“He’s this perfectly normal guy, and dude, we know him. You know him, I know him, the entire town knows him.”
“And he would be… ” I prompted.
She leaned in and whispered to me, “Frank Healy.”
I started laughing, quietly at first, then loudly, because I just could not contain it. “You do realize that if Chad Healy had asked me out, we’d be sisters, right?”
Chad Healy was a policeman in our town. He was hot, even Rocky thought so. But she did say he wasn’t her type…and thank God for that. Chad, apparently, had always liked me, but never asked me out. Everyone knew there was only one guy for me. But I would never forget he was the one who carried me away from the scene of my family’s car accident.
Rocky put her head down in her hands. “She knew, Gen. She had a wild weekend, but she knew. And Frank really liked her, a lot. Then he got together with Missy, and you know how that ended. And Frank has always come into the shop, always said hello to me, asked how my mom was. He would come in and buy random things like long fancy matches for the fireplace, or a wind chime that cost eight bucks. He was trying to stay in my life without…”
Her tears hit then, and I knew it was time to go. “Rock, go with the white chocolate mud cake with the blueberry-coconut filling and white chocolate ganache. Betty will cover that thing in royal icing in various shades of purple, and it will look and taste incredible. Come on, we’ll talk in your mom’s shop. I’ll come back later and make the order with Betty, okay?”
She nodded and followed me out the door as I made the international hand symbol for “I’ll call you” to Mr. Brewster.
After some tears and a restock of beeswax candles at Mystic Moonstone, Rocky wanted nothing more than to have her dad give her away. Frank knew that Rocky knew about him, he was just waiting for her call. She explained her biggest problem was getting a suit ready for him.
“Five days, Gen. I have five freaking days!”
So we made a list, another list, I should say, and I told her I could easily accomplish everything on it. She had plenty of fabric, so that left her with three things: meet her dad, take his measurements, and make his suit so he could give her away.
Done.
****
I climbed a steep driveway off Broadway in San Francisco. The Victorian house was beautiful, not brightly done up like some of the “Painted Ladies” you saw in the city. I didn’t spend much time here. I had an irrational fear of earthquakes and bridges after the Loma Prieta quake years ago. It scared the crap out of me. I avoided crossing the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge and the Golden Gate. So, a day in San Francisco was an absolute treat.
I knocked once and waited when I was finally greeted by a beautiful cowgirl.
“Genevieve?” she asked.
“Yep.” I smiled affably.
“Won’t you come in?”
She led me into an impressive, magazine-worthy entry, the walls a light mocha color, the picture rails and crown moulding done in a bright white with gold leaf details. One wall was filled with black and white photos. The other had a little table with a marble top, a huge bouquet of white lilies, and a large oval mirror in a gilded frame.
“Your home is beautiful,” I gushed. It wasn’t my style, but it was grand nonetheless.
“Thanks, doll.” She led the way into her kitchen, which was sleek, modern, and apparently owned by a chef by the way it was kitted out. The style seemed utilitarian compared to the rest of the house. “I’m Gloria.”
“You’re…” Oh my good Lord. Gloria Rhodes, billion-hat chef, stood in front of me dressed in cowboy boots, jeans, a leather vest, and a button down, collared shirt in a bright floral print. I only knew who she was because she was a guest chef on some competition cooking show. “You cook really good stuff.” And it’s an A-plus for Genevieve Clare in the compliment department and use of one syllable words. “Sorry, you’re the first celebrity I’ve ever met.”
“Hardly.” She waved her hand. “We’re having a theme night at my restaurant. Obviously, I’m a cowgirl.”
“Obviously,” I smiled.
“Shall we get down to business? I really need to be at the restaurant by three at the absolute latest.”
“So, I have this…” she twirled her fingers in circles on either side of her head, “…inoperable brain tumor thing. I’ve seen specialists. You name it, I’ve tried it. I’m getting to the point where driving probably isn’t a good idea. I’ve trained and delegated at work, so I’m not cooking and endangering other people’s lives…” She stopped talking and looked at her watch. “Come on, we’ll sit for a moment.”
