Pieces of Happily Ever After

by Irene Zutell

  I’d been thinking the same thing, but I didn’t feel like drawing attention to it. I shrug my shoulders. “I don’t know. I guess he’s having fun playing with Gabby.”

  “Oh, please. He never played with Gabby before.”

  “Maybe he’s changed.”

  Lauren eyes me severely. “Don’t you even say something like that.”

  “What do you mean, Laur?”

  “It sounds like you’re considering him and you can’t ever. Not after the way he treated you.”

  I flinch. “I’m not considering anything. I’m the one who filed for divorce, remember?”

  “I’m just warning you. I know he can be charming.” She looks past me. “Oh, look,” she says flatly. “Here he comes now.”

  I turn. Alex is heading right toward me. His clothes are rumpled and the knot in his tie is loose. He smiles at us uncomfortably.

  “Lauren,” he says, nodding.

  “Hi Alex,” she says, devoid of any expression.

  “Um, Ally, can I talk to you privately for a moment?”

  Lauren bugs her eyes out at me.

  I give her a look that says, “Don’t worry.”

  But I am a little bit worried.

  10

  The Cycle of Life

  Idon’t know where to talk to him. Usually, we’d go into our bedroom when we needed to speak privately, but that seems strange and charged with hidden meaning. So instead we head into Gabby’s room, surrounded by her princess motif. I sit at the edge of her pink canopied bed while Alex sits in her pink princess throne chair.

  He clears his throat. “How are you holding up?”

  “Fine,” I say.

  “Good, good,” he says, picking at something underneath his nail. “You know, Ally, I really admire the way you took care of your mother. I know I had my doubts, but I think it was good for Gabby. I think she’s learned that life isn’t all about princesses and princes and magic spells and happily ever afters.”

  No, you already taught her that lesson.

  Instead, I nod my head. Where is he going with this?

  “Ally, I’ve made a terrible mistake. Can you ever forgive me? I love you. I always did. I must have been going through some weird midlife crises. Rose never meant anything to me. Please, take me back. Please, forgive me. I promise I will make it up to you. I’ll do whatever it takes to win you back.”

  I lean back on the bed a bit and smirk. I’m looking forward to hearing him grovel.

  But what would I do? Would I even consider it? No, right? He dumped me. Actually, he didn’t just dump me—he humiliated me. I could never ever consider it. Never.

  But what am I doing right here?

  “There was a guy at the church today. You seemed to know him. He’s a photographer.”

  Johnny. He’s jealous of Johnny!

  I stare at him blankly, as if I have too many admirers to keep track of just one.

  “Just watch out for him. He’s a piece of shit scumbag.”

  He studies me, gauging my expression, to see if Johnny means anything to me. To see if his opinion of Johnny means anything to me. But I keep a poker face.

  “Just watch out. He’s after something.”

  He looks at me, expecting me to jump up, panicked and shriek, “What? What? What is he after?”

  “Is that why you wanted to talk to me,” I say, annoyed. “Because I can take care of myself.”

  Alex nervously shakes his head.

  “What is it that you want then, Alex? Because I really should get back out there and—”

  “Rose is pregnant.”

  He blurts it out so fast that I have to replay the words in my head to figure out what he said. Then I have to replay them again even to decipher their meaning. Rose is pregnant? How could that be? I thought it was over. A source said there was trouble in paradise. Besides, Alex was supposed to try to win me back.

  Despite all I’ve been through with Alex, this is shocking. It’s beyond shocking. It’s like a sucker punch to the soul. I can’t breathe. I can’t talk. I just stare at him, struggling to swallow.

  Is it yours, I want to say. But I clamp my mouth shut just like Mom.

  Alex nervously coughs. “We’re getting married.”

  We stare at each other. I feel tears well in my eyes. I’m not sure why. I’ve known for a long time that this was over. He cheated on me. Hell, we’re divorced. But now, despite how cruel he was, he still gets the fairy tale.

  And I still don’t.

  “Oh,” I finally say.

