Saving Phoebe Murrow: A Novel

by Herta Feely

  At once she felt Dylan’s hand graze the top of her thigh and rest there. As casually as possible, she brushed it away, hoping that neither Jessie nor Noah had noticed.

  “Supposedly the weed’s awesome,” Dylan said to her. “You should try some.”

  She wanted to shake her head and also tell him that she liked Noah, and didn’t he know that Jessie liked him? In any case, she definitely didn’t want to go to Sam’s to smoke.

  Suddenly everyone but Noah was laughing.

  “You look like you just saw a ghost, Phoebe!” Nick said. She joined in the laughter, knowing it was in good fun, but wondered how they could be so cavalier. Her mother, and maybe even her father, would kill her if they found out. Didn’t their parents care?

  Chapter Six

  Aqua buzzed with the chatter of clients and manicurists, and several TV sets were on, though the sound was off. The TV nearest to Isabel flickered with silent images of the Dr. Phil show. Captions scrolled across the screen. The talk show host sat there with two girls, about Phoebe’s age or maybe a little older, and two sets of adults who appeared to be their parents. Dr. Phil wore his usual serious expression as he spoke to the parents.

  Isabel read the subtitles. “So when did you first notice something was wrong?” Dr. Phil asked.

  “After things had already gone pretty far,” one mother said. The other mother agreed, saying she’d had no idea. Isabel wondered what they were referring to, though she’d felt similarly shocked when she’d learned of Phoebe’s “self-injury,” the label Dr. Sharma had applied to Phoebe’s cutting.

  “It’s a way of coping with emotional pain by inflicting physical pain on one’s self,” she had explained. For a time Isabel couldn’t understand why her beautiful girl had done this. She could hardly look at Phoebe’s wounds and scars without bursting into tears, and Isabel was not prone to hysterical crying.

  She still experienced bouts of guilt when the memory picked at her, sure that her busy schedule had caused her to miss signs of trouble between Phoebe and Skyla. Ron had insinuated as much. Though of course he hadn’t noticed either. If she’d had an inkling of the depth of the problem, she would have intervened. Or at least handled things differently.

  Isabel knew that some of her friends found it surprising, contradictory even, that while she felt obligated to manage many aspects of Phoebe’s life, she tended to stay out of “girl dramas,” believing it best they resolve their own differences. It was what her mother had taught her. How else would they grow up? But it was painful when she recalled that Phoebe, attempting to uphold her philosophy, had refrained from revealing the severity of Skyla’s lengthy torment. Now Isabel prayed that the cutting had been an aberrant episode, as Phoebe insisted. And as Dr. Sharma claimed was possible.

  But she wouldn’t make that same mistake twice. She’d be watching Phoebe and urging her to talk about what went on at school. If only she would. After the initial revelation about Skyla attending Georgetown, and a week of seeking her advice, Phoebe had resorted to saying, “It’s no big deal, Mom, really.” She just hoped Phoebe would have the courage to keep the girl at arms’ length.

  Girls, she thought, and shook her head a little as she watched the two on TV exchange furtive glances. What had they done? She wished she’d tuned in to the beginning of the show.

  As Thuy rubbed her calves with cream, Isabel released a long muted groan. The memory of Ron massaging her feet slithered into her mind. In the early days, he’d often whispered how sexy her feet were, and she used to tease him with her toes. Maybe tonight, she thought. We could use a little sex. Her mouth tilted into a crooked smile, but her eyes returned to the TV. She watched Dr. Phil’s lips and read the delayed, sometimes misspelled subtitles.

  “So, young ladies, from now on you’re going to stay out of trouble? Right?” She could hear his trademark inflections in her head. “Because what you were doing almost got you killed, didn’t it?” The girls nodded dumbly. “And you know that’s not what you want?” Nod, nod. “And, in the future, you’re going to be more careful? You’re not going to do that ever again?” They continued nodding, though not very convincingly. “Right?” he demanded.

  Their hesitant answers and embarrassed little smiles made Isabel certain they were disingenuous. What had they been discussing? Drugs flitted through Isabel’s mind. She assessed the girls more carefully. Were those circles under their eyes? She couldn’t help thinking how many more dangers and temptations existed for children as they grew older. And it seemed far worse today than during her own youth.

