The Club

by Jane Heller

  I sat at a table about halfway between the men and the women and ordered lunch. Several minutes later, as I was wrestling with my rock-hard cantaloupe, Claire got up and walked over to her great-uncle’s table. She was lovely in her mint green silk suit and lacy white blouse. Her hair looked like something out of a magazine ad, all thick and lush and shiny. And the way she carried herself. Shoulders back. Head high. Eyes bright and smart and knowing. She exuded a kind of self-confidence I’d always wished I’d had.

  “Hello, Uncle Duncan,” I heard her say.

  Duncan rose from his chair, as did his cronies. “Claire.” His lip curled when he uttered her name. How he must despise her, I thought. She’s made him look like an impotent old fool.

  “Please don’t get up,” she told the men, who remained standing anyway. “Playing golf today?” she asked Duncan.

  “No, the course is full—of women,” he said, his nostrils flaring, his eyes narrowing with resentment.

  “That’s a shame,” she said. “Well, give my best to Aunt Delia, will you?” She patted him on the shoulder and walked back to her table.

  Duncan and his pals sat down. He lifted his glass and took a long sip of his scotch. His hand trembled as he set the glass down on the table. And when the man seated next to him nodded in Claire’s direction and mumbled, “Fuckin’ dyke,” Duncan chuckled in agreement.

  Of all the nerve, I thought. Claire was a member of his family, after all.

  Claire resumed her conversation with her friends. I leaned toward them and strained to hear what they were saying.

  “I want to thank you all for coming,” I heard her say, “and for letting me ‘recruit’ you. You’re just the sort of members we need at The Oaks, and I hope you will decide to apply for membership. Especially now that you’ve seen the club for yourselves, had lunch, walked the grounds, etc.” She paused. “Now I know what you’re thinking—that the food’s god-awful here—but I’m working on that. I’m looking into a replacement for the chef.”

  “Good move,” said one of the women. She was heavy-set, with short dark hair, bushy eyebrows, and a faint mustache. I vaguely remembered seeing her on “Court TV” prosecuting somebody or other for first-degree murder.

  “You’ve got to change the menu too,” said another woman, an African-American with Whoopi Goldberg dreadlocks. “It’s nothing but honky stuff.”

  “My lunch wasn’t bad,” said a beautiful redhead whom I recognized as a local TV weatherwoman. “But I’m more interested in hearing about tennis at The Oaks. There are sixteen courts, right?”

  “Yes. And they’re very well maintained,” said Claire. “The only problem with tennis is the assistant pro. A guy named Rob. He’s next on my hit list.”

  “Why?” asked Ms. Doppler Radar. “Bad teacher?”

  “No, bad guy,” said Claire. “He puts his hands all over the women who take lessons from him. We’re talking sexual harassment here.”

  So Claire was trying to get Brendan, the chef, and Rob, the assistant tennis pro, canned! Boy, she wasn’t wasting any time turning the club around. I had to meet this woman. I just had to. But how? I couldn’t go waltzing over to her table and introduce myself. Not in front of her friends. I’d have to wait until she was alone to tell her about my cookbook idea.

  I hung around until Claire and her guests got up to leave. Then I signed my check and hurried outside after her.

  Perfect, I thought as I watched her shake each of their hands and point them toward the parking lot. They were leaving and she was staying. Maybe she’d have a few minutes to chat with me after all.

  She took off in the direction of the tennis courts, walking so fast I was forced to trail several paces behind her, which is what I get for being the only person on the planet who has yet to discover the charms of the Stairmaster.

  I was in hot pursuit of Claire when she turned off toward the locker rooms. I followed her around the corner and would have barreled right into her—into them!—if I hadn’t heard voices that stopped me cold.

  “Claire!”

  It was a man’s voice. I ducked behind the side of the building to listen.

  “Yes?” she said.

  “Don’t you recognize me?” said the man. “Have I changed that much, Clissy?”

  Clissy?

  “Oh, it’s Ducky Laughton, isn’t it,” she said, somewhat unsteadily, it seemed to me. “Nobody’s called me Clissy in years.”

