A Shameless Little BET

by Meli Raine

  “Don’t tell me what to do.”

  He looks at my neck.”Where’s your pendant?”

  I fish it out of my pocket and thrust it at him.

  No hand reaches out. “You need to wear that.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Trust me. You do. If you want to live, you’ll listen to me. To us. I understand you’re hurt. I do,” he emphasizes with that voice so filled with compassion, so complicated. It’s easier to think of Drew as this domineering, confident asshole who thinks he knows better than anyone else what it takes to be safe.

  It’s so much harder when he’s nice. When he’s insightful. When he’s a well-rounded human being with all the complexities of emotion.

  “Silas is hurting right now,” I say. “He had to re-live, in some ways, what happened with Rebecca.”

  “More like, he had to make sure he never had to experience what happened with Rebecca again, and certainly not with you. You’re not exactly a simple case, Jane. From my perspective, you really could have gone either way. I trusted Rebecca completely. Rookie mistake in the field. But she was good. Too good. Gentian’s spent the last three years avoiding romantic entanglements because he thinks his instincts in that arena are broken.”

  “He does?”

  “He did. Until this morning. He’s the one who swore you were innocent. I’m the one who didn’t believe it.”

  “Really? I never would have guessed.”

  “If you need to be pissed at someone, be pissed at me.”

  “Give me a harder task. Done.” Against my better judgment, I put the pendant back on. Drew visibly relaxes.

  “Here’s something harder: Go see Gentian.” He reaches into his breast pocket of his jacket and hands me a folded note. “Spend time with him. Don’t hate him. Don’t reject him. Respect the position he was in and go from there.”

  “What’s this?” I know the answer before the words are out of my mouth.

  Silas’s handwriting stares up at me.

  Can you come to my apartment to see Kelly? She’s been begging for you. She wants the Dead Mommies Club to have a meeting tonight at seven.

  The handwriting breaks, a little shaky, for the words Dead Mommies Club.

  She wants me to tell you it’s Princess Tea, so dress accordingly.

  The note is signed in a child’s scrawl. K E L L Y is in a crooked line, the letters of different sizes, surreal and elegant in its simplicity and rawness.

  “Damn it,” I whisper. “Princess Tea with Kelly.”

  Lindsay catches my eye. “I’m totally boring compared to Princess Tea with a fun five-year-old. Go on. I’ll be here if you need me.”

  “You will?” Drew asks her, face blank.

  “You got us a room next door, right?” She snuggles against him. “I’m sure we can find something to do.”

  One side of Drew’s mouth goes up in a smile.

  I set the note next to the tea kettle and resume my brewing. “Tell Silas I’ll be there. For Kelly,” I stress. “Duff can take me. I need to get some of my things from my apartment anyhow.”

  “You’re not staying at your place?” Drew asks, his voice interrogative.

  “No. I will hang out with Kelly, but it’s too hard to be that close to Silas all the time right now.”

  Drew nods. “I think Gentian’s the opposite right now. It’s too hard not to be with you all the time.”

  “That is Silas’s problem. Not mine,” I lie.

  Because suddenly, that’s how I feel, too.

  Chapter 7

  Jane

  Duff seems to know where I’m going to ask him to take me before I even open my mouth. I know because of the specific exit we take.

  “The Thorn Poke,” I call out. He nods. I’m on my way to a Princess Tea, and the one person in the world who can help me right now is Lily. Kelly deserves some fun. When you go to a meeting of the Dead Mommies Club, you need something pretty to counterbalance the grief.

  Am I really on my way to hang out with a five-year-old and talk about dead moms? In the apartment of her uncle, who I had sex with, and who I watched get shot in the heart this morning? Who now wants me to commit myself to him and understand he loves me?

  I am.

  My life is messier than even I thought.

  As we head to Lily’s store, I decide to catch up on email. The first one: to Hedding Stuva. I have three, two of them from Lottie Crenshaw asking me to sign papers and return them, and one from Helen Stuva herself. I start with that.

