Fate and Ms. Fortune

by Saralee Rosenberg

  “What kind of favor? He should have gotten my approval first.”

  “It’s not a big deal. He just wants me to show his new stepdaughter how I do makeup.”

  “No! I will not sit there and be your little demonstration girl.”

  “Fine. I’ll just have her observe. I won’t say a goddamn word to her.”

  Gretchen jumped. I was never abrupt with her. Never disrespectful. “I beg your pardon?”

  “I’m sorry. I just got some very bad news…I’ll go get the eye patches for you and then tell Simon to forget about—”

  “No. It’s fine. Maybe if you have a little assistant, you won’t do such a rush job.”

  My cheeks turned crimson. “You think I do a rush job?”

  “Well of course you do. You have to work fast. It’s morning television.”

  “Oh.”

  “But clearly you can’t wait to get away from me.”

  “I’m sorry you feel that way.” Bitch!

  “Oh please. You could give a damn how I feel…You’re Hit and Run Robyn.”

  Hit and Run Robyn? It was like getting stomach-punched, for in spite of my personal feelings, I had never sacrificed her appearance. In fact, she had no clue how much thought I had put into creating a look that was not only flattering but circumvented her long nose, sunken cheekbones, blotchy complexion, and the normal signs of aging, which were exacerbated by binge drinking, smoking, and God knows whatever drug dependency had made her already tiny eyes droop.

  “Let’s talk after the show,” I said. I’d do it now, but I’m late for my nervous breakdown.

  “Yes, it’s time we did…Oh damn it, Robyn…It’s so unprofessional to resort to tears.”

  It’s so unprofessional to resort to tears. I cried as I fled down the hall to the makeup studio. Hit and Run Robyn? Prick! I had been totally devoted. Never said a bad word. Well maybe a few, but nothing terrible. And what about getting extra credit for not having revealed the secret that could bring her down like the S.S. Minnow?

  I flipped on the light switch and ran for the bin that contained my eye repair products when I thought I saw a shadow behind me. It had to be the way the sunlight was peeking through the curtains, or that my vision was now so blurred, I could barely see my hands.

  “Scare the shit out of me why don’t you?”

  I screamed when a massive figure emerged from under Gretchen’s down comforter on the couch. “Oh my God.” I grabbed a can of hairspray in case I had to blind the intruder. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”

  “Oh chill.” A girl shimmied back under the comforter. “You know who I am.”

  I put down the can and placed my hand on my beating heart. “Sierra?”

  “Sierra Paige Mather. Don’t bother to curtsy. Where do you get Coke around here?”

  “What?”

  “Coke. Pepsi. Yoo-hoo. What the fuck. Something with caffeine.”

  “Oh. Um, the commissary is on three, but I’m sure you could check the greenroom.”

  “Whatever. Simon’s looking for you. He needs to give you the rundown on me. You know, be nice, show her everything. All that shit. On the way back, get me two cans.”

  I tried to calm down but my temper was bubbling like a cauldron. For a moment all I heard were the sounds of a blob rustling and birds chirping. “Jump,” they were saying. “It’s all over.”

  “Dudette, are you just going to stand there?” She peeked out.

  “I’m sorry,” I mumbled. “It’s been a terrible morning. You frightened me and I’m—”

  “Boo hoo, Dorothy. Life’s a bitch. Just ask the Tin Man.”

  I wanted to shake her like a can of Coke, but I didn’t want word to get back to Simon that I had a bad attitude. “The pantry down the hall also has breakfast stuff,” I offered.

  “Great,” she mumbled. “I’ll take some Pop-Tarts, but not the ones with the fruity shit.”

  “Oh good.” Simon walked in and put his arm around me. “You two have met.”

  “Not really,” I said. “I was getting something for Gretch. Oh God. She’s waiting for me.”

  “Sierrapaigemather, you have to get up now, dear. This is Robyn. She’s the one who—”

  “For God sakes, Simon, is this little conference necessary?” Gretchen blew in. “Can’t you see my eyes are nearly swollen shut? I need Robyn this instant.”

