I sat in the bleachers and waited for her. I never thought Jay would abandon me. He was the one bright spot in my life. How could he cancel our prom date? My life had been shaken to the core. I felt more alone than ever.
“What’s wrong?” Callie asked when she saw me. Sorrow must have been written all over my face. “I thought you would be happy. Did you find a dress?”
I nodded. “Jay doesn’t want to be seen with me, so he isn’t taking me to the prom.”
Callie sat beside me. “I’m not surprised. You do know that his friends, Rick and Jared, were the ones who spray painted your car?”
I shook my head sadly. I didn’t know. “Rick and Jared? I just saw them with Jay. I thought Mrs. Clancy said they were punished.”
“Punishment doesn’t extend to them being kicked out of school. The police department has them doing community service. They still get to come to school provided they don’t get into any more trouble.”
“Does Jay know what they did to my car?”
“I can’t say for sure, but he would have to be deaf not to have heard.”
The bell rang for the start of the school day.
“We have to go,” I said.
Callie gave me a ride back across campus. She pressed me for details on what exactly Jay had said. I told her his family told him not to see me.
Numbly I sat through my classes. I knew everybody knew that Jay had broken up with me. I could feel my classmates looking at me. When I looked up they rapidly looked away.
I didn’t know who to be upset with, Jay or his family. I thought his mother liked me. She worked on several charities with Mom. Whenever I was around her, either at their house or when our paths had crossed at the country club, she seemed friendly enough.
Mom had been pleased when Jay and I started hanging out together. She said that his family was “old money.” She also warned me that Jay’s Mom and other old money families looked down on us and the recent family additions to Fairfield as nouveau riche. I told her that Jay’s Mom treated me well.
Not so much!
They probably didn’t want his picture to appear in the paper or on TV if he was hanging out at my house. The media lounging around our gate didn’t bother me. I wasn’t the one they wanted to talk to. I was used to seeing them there when I left for school and when I returned in the evening. There were fewer and fewer of them each day. I took that as a sign that Dad was being cleared, slowly but surely.
“What was the use of going to Chicago? I have a dress and no one to take me to the prom. This would be real funny if I didn’t feel like crying.”
9
A uniformed guard opened the front door of our house, nodding to me as I entered.
Dad’s law firm had hired a security firm after several threatening packages and letters arrived at our house. Guards were posted at each entrance. Every car that came on the property had to be searched, which somehow didn’t unnerve me, being just a continuation of the nightmare.
I went to my room, happy to be alone after getting through the day. My brain felt like it had frozen. I closed my closet door, where my prom dress hung, reminding me of dreams shattered. I couldn’t bear to look at it. I just wanted to lie down, deep under the covers, and not come out. Ever.
The coldness of our house had penetrated my bones. Mom and Dad were trying to save on heating bills so the thermostat was turned way down. The heat was turned on early every morning and stayed on until noon. Therefore, the house was warm when the lawyers and clerks arrived. I didn’t benefit much because I was at school during most of the day. At least I was warm there. When the house started to cool down, I could see the law clerks putting on sweaters and their suit jackets. They were polite about it and tried to do it discreetly, but I knew they were getting cold.
So I was covered up in my bed trying to get warm before I dressed in warm-ups and went down for dinner. I wanted to buy a space heater for my room, but Mom vetoed it. She had heard too many stories on the news about houses burning down because of them.
Mom would rather be in a pretty house with no heat than in a house with only certain rooms warm. I thought it had to do with a status thing. How many wealthy people heat their big houses with space heaters? Only poor people who’re trying to save on energy bills use space heaters.
I started staying at school as long as possible, working in the newsroom after school, so I wouldn’t have to go home to a cold house.
Ignoring Mom’s calls to dinner, I buried myself further under the white eiderdown comforter on my bed. I felt myself slipping off to a place of blackness and a void in time and space.
“It’s your fault! It’s all your fault!” I screamed as I came into the kitchen the next morning.
Dad’s eyes searched mine. “What’s my fault, Kitten?”
“It’s your fault that Jay broke up with me. His family doesn’t want him to see me anymore.”
“Sit down and have some breakfast,” Mom said. “You’ll feel better.”
“I don’t want any breakfast. I’ve tried to be supportive, but did you stop to think what getting mixed up with crooked people would do to me?”
“I didn’t know this was going to happen,” Dad said.
“Maybe you did know. Maybe you were a part of the scam. Maybe you even helped plan it,” I cried. “Whatever. My life is ruined.”
“Darling, your life is not ruined,” Mom said. “You have your whole life ahead of you. If anybody’s life is ruined, it’s mine.” She paused, thinking about what she had said. “And your father’s.”
Crestfallen, Dad stood up from the table. I could see the hurt on his face. My words had hit home. I didn’t care.