  Thankfully, the Dr. Phil show had neared its end and was followed by a Jenny Craig ad, which reminded Isabel of the high-protein weight-loss drink, something called Slenderella, that Sandy had tried to sell to her on several occasions. She’d figured it was Sandy’s roundabout way of trying to befriend her, though she’d been tempted to ask if she thought she was overweight, which at 120 pounds and a height of 5’7” was hardly one of Isabel’s concerns.

  She’d be the first to admit, though, that she had resisted Sandy’s pursuit of friendship. Isabel would like to say that, as with most things, she’d given the matter considerable thought. For example, she could make the case that she and Sandy had little in common outside of their daughters, and to build a relationship based on that – when who knew how long their children’s friendship would last – seemed pointless, especially when her free time was so precious.

  Likewise, Isabel could say that she objected to the woman’s laissez-faire parenting. Kids will be kids, was Sandy’s incantation no matter the transgression. And then there was her mindless, gossipy chit-chat. Isabel detested women’s tendency to gossip and rarely indulged. She made no apologies for it, and once or twice when she’d cut her off she knew Sandy had felt rejected. All of these facts would contribute to Isabel’s rational examination of why she did not reciprocate Sandy’s attempts at friendship.

  But the real truth was that each encounter with Sandy triggered an inexplicable revulsion, as if somewhere deep inside of her she sensed that Sandy could not be trusted. That, at her core, the woman was sly and cagey, and around men an unapologetic flirt. Yes, this was, most likely, woman’s intuition at work. And yet she chided herself for this automatic response, because her mother had taught her not only about the Golden Rule, but also that all people contain goodness, one only has to know where to look.

  As these thoughts cycled through her mind, Isabel remembered Sandy’s earlier call and realized she’d missed an opportunity to cut her some slack and also to advise her, because when it came to attire, Sandy often looked like she’d just stepped out of a Victoria’s Secret catalog, so inappropriate for the Georgetown crowd. Every item of clothing clung to her body – a shapely one, she had to admit, even if her breasts had been surgically upholstered – a birthday gift from her husband Bill. At least that was the rumor. Isabel only hoped that tonight Ron wouldn’t make a fool of himself, the way some men did. The same held true for Sandy.

  Thuy gathered Isabel’s things and moved her to the manicure table. As Isabel glanced around, nearly every chair and workstation was occupied, making the place feel overcrowded.

  The noise of an ululating phone was silenced when a teenage girl a few chairs away answered it. Several heads turned as the girl began speaking – too loudly. She roared with laughter then suddenly dropped her voice to a whisper. The room seemed to grow quieter too. Isabel listened more intently. “You think you can me get some?” the girl asked. “I’ll pay you back.” The implication seemed all too obvious.

  Isabel’s thoughts traveled between Phoebe, the TV, which again featured a commercial, and Thuy, whose soft, quiet features belied the strength in her hands. She rubbed Isabel’s forearms, then her palms and each finger. Isabel closed her eyes and tried to relax. She needed to spend more time getting to know Phoebe’s friends and their parents, even if one of them was Sandy. She’d start by being friendlier, that evening, and released a long exhalation of air.

  “You hav
e long week?” Thuy asked in a low voice. Isabel nodded. Much too long, she thought, when suddenly she noticed a local news commentator’s head appear on the TV screen. He wore an earnest, worried expression as he spoke.

  The words “Breaking News” popped up behind him. His mouth moved rapidly, though in silence, and for some reason subtitles now failed to crawl across the screen. Isabel’s brow wrinkled. What was he saying? Anything could have happened. Anything from those exploding sewer lids in Georgetown, to a drive-by shooting (she thought of the DC sniper of a few years ago), to another act of Al Qaeda terrorism. Why on earth didn’t they turn up the volume?

  The image on the screen flipped to a low-income neighborhood. At the bottom it said, “Adams Morgan.” She caught sight of several police cars outside a crumbling apartment building. What the hell’s going on, she wondered. But the announcer’s face returned, mouthing the words, “…breaking news story. Back in a minute.”