  So it was the Duckster, Claire’s classmate at Berkeley. Nedra said they’d been college sweethearts. But then wouldn’t Claire have recognized him? And wouldn’t she have reacted with more enthusiasm?

  “I’ve been hoping to run into you,” he said. “More than you can imagine. You were my Grand Passion, you know.”

  What was Nedra, chopped liver?

  “Really, Ducky,” Claire said. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to—”

  “To what? To stir up old memories?” he said. “I disagree. I’ve been waiting twenty-five years to tell you how I feel about you, about what happened between us.”

  Uh-oh.

  “Well, it was a very long time ago, wasn’t it,” she said. “And you’ve gotten over it, judging by that wedding ring on your finger.”

  “Yes, Nedra and I are happy,” he said. “But I still think about you. About what might—no, should—have been.”

  Oh, God. So Nedra had reason to be jealous. The man was a cad.

  “Why would you think about me now, so many years after the fact?” said Claire. “Surely, your life is full?”

  “You’re an unforgettable woman, Clissy,” Ducky said. “You taught me everything I know about believing in a cause, about fighting for change, about standing up for peace and love and equality for all.”

  Jesus. Did he really think that if he made himself sound like Gandhi, he’d win her love? At this stage of the game?

  “Let’s have dinner together,” he went on. “We have so much to catch up on, so much to reminisce about.”

  “I don’t think so, Ducky,” said Claire, sounding uncomfortable. Reunions with old lovers could be so excruciating, especially old lovers who were revisionists.

  But Ducky wasn’t giving up. “It’ll be just like the good old days,” he insisted. “Some wine. Some candles. Some music. You remember those evenings, don’t you, Clissy? Before the trouble? Before I went away?”

  “Listen, Ducky,” said Claire. She’d had enough, I could tell. “I don’t want to relive those times, and I wouldn’t think you would either. We’re both members of this club now. That means we’ll be running into each other from time to time. I’d like to keep things cordial, okay?”

  “Cordial? After what we had together?” he said.

  God, he was pathetic.

  “Yes, cordial,” she said. “Now, I’m supposed to play tennis and I haven’t even changed my clothes.”

  “Who are you playing with?”

  “A woman named Larkin Vail,” she said. “Frosted blond hair. Big forehand. Big first serve. The pro thought we should play each other.”

  “Only if you’re prepared to fight to the death,” Ducky laughed. “Larkin approaches every tennis game as if it were her last. The only thing worse than losing to her is beating her. She doesn’t like to be beaten.”

  “Good. Neither do I.”

  “So when will I see you?” asked Ducky, sounding like a love-struck teenager.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Let’s just leave it at that, okay?”

  “For now,” he said.

  “Bye, Ducky. Take care,” said Claire, and off she went into the ladies’ locker room.

  I was about to follow her inside when I narrowly missed a head-on collision with Ducky.

  “Oh, hi,” I said, an awkward, embarrassed smile on my face.

  “Judy, hi,” he said. I could sense that he was dying to know if I knew that he had just made an ass of himself in front of Claire.

  “How’ve you been?” I said.

  “Fine,” he sa
id. “You?”

  “Fine,” I said.

  Stimulating, huh? I was itching to get away from Ducky and resume my pursuit of Claire.

  “Oops,” I said after checking my watch. “Gotta go.”

  “Me too,” he said.

  And one of the world’s great non-conversations came to a merciful end.

  I hurried after Claire, who was now decked out in her tennis outfit and heading over to the courts. When she got there, she walked straight onto the teaching court, where Rob was giving Bailey Vanderhoff a lesson—and a back rub—and she insisted that he remove his hands from Bailey’s body immediately.

  “That’s just my teaching style,” Rob protested after Claire accused him of sexually harassing Bailey.

  “Then your teaching style is against the law,” Claire said. “Putting your hands all over a woman’s body is not part of your job.”

  “But they like it,” Rob said.