I followed her into another room. There were tall windows covered in thick gold drapes and braided, cream-colored tie backs. A daybed sat beneath one window, and in the middle of the room were two white couches with huge pillows. She guided me to one and sat across from me in the other.
“You may or may not know I’m a lesbian.” She gestured toward a framed black and white photo hung prominently in the room, as if that was the sole purpose of the room itself. It featured two women. One was her, with her forehead pressed to another woman’s with long, blonde hair. Their chests were pressed together with their arms crossed, hands in the back jeans pockets of the other, their top half nude. It was beautiful, tender, personal.
“It’s public knowledge, but on the celebrity scale, I’m a minor-leaguer, so…maybe you didn’t.”
I didn’t, but I didn’t think she was a minor-leaguer since she had her own line of cookware at Macy’s.
“My family hates that I’m a lesbian, my dad especially. I’ve left a significant amount of my estate to my long-time partner, Lauren. She’s staying with her family in Hawaii at the moment, but she knows this is coming.”
“I’m sorry, I’m not exactly sure what you want me to do? I thought you wanted me to get rid of your…” I paused, “sex toys?”
“I had to get you here somehow.” She grinned. “I need someone who is not a friend and is not a family member to erase my digital footprint. Here.” She handed me a list of three different accounts. “I’ve closed quite a few already. Those are the ones I’ll need you to close. I’ll send you a text when it’s time. Lauren is the love of my life, and our story will be made public. I have some nifty drugs that will make me go to sleep and not wake up.” She took a breath then said, “Ever. There are emails she has kept that will explain, as far as the public is concerned, that I broke up with her and kept my health a secret. But one letter, the one where I say goodbye and tell her I didn’t want her to watch me suffer, that story will be sold to a magazine, highest bidder, and the money will go to cancer research. I’m taking three days off work to get out of town and clear my head.
“Clear my head.” She laughed. “That’s the story my employees know. Publicly, it’ll look like I left everyone in the dark and offed myself to save them from the pain of watching me suffer. Lauren will become an advocate for cancer research, and, hopefully, it’ll help her career. She’ll need a distraction when I’m gone. I’ve written exact instructions there, and I have cash to pay you now. No money trail, no digital trail. When the story of my death hits the news, give it a couple of days then shut everything down. I need you to do it before my dad tries to.”
She smiled proudly before she said, “My family has always been very against my lifestyle, and it’s likely they will fight Lauren on every single aspect of my death. Father is a lawyer and things are going to get nasty. A few days gives people time to write condolences on social media pages and then, that’s it. Lauren can grieve without any hassles; she’ll have support from all of our friends. But I need someone on the outside to do this. She and I will text until I cannot text anymore. But you don’t know that. So, can you?”
I had never had a request like it. Furthermore, I’d never even thought about what happens to my emails and stuff when I die. I knew that, even when someone had power of attorney, contesting family members made something that could have been so simple, like, s
ay, respecting someone’s dying wish, a giant pain in the motherfucking ass.
I answered her with, “I have a wedding this weekend.” I had a feeling, whatever they were planning, it was going to be soon.
She nodded. “That should be fine.”
“And I’m getting married Christmas Eve,” I added.
She gave me a pleading smile and simply said, “Thanksgiving.”
My anniversary. But I didn’t feel I could say no. All I had to do was close her accounts. I could do it from the fake email she wrote down from an Internet café.
But I had one important question. I didn’t meet her eyes when I asked, “Are you really sick?”
She left the room and returned with a small, rolling suitcase. She opened it to show stacks and stacks of folders and handed me the first one. It contained her entire medical history. She’d somehow gone through radiation and still continued to work.
“You had radiation? It didn’t help?” I asked.