  The news had made her restless. As Thuy deftly lacquered the nails of her left hand, Isabel wished the manicure were finished. She wanted to be home to sit in her clean house (thank you, Milly) and have a glass of Chardonnay. She again tried to relax, inhaled the familiar scent of polish, but another uncomfortable thought about Phoebe niggled its way into her brain. What if she’d gone to Adams Morgan after all?

  The teenager in the salon had finally stopped speaking into her cell. In repose, this girl had a pouty lower lip, and an angry slant to her eyebrows. Not very pretty, Isabel thought. Instantly she chided herself. What did that matter? She was someone’s daughter. Isabel rarely wondered what other adults thought of Phoebe. Even after she cut herself, she’d always taken for granted that Phoebe was wonderful, smart, reliable, and kind. And very pretty, even if she had inherited Ron’s short, slightly stubby fingers.

  She considered this as Thuy brushed sunrise onto her long nails, which accentuated her shapely slender fingers, fingers someone had once referred to as perfect.

  Actually, she’d always thought that Phoebe was perfect, or nearly so, until a little over a year ago, when she’d begun accumulating used clothing. Disgusting smelly men’s pants, coats, and shirts, women’s dresses, and even old petticoats and tattered jeans. God only knew where she found them. Surely she hadn’t been going to shops in Adams Morgan all along?

  One day – when was it? – Phoebe had told her she wanted to design clothes. A skill she’d learned from Ron’s mother. With her chubby, nail-bitten fingers, Phoebe began tearing these hideous clothes apart, then sewed the dark swatches of fabric together, layering them into skirts and assembling them into misshapen jackets.

  At first, Isabel had objected. She wanted to steer Phoebe toward a sensible profession. But all at once, passionate, determined, and headstrong, Phoebe had insisted fashion was her future. Isabel believed it to be a cutthroat, low-paying industry, and hoped her own mother was right when she’d called it a phase Phoebe was bound to outgrow.

  On the TV, the commercial concluded and the same neighborhood featured earlier reappeared. Isabel leaned toward the screen. A crowd of people had gathered behind Cynthia Chan, the female reporter at the scene, microphone in hand. Police cars stood in the background. The reporter was saying something, her mouth moving exaggeratedly. Still without subtitles, Isabel could only guess at the content. Her eyes drifted to the cluster of people surrounding the woman, mostly Latinos, though whites were among them, and a few African Americans.

  A girl standing further back near a policeman caught Isabel’s eye. A fair-haired white girl, wearing a jean jacket that looked like one of Phoebe’s creations!

  Isabel’s distance from the TV made it impossible to discern the girl’s features. She tugged her hand away from Thuy and jumped out of her chair, awkwardly threading her way toward the TV set in her paper flip-flops. She called out for the volume to be turned up. As she drew near, the camera angle shifted and the policeman and the girl disappeared.

  Isabel gazed emptily at the screen. The image switched back to the anchorman, whose mouth shaped the words, “Thank you, Cynthia.”

  Isabel turned around to find people staring at her. She felt the need to say something, but the words caught in her throat. “I just thought the girl looked—” She stopped; her eyes scanned the clientele. They looked like jurors, hanging on her every syllable, their own thoughts in limbo. Normally she took this in stride, but now their stares unnerved her. Finally, she met their gaze, and groping for a word, added, “Familiar. She looked familiar.”

  Chapter Seven

  Heading home, Isabel pressed the button to turn the car radio on and again noticed the botched polish on her index finger. She’d nicked it in her rush to leave the salon. How annoying. Now, she’d have to live with this imperfection for an entire evening. Thuy would gladly have fixed it, but after her outburst, Isabel had felt too embarrassed and all she’d wanted was out.

  She switched to a news channel, hoping to find out about events in Adams Morgan, and praying there was no connection to Phoebe, who shouldn’t have been there, in any case, and who hadn’t answered when she’d called. Eventually, the announcer had stated that a drug ring had been infiltrated, a dozen people arrested. They provided the names of the leaders, part of a local Latino gang, several of whom had connections to drug kingpins in Mexico and Central America. There was no mention of Phoebe or her friends. Thank God!

