The Fortune Quilt

by Lani Diane Rich

  Excuses about conflict of interest and journalistic integrity flash through my mind, but they fade fast. Even though the Mary thing is exactly the kind of vague coincidence that make ladies who heart schnauzers pony up the big bucks for this kind of stuff, I can’t shake the sense that this quilt is somehow connected to my mother, and despite all reason I am suddenly overwhelmed with wanting it. I reach for it, and feel an instant sense of calm when I hold it in my arms.

  “Thank you.”

  She smiles and cocks her head to the side. “Call me if you have any questions.”

  I nod and find my way out. When I reach the Blueberry, Christopher tosses his cigarette butt on the ground and chuckles, eyes on the quilt.

  “You’ve got to be shitting me.”

  “Shut up.” I toss the quilt into the back of the Blueberry. “Let’s go make some widgets.”

  ***

  The most persistent memory I have of my mother is from when she brought Five home from the hospital. She looked like she hadn’t showered in days, which was unusual for her. She was the kind of woman who never left the house without makeup. I didn’t make too much of it at the time, figuring this was just the way it was when there was a new baby in the house. I was four when Ella was born, and couldn’t remember the aftermath of that for comparison, but to my twelve-year-old brain, it made sense. I helped Mom up to her room while Dad tended to Five. It was when my mother looked down at me, her eyes distant and strange, that I had the first inkling something was really wrong. She didn’t say anything to me, just headed into the bedroom, where she stayed for the next six weeks.

  Whenever I wasn’t in school, I took care of Five. I sterilized her bottles. I mixed her formula and left it, ready to warm, in the fridge. I bathed her at night. I gave her midnight feedings. I failed my pre-algebra exam.

  I remember Dad telling me that Mom was just tired and overwhelmed, and that he was proud of how much I was helping out. Then one day I came home from school and found Five sitting in her crib, screaming, her diaper brimming with yuck. I went into the bedroom and yelled at my mother, told her to get up off her ass and take care of the baby. I never spoke to my mother like that before, and it worked. Her eyes cleared, and for the first time since coming home from the hospital, she was actually able to focus on me. It only lasted long enough for her to scream at me to get the hell out of her room, but at least it was something.

  She left the next day while Ella and I were at school. We came home to a note and a neighbor, who handed Five over to us and left.

  Dad held it together pretty well, but he never got over it. It was like one of those cartoon characters, running through a wall and leaving a bunny-shaped hole behind. One look at Dad, and you could see the Mary-shaped hole left there. He never even filed for divorce. Technically, if she’s alive, they’re still married.

  I don’t think about my mother very much. There’s no reason to. But on the day that Brandywine Seaver gives me the quilt, I find I can think of little else. When I get home that night, I sneak the quilt up into my room and tuck it under my bed, as though it’s some sort of contraband. I don’t know why, though. If Dad saw it, he wouldn’t think twice about it. As well he shouldn’t.

  It’s just a quilt.

  ***

  “So, tell us about the quilt,” Lindsay says three days later, leaning over Christopher to refill my glass of wine. It’s our weekly Friday night get together, in which Lindsay—Christopher’s roommate and certifiably the coolest girl on the planet—cooks us a lovely roast with garlic mashed potatoes and I bring something from the Albertson’s bakery for dessert. We are nibbling on caramel brownies and drinking red wine and I feel relaxed and happy. Christopher sits on the couch between the two of us and shakes his head.

  “Lindsay wants a quilt now,” Christopher says. “Tell her it’s a load of crap or I’m gonna have to cover her rent next month.”

  I look at Lindsay, ignoring Christopher and waving my wineglass lazily in the air as I talk. “She didn’t say anything of substance. It was all just random stuff about South America and paintbrushes and a book with an amber spine…”

  Christopher raises one eyebrow. “A what?”

  “And, you know, I don’t believe in that stuff anyway.”

  “You didn’t mention the book with the amber spine before.” Christopher’s voice is tight and strange, and his cheeks are red. For such a big guy, he really can’t hold his drink.

  “Of course I didn’t, because it doesn’t mean anything,” I say. Lindsay reaches for another brownie.