  “Just hold on.” He smiled. “This is my stepdaughter—”

  “Hello?” The lump finally sat up. “We’re not related, okay? You’re just the latest fool bastard to marry my mother…God. Way to suck at life.”

  “Simon,” Gretchen snapped. “Have your whatever she is to you hand over my comforter before it gets, I don’t know, infested. That was given to me by the Duchess of York you know.”

  Oh please. Not the Fergie story. How many times did we need to hear about the two mad-dash shoppers reaching for the same Simone Astor sweater at Bendel’s and having such a laugh, they ended up lunching together and becoming the most marvelous friends. “She’s really quite lovely, you know,” was Gretchen’s patent-pending close.

  Fortunately we were spared, as Gretchen was too busy trying to assess whether Simon’s whatever she was to him had left any cooties on the couch.

  It was hard not to laugh. For all her southern-fried, polite-to-your-face breeding, Gretchen was doing a lousy job hiding her feelings. And who could blame her?

  Sierra etc. was a supersized goo girl who looked slovenly in a baggy sweatshirt and jeans. And unlike a true makeup artist, she knew nothing about the ground rules for eyeliner (read the directions—don’t apply to lips). Her chopped/cropped hair was three shades of purple, and her black fingernails made her look like she’d just left the set of Dracula II: Return of the Fat Ass.

  Hardly the image one would expect of the daughter of a Beverly Hills socialite.

  “Which part of ‘I need Coke’ don’t you two get?” She glared at Gretchen and me.

  It was 5:30 in the morning. Who would believe me if I said it was already a long day?

  Chapter 8

  IN HONOR OF my twenty-first birthday, my father bought shares in Kimberly-Clark, makers of Kleenex. Though he had no idea how his wife, a stoic, had spawned a crybaby like me, he figured the family might as well profit from my overactive tear ducts.

  How ironic, then, that my career would dump me smack in the middle of the news business, where not a day went by that I didn’t hear reports ranging from bad to unfathomable. But did it desensitize me, or help me acquire some decent coping skills?

  To the contrary, I was still awful at getting awful news, whether it be mine or someone else’s. And even worse at getting a grip. Which was why as soon as the show was over, I retreated to Gretchen’s dressing room, where I sat Indian style, frozen like a photo, sobbing without shame.

  I realize it made no sense that as much as I despised my boss, I loved using her personal space to regroup. Especially at midmorning, when Gretchen was holed up in meetings, and the long hall leading to her private sanctuary was quiet and dark.

  But at the moment, not even her scented creams and candles could steady my nerves, for I felt like an Egyptian David Letterman doing battle with the top ten plagues, with no hope for a commercial break, let alone the Red Sea parting.

  My father was clueless, my brother was useless, and my mother was a walking time bomb. Gretchen wanted to get rid of me, Simon wanted to take advantage of me, and Madeline wanted to borrow me so that her mess of a brother-in-law would be off her hands. And as if there weren’t already enough crazies in my life, please welcome Marv Teitlebaum and Sierra Paige Mather.

  Did I mention that until payday on Friday, I had $124 in my bank account?

  Frankly, not only was this too much to handle at once, but I was desperate for a culprit. Someone to whom I could direct my anger. Dear Mr. President. No. Dear Congressman. No. Dear David…no damn it! He was in jail.

  Up until now I hadn’t realized the speed at which I implicated m
y ex-husband as the source of all my grief, just as he had charged that gambling was the cause of his. But without him playing the role of villain, how would I survive the loss of my most reliable crutch?

  Meanwhile, my mind was racing but my foot was falling asleep. And though the burning tingle was annoying, I couldn’t get up, for fear it would mean that the self-pity party was over.

  A call from Phillip forced my hand. “What do you mean you have no idea where Mom is? This is nuts, Rob. I don’t have time to chase her. Get her a cell phone for God’s sake.”

  Perhaps he’d forgotten the last time we went through this exercise, she refused to leave the phone on for fear the battery would die, then wrote nasty letters to Sprint. “Twenty-nine ninety-five a month? But I only used the phone twice last month and the ads say nights and weekends free.”