  Alex nods and takes a deep breath. He wants to escape, but he doesn’t quite know how to. I suddenly understand that this is the last time we’ll ever be alone again. I decide to make the most of it.

  “What happened,” I say. “To us. What was it?”

  I figure he’ll just give an annoyed shrug and say, “Let it go.” But instead, his eyes tear.

  “I dunno. I’m really sorry, Al. I guess everything just seemed so serious all the time. With your mom and Gabby and work, you seemed stressed and unhappy. I probably did, too. But, I dunno, it just seemed to take over everything. We used to have fun. We used to laugh. Everything just felt so heavy. We never had fun anymore.” He runs his hand along the fluffy pink armrest of the throne. “I just wanted to run away, I guess. I’m sorry.”

  I want to defend myself. I want to say I was not stressed and unhappy. But I was. I want to say, Alex, my mother was dying, of course things felt heavy, but I don’t. I want to say life is serious. Life can make us unhappy. We grow up and become adults. We can’t run away from it, because you can’t run away from yourself. Maybe Rose is in that rarefied air where she never really has to be serious or sad or too heavy, but still, that doesn’t mean her mother won’t get Alzheimer’s or her father won’t die of cancer. After all, whether you’re driving a Hyundai or a Rolls Royce, there are no free rides.

  Instead, I say, “Well, that’s great. Good luck.”

  He stands up and gives me an awkward hug that’s over as soon as it begins.

  “Thanks, Ally,” he says. He turns toward the door. Then he stops and turns back. “Just watch out for that guy, okay?”

  “He’s actually not so bad,” I say cheerfully. “Besides, he’s no longer a paparazzo. He stopped months ago.”

  Alex shakes his head. “Ally, yesterday he took photos of Rose leaving her obstetrician. She just found out she was pregnant and now it’s going to be all over the tabs, because of him.”

  Another shock. Another sucker punch to the soul. Another “But wait, there’s more!”

  I nod at Alex and smile, as if this news is quite pleasant.

  “You okay,” he asks.

  I can’t speak. I feel like I’m choking. I just nod my head again and smile even wider. I’m terrif! But tears are streaming down my face. I hate myself for crying in front of Alex.

  “Well, ’bye, Ally,” Alex says slowly.

  Then he turns and is gone.

  Part Three

  Happily Ever After

  1

  Chasing Butterflies

  The poo-poo’s coming! The poo-poo’s coming!”

  Gabby and I are sampling peaches from one of the vendors at the Calabasas Farmer’s Market when two girls about twelve years old shout this and laugh hysterically. I glance over at Gabby. Her face gets red and her eyes water. I put my hand on her shoulder and am about to whisk her toward the flower stand, where Gabby goes each week to collect the stray flowers that have fallen on the ground.

  Then one of the girls puts out her hand to high-five Gabby.

  “You were totally awesome,” she says.

  “Yeah. I made my mom buy me a box of that cereal. Then every time I finish, I say, ‘The poo-poo’s coming!’ And I grab my butt. It totally cracks her up,” the other girl says.

  “Really? It totally drives my mother nuts,” the first girl adds.

  Gabby’s face lights up.

  One of the girls hangs her head and asks sheepishly, “Can we get
your autograph?”

  Is this for real, I wonder. I look at the girl, trying to decide if this is a gag. But she is completely sincere—and almost embarrassed. She hands Gabby a piece of paper.

  “Sure,” Gabby says, sucking in her cheeks.

  She painstakingly prints out her name, leaning the paper on one of the girls’ backs.

  And, of course, this being Los Angeles, where residents are equipped with celebrity radar, soon Gabby is surrounded. It’s not like they all recognize her, but they think they should, so they pretend they do. And even though she has one line in a TV commercial, she is a star—at least here in Calabasas, where Howie Mandel is as big as it gets.

  “Say it. Say it. Please. Please,” one of the girls begs.

  The crowd begins to chant along.

  Gabby looks at me, beaming. I smile at her and nod. “Go ahead, Gabs.”

  Part of me is completely bewildered by this attention, part of me is completely proud, and part of me is horrified that this will create a monster. After all, Gabby has high diva potential.