  “Well, now that we’ve taken care of the softball questions,” she says, setting the brownie down on the plate in her lap without taking a bite, “there’s something we need to talk about.”

  “No,” Christopher says, warning deep in his tone, and Lindsay rolls her eyes. I can’t help but smile. They act like such a married couple sometimes, and I’m 90% sure Lindsay’s in love with him. Sadly, Christopher’s too thick to know a good thing when it’s making him garlic mashed potatoes, and I’m sure as hell not gonna be the one to tell him.

  “She’s a girl,” Lindsay says, shooting a look of pure loving evil at Christopher. “She needs to talk about this stuff.”

  “Not all girls need to talk everything to death,” Christopher says, grabbing his beer bottle off the coffee table.

  “Yes. They do. Ella’s still on her honeymoon, so who is Carly going to talk to if not you and me?” She leans forward to build a direct eyeline between us that excludes Christopher. “The thing with Seth at the wedding. How are you doing?”

  I take a deep gulp of wine, then wince as I swallow. “I’m fine. It’s no big deal. He’s just… you know… still having a hard time. I guess.”

  Christopher snorts. “You’re making excuses for him? He got drunk and made you miss your sister’s wedding.”

  I pat his hand. “Take it down a notch, there, Bulldog. I was there for most of the wedding, and Seth… you know. He’s still adjusting.”

  “He’s an asshole.” Christopher takes a swig of his beer.

  Lindsay nibbles her lip. “Are you sure you’re okay? I mean, that had to be tough. And you know, we’ve never really talked about why you guys broke up in the first place. Did he…” She pauses, and a look passes between her and Christopher. “Did he do something… bad to you?”

  “What?” I laugh, then stop when I see how intently Christopher is watching for my answer. “This is what you think? You guys have been talking about this?”

  Christopher picks at his beer label, not looking at me. “Not us. Her.”

  “He just seemed to love you so much,” Lindsay said. “And then, suddenly, poof. Gone. I was just worried—”

  “He didn’t do anything wrong.” My throat feels dry and I grab my wineglass. “He was great. I just wasn’t ready, I guess, and he couldn’t accept that. When I gave the ring back, he kinda freaked out.” I see Christopher tense next to me and I backtrack. “Not in a bad way, just… he started drinking, he wouldn’t stop bugging me about it, and it just got to be too much. So I ended it for good and moved back to Dad’s.”

  Lindsay nodded, her face full of sympathy and understanding. “And how’s that going, being back home?”

  I shrug. “It’s okay. I mean, at first, it was really comforting, you know, being Daddy’s little girl again after going through all that crap with Seth. Then there was the preparation for Ella’s wedding, and Five really seems to like having me around. I’m probably going to get my own place again after November sweeps, when things calm down.” I stare down at the wineglass in my hand, and feel a little shaky from thinking about Seth. See, this is why I don’t like talking about this kind of stuff. It doesn’t do any good, it just upsets me, and who needs that? I down the last of my wine. “And that’s it.”

  Lindsay watches me expectantly, and I see a slight expression of disappointment seep over her face as she realizes that’s the end of the conversation. But still, she smiles, because Lindsay, as previously sta
ted, is the coolest girl on the planet. I aspire to be Lindsay someday, with her long blonde hair that does what it’s told and her great cooking and her ability to always be kind no matter how bad of a verbal ass-kicking someone desperately need. Lindsay never says the wrong thing. Lindsay would have taken the quilt graciously, sent a thank-you note exactly three days later, then called Brandywine Seaver to report every instance in which one of the predictions might possibly be coming true.

  I hope Lindsay never gets a thing for schnauzers, I think, and the thought makes me laugh a little.

  “Well,” Christopher says, standing up and grabbing the empty bottle of wine, “I’m ready to kick both your asses at Scrabble. Who’s up for an ass-kicking?”

  Lindsay and I share a smile as we follow Christopher to the table, where we proceed to annihilate him in Scrabble, the way we do every Friday night.

