“A while.” His eyes are soft. “Should I leave you two to it?”
“Actually, mate,” Vijay says, shaking Henry’s hand, “I was just on my way out. Charlotte,” he says, grabbing his coat and gloves from where he’d lain them on the wing chair, “I’m glad we did that. Call me later.”
“I wish I could be with you tonight.” I tell him.
“There will be many other nights,” he replies. “See you soon.”
After Vijay leaves, Henry remains standing. “Take off your coat,” I say.
“I thought you might prefer it if I left.”
“Don’t pin it on me,” I tell him, folding my arms. “If you’re still mad at me, and you want to go, then go.”
His eyes blaze. “Don’t you throw it back at me. If I’ve interrupted something let me know.”
“You haven’t.”
“What’s the bottle of wine for?” he asks, eyes narrowed. “To christen a ship?”
“Since when is it illegal for me to drink wine?” I demand.
“Where do you think you’re going?” I say, grabbing his arm and pulling him backward as he stomps toward the bedroom. He surges on.
“Aha! Your bed is messed up. I knew it!” He jabs a finger toward my chest. “I knew it!”
I swat his finger away. “You don’t know anything, Henry Wentworth. Nothing about me at all! Besides, what do you care? You left me when I needed you.”
“I did no such thing.”
“I wanted to tell you why I was scared, and you abandoned me!”
“I didn’t abandon you,” he says, trying to rip off his overcoat. “I was trying to save you from yourself.” He manages to get himself untangled, and he throws the garment on the floor.
“I thought maybe if I cleared out, you’d calm down and have a think. I still maintain that going on The Today Show is the surest route to getting Hudson back in your arms.” He sits down on the edge of the bed, and puts his head in his hands. “Don’t you see? Everything I’ve been doing, I’ve been doing for you. My foolish mistake! Out of sight, out of mind, I suppose.” He looks up at me. “I wish I’d been the one you confided in.”
I sit down next to him on the edge of my bed. “Henry, there’s so much I’ve wanted to tell you.” I look into his eyes, but he looks away. His jaw is set. I wanted to tell you how much it has mean to have you with me since Hudson’s been gone, I think. I wanted to tell you how the blue of your eyes sends shivers of pleasure to my core.
He shifts his eyes back to mine. “Then why didn’t you?” He looks hurt. “I told you my biggest secret. Don’t you trust me?”
“Up to now, I haven’t really let myself trust anyone. It’s never been safe, you know? I suppose you have to choose to trust. Are you telling me I should choose you?”
“I’m telling you that I wish you would.” He scoots closer to me, so that our thighs are touching, hip to knee. “The choice is yours.”
I take a deep breath, and take his hand. He squeezes it. “Here goes. For starters, Vijay is just a friend who came to coach me. Nothing happened.” Henry breaks into a smile, and angles his body a little more closely toward me. I continue. “Let me tell you about the day I found Hudson.”
I talk for a long time, filling in the details of what it was like to grow up never knowing my father, wishing I were normal. I tell him about the loneliness of boarding school, and how painful it was to behave on the outside like I was one of the girls, but to feel like a different species on the inside. I told him about going home for holidays with Aunt Miranda, and how she made an effort on the rare occasions when she was home but never quite hit the mark, and how that made me feel like it was my fault. If I had just been a better girl, I could have made her mother me.
At some point, Henry pulls me to the middle of the bed, and we sit knee-to-knee, holding hands, faces just inches apart. “Sometimes,” I whisper. I can hear that my voice is raspy and weak. “Sometimes,” I try again, “I worry that my mother didn’t stick around because I wasn’t good enough.”
“It doesn’t work like that,” Henry says softly. “You were a very good girl then, and you are a wonderful person now. It was an accident. These things just happen. It may not be fair, but that’s life. I’m just sorry it happened to you.” He kisses me lightly on the forehead.
“Thank you, Henry.” I feel so tired. “I think I need to sleep now.” Gently, Henry cradles me in the crook of his arm, and lays me back on the pillow. My muscles are loose, and I’m floating.