“Every day it kills me that I have put my family in this situation. Yes, it is my fault. If I hadn’t tried to give both of you the best of everything, I wouldn’t have worked at this firm. I wanted my family to live in the best neighborhood. I wanted my family to have every door opened to them. I wanted for you, Kitten, what I didn’t have growing up. I promised to make this right, and I will.” He threw down his napkin and went into his study.
“I’m not hungry,” I said as I went out the door.
10
I went to my safe haven. The park.
Fairfield College sits across the railroad tracks from the park, up on a hill. The land the park sits on used to belong to the college. Back in the day, a professor loved to jog along the Missouri River. He urged the college to put in a walking/jogging trail and the work was begun. He got local businesses to donate the material. Unfortunately, the professor died in a tragic car accident, and the trail lay unfinished. As a memorial to him, Fairfield College donated the land that River Landing sits on to the city and the city finished the trail and constructed a park on the site.
I sat on a wrought-iron bench, looked out on the Missouri River, and just stared out into space. I must have looked lost and forlorn because the Old Women stopped to talk to me.
“It can’t be that bad,” Rose said.
“Don’t you remember?” asked Maybelle. “When you’re that age everything is that bad.”
“I’ve been following the news about your father’s situation,” Rose said. “I don’t hear that much about him, only about that Williams fellow. I hope that means your father is OK.”
“He is,” I said. “Thanks for asking.”
“Then what has you down in the dumps?” asked Maybelle.
“I have a prom dress but no date.”
“No boyfriend?” asked Rose.
“He broke up with me because of Dad’s situation.”
Maybelle sat beside me, “Then it doesn’t seem like he was the right fellow for you.”
“I went to Chicago over the weekend to get a designer dress, me and my cousin and my Mom and aunt.”
“Honey, he’s not the only pickle in the barrel,” said Maybelle.
“It might seem like it now, but you don’t have to settle for him,” Rose said. “Go to the prom with somebody else.”
&nb
sp; “But I don’t know anybody else. Only the people at my school.”
“What about your cousin? Maybe she knows somebody,” Rose suggested. “When I was a young lady in my first job, my boss was giving an elegant party at his house. Everyone was supposed to bring spouses and significant others, and I didn’t have a date. One of my friends offered her husband and he went as my date.”
“You’re kidding,” I said, incredulous.
“I kid you not,” she said. “I had a wonderful time. We were friends, and we both knew it was a one-time thing, and he was doing me a favor. End of story.”
“Now you go ask your cousin if you can borrow her boyfriend for the evening,” Maybelle said.
“I couldn’t do that,” I said. “We don’t have that type of relationship. I hardly know her. We don’t see each other often.”
“Oh,” said Rose. “Then we have to come up with another plan. I’ll ask my friends to suggest a nice young man to be your date.”
“You can’t do that!” I exclaimed.
“I can, and I will,” Rose replied.
Maybelle said, “I see you sitting here day after day. You’re a young girl. You should be out with your friends. Where is your mother? I haven’t seen her since this whole thing with your father broke.”
“She doesn’t go out much,” I said softly. “Besides, I have to drive her car now. Dad had to sell mine. If Mom came out here in the mornings, I’d have to drive her back home before going to school.” I had to defend Mom. She would be out here with me if she could.
“We could give her a ride,” Rose said.
Mom would just love riding with the Old Women. I dared not tell her what they said.
“The important thing to remember is that this isn’t the end of the world for either of you,” Maybelle said. “Everybody has ups and downs. It’s how you deal with them that counts. I bet your father isn’t sitting around feeling sorry for himself. He’s probably doing everything he can trying to get out of this mess.”
I smiled. “You’re right.”
“Everybody has something they wish wouldn’t have happened,” Maybelle said. “Let me tell you about me. It hasn’t been that long ago either. Only about twenty years ago.”
That was longer than I had been alive. But I didn’t say anything. I wanted to hear her story.
“I was an executive in a big company in New York. Oh, I had a good job.” Her eyes glistened, remembering. “I had reached heights only very few women have ever reached, then or now. But I got involved with my boss. Everybody knew about it, but things were going well with the company and nobody said anything. Did I tell you he was married?”
“Don’t be telling her your sordid story,” Rose said, shaking her head and clucking her tongue. “She doesn’t want to hear about your life.”
“She needs to hear it,” Maybelle said and continued with her story. “Well one day the auditors came. Earnings for the company had been misstated and made to look as if we were making money when we were in fact losing our shirts. The CFO said that he had been directed by my boss to cook the books, so to speak. Needless to say, there was a big scandal, along with another scandal that included the boss and me. The CFO and my boss went to jail. I lost my job. Nobody would hire me. And I came back here to live with my sister, where I’ve been ever since.”
“What happened next?” I asked.
“I changed my name and started over as a secretary,” she said. “It hasn’t been easy, I’m not going to lie and say it was, but we do what we have to do.”
“Come on, Maybelle,” Rose said. “Let’s finish our walk. Besides, she needs to get to school.”
I looked at my watch. She was right. The first bell was ringing about then. I’d miss homeroom but if I hurried, I’d get there by first period.