  ***

  November sweeps starts, ironically, on October 26th, and Christopher and I are plunged into the insanity. We work long days, drink loads of coffee, and spend countless hours trying to soothe our boss, Victor. He’s perpetually convinced that Tucson Today is on the verge of being canceled, which it never is, and the paranoia gets ten times worse during sweeps, when ratings are actually measured. And every sweeps, Tucson Today performs consistently, and there’s nothing to worry about, a fact which doesn’t so much as make a dent in Victor’s neurosis. He’s like one of those elderly aunts who insists she’s about to die every day and ends up outliving everyone else in the family. Sadly, though, Victor’s freak-outs tend to be infectious to the less hardy on the show.

  “So, this psychic quiltmaker story.” Eloise Tucker, the show’s host, huddles even closer to me in the tiny sound booth as we review the voice-over script she needs to read for the story. “Do you really think it’s, you know, sweeps material? I mean, I’m not going to win a regional Emmy with something this fluffy, am I?”

  I keep my smile on. Eloise Tucker is never going to win a regional Emmy, because she’s never investigated, produced or written a story. She just looks pretty, reads the VOs, introduces the stories on air, and has to have Tucson spelled phonetically on every script lest she call it Tuckson. Somehow, she has managed to misinterpret Victor’s obsession with the show winning a regional Emmy as being an obsession that she win a regional Emmy.

  And I have no intention of being the person to disabuse her of this notion. I have to admit, though, it’s tempting every time she calls one of my stories “fluffy.” Especially when, as is the case with the psychic quiltmaker, I was assigned the story and had no choice in the matter.

  “I wouldn’t worry about it,” I say diplomatically, then spell out both Brandywine and Seaver for her phonetically at the top of the script.

  BRAN-dee-wine.

  SEE-ver.

  “But shouldn’t we be out interviewing the family of that kid who got bit by the snake?” she asks.

  No, I think, because a) the snake wasn’t even poisonous and b) we’re a magazine show, covering human interest stories with depth and intelligence, not a bunch of news idiots who think the only path to good ratings is to terrify everyone that there’s a snake in their backyard waiting to gobble their children whole.

  I don’t say this out loud, though, because we share editing facilities with the news people.

  “Mmmm,” I say noncommittally. “Maybe.”

  Eloise’s eyebrows knit as she looks at the script.

  “Yeah. Okay. And how do you pronounce Bilby?” she asks as I’m about to hand her the script. I smile, take the script back, and scribble again.

  BILL-bee.

  There’s a tap-tap at the door, which is slightly ajar. Christopher pokes his head in and grins at me.

  “Victor’s on a tear again,” he says, his voice thick with laughter. “He wants us to do something on the snakebite kid.”

  I look to Eloise, who’s standing a bit straighter, no doubt so she can pat herself on the back internally for having such great television instincts.

  I swap a look with Christopher, and tell him I’ll be there in a minute. He ducks out, shutting the door behind him, leaving Eloise and me in total sound seclusion.

  “God, he’s so cute,” she says, sighing like a teenager.

  “What? Who? Christopher?”

  “No worries,” she says. “I’m not going to steal him from you.”

  This takes me a moment to process. “What?”

  “Oh come on,” she says, leaning closer and speaking to me as though we’re girlfriends having a bathroom confab. “Everyone knows about you two.”

  I laugh outright. I can’t help it.

  Eloise raises a skeptical eyebrow. “You are sleeping together, aren’t you?”

  “No! He’s my best friend. That’d just be… wrong.” I am suddenly beset by a mental image of Christopher lounging naked in my bed. “Oh, God. Wrong.”

  “Seriously?” She doesn’t believe me. I can hear it in her voice.

  Puppies. Think of puppies. Cute little puppies… jumping all over Christopher naked in my bed.

  “Gah!” I say, swatting at her with the script. “Yes, seriously. No.”

  “Oh.” Her face brightens. “So you wouldn’t mind if I asked him out, then?”

  “No,” I say, but in that moment I realize I do mind. The idea of Christopher ending up with someone as plastic as Eloise bugs me. Besides, Christopher is Lindsay’s, even if neither one of them knows it yet. So, I throw in a little lie. “But his girlfriend might.”

