“I didn’t see any cupids in the mantle.”
“Probably because it was dark, ha. We were there in August. Some housekeeper let us in and was having trouble with the new alarm.”
“Short brown hair? Solid build?” Mary the housekeeper from Fifth helps in the new place, Peter said.
“Yes. Joe helped her figure out the new keypad, so I was free to wander. Did you see that winding stairway? Carved oak leaves! Lion’s head newel post!”
Joe saw Peter’s new alarm code?
Abruptly Mel stops fiddling with a daisy and flings it onto the counter. “I’m feeling guilty - why am I going on like this? Maybe Alex is right and you should listen to your lawyer. I have heard things about that family…what’s the Mrs. like?”
“Who?”
“Greer’s wife. What’s she like?”
The question sends me back to that huge, opulent, and dismal apartment. “Seriously depressed.” I shudder a little, fighting my post-Alex headache. “Passive. Lets her brother control her, overmedicate her. Says she’s a bad mother, doesn’t begin to know how to connect with her children.”
“That fits with what I heard – hey, what’s the matter?”
Mel probably thinks I’ve fallen off the chair, but I’ve only ducked wearily to pull up my shoulder bag. With an effort, I hang its strap on the back of the chair; then pull out The Secret Garden, lay it on the counter, stare at its cover illustration.
“My childhood tranquilizer,” I sigh. “Need it again.”
Mel rhapsodizes about the book too. Oh, the memories, such a favorite. I point out that the text alone is mesmerizing, calming to read out loud…and calm is what I need urgently right now, or I’ll explode.
“So read it out loud?” Mel says plaintively, watching me open the book. “I could use calming every waking moment of every bleeping day. Oops, wait a sec; don’t start without me.”
She stops to sell readymade fall bouquets to three customers. Business is light at this hour, so we can get back quickly to the book. I thumb the first page. She leans closer, jokes about wanting to pop her thumb in her mouth like a little kid.
I start to read.
“When Mary Lennox was sent to Misselthwaite Manor to live with her uncle, everyone said she was the most disagreeable looking child ever seen.”
Mel gives a hoot, says she used to know that first line by heart.
I sigh, continue reading.
“She had a little thin face and a little thin body, thin light hair and a sour expression. Her mother had been a great beauty who cared only to go to parties and amuse herself with gay people. She had not wanted a little girl at all…”
We have to stop. Two more customers come wanting fall bouquets, and we notice we’re running low on them. “More asters, please?” a woman requests, and a man wants sunflowers, and for some reason yellow roses are more in demand, maybe because red and pink go less well with fall colors.
I put the book aside, and get to work. I’ve calmed a little, though a painful hollowness persists. I still hear Joe’s words, and Alex’s, and feel like a stupid, naïve girl whose feeling of maybe falling in love has been smashed. It hurts. Peter, Peter, who are you?
Mel brings another container of yellow roses from inside. We cut their stems, work in lilies and sunflowers, wrap with twine…
…and Joe comes to apologize for his ambush.
“Really sorry,” he says, downcast, hands in pockets. “Intervention was too strong a word. I was out of line.”
“No problem,” I exhale, angry again, wanting very seriously to strangle him. Instead I strangle the roses, twine them too hard. The supplier has done a bad job prepping the stems. My hands shake, a thorn stabs my thumb, and I cry out. “Ow! Oh-h.”
Blood springs, bright red. Mel whimpers and drops the bouquet she’d been handing to a woman, who goes all round-eyed and bleats “tetanus!”
Joe looks concerned and pulls at me. “C’mon, let’s fix that.”
In the tiny bathroom he’s a hero again: consoles, runs warm water, pulls bandages down from his cabinet. I wash my trembling hands with soap. It’s a deep, really nasty puncture and the blood won’t stop; keeps oozing, spattering the sink and suds. “Hold your arm up,” Joe says, and I do because I’m limp. He dries my hand with paper towels; murmurs “pain…yow, the biggest thorn got you” as he applies a wide Band-Aid; fabric, thick gauze underneath.