  Jane, Can you complete the forms Lottie sent, then email me back with a good time for a meeting in D.C.? It will allow us to release some of the funds early so you can start to go through the contents of Alice’s property and make larger-scale decisions. We also have some distant relatives who are a possible issue in the will, but that can be resolved if we can meet.

  In D.C.? I sigh. More complications.

  Can’t this be done here, in the L.A. offices? I reply. It’s email, though. Not text. I won’t get a quick answer.

  But her words resonate. Contents. Property. Decisions. I actually own Alice’s ranch? Her paintings? It’s time to face all of this head on and stop being distracted. Then again, it’s not like I’ve been lazy.

  Life just keeps coming at me. Hard.

  The SUV pulls up in front of the flower shop. A man I recognize stands at a bus stop, pretending to wait.

  “Is that Romeo?” I ask Duff.

  “Yeah.”

  “Hm,” I say, stepping out of the SUV. I don’t look at the guy. Don’t acknowledge him. And in a few seconds, I forget about him.

  “JANE!” Lily shouts, coming around the counter to give me a hug. Spirits lifting instantly, I know I’ve made the right choice.

  She smells like roses and dirt.

  “You never catch a break, do you?” she whispers. “You need a vacation.”

  “I need a friend,” I say with more emotion in my voice than I thought I allowed myself.

  “You always have one here. What happened?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You are rattled to the bone.”

  “It’s that obvious?”

  “Yes.” She gives submissive shrug. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t ever apologize for telling the truth.”

  “People don’t like it.”

  “Stupid people don’t like it. I want nothing but the truth.”

  “Okay. Orange is definitely not your color.”

  “Huh?”

  “I’ve been dying to say that to you but didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”

  I start giggling at the absurdity of her comment and can’t stop. Sometimes she’s so light, it’s almost like helium itself turned into human form.

  “Oh, Lily,” I gasp, wiping my eyes. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For not testing me.”

  “Oh, you wearing orange is definitely a test. A test involving how hard I can bite my tongue.”

  “Stop!” I wave at my eyes. “You’re killing me.”

  “No. I’m probably the only person not killing you, Jane. Or not trying to.”

  That is sobering. “I’m here to get ready for a Princess Tea,” I blurt out, needing to change the topic. Fast.

  “Ooo! What kind?”

  “There are kinds of Princess Teas?”

  “Of course! Is this Disney princesses, Kate-and-Meghan princess level, little Charlotte – what kind?”

  “Silas’s five-year-old niece wants a Princess Tea for the members of the Dead Mommies Club.”

  She freezes in place, mid-grab as she reaches for a pink ribbon. “Could you–could you repeat that? I don’t think I heard it right. Did you say ‘dead mommies’?”

  “Yeah. I did.” I sigh. “Her mom died a few weeks ago. Drug overdose. Silas’s mom is getting custody and Kelly and I bonded.”

  “Your mom is dead, too,” Lily says in a tone that isn’t a question. “She was part of the whole scandal, right? I confe
ss I didn’t pay much attention to it.”

  “You probably protected your sanity, then.”

  “I know we’re supposed to be informed citizens, but I’ve gone old-fashioned,” she confesses. “I read the Sunday newspaper. The actual print one, black ink and all. That’s it. Any other news I get is through social media. I ignore the memes.”

  “Always ignore the memes,” I say seriously.

  “So you’ve been invited to a Princess Tea with a five-year-old who needs a friend and who has no mommy,” Lily summarizes.

  “That is a brutally cogent way to put it.”

  “Truth, Jane. Truth. Let’s make her an amazing princess arrangement.”

  Three tiaras later – one for the flowers, one for me, and one for Kelly – we have our princess flowers, a gaudy, overblown mix of hot-pink Gerber daisies, lime-green spider mums, and sunflowers that would thrill any little girl playing dress-up.

  “Are you sure you’re my age, Lily? Because this looks like a five-year-old made it.”