“The thing is, it changes you. I’m a chef. The reason I don’t cook anymore isn’t because I’m afraid I’ll set the restaurant on fire, it’s because things don’t taste the same, they don’t smell the same. It could be the tumor pressing on those areas, I’m not sure. But I know it changed after I had that treatment.”
“Oh,” I said quietly. There really wasn’t anything more I could say.
“Ms. Clare?” she asked, her eyes welling up with tears. “I’d rather die now, leaving a good-looking corpse, rock-n-roll and all, than start having seizures and whatever else is coming in my future. I want to choose how I die, just like I chose how to live.”
I pulled out the contract which bound me to secrecy. It wasn’t exactly notarized, but it was still signed by all parties. I’d never come into any kind of legal trouble that involved lawyers. It didn’t matter anyway, what happened, happened. I’d made my decision.
I handed her my own folder and a pen with a huge flower on top.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
****
I drove back home with a heavy feeling in my gut. It was weird, growing up in a house of people who looked heavenward if they took the Lord’s name in vain. Even now, I hadn’t been to church in years, but I rarely let blasphemy leave my lips, and when it did, I could hear Gran scolding me, “Genevieve!”
But suicide was something that baffled me when it came to the hereafter. I knew Catholics weren’t real hip on it. I was raised Presbyterian, so I assumed it was frowned upon. But when someone was going to die in pain, and they wanted to choose how and when to end their own suffering… I had no idea how I really felt about that.
I pulled up to the house and saw Ahren outside, arranging new evergreen shrubs in pots that would sit at the beginning of the bridal walk and two more at the bottom of the front porch steps.
He pulled off his work gloves and met me as I closed the car door. “So, how was your meeting with the kinky chick?”
I shook my head and let it land against his chest.
“Hey.” He eased me back. “What happened?”
Instead of explaining everything to him I asked, “If I was suffering, like, from a disease, and I asked you to help me die, would you?”
He blinked once then blinked again. “Something you need to tell me?” His face gave away absolutely nothing.
“Like the Chief in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Would you do that if I asked?” He stared at me, again his face completely blank.
“Hypothetically,” I clarified.
“Glad you cleared that up, Gen.” I think he started breathing again at that moment. “Honestly? I’ll have to give it some thought. But off the top of my head, if we didn’t have kids I had to be here for, I’d probably suggest we go BASE jumping together. Without the parachute, of course.”
“Of course,” I said with a small smile.
I then explained everything to Ahren. I thought he might have some moral misgivings about me helping this woman, but he didn’t. I’d pulled over on the way home and used my phone to check online if there was any gossip about Gloria being ill, but there was nothing. I also checked to see if suicide was illegal in the state of California and was surprised to find out it wasn’t anymore. But if Lauren was with Gloria when it happened, that would make Lauren an accessory, aiding or something, and with Gloria’s dad being a lawyer, I now understood why she wanted outside help.
I opened the padded envelope Gloria had given me and fished around for the card with the accounts and instructions she’d slipped inside before she sealed it. The card was at the top, so I opened it and handed the envelope to Ahren.
“Gen?”
“Yeah, here. She wrote everything down, exactly what I need to do and—”
Ahren pulled out the contents of the envelope and stared at me.
“Whoa.” No other word for it, just, whoa.
“Baby, did you know how much she was paying you?” he smirked.
“Uh, no, I just kinda took the envelope and left. I was kinda caught up in the moment, you know?”
“I haven’t counted, but it looks like there’s well over ten grand here.”
“I better do a really good job then.” But I knew exactly what I would do with that money. Gloria had the research angle worked out. The Children’s Hospital was always looking for donations for their cancer wing. “I see an anonymous donation to Benioff Children’s in their future.”
Ahren wrapped his arms around me in a tight hug and said, “Love you, Gen.”
I stood next to my best friend and watched as her mother laced up the back of her dress.
“All done, baby. Can you breathe?” Guava asked.
“Kinda.” Rocky giggled.
We were on the sun porch at the back of my house. The blinds were drawn so no one could peak inside. There was a light tap on the screen door.
