them.”
I beamed. “Thanks!” Glenn helped me shoulder the backpack, and I put-putted out of their cul de sac and headed for the highway.
Choosing Sophie Page 9