I let him do all that because it’s all been…too much. I want to give up and I feel faint again, grip the sink with my left hand. Faint? That makes twice in less than twenty-four hours!
What is happening to me?
Then, surprise: my light-headedness takes me back to nearly dropping onto Peter’s terrace, seeing him pull his shirt off, scoop ice from freezing water with his bare hands, make a cold pack to press to my brow. I see his shivering, naked shoulders; feel him pull me to him…
“…may bleed through but we’ve got plenty,” Joe says brightly, back to peering at bandages in his open medicine cabinet. They range from small to large, fabric, plastic, and gauze rolls. He shakes his head. “Tending plants sure can cause injuries,” he sighs, and I recall next Peter’s reaction to how I left him last night.
That’s not right, a woman alone in the street.
Spontaneous. Distractions all around, no chance to plan sweet talk. Again I think, What man these days talks like that?
It heartens me…but I do admit to feeling faint.
“You’re still upset and you haven’t eaten,” Joe says, urging me back to his office and my waiting sandwich and coffee. “Saved them for you,” he smiles, pulling one of the chairs closer to him, settling me into it, unwrapping the deli foil.
I thank him, look balefully at the soggy bread and protruding, wilted lettuce. One-handed, I try to get the lid off the plastic coffee cup. Forget it. Joe seizes his chance to help again; masterfully peels off the lid and flings it into the trash.
I drink gratefully.
“Good?” he asks, retaking his seat.
“Wonderful.”
“I’m sorry,” he says again.
“Why?”
“Because the coffee’s cold, and because I had no place saying what I did. What was I thinking?”
“No, you’re right,” I placate.
“I just hate to see you subject yourself to more turmoil, situations that could hurt you.”
“You and Alex are both right,” I say dully. “My rational side admits it. What’s that wonderful line? Don’t get involved.”
Joe raises his shoulders in a shrug. “I’ve heard that selfish people live longer.”
“No doubt.”
He looks away to his poster of tulips in Holland, and we’re both quiet for moments. I eat the sandwich with my non-bandaged hand, forcing myself to re-mull his Manipulation! warning; wondering again if Alex’s comments were just paranoid-lawyer think.
Peter is Peter, I decide. A believe-it-or-not sensitive man who knows that his daughter keeps her favorite book under her pillow, and worries about a woman alone in the street at night.
On the other hand, his lawyers are…in Alex’s words…killers. They’ll destroy your reputation and your life to score their wins.
I feel Joe’s eyes back on me, and blow out a heavy breath. “How did I get into this situation?”
He gestures sympathetically.
“People in emotional situations,” he says, “fall easily into more emotional situations. They’re…susceptible, vulnerable. It’s like the original heartache lowers their immunity to more heartache…they even seek it out.”
I watch him toy with his Bic pen.
“You were traumatized by what happened to Kim and primed to see other women in pain, especially what seemed like similar pain.”
I nod reluctantly. “You should be a shrink. Oh wait, your dad is, I forgot.”
Mel and Joe rarely talk about their psychiatrist father. Their parents have been bitterly divorced for a few years. Mom cited cold, emotional abuse.
The Bic gets tossed across Joe’s desk. “Yep, I grew up hearing that stuff too. It really helps with acting, understanding the human psyche.” He drums his fingers, and shrugs. “So I should have been a better actor, right? Should have been more successful. Why aren’t I?”
“You’ve got a great business. Most actors we know are out of work.”
He exhales and nods with a dismal shrug, as if I’ve told him nothing that matters.
I finish the sandwich and coffee, and thank him again.
“Happy to - hey, I’m the sandwich guy!” he smiles, throwing his palms out.
I blink, realize that Joe has just…what? Acknowledged that if he can’t be my lover, he’ll have to make do with just bringing me coffee? That scene in his bathroom…I was the hurting child and he was Daddy, thrilled that I was needing him.
Now who’s over-analyzing?
I get up and toss my cup and napkin into his basket. “Well, I’m feeling better,” I lie. “Thanks for patching me up.”
He shifts, tilts his head to see my thumb. “It’s not bleeding through?”
