I can’t believe that is what she is taking from the experience.
“Well, luckily that’s something your old man can take care of. The Galleria’s right around the corner. Let’s go.”
“Sean, no,” I say.
“You want to come with us?”
My mouth opens, then snaps shut, then opens again. “No. And they’re not going either. We need to go upstairs and unpack.”
“Okay, kids. It looks like it’s just us. Let’s go.” With the girls attached to him, he walks toward the street.
Tom hesitates.
“Tom, you coming?” Sean asks with a glance back.
Tom looks at me, his loyalties torn.
“Go,” I say, mustering up a fake smile. “Have fun.”
He trots after them, and my smile drops, my heart thumping erratically in my chest. Something very bad is happening, a dark force creeping toward me that I feel but am powerless to stop.
I watch as they climb into a brand-new red convertible Mustang parked at the curb, and my eyes bulge at the sheer expense of it, knowing the only way Sean could afford a car like that is if he sold his rig.
“Top up or down?” he asks.
“Down,” Molly squeals, and the black top collapses into the trunk.
They drive away, and I am left alone in the garage with the bags.
51
My nails are nibbled to nubs. The laundry is done, and the condo is spotless. I’ve baked cookies and written a list of everything that needs to be done in my life—at the top of the list, Call Divorce Lawyer, underscored three times. I sip a beer as I stare at the list, hoping the alcohol will settle my irritation.
I wish my mom were here. While we were gone, she took the opportunity to visit a friend in San Francisco, and she doesn’t get back until tomorrow. Strange how I’ve grown used to her company. She still nags and annoys, but I find comfort in it. Like an irritating conscience sitting on my shoulder, her pestering is reassuring, letting me know when I’m being an idiot and when I’m doing all right. Like I know right now she’d be having a fit, screeching at me for what a mess I’ve made of things, but then she’d sit down and help me figure it out.
It’s one of the reasons I haven’t gotten us a place of our own. Though I hate to admit it, I like living with my mom, and I know she likes it too. If we move out, something precious will be lost, all the unplanned moments we share together.
She would be proud of how I stood up to Chris and blown away that Tom started talking and got himself hired as Grant. I want to tell her about Helen and Griff, and how now we’re all friends.
The last thought makes me smile, and I wish I had Griff’s number so I could text him something stupid like, Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids. He would get it because it makes no sense, and most of our jokes are like that, nonsensical randomness that somehow makes us laugh.
I could use a laugh right now, my irritation at critical mass. It pisses me off that the kids love Sean so much. Part of me feels like they should love me enough not to love him. I know that’s wrong, but being here alone while they’re off with him is awful. And so while I know it isn’t fair to make them choose, I want them to choose, and I want them to choose me.
He left us, abandoned them. How can they forgive him so easily? Shamefully I recognize that I also considered forgiving him and taking him back.
Why? Do I think so little of myself?
The answer is instant and absolute—a simple, universal truth: We all want to be loved and loneliness is a powerful elixir for forgiveness. Our need to have someone care about us is as rudimentary as hunger, and it allows us to overlook faults and accept less than we want or deserve.
My thoughts are so distracted that I’m startled when the door opens and Molly walks in. “Hi, Mom,” she singsongs. “We’wre back.”
Tom follows, and my eyes bulge at his new getup of camo fatigues with a black T-shirt. He looks like a thug. I frown at the skull cap low on his head and the leather band with studs on his wrist—the ensemble similar to an outfit Grant would wear on the show.
“Hey,” he says, the attitude and voice not my son’s.
Emily is transformed as well, her heartbreak that was so gut-wrenching only hours ago manifested into a disturbing adaptation. Her long, wavy hair has been sheared to shoulder length, and her outfit—a plaid miniskirt, tight white tank top, and knee-high black leather boots—looks like something Kira would wear. The new look is edgy and sexy, and combined with her natural height makes her look closer to seventeen than twelve.