“Shh,” he tells me. “You’re all right now. Everything is going to be fine.”
I breathe in Henry’s scent. The earthiness is comforting. So is the after-rain aroma. It’s fresh, like the world’s been washed clean.
He kisses away what’s left of my tears and strokes my cheek. I close my eyes, and let myself rest. It feels good not to be alone.
Chapter 13
I wake to an unfamiliar chiming sound. I feel Henry shuffling around in the darkness. I see the light from his cell phone as he shuts off his alarm. I do a big yawn and marvel at the fact that I slept the whole night in his arms. I could count the number of times I’d spent the whole night in a bed with James, and on the rare occasion when I did, I had always awakened several times throughout the night.
“Good morning, Sleeping Beauty,” he says to me, switching on the bedside lamp. “It’s 4:30. Have you made a decision?”
I sit up. I check in with myself and am surprised to find I feel refreshed, and well rested. “What happens if I say no?”
“Then you say no,” he says, sitting up opposite me.
“I’m surprised you didn’t cancel.”
“I wanted to leave our options open. I can clean up a mess and do damage control, but I could never have secured this slot twice.”
“Will I ruin your career if I bow out?”
“Please don’t factor that into your choice. I want you to do what’s right for you.”
I think about Mrs. Rabinowitz, and my new friends, Craig, and Vijay. All of them have been willing to stick their necks out for me. All three of them risked something for me and Hudson. Each one of them called in favors and risked. Not to mention Henry. I look at gorgeous Henry, rumpled and wrinkled from sleep, rubbing his eyes and yawning. He’s done so much for me. I can’t believe I ever doubted that he was on my side. He’s not Miranda’s minion, he’s my boyfriend. That thought flips my stomach like going down a roller coaster hill. Well, maybe he’s not technically my boyfriend but we’re something. I’m sure of it.
I take a deep breath. “When do we leave?”
Henry breaks out into a huge smile. “That’s my girl!” he says, and he gives me a quick peck on the lips before springing out of bed and running to his shower to get ready for my big day.
*****
I’ve been up for ages, drinking only coffee. There are platters of fruit and pastries everywhere in the green room of the NBC studios, but I couldn’t eat if I wanted to. I have over an hour before my scheduled appearance, and I don’t know what to do with myself. They’ve made an attempt to gussy up the bare cube of a room by draping a malnourished pine garland across the room-length mirror, and installing a wan two-foot-tall tree dotted with candy canes on the counter in front of the three Naugahyde swivel chairs.
There’s a woman in the holding room across the hall from me, who keeps pacing and laughing. She’s an army sergeant, just back from the Middle East, and they’re going to surprise her children by having brought her home in time for Christmas. She’s being fussed over by her own mother, and sisters, and aunts. They’ve all been sweet to me, popping in to introduce themselves. They’re bursting at the seams with joy about having their girl home. I can’t help wishing my life were like that.
It’s really my nature to deal with things on my own, but I have to admit it’s nice to have Henry here with me. There are moments when his knowing all of my personal business and being physically near set off a trigger in me. It’s like my clothes are too tight, and
I feel like I need to burst into a run. I’m not used to people being so close, not like the sergeant across the hall from me. She looks like she revels in it. But I know Henry is on my side; everything he’s doing, he’s doing for me. I focus on that. From the time we walked in, he’s been acting as my agent, personal assistant, and body guard. Because of him, my nerves are holding steady, but just barely. I wish Aunt Miranda had shown up, though. I texted her when I was leaving The Waldorf, telling her I was going on television, but she never responded. I know she’s busy with the mayor’s daughter’s wedding, but it stings.
I run a brush through my hair. I have no idea how much makeup to put on, so I swipe on some lipstick and hope for the best. My clothes look good. I’m wearing my first-day outfit from my Macy’s delivery. I stare in the mirror and, suddenly, I see Vijay’s face. I whip around to make sure it’s really him and not a daydream.
“Vijay! How did you know I was here?”
“I have to say you did clue me in when you said, ‘I am going on The Today Show with Matt Lauer tomorrow’, and then we practiced together for over an hour.”