  “Girlfriend? Really?” Eloise’s eyebrows knit together. “Well, poop.”

  ***

  “Agh!” Five says as she checks herself out in the hall mirror. “I look like I’ve been puked up by Mother Goose.”

  She turns to face me and Dad, her tremendous, hooped Little Bo Peep skirt rustling around her as she stabs the tremendous staff into the ground.

  “It’s a Halloween dance,” I say. “You’re supposed to look ridiculous.”

  “I look ridiculous?” Five wails. Dad steps forward and puts both hands on her shoulders.

  “You look beautiful, baby,” he says. She smiles gratefully at him. “And knowing it took two of us to get you all fastened up in it makes me feel much less antagonistic toward your little boyfriend Bobo there.”

  Five rolls her eyes. “His name is Bo. Just Bo.”

  “Wasn’t Bobo the dog-faced boy?” I ask.

  “No,” Dad says. “That was Jojo.”

  “Bo,” Five continues. “Not Bobo, not Botox, not Daddy’s Little Heart Attack. Just Bo.”

  A horn honks outside, and Five grabs her little white string-drawn satchel.

  “I’ll be home by one,” she says, kissing Dad on the cheek.

  “Eleven-thirty or I send the cops out for you,” Dad yells out the door. He waves to both of them, muttering through his smile, “Touch my baby girl, Botox, and I’ll castrate you, you little bastard.”

  He closes the door and puts one arm around my shoulder, guiding me toward the liquor cabinet that sits innocently in the corner of our living room.

  “Drink some scotch with your old man, Carly. I need something to make me forget my baby’s out with that little tattooed good-for-nothing.”

  “Give the kid a break. He got the tattoo with the entire swim team when they won the state championship. And it’s not like it’s in a place where anyone can see it, anyway.”

  “Exactly!” Dad says, raising one glass with a flourish and handing it to me. “How many nights do you think I’m up wondering how my little Fiver knows that boy has a dolphin on his left buttock?”

  “It was in the school paper, Dad. She showed me the article.”

  Dad raises his eyebrows. “Really?”

  I clink my glass with his. “Really.”

  “They write about buttocks in the school papers now?”

  I take a drink. “Your taxes at work.”

  He lets out a huge sigh. “I swear that child is trying to kill me.”

  “You sur
vived me and Ella, you’ll get through this.”

  We head down the hallway, settling on the big black leather couch in Dad’s office. The walls are lined with Dad’s architecture books, and blueprints of his latest project obscure the surface of the desk. The old world style globe sits in the corner with Ireland facing out. Just like always.

  “So, how are things going with that new building you guys are doing down on Tanque Verde?” I ask.

  “Do you think she’s happy?” Dad asks.

  I think about this for a moment, and shrug. “As long as she doesn’t sit down too fast and get hit in the face with the skirt, yeah, I think she’ll have a good time.”

  “Ella,” he says. “I was just wondering. I haven’t heard from her much since she came back from her honeymoon.”

  “She’s married now,” I say. “She has to dote on Dr. Greg for a while.”

  “I know,” he says. “I was just wondering if you’d heard from her.”

  I shake my head. “I talked to her for a minute on the phone last week. But she seemed fine. And when’s our next Girl’s Night? A week from Sunday? She’ll be here for that.”

  “Yeah,” Dad says, then takes a deep breath and looks at me. “He’s good enough for her. Greg? Right?”

  I stare at him for a minute, wondering what’s puttering around under that fringe of red hair. “Yeah. I think so. What’s with the worry?”

  Dad stares down into his glass. “Ah, nothing. I’m just an old man not wanting to accept that his baby girls are no longer his baby girls.” He smiles and claps a hand down over mine. “And how are you? Have you talked to that Seth since the wedding?”

  That Seth. “No. No, I haven’t.”

  “Good,” he says, and takes a sip of his drink. “He was never good enough for you.”

  “Of course not,” I say. “No one ever is.”

  He raises his drink and we clink on it. Poor Botox. He doesn’t stand a chance.