  “That’s simultaneously insulting and gratifying. Like my last date.”

  “In terms of look, it’s professional. But it’s like you’re the little-girl whisperer. You just know what she needs.”

  “I let the flowers tell me what to do.”

  I peek inside a giant calla lily. “Hello? Is there a two-way microphone in here?”

  She laughs. “Lordy, no. My dad is paranoid. No cameras anywhere near The Thorn Poke.”

  Duff looks up and around, all over the store, clearing his throat. Funny how you can tell what someone’s thinking from as simple a sound as that.

  He’s not pleased.

  “Aren’t cameras good for business in case of a problem? Or a break in?” I ask her, reaching up to finger my pendant. She has no idea I’m wearing a camera.

  And I keep it that way.

  “Sure they are. Try telling my dad that. He still won’t use a credit card on the internet because he thinks someone will steal the numbers and bankrupt him.”

  “But the store takes credit cards?”

  “We do. And our online portal does, too. Dad isn’t consistent. He says the business transactions are separate from his private life, and –” She puts her hands up in a gesture of surrender. “I am not a mindreader. He just says that Big Brother can’t track what he doesn’t know.”

  Oh, yes he can.

  I don’t say that, but it’s so hard not to think it.

  My credit card takes on a menacing feel in my hand. “You, uh, this isn’t a problem?”

  She takes it and swipes. “I will happily take your money. I don’t care if the government knows which brand of toilet paper I use. Generational change is coming, and when Dad retires and I take over this place, I plan to have microchip implants in everything.”

  I’m horrified.

  She bursts out laughing. “I say that to Dad to get him riled up. Funny. He looks just like you do right now.”

  “You are evil.”

  “Naw. Just bored.”

  I realize no other customers are here. “Quiet day?”

  “Yep. I’m so glad you came in. Do you have to rush to your princess gathering of the...” her voice trails off. “Dead mommies? Or can you stay for a cup of coffee?”

  The air in here is so fresh. Almost heady. I yawn and my stomach growls at the same time. Lily laughs.

  “Or want to go next door and get a burrito?”

  My stomach growls again.

  Then my phone buzzes.

  We have dinner here if you want to come early. Kelly insists that princesses need to eat grilled cheese and my mom’s homemade tomato soup before having their princess ice cream at princess tea, Silas texts.

  Lily looks over my shoulder and reads. I let her.

  “Oh my God, that is the most adorable text ever.”

  My heart melts, imagining Kelly and her instructions to her uncle and grandma. How she feels empowered to make demands and have the adults in her life fall in line. How critical this is to her long-term sense of safety and security.

  “I know,” I say to Lily, unable to articulate more.

  I text back, Tell her I’ll be there. I would never want her to not trust me.

  Passive-aggressive? Absolutely.

  K, he types back, giving me nothing.

  “You need to eat.” Lily reaches for my wrist and pulls lightly. “Mom has cookies in the back. Stay just a little longer. I want to know what happened to you.”

  “You know what’s happened to me.”

  “Something else happened. You’re shaking, Jane. It’s a low vibration in you. What scared you so much that your pieces can’t fit together and rest?”

  “Are you a psychic? Or an intuitive? Some mystical creature who senses things?” I joke.

  “It doesn’t take special powers to tell you need cookies. And a friendly ear.”

  “You are psychic!”

  As we wind our way through the store, Duff follows, but keeps a respectful distance.

  In the back, there is a long, black curtain Lily parts almost as if by magic. Her hip moves to the right, then left, one arm sweeping it as if it were a wall of water. That kind of practice comes from years of living in a place so ingrained in your body, it becomes part of you.

  The back of the store is about what you’d expect. A desk, overflowing with paperwork, scarred wood, and two creaky office chairs. A door marked CLOSET, another door marked BATHROOM, EMPLOYEES ONLY. Then, a bit further back, a loveseat next to a small table with a fridge, microwave, and a basket of single-serve snacks.