  “Then they should make an appointment with you after hours,” said Claire. “You were hired by this club to teach tennis, not give massages.”

  “Says who?”

  “Says I. I’d start looking for another job if I were you.”

  “Another job? What for?” Rob said smugly. “The real women at this club like the way I teach tennis. They’re not gonna let me go.”

  “We’ll see,” Claire said as she walked past a dozen gaping stares, including mine.

  Everyone was buzzing about the incident until Claire took on her next victim: Larkin Vail, The Oaks’s reigning women’s singles champion and the favorite to win the tournament in September. All eyes were on the two women as they settled onto Court 1 and began smacking shot after shot at each other. And that was just the warm-up! Once the actual match got under way, they battled each other for two and a half hours. Larkin won the first set. Claire won the second—and the third, in a tiebreaker. Larkin was so undone by her defeat that she smashed her racquet against the fence until she bent it—and the fence. Then she stalked off the court muttering something about retribution.

  I hurried after Claire as she made her way toward the clubhouse. God, she walked fast. I could hardly keep up with her. She turned off into the ladies’ locker room, so I followed her in there, even though the ladies’ locker room was my least favorite spot at The Oaks. I just couldn’t get used to stripping in front of a bunch of strange women. The ladies’ locker room at my parents’ club in Boca Raton had private, plushly carpeted changing rooms, with full-length mirrors and portable hair dryers and all the comforts of home. But The Oaks, that bastion of shabby gentility, offered no such amenities. Its ladies’ locker room was one big space that was decorated in “early high school gym.” In other words, you stood at your little locker and changed into your bathing suit and tried to act nonchalant about the fact that a dozen eyes were checking out your cellulite. It was the sort of togetherness I could have done without.

  On that particular afternoon, however, I welcomed the intimacy and closeness of the setting, because guess who was standing stark naked right next to my locker as I walked into the room: Claire Cox. Alone at last! And what a body. I tried not to look, really I did, but how could I not? She was athletic and tight and nothing sagged, not even her ass. I wondered if she was into fitness videos and, if so, which one. I wondered if she had a personal trainer. I wondered why I was wasting time pondering her exercise regimen when I’d finally gotten her alone.

  “Excuse me,” I said, trying not to look anywhere but at her face. “I’ve been hoping to talk to you. My name is Judy Mills.”

  “Hi,” she said, seeming not the least bit modest. “Claire Cox. Nice to meet you.”

  “I know this is going to sound tacky,” I began, “but I have a business venture I’d like you to consider.”

  Claire raised an eyebrow and looked at me. “My agent handles things like that,” she said.

  “Yes, but this is something I’d like to discuss with you personally.”

  She slipped into her black, one-piece bathing suit and said, “I’ll tell you, Judy, with all my lectures, television appearances, and fund-raising activities, I’m kind of overcommitted. Maybe some other time.”

  “I’ve read that you’re a great cook,” I blurted out as she was about to leave the locker room.

  She turned to face me, then threw her head back and laughed. “Don’t tell me you want an invitation to my weekend retreats. Is that it?”

  “No,” I said, a little insulted that she thought I was some groupie hoping to mooch a meal. “I’ve read that you’re a great cook and I wondered if you’d ever thought of writing a cookbook.”

  She laughed again. “No. I can honestly say I’ve never given the idea any thought.”

  “May I tell you something about my background?” I said, then, without waiting for a reply, I gave Claire Cox a thumbnail sketch of my history in book publishing.

  “Sounds like you’re a shrewd editor, Judy,” she said. “But I’m not sure I understand why you’re—”

  “I think you should do a cookbook,” I interrupted. “A cookbook that presents all the recipes you prepare for your famous women friends at those weekend retreats. You could include anecdotes about the people you’ve cooked for, about the causes you’ve fought for, whatever you want. Most importantly, you could donate the profits from the book to breast cancer research, abortion clinics, you name it.”

  The last sentence hooked her, I could tell. She was a sucker for projects that raised money for her causes.

  “It’s not the worst idea I’ve heard lately,” she admitted.