  Gabby squeezes her eyes shut as if she’s struggling to get into character. She takes a deep breath and then exhales slowly out her nose. I imagine this is something Rose taught her. Maybe not. She’s been a drama queen for years without any coaching.

  A few of the adults titter.

  Then Gabby opens her eyes, widens them as if something’s just dawned on her and scrunches her face in agony.

  “The poo-poo’s coming! The poo-poo’s coming!”

  The crowd bursts into applause and laughter.

  Gabby takes a deep bow. Her hair brushes the pavement.

  It turned out that despite what Alex had thought, the director had loved Gabby’s ad-libbing. And so did the cereal’s marketing department—so much so that they redefined the cereal. So now, SUPERCrispyCrunch is a cereal that “keeps you regular—SUPERregular!”

  “The poo-poo’s coming! The poo-poo’s coming.” Kids and some adults imitate Gabby as they stroll through the farmer’s market.

  It dawns on me—Gabby has a catch phrase. Faye was right!

  When I get in the car, I excitedly call Faye from my cell.

  “You won’t believe what happened,” I tell her. Then I breathlessly explain.

  But Faye is unmoved.

  “I keep telling you, I’m good at what I do,” she says. I can picture her shaking her head at me and frowning. “You’re the one with all the doubts.”

  “But it was exactly what you predicted!”

  “And?”

  “Well . . .”

  “It’s like I’m psychic!” Faye laughs.

  I don’t want to bring her down with how wrong she was about Johnny. He called me the day after Mom’s funeral to see how I was doing. I didn’t call him back. He called me a few more times. Then he left me a message, saying that he wouldn’t bug me anymore. And he hasn’t.

  “I’m a pebble star,” Gabby announces from the backseat. “Can I call Daddy to tell him?”

  “Sure,” I say. I tell Faye I’d see her soon.

  Then I hand the phone to Gabby.

  Gabby is going to be a flower girl at the nuptials of Rose and Xander—“Rx.” She says she’s wearing a princess gown and a diamond tiara. They’re getting married on New Year’s Eve at a top secret location, she tells me. It’s so secret that she doesn’t even know where it will be. She tells me that the guests will meet at Van Nuys airport, where a private jet will whisk them away to some remote island somewhere. She said they hope it’s so remote that no horrible pepperonis will be there to take photos of them.

  “I don’t understand why they hate getting their picture taken, because I love it,” Gabby had said.

  Rose’s agent wants to cast Gabby in a movie. It’s just a small part. A friend of the daughter of the lead. But she’ll have to head to Salt Lake City for a week right before Christmas. My first instinct was to tell her no way, but I see how her face lights up when she sings and dances and, well, signs autographs.

  Maybe I’ll let her do it just this once. Then back to school. Back to a normal life.

  I wonder if this is what every future stage mom has once uttered.

  As we drive home, Gabby says, “Can we please not put those ugly things on the lawn again?”

  “What ugly things?”

  “Those blow-up snowmen. I had a nightmare about them last night. I got stuck in that snow globe with ’em and couldn’t breathe. It was very scary.”

  “It was just a bad dream, honey.”

  “Can we do something beautiful this year?”

  “Yes.”

  “I mean it, Mommy.”

  “I promise it will be better than last year. I also promise you’ll get that puppy,” I say. I turn in my seat and look into Gabby’s eyes. “I know I’ve made a lot of promises and some of them haven’t happened yet, but they will.”

  “A puppy! A puppy! Finally. Can it be a Chihuahua?”

  I don’t tell her that Chihuahuas should be considered rodents, not canines. Instead, I nod my head. “Yes, you can get a Chihuahua. We can even buy it a fancy outfit and everything.”

  “Yay! Yay!”

  As we pull into the driveway, Gabby bangs on the window and shrieks. “Pepperoni! Pepperoni!”

  My first thought is that a pizza delivery man has come to the wrong address. But it’s Johnny. My heart pounds. My stomach tightens. Gabby runs out of the car and leaps into his arms.

  He didn’t expect this kind of greeting from Gabby and he stumbles backwards.