  Isabel shook her head, partly at herself, and also because she was glad the police had been successful. She knew, however, that for every apprehended criminal, there were dozens more who roamed free. Until recently, it hadn’t bothered her how often she defended guilty clients. Everyone had the right to a defense. But lately it galled her that she spent more time on her clients than with her family, and that so many got off virtually scot-free.

  The ride home calmed Isabel. She reproached herself for jumping to a conclusion, which in law school she’d been taught to avoid. Witnesses did it all the time. They put the wrong two and two together to arrive at incorrect assumptions.

  Having seen the words “Adams Morgan,” she’d thought of Phoebe and assumed she’d been talking to the policeman, possibly that he was arresting her. She tried to summon the TV image to review what the girl had been wearing and what she’d looked like. After careful consideration she decided the girl appeared similar to but had not been Phoebe. To be absolutely certain, she’d simply ask her when she came home. Of course she’d have to phrase the question just so, but then she spent her life doing that.

  Isabel arrived home a few minutes past five. Maybe a little early to have a drink, but after such a harrowing manicure she breezed through the clean rooms and headed straight for the wine fridge in the kitchen. She pulled out a bottle of Sonoma-Cutrer Chardonnay. The cork made a lovely popping sound, and the golden liquid gurgled as it filled the glass.

  On the way to the solarium, she picked up her worn leather briefcase in the hallway; maybe she’d review some briefs for a case going to trial in a few weeks. The large glassed-in room was her favorite. At least a dozen orchids were in full bloom, not only Phalaenopsis, but other rarer breeds, too. And in assorted colors.

  Curled up in the peacock chair, she was almost instantly greeted by Hagrid, who jumped on her lap and began to purr as Isabel stroked his thick black fur. She took a few sips of wine, stared outside at the brilliant display of fall in the backyard – two maples seemed aflame and a gingko’s gold leaves shimmered in the slight breeze – then closed her eyes. “Ahhh,” she said, finally relaxing and enjoying the quiet moment. It was 5:20.

  Instead of the legal brief, though, she picked up the latest copy of Phoebe’s Seventeen, which had arrived in the mail. It was yet one more way to get a handle on her daughter’s teenage mind, and something they could talk about.

  One by one she flipped the pages, taking in the teen fashions, admiring some, disparaging others. She examined the emaciated models – their toothpick legs, the dark bruises under some of their eyes – and wondered about their lives. She’d read a
bout heroin addiction. Though Phoebe’s collage of teen idols included a couple such photos, from what she gathered Phoebe had no desire to be one of them. She had chosen the images for the clothing they wore. Among them was a short gathered skirt, which actually resembled an item Phoebe had copied and sewn. At times, Isabel felt a grudging admiration for her skill.

  She took another sip of wine then thought she heard movement at the front door. She suspected it was Phoebe and realized she’d given little thought to what she would say to her daughter. Her mind raced to find the right phrases and words. The doorbell rang and an alarmed Hagrid dug his claws into her thigh before scampering off.

  “Ouch!” Isabel said in a half whisper.

  Fully expecting to see Phoebe when she opened the door, it startled her to see Jackson. “Oh, it’s you,” she said, “hi, honey.” Behind him a silver SUV tooted its horn. Though normally she might have taken a minute to chat with her friend Kat, now Isabel just waved and shouted, “Thank you.”

  “Bye,” came the response. The vehicle sped off.

  “Did you forget your key, honey?” Isabel ushered Jackson inside.

  He shook his head and looked at her sheepishly. “I saw your car in the driveway.”

  She ran her fingers through his brown mop, a virtual replica of Ron’s. “You rascal you,” she said, “too lazy to get your key out, huh?” In the kitchen she offered her ten-year-old son a snack. After a few minutes of rather distractedly asking him about his day and getting short monosyllabic answers, she conveniently allowed him to play his new video game.

  She ran through several scenarios of what to say to Phoebe, expecting her at any moment. When she saw that it was nearly six, she grew worried. She should have been home by now. Only then did the specter of something actually having happened to her daughter return. What if Phoebe had been arrested? Police swoop in, arrest everyone in sight. Guilty or not. Had that girl talking to the policeman been Phoebe after all?