  She hands me a granola bar with chocolate chips. “You like this?”

  “I like anything.”

  We sit. We munch in silence. And then, somewhere in that quiet, I realize how right she is.

  Lindsay was the first person I talked to, but she got me while I was still reacting. She sympathized with my feelings. She corralled Drew and managed him – to the extent that you can manage Andrew Foster.

  What I haven’t done since this morning is take time to tell my story.

  Deep breath.

  Another deep breath.

  “Silas and his boss set me up this morning. His boss pretended to shoot Silas in the heart while I had a gun pointed at his boss’s head.”

  Her eyebrows go sky high. She stops chewing.

  “It was a test to see whether I’d kill his boss or drop to the ground and try to save Silas. He was wearing a vest and the gun was filled with blanks. Hmm. I need to remember to ask Drew about that.”

  “Who’s Drew?”

  “Silas’s boss.”

  “Jane. Jane.” Lily is breathing hard, eyes wide. “That happened to you this morning?”

  I look at a wall clock. “Yeah. About ten hours ago? Maybe eleven. I’ve lost track of time.”

  “And the point of this whole thing was to see if you really love Silas? Because there are much better tests of that.”

  “No. The point was to see whether I’m as evil as the media and other people claim I am. Someone led them to believe I was behind Silas’s sister’s death. And other deaths.”

  “Someone very powerful.”

  You have no idea.

  As if on cue, the television in the back corner, which has been on the entire time but muted, flashes to a picture of Monica Bosworth in China.

  The headline says: Presidential candidate’s wife on humanitarian mission in Asia.

  The vision of her, combined with Lily’s reaction, makes the granola bar in my stomach turn into lead balls.

  “Got any coffee?” I ask. She points to a single-serve machine. I’ll take anything right now.

  “I don’t know what to say,” Lily whispers. “Is Silas okay? Were either of you hurt?”

  “His chest took a beating, I’m sure. My heart did, too. Funny. I wasn’t the one who got shot, but I’m pretty sure my body thinks I did.”

  “That explains the shaking.”

  “Some of it.”

  “You must fee
l so betrayed.”

  “I do. I understand why they did it, but yes. Betrayed is a good word.”

  “Why? What possible reason could someone who you love – someone who loves you…?” Her pointed question is easy to answer with words.

  Hard to explain otherwise.

  “He said so. Said ‘I love you.’”

  “Then he sounds like a demented ass who is playing mind games with you.”

  “There’s more to it.”

  “Better be if he expects you to get over that.”

  “He was engaged. To a woman in the military. They served together in a military intelligence unit. She turned out to be a spy. Started killing people on a diplomatic mission, including a U.S. congressman. Silas had to kill her on the spot to save everyone remaining.”

  A chocolate chip resting on Lilly’s lip falls off her face, plinking on the concrete floor. “You weren’t kidding when you said there’s more to it.”

  “Told you.”

  “Your life is very complicated, Jane.”

  I sigh and sip my fresh coffee. “Tell me about it.”

  Shuffling sounds on the other side of the curtain alert me to Duff’s presence before he speaks. “Jane? We need to leave.”

  “Five minutes.”

  “No problem.” Duff leaves.

  “I get it now. He had to test you,” Lily says slowly, eyes narrowed in thought.

  “Had to?”

  “What if he hadn’t done that?” Lily asks, eyes rolling slowly around, her brain processing. “He’d always wonder. His boss would always wonder. Nothing would have been real with them. Especially with him. Silas.”

  “Huh?”

  “You said you like the truth.”

  “I do.”

  “The truth is that we all test people. Every single one of us. It’s part of being human. We only know our limits and other people’s limits when we hit them. It’s like my little brother, Bowie. He has to push every single limit in order to figure out where he ends and other people begin.”

  “Silas should have trusted me because I said so.”

  “Really? You expect a security specialist dude to take you at your word? You? Have you read any of the news about you, Jane? Dang.”