  Then came a knock at the door. Damn! The last thing I needed was to be found crying in Gretchen’s room. This being a news-gathering operation, office gossip traveled at twice the speed of an instant message:

  I took a deep breath before opening the door. Of all people, it was a security guard wondering if I’d seen my mother. Not him too?

  “Or at least I think she’s your mother.” The embarrassed man cracked his knuckles.

  “Can’t be. My mother wouldn’t know how to get here on her own.”

  “Short, little, blond lady?” He raised his hand to chest level. “Yells pretty loud?”

  “Damn her!”

  “She tried to get past the desk without clearance.” He peeked in as if I might be hiding a stowaway. “You didn’t give us her name this morning.”

  “I would have if I was expecting her. So wait. Where is she?”

  “Can’t tell you. That’s why I came up here. Maybe you can help us locate her.”

  “Well I’m sure if you sent her away, she’s probably out shopping or something.”

  “No ma’am. We reviewed the tapes and she never walked out the stage door…Means she’s gotta be in the building…I don’t want to lose my job…Can you call her cell?”

  “She doesn’t have one.”

  “Same with mine.” He shrugged. “Gave my mom a phone for Christmas…only time she uses it is to prop the back door open for the cat.”

  Next thing we know, Runaway Mom gets off the elevator with the loathsome Sierra, unaware that (a) there was an all points bulletin out for her (or maybe both of them), and (b) her new friend was probably too stoned to care what she said.

  “Yoo-hoo.” She waved. “Found you.”

  “You are unbelievable,” I cried. “How did you get up here?”

  “It wasn’t easy.” She was all smiles. “I couldn’t remember which floor you were on, and let me tell you, they were not at all helpful downstairs. Oh, you again.” She sneered at the guard.

  “Mom, you can’t just barge in here without getting clearance,” I yelled. “Innocent people get in trouble when you break the rules. Why didn’t you call me before you came?”

  “Calm down, darling. Remind me to get you that book Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff.”

  Again with the recommended reading list. “Remember last night I told you I’d be on the run all day today?”

  “I thought I’d surprise you and take you to lunch. Sor-ree if it’s too much trouble.”

  “It’s not too much trouble, but I have to get Gretchen ready for a taping at two, then I promised I’d help her get ready for this big media dinner tonight…”

  “Don’t you ever chill?” Sierra yawned. “She’s just trying to be nice.”

  SHUT. UP. “I’m aware.” I smiled. “By the way, what happened to you this morning? I thought you were supposed to be observing me.”

  “It’s not like a job or anything…I hung out in Simon’s office. He’s got a better couch.”

  “Uh huh…So how did you get past the guards?” I turned to my mother.

  “Are you kiddin’ me? Security around here stinks. What good are all the fancy cameras if nobody’s checking the side door where the smokers go…You fellas really oughta beef things up down there.” She jabbed the guard’s shoulder. “I coulda had a gun.”

  “Mom, stop. This isn’t the Bellagio…By the way, how did you two meet?” I felt like I was asking a couple to share their first-date story.

  “She bummed a cigarette from me,” my mother replied. “And I got a light from her.”

  “Yeah. Then she told me who she was looking for and I said what the fuck, I know you.”

  “Mind your manners, dear,” my mother reprimanded. “We’re in mixed company…So what do you say. Time for lunch?”

  “I told you I can’t.”

  “Did you eat breakfast?”

  “No.”

  “Then good thing I’m here. I’m saving you from being trampled when you faint on the street.”

  What part of “no” don’t you understand? my mother used to ask. Only now I was asking the question, for in spite of my protests, she wouldn’t take a no. So what if it was Pope week at work. She had come all this way to treat me.

  Besides, what educated person would go a whole day without eating (it was only 11:15), and didn’t I want to get to know Sierra now that we’d be working together?

  Um, no. I already knew more than I needed. She was the spoiled, rich girl who knew the price of everything and the value of nothing. The girl who by virtue of her connections felt entitled to opportunities, preferential treatment, and a free pass when she behaved like a brat.