“No, goofy! I mean how did you know I was here here?”
“I have a lot of friends in comedy who do very well. I don’t want to name drop but let me just say Jerry Seinfeld.”
“Shut up,” I say, slapping him on the shoulder. “You know Jerry Seinfeld.”
“No,” he laughs, “but I wanted you to let me say it. I know some of the writers from The Daily Show. They were on and they told me how to get to back here. Once I was back, I told the girl guarding the main door that I am your brother.”
My jaw drops. “But…”
“But what? I am a rich, deep brown and you are like a ghost dipped in bleach?”
I crack up. “Thanks a lot. I’ll have you know I get a good suntan every summer.”
“At the spray-on salon?” He winks. “That is the beauty of the story. After I told her you were my sister, I stuck out my chin and dared her to question me. Slum dogs like myself can leverage people’s need to be politically correct. Ah, I love it when the ends justify the means. Best part of the story? I was joking around with her, you know, and getting along. Another woman joined her behind the desk, and was listening in like she was bored on duty, are you with me?”
“Yes.”
“So the first girl asks what I do. We were shooting the breeze, right? I tell her I’m a doctor but I do standup comedy. People love that backstory. So she says, as people do, if you’re a comic, tell me a joke. So I launch into some of my act. The other woman asks me do I have a card. I give it to her, thinking she would look for me at one of the clubs. Turns out, she books the warm-up comics for the audiences. She invited me to send her my tape.”
“That’s amazing!” Hearing Vijay’s story lights a spark of hope in me. If I can just get through this interview, maybe I’d get Hudson back.
“Charlotte,” Henry says, bursting into the room at a clip. “Oh, hello.” Even though I explained about Vijay, Henry seems suspicious.
“Just here for some last-minute coaching,” Vijay says. “I had to creep out before dawn’s early light so I wouldn’t wake my girlfriend. She is not a morning person. Lovely in the afternoon, but you don’t want to cross her before that first cup of tea. It’s like disturbing a hibernating bear.” His eyes fill with affection. “So cute.”
Henry warms immediately, lunging forward to shake Vijay’s hand. “Good to have you here. Thanks for coming to support Charlotte.”
“Happy to do it. What goes around comes around. I firmly believe that.”
“I came in to take Charlotte with me to hair and makeup.”
I’m embarrassed.
“But you don’t need a thing. You’re beautiful as you are.” Henry smiles at me. My insides feel warm and gushy. “It’s standard treatment. Everyone gets it, all genders, regardless.”
“Go,” Vijay says. “I’ll wait here. I am going to pace. My rear end is due in the seat of a cab in two hours. It feels good to stand.”
Henry hands me over to a woman wearing an apron with a hundred different brushes in its multiple pockets. She introduces herself as Annie and gets to work. She sprays my hair with water, and while she dries it with a fat, round brush, I go over the lessons Vijay taught me in my head. My goal is to make the audience understand, he told me. Take the focus off of myself and my nerves will settle. Pretend I’m talking to one person, and one person alone. Make Matt Lauer understand how important it is that I get Hudson back, and the whole television audience will understand.
“Flip up, now,” Annie instructs. When I toss my hair and sit back tall in the chair, I see Aunt Miranda standing there with Penelope from Macy’s.
My heart swells. “Aunt Miranda! You made it.”
“I couldn’t very well let you go on national TV wearing rags, could I Cinderella? Penelope, would you be so kind as to offer Charlotte the outfits you chose for her?”
Excitement begins to replace dread as Annie expertly applies a face full of cosmetics that give the effect of a fresher, more wide-awake me without looking like a mask. Once I’m out of hair and makeup, I change into my television clothes. I put on a denim nipped-waist shirtdress with an asymmetrical hem and Penelope quickly accessorizes it with simple zip-up booties and a statement necklace.
“Perfect,” declares Miranda, as I come back to the Green Room. “You look sophisticated without being too urban or runway. Well done, Penelope.”
“Yes, very well done,” Henry agrees, not taking his eyes off of me.