“No, it’s good.” I head for the door. “Throbbing but reminding me to be careful.”
“With plants and people, right?” he says.
“Definitely.”
“You’re going to steer clear of the other thing?”
“Going to try.”
“Stay away from Charles Street?”
On the tip of his tongue, that address was, the man who needs Excel to search every other address.
“That’s right…” I turn back to him as if the idea just occurred. “You’ve been there.”
“Where?”
“To Greer’s new place.” I picture his parlor in the dark: tall plants before tall, dark windows. “Mel said you delivered palms.”
“Oh. Right, right. So many addresses, easy to forget.” Joe smiles, shifts in his seat. “So? You’re going to stay away from there?”
“Yes,” I lie again, and hesitate. “Although I do feel sorry for Greer’s wife…”
“There you go again, vulnerable!”
Up goes Joe’s index finger. “Avoid all of them. Don’t go feeling sorry for people who in the end might be really selfish – or destructive or downright crazy. You don’t know. Trust nobody.”
“Wise counsel,” I say agreeably. “Okay, back to the flowers.”
39
Mel is just disconnecting from a call. “How’s the thumb?” she asks.
“Still attached,” I say, noting that she looks fretful. “What gives?”
The sky has clouded over and the air has darkened, along with her mood, apparently. She shakes her head, tries to smile at a customer just leaving, and looks back to me.
“There’s this guy I used to date,” she says low. “A lawyer with Riley Hescock, know them?”
“Sure.” I watch her fiddle with the cash register. “Power lawyers.”
“We’re still fairly friendly,” she says, “so I called him. Turns out, I have heard things about that family; namely, the brother of Mrs. Greer. His name is Nick.”
“I met him.”
“He’s violent.”
“I got that vibe.”
We stop to wait on people. I move out from the counter, down the line of cut flowers in tubs to explain to a young man what will keep fresh longest. He chooses red carnations, comes back to pay, and leaves. Mel finishes with another customer, and turns back to me.
“Brother Nick assaulted a photographer, broke his jaw. Just after Greer and his wife separated, this guy from The Post tried to take a picture of her crying as she got out of their limo. Nick Jakes came tearing out from the other side of the limo and knocked him to the sidewalk, kept punching him when he was down. It happened in seconds. The guy tried to sue, Jakes paid him off and got him to sign an NDA; kept it out of the papers. Riley Hescock handled it.”
“Major bastard,” I say, and think: Nick tried to pay me off too. I frown down at my thumb. It’s throbbing. The bandage has reddened and is bleeding through. Souvenir of the stress from Alex’s visit.
“What’s crazy is…” Mel says, “a doorman who also had to be paid off said Greer’s wife just stood there, stopped crying and watched like a dummy while her brother pounded the guy. No reaction. Not horror or sympathy-”
“I told you, she’s heavily medicated. Big Brother pushes her pills at her.”
Mel screws up her face and cringes. “How can anyone let themselves be dominated like that?”
I say nothing, raise my shoulders in a shrug.
“Y’know what?” She bunches her lips. “I hate to say this but…I’m thinking Alex is right. Maybe stay away from all of them, you-know-who included.”
“Greer’s trying to extricate himself.”
Mel rolls her eyes. “From relatives like that you never extricate yourself. This Nick sounds seriously nuts. He walked into Riley Hescock during the photographer thing and nearly came to blows with the lawyer handling it.” She tosses a ribbon she was tying and looks at me, her features suddenly earnest. “Steer clear of them all, seriously. I just get this feeling of danger.”
Again I say nothing, feeling a chill.
She’s waiting, eyebrows up, so I finally nod to make her happy.
But my mind feels the first stirrings of a different alarm.
Could Peter be in danger?
For someone as smart as he is, it was frightening how he just fell asleep on the terrace like that, gun locked away…and then got careless drunk. And there was something almost naïve in the way he said he’d call about Sunday - I’d help him unpack, plant bulbs - as if nothing frightening was still out there….
It troubles me. Again I recall him reminding me of Gatsby, a tragic character you start out maybe not liking, who winds up shot dead.