Sean follows them in and sets at least six expensive-labeled bags beside the door.
I expect him to turn and leave, but instead, without even a glance my way, he follows Emily to the couch and sits down beside her. Leaning back, he drapes his arm over her shoulder and pulls Molly onto his lap, his body language suggesting he’s settling in for a while.
“Excuse me,” I say.
“Mexico versus the US is on,” Emily says excitedly, clicking to a channel showing a soccer match.
“Sean,” I say.
He glances back but makes no effort to move, like he belongs here, like this is his home.
“Damn, they’re already down,” he says, his attention turning back to the screen.
“By how much?” Tom says in his strange voice as he sits on the other side of Sean.
Unsure how to move him, I pivot from the meteor that crash-landed in the middle of my life and return to my list, underlining Call Divorce Lawyer three more times.
52
Molly twirls in a circle, her black skirt flaring around her thighs, the bedazzled edge winking in the light. Her denim overalls have been cast aside for our big night—her night—the night of the season premiere.
At six o’clock, the first episode of season four of The Foster Band will be aired to millions on the East Coast, an hour later it will be in the middle of the country, and two hours after that it will reach California. It will continue its journey around the globe until it finishes its travels fifteen hours later in Cuba, at which point an estimated forty-four million people will have been introduced to Molly.
The studio is hosting a party for all the people involved in the show and their families. Three hundred people will be there. The event is being held at the Park Plaza Hotel, and a limo is being sent to pick us up.
I’ve never been in a limo. I’ve never been to an event in a ballroom at a five-star hotel. I’ve never been to a premiere party. And I’ve never watched my daughter star in the number one show on television! My cheeks hurt from my constant smile.
My mom is my plus-one for the night, and her excitement exceeds my own. The dress she wears—a gauzy, taupe gown with a low neckline—emphasizes her proudest feature, her bodacious bust. It is the twelfth gown she’s bought since I invited her to join us two weeks ago, the other eleven returned to the frustrated Nordstrom’s saleswoman who was helping her. Her hair is freshly highlighted, and this afternoon she had her makeup professionally done. Sometimes I forget how beautiful my mom is, but she really is a stunner—tall and blond with curves that turn heads.
I take a final glance in the mirror to assess my own transformation, and my smile grows. My dress, a simple indigo silk slip that hugs tight at the bodice and flares at my hips, was an extravagance. But how many times in my life am I going to go to a once-in-a-lifetime event like this? I swish back and forth, admiring the way the liquid fabric opens and closes seductively around my legs.
“Em, the limo’s here,” I holler toward the bedroom.
I’m slightly concerned about Emily’s reunion with Caleb. The two haven’t seen each other since we left the farm a month ago. She assured me when we went dress shopping that it would be fine and that she was over it, but mother’s intuition is telling me otherwise.
Something has changed in Emily since our return, a subversive secretiveness that concerns me. Most of her time is spent alone in her room, and when she does come out, she divulges little about her day, her friends, or her life.
>
School started a week ago—her first year of middle school—and I blame it on that, a new stage in which she is simply figuring out how she fits in and who she is. The private school she’s enrolled in is near the studio and caters specifically to children who are either celebrities, the children of celebrities, or the siblings of celebrities. The school is safe and convenient, and Emily seems much happier than she was at public school. The school’s soccer coach has taken a real shine to her, and she now plays on his club team, which keeps her busy every afternoon and on the weekends.
The school costs a small fortune, but luckily I only need to pay for Emily since Tom’s role as Grant allows him to attend studio school.
Life has worked out grand for Tom. Thanks to his new career, he no longer needs to contend with the overwhelming challenge of public school with its unruly classrooms and dozens of classmates. Studio school is only three hours a day and usually only consists of him and Miles and the studio teacher.
“Em, let’s go,” I yell again.
She steps from the room, and I gasp.
“Em, that’s not the dress we chose. What happened to…? Where’s the…? You’re not wearing that!”