“You look very nice, Charlotte,” Vijay says. “Last minute pro tip: Don’t fiddle with your costume. Don’t touch your collar, don’t loosen your belt, don’t zip or unzip zippers, and don’t roll or unroll your sleeves.”
“Got it.”
“Your friend Vijay here is a riot, Charlotte,” Miranda says. “I didn’t stop laughing the whole time you were gone.”
I give Vijay a skeptical look, and he shrugs. “I told you. I am very, very funny.”
The PA wearing headphones pokes her head in the door. “Five minutes. We’re taking you to set in five minutes. Vijay, want to come watch the warm-up comic?” He jumps up and follows her, eagerly.
“Thank you,” I call as she strides out, obviously in a hurry. “So, everyone, I made a decision while I was in the chair. I’m going to offer a reward for Hudson on the air.”
“Yes, but darling, didn’t Henry already post that there’s a cash reward on social media?”
“He did, but it didn’t work. No one has come forward.”
“If you need to raise the ante, I’ll cover the cost,” Aunt Miranda says. “I’ll get you the funds, Henry,” she says in a loud whisper over her shoulder. “We need to get this dog back and put this thing to bed.”
“No, I want to offer something money can’t buy. I’m going to offer to throw a party. A Christmas feast. At my home. I’ll cook it.” Just saying it out loud gives me goose bumps. I’ve never had more than two people at a time in my apartment. But I know in my gut that offering something personal is the key to getting through to people.
“Are you out of your mind?” Henry demands. “You most certainly are not having strangers into your flat, and that’s final.”
I bristle. “Did you just give me an ultimatum?”
“Charlotte, that is how people get murdered on Craig’s List. I forbid it.”
I didn’t want to feel irritated with Henry after the lovely stretch of time we’d had, but I did. “Henry, I’m a grown woman. If I want to have people in my house, I will.”
“Let’s not discuss it now. There’s no point in getting upset before you go on air.” He clamps his mouth shut, and looks away.
“He does have a point, darling,” Aunt Miranda says.
“Oh, so now you’re on his side?”
“There are no sides. We’re just more experienced with this kind of thing than you are.”
Maybe it’s my nerves about going on live TV, or maybe it
’s the early hour, but my head is throbbing, and I’m buzzing with fury. Across the hall, the sergeant’s family are all gathered round singing For She’s a Jolly Good Fellow and giving her hugs. I wish I were alone.
“Excuse me,” I manage to say with in a civil tone. “I’m just going to pop down to the desk to see if they have any painkillers.”
I avoid all eye contact as I exit the room and walk the halls looking for a couple of aspirin. A kind young man in one of the reception areas gives me some, and a bottle of water. The walk did me good. I re-jigger my mind, and start psyching myself up for the interview. By the time I’m back in the hall where my Green Room is, the noise from the sergeant’s room has ended. She must have been taken to set. My heart lurches. I must be next.
“…texting me at all hours of the day and night.” I hear Aunt Miranda say, and I freeze.
“Miranda, I kept her busy. I kept her busy for days and nights, you know that.” I hold my breath. I know I shouldn’t eavesdrop, but I can’t help myself.
“What you should know is that this is the last time of year I can spare you.”
“Then why did you assign me to watch your niece?” I hear Henry demand.
“Because you’re the best. I figured that you would have this done and dusted in record time. I never counted on having to handle Macy’s without you.”
“If you wanted me at Macy’s, then why on earth did you put me on as a babysitter?” Henry replies with a harsh edge in his voice. I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut.
“You’re right, Henry. The fault is mine. It’s a weak leader who doesn’t take responsibility for her decisions. But I told you that I couldn’t be dragged off task, and you let her text and phone. I didn’t need to feel guilty whilst trying to pull off a mayoral wedding.”
“That’s not fair, Miranda. What did you want me to do? Tie her to a chair? Do you honestly think I relished missing the chance to rub shoulders with influential people in order to…to what?”
“Charlotte Bell,” the PA says, tapping me on the shoulder. I hadn’t even heard her walk up. “You’re up. Right this way, please.”
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