  “I’d like you to think about it,” I said, trying not to act too excited or pushy. “Think about how you might group the recipes, whether the book should be illustrated, what kind of title you’d like, that sort of thing. We can talk more specifically about the project once you’ve had time to consider the idea.”

  “Yes, yes,” she said, nodding her head. “I will think about it. There’s just one thing, Judy. How do you fit in?”

  “I’ll be your collaborator—your co-author, editor, whatever you need me to be,” I said. “I’d help you write the book, shape it, test the recipes, bring it up to speed so it’s ready for publication.”

  “Well, it’s an intriguing idea,” she said. “Do you have a card?”

  I fished around in my purse and handed Claire one of my business cards. It still said Charlton House, so I crossed out my old office number and filled in my home phone.

  “Great,” she said as she stuffed it in her purse and locked it in her locker. “I’ll call you.”

  Claire did call—that very night. She asked if we could have lunch at the club the next day. There was hope for me and my career yet!

  We met in The Grill. Claire ordered the pasta special, which bore an uncanny resemblance to Chef Boyardee Ravioli, and I chose the BLT, which had plenty of L and T but no B.

  “Have you noticed that the food here isn’t what it should be?” I asked.

  Claire rolled her eyes. “That’s all going to change,” she said. “But first, I’m getting rid of Mr. Testosterone.”

  “Who?”

  “Rob, the tennis pro with the groping hands. Then, I’m going to see that Brendan is replaced by a real chef. There’s no point in spending the members’ money to renovate the kitchen while he’s in charge. He’s hopeless.”

  For the next hour, Claire and I chatted like old friends—about her work, about my work, about the lack of romance in her life, about the lack of romance in my life. She was charming and open and I found her a refreshing change from the other female members of The Oaks.

  Eventually, we got down to the reason for the lunch: the cookbook.

  “I called my agent last night,” said Claire.

  “Your agent works on Saturday night?”

  “She’s a close friend as well as my agent,” she explained. “I told her about your idea and she thinks it’s terrific. She says it will be good for my image to show my less serious side for a change. She�
�s going to call you Monday to discuss money. When all that’s settled, we’ll get to work. What do you say?”

  “What do I say? I say I’m ecstatic,” I said. “This cookbook of ours is going to reopen doors for me. I’m really looking forward to working on it.”

  “Same here,” she said. “Now my agent can get very busy, so if you don’t hear from her by, say, Wednesday, call me.” She handed me her business card, with both her Manhattan and Connecticut numbers on it.

  “I’m giving a lecture in Stamford on Wednesday morning, then I’ll stay up in Connecticut through the July Fourth weekend.”

  “Will you be coming to the club’s July Fourth party next Monday night?” I asked. “The theme is the Wild West. A logical way for New Englanders to celebrate America’s birthday, don’t you think?”

  She laughed. “Actually, I am planning to go. I’m bringing a few women friends who’ve applied for membership.”

  “I hope they eat burgers, franks, and baked beans,” I said. “The club is describing the menu as ‘Wagon Train Food.’ Hunt and I are bringing his daughter and his parents. Wagon Train Food is their idea of haute cuisine.”

  I must have made a face because Claire asked me if I got along with Hunt’s parents and daughter.

  “About as well as the Israelis get along with the Palestinians,” I said. “In other words, they’re not my biggest fans.”

  “It’s no fun to have people gunning for you,” said Claire. “I know. I’ve gotten hundreds of death threats.”

  “Really? I’ve only gotten one.”

  “From whom?”

  “My stepdaughter.”

  “What did you do to deserve that?”

  “I existed.”

  Chapter Seven

  Claire’s agent called the next day and offered me a terrific deal: instead of paying me a flat fee as a consultant on the book, they wanted me to be the co-author and split all profits fifty-fifty. If the book sold well, I’d make big bucks! Even if it didn’t, I was sure to net a tidy sum on the advance. After all, Claire Cox was a celebrity, and publishers saw celebrity books as a hot commodity—even cookbooks.