  What do you bet her first words were directed to the hired help? “That will be all.”

  So how, you ask, did I find myself squeezed into a booth at a coffee shop having a lunch I didn’t want, seated next to a girl I didn’t like, with a mother who was driving me insane? Jewish guilt (you can run, but you’ll die tired). What if these were my mother’s last healthy days? What if she hadn’t beaten the cancer and a year from now I was standing over her grave?

  I shuddered at the thought until my reality check bounced. She and Sierra were ordering lunch and taking off for a cigarette break.

  “Mother, what are you doing?”

  “I need a smoke. Why don’t you call your brother now and tell him I’m fine?”

  “But you’re not fine.” I looked her in the eye.

  “Yes I am.” She pulled away.

  “Really? And I’m thinking, maybe instead of reading all those books, you should be paying more attention to your oncology reports.”

  “Oh, I see. The big mouth couldn’t keep his word.”

  “He shouldn’t have had to. You should have been honest with me.”

  “You want honesty? I’ll give you honesty. They found a little nothing in my breast. Like a peanut. They took it out. Now you see it, now you don’t.”

  Sierra tugged at my mother’s sleeve. “If you’re not gonna go out, can I bum another smoke?”

  “Jesus!” I went for my wallet. “You can’t afford to buy your own pack?”

  “I have money.” She shrugged. “Just not on me.”

  Because you spent it all on drugs. “Fine. Here’s four dollars.”

  “I need ten.”

  “For cigarettes?”

  “And gum.”

  “That’s crazy,” I gasped.

  “Tell me about it. It’s nuckin’ futs.”

  “No, it’s insane that it’s so expensive, yet you still keep smoking.”

  “So? We’re paying over two dollars a gallon for gas,” my mother exclaimed. “But do you see anyone giving up those big, farshtunken Humdingers?”

  “Good point, Sheil.” Sierra nodded.

  Sheil? Oh that’s good. You should be able to freeload at least a pack now. “You know what?” I got up. “I can’t do this.”

  “Where are you going?” Sheil asked.

  “I told you. I have to get Gretchen ready for a taping.”

  “You want one of my Zolofts?” Sierra bit a hangnail. “Take some of the edge off?”

  “No. And when I get home,” I said
to my mom, “let’s you and me have a nice long chat.”

  “Oy. Speaking of home,” she said, “I forgot to tell you. You got an important phone call.”

  “Oh God. Please tell me you didn’t pick up.” My luck you invited a collection agency over for cake and coffee.

  “What am I? An idiot? I just listened to the answering machine.”

  “Oh. Sorry.”

  “Then I picked up because it was that girl from the bar mitzvah who wants to fix you up.”

  “Are you serious? She’s like stalking me.”

  “She’s not, darling. She just wanted to tell you she spoke to him and it’s okay to call. Here.” She reached into her pocket. “This is home, this is his cell phone.”

  “Call who?” Sierra asked.

  “A very handsome and successful man,” my mother said. “And how’s this for bashert? Melinda said he lives a few blocks from here.”

  “Madeline.”

  “Same thing. And what a co-inky-dink? It’s right around where you and David lived, too.”

  “Thanks, because I’d forgotten my old address.”

  “What the fuck?” Sierra said. “Call him.”

  “Not for nothing.” I glared. “But why do you care?”

  “I don’t. I just want you to stop talking so me and your mom can go out for a smoke.”

  It wasn’t exactly the Red Sea parting, but in a way it felt like a miracle. Suddenly everyone who had made me miserable that morning scattered in all directions, giving me the first chance in days to make it to the Promised Land (the ladies’ room) without feeling like I had to hide in a stall.

  New pals Sheil and Sierra decided to get to know each other over Greek salads and a half a pack of Newports. But not before I whispered to my mother that if she so much as breathed one bad word about either my father or myself, she’d be looking for a new roommate by sundown.

  From there, my mother planned to meet up with Aileen, a neighbor from Fair Lawn, who had recently convinced her husband, Arnie, that what their empty nest marriage needed was a little pied-à-terre in Manhattan so that they’d have a weekend place to rekindle their passion.