No….
I shudder, remember Nick Jakes glaring his daggers at me in the elevator vestibule. Mel has shaken loose thoughts I’ve been trying to push down.
Customers come and go. I stay deep in my fit of abstraction; recall Peter fumbling drunkenly with his French doors lock while not setting his sophisticated alarm…and apparently not warning Mary, last August, about letting Joe or any stranger see his new alarm just weeks after Darcy Lund was killed.
My unease deepens.
I mix up customers’ credit cards, give someone the wrong change, barely hear people when they speak.
And Mel is griping. What a pair we make. She’s impatient to be done here…her phone is back to her ear as she calls Joe inside to tell him she won’t be coming in tomorrow; she has to catch up with her studies.
She disconnects, and then smacks her head. “Wait, what am I thinking? It’s Friday, the weekend’s going to be heavy - you’ll need me.”
“No, I’m good,” I say, wrapping anemones. “Go study.”
By three the sky has become as dark as dusk. The air is heavy, a downer that seems to affect every creature. Mel tilts her head to someone’s dachshund that refuses to be walked; just lies on the pavement letting its leash be tugged. I point out people’s posture: their whole bodies droop, move with effort. They buy fewer flowers, too; just the must-get birthday bouquets and such, nothing joyously spur of the moment.
I scowl up at more clouds brewing. Mel refunds a woman complaining her flowers were wilted.
“Bitch,” she mutters after the woman stalks off. “They weren’t wilted. She’s wilted.”
Her mood has become worse. I say nothing, thinking of Peter again, scanning the readout of today’s sales so far. Peripherally, I see Mel step out onto the sidewalk.
“Ava?”
“M-mm?”
“Do you ever get the feeling we’re microbes?”
I glance up to her, follow her gaze. She’s staring down the block to Chloe Weld’s brownstone.
“It’s as if nothing ever happened,” she says, coming back. “The yellow tape is gone. People walk past as if she never existed.”
I draw a deep breath. “Her fami
ly grieves and the police are trying to work the case. She’s far from forgotten…and no, I don’t feel like a microbe. Where’d that come from?”
“We’re tiny nothings. We don’t matter, we just dream of not being helpless.” Mel’s hand smacks her bar exam book. “Why am I killing myself with this? So I can become a slave to an eighty-hour week? A bad feeling’s caught up and I feel so angry. People strolling past Chloe’s building like she was nothing is awful! Everything’s so unfair to people like us.”
I look at her.
She waves a despairing hand. “Go to Greer. I take back everything I said.”
“How so?”
“I used to loathe women who flirted with rich guys. I really did want to make it on my own but it’s too hard, forget it! The gold diggers are the smart ones - and the very rich do have it better. They can be weird, crazy, careless…they can sleep all day.”
“Yeah, they’re a really happy bunch,” I say. “That’s just your mood talking.”
She makes a face and shrugs. “Mood colors everything, doesn’t it?” she says unhappily.
I agree; try to deal with my own troubling thoughts.
Nick Jakes is just a cowardly bully, I persuade myself. He got enraged at someone photographing his weeping sister, beat up the guy, then paid to keep it quiet. He’s terrified of scandal – “family debacle,” he called it - that’s right…so fear not. I was just jumping at shadows.
I check my phone, and notice I have a call waiting.
My agent Renata, making sure I remember the audition she’s lined up for next Monday, for a movie called Glory.
I take a breath and call her back, reassure that I’ve got it all memorized, the time and audition studio’s address and the lines, even.
“Let’s hear,” she prods teasingly. “That’s the important part.”
I straighten my shoulders and recite, powerfully, the words of a furious, rescuing mother: “Let my child go or I swear I will find you, and I will kill you slowly…do you understand? Have I made myself clear?”
Mel is watching, and I almost laugh. “Sound good?” I say to the phone.
Renata is delighted. “Sensational. This should go very well, in fact. I’m hearing all over that Brett Moore’s trial prep is in trouble – big, serious trouble. No one’s scared of the big bad wolf anymore.”
Girl Watching You Page 17