11
The newsroom was empty except for Mrs. Stevens and me.
Even though the room housing the newspaper was equipped with state of the art computers and other equipment, most staff writers worked on their own computers outside the newsroom. Mrs. Stevens assigned stories, or we could come up with our own story ideas for approval. It didn’t matter where we worked as long as we got our stories in by deadline.
I cherished the silence of the room today. This seemed like the only place, besides the park, that I could have peace and quiet without life intruding and sending me into a tailspin. All the interviews and additional research for my story were done. I just had to bring it all together and make sense of it.
Mrs. Stevens insisted that we turn in a hard copy of our story, along with submitting it electronically. She would probably never see her reporters if the rule wasn’t in place. Students at Fairfield Oaks led busy lives, inside and outside of school.
I loved the process of putting a story together and making it appeal to my audience. It started out as a jigsaw puzzle with all the pieces in disarray. Much thought went into deciding which piece of the puzzle fit into each space. The process of adding and taking away sections until each component flowed smoothly consumed me and made me focus on something other than myself.
I worked late on my story. I had planned to turn it in yesterday, but the Jay prom derailment had sidetracked me. I was only sixteen years old, and in the past month, I’d suffered enough for a lifetime.
I handed Mrs. Stevens my story five minutes before deadline. She quickly scanned it.
“Good work,” she said.
“I hate to see you go,” I said. “Do you know what you’re going to do next school year?”
“I’m going to Lincoln Prep to teach journalism,” she said. “I’ll be teaching students what it takes to be a modern multimedia journalist.”
“I wish you could teach it here?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “They want a change.”
“That’s messed up!”
“Don’t worry about me,” she said. “I have a new opportunity at Lincoln Prep. I’ll get to start their journalism department. In fact, I’ll get to order all of the equipment. Everything will be new.
“I told you that my faith in God would bring something good out of losing my job here. This job closed, but God opened a better one for me at Lincoln Prep. One thing I’ll get to do there that I couldn’t do here is start a broadcast journalism division where one person will write, shoot, edit, produce and file a story.”
“Sounds exciting.”
“Although the news business is changing, I’m excited about the changes.”
“My cousin goes to Lincoln Prep,” I said.
“It’s a great school, located in the inner city. Students there get the best education that’s available. It’s comparable to the education here, with over ninety percent of the students going on to college.”
“Really?”
“They have an award-winning debate team,” she said.
“I know. My cousin is on it.”
Mrs. Stevens packed up her briefcase while acknowledging other students who were turning in their stories.
“I’ve been thinking about a story, and I think you’re the perfect person to do it,” she said.
“What’s the story?”
“I think we should do a story on how students at Fairfield Oaks are being affected by the current economic recession.”
“Maybe you should get somebody else for that story,” I said. “I don’t feel comfortable doing it.”
“Why not?” she asked. “Because of what’s going on with your family?”
I didn’t say anything, but I knew that wasn’t a credible excuse.
“If you pursue journalism as a career, you’re going to have to write and investigate your stories regardless of what’s going on with you personally,” she said. “Now’s a good time to practice.”
“Maybe I don’t have it in me to be a journalist. I’m barely getting through the day,” I told her.
“I think you can do this story. It will be a long investigative piece and will do you good to get your mind off your troubles.”
“Most everybody here is not worried about money,” I protested.
“But some are,” she said. “I hear talk every day in the teachers’ lounge about students and their families.”
“If I do the story, can you tell me who to talk to?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Then it wouldn’t be investigative. You have to do your own work.”
I promised her I would think about it.
We walked out together. As we parted on the school steps, she asked, “How is your family?”
“We’re OK,” I said, “Just trying to get through each day.”
“Keep your chin up,” she said. “Remember, have faith in God and He’ll bring something good out of this situation for you.”
I watched as she went to the teachers’ parking lot. I didn’t want to keep my chin up. I wanted to be anywhere except here. And I didn’t want to write a recession story about students in my school. If I did, I was afraid I would have to write about my family, even though our downturn in economics wasn’t caused by the recession.
12
My e-mail account was bulging with messages titled “Your Campaign.”
Your new slogan should be: Crooks Daughter for Treasurer. LOL
Another read: Do the right thing. Don’t run!
Another: We can’t trust you. Thievery runs in the family.
Still Another: Money, Money, Money. Gone, Gone, Gone.
Another e-mail: Get off the ticket! Now!
Another one: Lauren Moffit for Treasurer. A Fox in the Henhouse.
And another: All the Moffits are thieves.
I closed my e-mail account and immediately got a new e-mail address and notified family and close friends. There was too much animosity. The e-mail messages had helped me make a decision. I would abandon my campaign before even running. I already had enough to deal with. I wouldn’t subject myself to more stress. I didn’t want to be treasurer that bad. The only reason I had agreed to run was because Jay had asked me.
The People in the Park Page 5