Her dress, if you can call it that, is a narrow tube of vanilla sequins cropped at her thighs and chest. On her feet are a pair of gold platform heels at least six inches tall.
My phone buzzes. It’s the limo driver texting again to let us know he’s waiting.
“Get changed,” I say. “Now.”
“I can’t. I returned the dress we bought for this one.” A glimmer of a smile curls her red-painted lips. “This is the only dress I have.”
Heat creeps up my chest to my face. She planned this, timing it so I’m left with the impossible decision of letting her go in a tramp outfit or telling her she can’t go, which would mean either my mom or I have to stay home as well.
“She looks fine,” my mom says, clearly realizing the options as well and choosing option number one. “Come on, Faye, let’s go.”
I glare at Emily. She is definitely her father’s daughter; this is exactly the kind of stunt Sean would pull. It’s possible he even put her up to it.
My divorce lawyer told me I need to let Sean see the kids. So the way it’s been working between us is that the weekends are now his, an arrangement that, quite frankly, sucks. While I’m responsible for getting the kids to school and work and for rehearsing their lines and giving them baths and helping them with their homework, Sean is responsible for nothing but taking them to the beach or the movies or amusement parks and bringing them back Sunday night stumbling tired, drunk with love for their dad, and their heads filled with his off-color ideas of right and wrong and how to deal with the issues in their lives.
He probably even returned the dress with Emily, the two of them tittering with glee as they hatched the plan, identical smirks on their faces, like the one she wears now. I hate it when I see him so clearly in them, the man I hate manifested in the kids I love, confusing the notions of love and hate until they’re muddled into a maddening brew that makes me want to slam a sledgehammer into a wall.
Grabbing a dishcloth from the counter, I hold it under the sink, march over to my twelve-year-old daughter, and wipe the expression from her face along with the rouge, lipstick, and mascara she caked on. There are black smudges beneath her eyes, but at least her face no longer looks like a hooker’s.
If looks could kill, I’d be dead, her laser-green eyes piercing me, but luckily all her vicious glare does is make me smile.
“Now we can go,” I say.
“I’ll just put it on again when we get to the party,” she says.
“And I’ll just wipe it off again, and I’ll do it in front of everyone, with Caleb front and center.”
She storms past, wobbling on her ridiculous shoes, and as I follow, I wonder how it got this bad this fast. Only four short months ago, she was my little girl who didn’t give a damn about clothes and who would have laughed at a girl like the one she’s become.
53
There’s a red carpet! An actual strip of four-foot-wide plush red walkway leads from the limousine to the entrance of the Park Plaza Hotel.
And paparazzi!
A virtual ocean of press crowds the runway, the throng kept at bay by a wedge of bodyguards that stand like tuxedo-clad pillars parting the sea to protect the passage to the promised land.
It’s all very exciting.
Cameras flash, and reporters shout out, “Molly, look this way.” “Over here.” “Give us a smile.”
A woman with a clipboard beside the entrance asks my mom, Tom, Emily, and me to step to the side so the press can get some shots of Molly alone. She looks absolutely darling, her smile radiant as she waves and twirls and curtsies for the crowd.
My mom grasps my hand and gives it a squeeze.
What a moment. I hold her hand tight to keep myself from jumping up and down with the sheer joy of it.
We are ushered into the grand ballroom, and my breath catches. It’s the most glamorous room I’ve ever seen—marble columns, crystal chandeliers, painted cornices, a stage with a twelve-piece band playing jazz.
Centerpieces the size of cars stuffed with white roses adorn fifty black-clothed tables, and hundreds of stunning people in gorgeous gowns and tuxedos sit and mingle around them.
By the time we reach our table, I’m breathless—my eyes, ears, and nose working triple time to take it all in, my brain buzzing with disbelief that we are a part of it.
Our table is near the front, and already seated there are Miles, his two sisters, and his dad. Since her meltdown at the farm, Rhonda has vanished, and Miles’s dad has taken over as Miles’s manager.