  “Hello, Gabs,” he says. “You seem extra happy today.”

  “I signed my first autograph and I’m finally getting the Chihuahua my mommy’s been promising me for about one hundred and sixty thousand years.”

  He laughs and kisses her cheek. “Well, that’s the most perfect day I’ve ever heard about.” He looks over at me and smiles. “Can I take you ladies to the coffee shop for some ice cream to celebrate?”

  Gabby squeezes him tighter. “Yes!?”

  She looks over at me. Unconsciously, a scowl spreads across my face. I shake my head.

  “Oh, Mom! Just when I thought you were starting to be fun for once in your life.”

  “Yeah, Mom,” Johnny chimes in.

  He must have caught a look on my face because his smile disappears. He sees Gabby’s the only one happy to see him.

  I don’t know what I should say to him. So what if he took pictures of Rose? What does that have to do with me? It’s not like Johnny and I are anything to each other, really. Nothing’s happened beyond some flirtatious banter. As far as I’m concerned, now nothing will ever happen. Although it would have been nice. Why the hell did he have to ruin it by lying?

  Gabby spots a butterfly flitting around the lavender in our front yard. She grabs her net and races to catch it.

  “Are you having a tough time still with your mom and all?” I hear that slight Smoky Mountain twang. “You still need some space?”

  “That’s not it,” I say, my eyes blazing into him.

  He steps back and puts his hands on his chest. “Is it something I did? What could I have done? I thought we were becoming friends.”

  I don’t want to get into this with him. What purpose would it serve? He’s a liar.

  “No. I’ve just been busy.” I want to sound casual, but I can hear the snap in my voice.

  “So cold. Okay, Alice, what did I do?”

  “It’s just . . . nothing.”

  He searches my face, confused. “What does that mean? Does that mean it’s just nothing? Or does that mean it’s just something you were going to tell me and then you thought better of it?”

  I’m going to get into this. Why? What do I want from him? I can’t like a liar. They’re in the same category as a cheater. Actually, they’re inextricable. If you lie, you will eventually cheat. And when you cheat, you will lie about it.

  “It’s just . . . well, it’s really none of my business,” I say. I can feel my voice quiver. I
wish it didn’t do that when I’m upset—it gives me away. “Well, I wish you hadn’t told me you were done with all that paparazzi stuff when you weren’t.”

  “What?”

  “Alex told me you took photos of Rose at her doctor’s office. I saw the pictures in the Enquirer myself.”

  The cover featured a photo of Rose leaving her gyno office with a big grin on her face. In one hand, she held a bag of baby books, in the other was an ultrasound photo that the Enquirer had enlarged.

  He bites his lip and nods his head at me. “And why does that bother you? You still in love with Alex?”

  I’m infuriated that he sees it this way. “This has nothing to do with Rose and Alex. It has to do with you.”

  “Me?”

  “You lied to me. I trusted you and you lied.”

  He gulps hard and speaks softly. “Here I thought all this time you were avoiding me because you needed time alone and it’s not that at all.”

  He sadly shakes his head. “Why didn’t you just say something? You could have asked me about this. It’s all so simple.”

  He pauses, waiting for me to say something. I feel my eyebrows furrow.

  “I did a favor for a friend, okay? She’s an editor at the Enquirer and she was very close to being fired. She had heard Rose was pregnant, but couldn’t confirm it. Rose’s publicist said it was a lie. I guess Rose was negotiating some big movie deal and she didn’t want to lose the part because she was pregnant.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Anyway, I know a friend of a friend who works for this gyno to the stars. And, well, she gave me great access. So instead of being fired, my friend was promoted. But I didn’t know it was Alex’s. I thought that had been over for a long time. I thought she was back with that singer, Flipper.”

  “Finn,” I say.

  He smiles. “Of course, the money was great. I can’t deny that. You know, it’s not the easiest thing in the world to go from making tons and tons of money to begging art dealers to show my work. I’m slowly building a clientele. But it wasn’t like I planned this at all. When I told you I was through, I thought I was. But I guess I wasn’t. Sometimes things just come up.”