“Who is it?” Guava asked in a delighted sing-song voice.
“It’s Frank, honey. Open up and let me look at my girls.”
My girls. In a short time, like, five seconds, it seemed Guava and Frank had reunited. They were apparently taking things slow, according to Guava, but he’d been at her house every single night for five days. I loved that for her and Rocky, but mostly I loved it for Frank. He briefly married a woman named Missy, who’d decided she wasn’t interested in being a wife or a mother and left Sheriff Frank Healy to raise his son from the age of four. As far as anyone in town knew, Frank had never dated again. He focused on his career as a local cop and raised his child.
Chad followed close behind Frank onto the porch. It was a generous size, but with Rocky’s gown, my gown, and the mass of petticoats involved, half the room was consumed by tulle. Chad was one of the most eligible bachelors in town. We’d all grown up together, went to the same school, the same everything. Rocky and I were outcasts, but he was the sheriff’s son. Chad had played baseball, he was on the swim team, then he became a cop. Did I mention he was gorgeous? He was the opposite of Rocky. She looked like Guava; dark hair, fair skin, and light blue eyes. Chad had hazel eyes, tan skin, and light brown hair, just like his dad.
“You look beautiful, Rocky.” This came from Chad, who was in the process of handing her a small, gold box. “I wasn’t sure about your style, so if it’s not your thing, you can take it back to Pearson’s in Santa Rosa and get whatever you want.”
Rocky lifted the lid to see a white gold chain with a simple diamond pendent. It wasn’t overdone, ostentatious, or showy. It was perfect, and I knew, without a doubt, Rocky would not be returning it.
“My something new.” Her bottom lip quivered as she handed the box to Guava so she could have a closer look.
Rocky reached out and took Chad’s hand, but never lifted her eyes to his. She stared straight at the floor and announced to us all. “I just want to tell you all, all of you, I love you. Every single one of you.”
I was glad she kept her speech short, because I was already on the verge of tears, trying so hard to keep my shit together for my friend
and her “new” family on such a special day.
The seventy-five wedding guests piled into my house and yard for the reception seemed surprised that a Halloween wedding next door to a cemetery wasn’t a more macabre affair. Rocky did have a color theme of purple and lavender accents, my dress a rich shade of eggplant. She wore a creamy satin gown with a three-quarter sleeve and tight bodice that gathered into four layers at the back. There was a layer of cream and lavender tulle that fanned out beneath each satin one. It was graceful and beautiful with a wide sash of the same eggplant fabric as my dress. It came together at the back in the shape of a rose with tulle petals interspersed and tiny matching crystals that caught the light when she moved. She was stunning, and it was her, through and through. She called my wedding gown her labor of love, and I hoped I would look half as beautiful on my big day as she did on hers.
I stood at the top of the drive, admiring the scene of tealights in clear glass holders. The pumpkins were all white with hearts carved into them, lit and glowing around the grounds. I walked across the drive and into the woods so I could disappear into the cemetery unnoticed.
I knew I was going to be busy all day, so I’d gone to spend time with my family in the morning. I took my bottle of whiskey and three glasses, poured a drink for Mom, Dad, and Gran, and sat with them for a bit.
“Rocky is getting married today,” I told them. “I think she forgot my birthday. Just like in the movie Sixteen Candles.” I smiled. “But I can’t think of a better way to spend my birthday, except, of course, I wish you could be here. The house looks beautiful, and the garden… Ahren is a magician, that’s all I can say.” I brushed the leaves from each of the graves. Even with the warm weather, fall was upon us. So much color everywhere. “Drink up,” I commanded. “You have to wait until Thanksgiving for the next one. I’ll come back later and tell you how it went.”
It was now “later” and I was listening to the sounds of big band music echoing through the forest. I stepped down, and, looking toward the house, not the graves, and heard, “Happy Birthday, Genevieve.”
The Morbid and Sultry Tales of Genevieve Clare Page 17