Tonight he looks uncomfortable, a pinched expression of endurance on his face like he already can’t wait for the night to end.
My mom sits beside him and his disposition lightens. I blush as she introduces herself with a slight bow so her assets are well presented, a gesture not lost on Miles’s dad, whose eyes obediently follow her lead before self-consciously snapping back to her face.
I look around for Griff and spot him standing beside a table one row over speaking with Helen. No date. Surprise and relief wash over me. Which is very selfish. Griff treats me like his kid sister, calls me Squid, and teases me every chance he gets about kissing Chris, making it very clear that he’s not romantically interested in me in the least. The problem is, the clearer he makes his disinterest, the more attractive he becomes.
Feeling my stare, he looks my way and gives his signature Elmer Fudd grin, which I ricochet back at the exact moment the band stops playing and the room grows dark, and my heart leaps in my chest as my feet leap toward my chair. Everyone around me hurries into their seats as well, chairs scraping against the floor as they maneuver for a clear view of the massive screen that has descended in front of the stage.
My pulse pounds in time with the seconds ticking down, then the room begins a unified, thunderous countdown. “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.” Showtime.
So quiet you can hear a pin drop, a commercial for the season premiere of Deathfinder finishes, then the opening credits for The Foster Band roll, and the crowd bursts into a short ovation before quickly quieting again, then the “previously on The Foster Band” segment finishes and the show begins.
The first half of the episode doesn’t involve Molly, and my pulse settles as I relax into spectator mode. The show is so different from the performances that created it that I almost forget it’s a product of the work we did. The music and sound effects combined with the camera angles are completely transformative. And the editors did an amazing job, each scene pieced together for maximum impact. I understand now why we did so many takes, why each line was said six times, ten times, a hundred times. The final version is the best of all those tries spliced together into seamless perfection.
Molly appears and my heart explodes with pride and awe. She’s so much larger than life, so much grander
than the little girl sitting beside me bouncing her legs and slurping her Sprite. The scene is the one of her and Miles arriving with their dad at Mr. Foster’s office and the dad collapsing of a heart attack.
Beside me, my mom dabs her eyes with a napkin when Molly starts to cry. I look around and several other women are dabbing their eyes as well. Way to go, Molly!
The final scene is of Molly and Miles being driven away from the hospital with Mr. and Mrs. Foster watching. Molly looks through the car window and lifts her hand in a final good-bye, and a fraction of a second later, the car is T-boned by the ambulance, jettisoning it onto the sidewalk as the audience is thrown back in their seats by a wall of noise and blinding light.
I knew it was coming, and I still nearly jumped out of my chair. The scene, which was dramatic when shot, is now mind-blowing—the special effects and sound editing amplifying it to epic proportions.
Mr. Foster runs toward the car as Mrs. Foster screams at him to stop. Molly cries out, and the show ends. Then the audience is on their feet applauding, and I stand with them, my heart bursting with pride.
54
There is a champagne fountain for the adults and a chocolate fountain for everyone. Dinner is filet mignon or sea bass, and the bar is open.
Work hard, party harder seems to be the motto, and before the band finishes its first set, people are dancing on tables and letting loose. Tom and Miles are in a corner playing a game with bottle caps, and to my chagrin but not surprise, Emily has reunited with Caleb, the two giggling beside the caviar bar. Molly is on the dance floor and being passed around like a hot potato, twirling and bopping and sashaying her way into everyone’s hearts.
My mom and Helen have struck up a conversation, and I know this will be remembered as one of the greatest moments of my mom’s life, the night she hung out with the great Helen Harlow at the Park Plaza Hotel.
Funny how quickly the stardust has left my own eyes. Only two months ago, I too was awed by these people. Now they are mere humans, some exceptionally talented, but with flaws and problems like everyone else.
No Ordinary Life Page 20
