by Sasha Dawn
And when my father sent my mother and me packing, Mom’s the reason I wasn’t afraid.
I scroll through a photo album that contains pictures of Hayley and Mom and me throughout the course of my life. For so long, it was just the three of us. Three chicks making it happen together.
I didn’t even know Hayley wasn’t Mom’s daughter until I was going into kindergarten, and when I found out, Mom simply said it didn’t matter. That I was her firstborn, but Hayley was her first baby.
I’ve been so hard on Mom. I mean, I get that she made a gargantuan mistake by having Ted move in, given the way the papers were written. But that doesn’t mean she should have to pay for it forever. Her life’s hard enough without me making it worse.
But I don’t know how to change it.
I think of all I’d sacrifice if I weren’t on Dad’s good side. He could start treating me the way he treats Mom. If I piss him off, the trips will go away. So will the concert tickets. And that’s okay.
But what if he stops trying to get me auditions? It’s unprofessional, since he’s my manager, but it could happen. What if he, out of spite, decides I need some tough love, too?
Nothing is going to change with him. Ever. Who am I kidding?
Unless something else changes, unless the dean of admissions finally decides that I’m too good an asset to pass up and helps me find a way to pay tuition, I need my father too much to do the right thing.
I scroll through my phone and find my favorite picture of my mom, sister, and me. I post it to my Instagram: All the good things in life. Cotton candy and pink lemonade.
Lyrically alerts me that I have a message. I shoot over to the site.
Dylan: You there?
Me: Here now.
Dylan: So about that moon
Me: Yeah
Me: Word on the street is it’s kind of sketchy to leave gifts for a stranger at her school
Dylan: Oh man
Dylan: Not trying to be sketchy
Me: I didn’t think so
Me: but this is quite a cloak-and-dagger way of sharing your work with me
Dylan: I do have a flair for the dramatic
Dylan: and a playfully mischievous nature
Me: Does this mean you’ll let me use your lyrics?
Dylan: It means I’m game to keep talking.
Dylan: Saw your tweet. You had a bad day?
Me: A little good, a little bad.
Dylan: Such are most days.
Dylan: Wanna talk about it?
And surprisingly, I do.
Chapter 15
I didn’t hear Mom leave for work today. And I barely slept. But still, I trudge down the hallway to the bathroom.
The Sophias have texted.
Sophia 1: Who’s up for coffee during zero hour?
Sophia 2: Hand in the air!
Sophia 1: I’ll bring it.
Sophia 1: Text your order.
Sophia 2: Americano with two pumps mocha.
Sophia 2: Thx!
Sophia 1: Madelaine?
Sophia 1: You want to join?
I type I see right through you.
My finger hovers over the send button, but at the last second, I delete it all instead. And as an extra measure, I block them both.
Better to simply ignore what they think is a cunning attempt at getting back into my life than to call them on it. If I respond at all, they’ll defend each other, try to make me feel like I’m being unreasonable, try to convince me I misconstrued what I know I completely understood.
“Madelaine?”
I stop and peek into Mom’s room.
She’s standing at her dresser, wearing a pair of jeans and a tunic sweater that’s the same shade of pink as my hair. It’s her favorite color, and I love seeing her in it, even if it sort of takes me aback. This isn’t usually the kind of ensemble she wears to work, and I wonder why she’s wearing it today.
In her hand is a mascara wand. She leans toward the mirror and brushes her naturally thick lashes with a coat of black.
“Running late?” I ask.
“Not exactly.”
I check my phone for the time. Maybe I’m the one off-schedule today. But no. It’s just past six.
Instantly, my mind goes to Ted, and I jump to the conclusion that she’s prepping for a day out with him. Playing hooky, he used to call it. “Taking the day off?”
“No.”
“Going in late?”
She looks at me. Smiles. “I quit my job last night.”
“What? Which job?”
“Both of them. I was just so tired, see, and I think that’s why I lost it on you. And I can’t do that, Lainey. I need to be my best self for you. After all that happened yesterday, I started thinking about it. Really thinking about it. And I emailed my boss at Hembry after you went to bed and told him I’m done. Then, I called my boss at Walton and told her the same.”
My brain scrambles to process this information. “No two weeks’ notice?”
“Nope. I’m just done.”
“Won’t that make them mad? I mean, you always say the way you leave a job could affect the next job. Wouldn’t you want to leave on good terms?”
“I think there are better things I can do with my time. I hated those jobs, Lainey.” She rummages in a drawer for the next cosmetic. “Hated them. I decided life’s too short to spend my time getting coffee for other people.”
It feels as if someone just carved my heart out of my chest. How does she think we’re going to make it? Money’s already tight. Already we can’t afford things. And, God, not to mention . . . . “The courts aren’t going to like this.”
“Don’t worry about the courts.”
I take a deep breath. Maybe, if not for the emotional evening we shared yesterday, I’d really let her have it. How does she expect me to react? What she’s just done is again putting me in an impossible situation. My dreams of attending the academy may as well be chalk drawings on the sidewalk in the rain.
Everything’s blurry, and I feel like I’m either going to cry or scream. I don’t know what we’re going to do.
Unless . . . “Did you hear from the Minnesota people? The choreographer position?”
“No. I’m not sure my heart’s quite there, either.”
“Mom.”
Maybe Dad’s right. Maybe Mom is in her financial situation exactly because she refuses to change it.
And yet I remember her discipline on the dance floor. I’ve never seen her perform live, but I’ve seen Nana Adie’s old videos. My mother was the picture of grace. Until, that is, I came along.
“I want to tell you what I’m going to do today instead,” Mom says.
“Okay.” I lean against the doorframe.
She brings her hands to my cheeks. She’s been doing this since I was little, holding my face in her hands.
But I don’t like to have my face touched.
I pull away, but instantly regret it when I see the expression on her face. It’s the same look she had when she told me Dad wanted out of their marriage, and when she told me Ted had moved out of our place. It’s the result of rejection, and this time, I’m the reason for it.
She turns away. “We’re going to see the dean of admissions at your dream school.”
I feel my mouth fall open. “Yeah?” Please let this be more than Mom’s deciding to storm the office and demand a meeting. I still haven’t gotten a response to the email I sent.
“I asked for the meeting last week,” she tells me. “They emailed last night to confirm. Private visit. Today. They still want you if we can work out the finances.”
I throw my arms around her. At the moment, I don’t care about anything but the chance to tell the dean about all I can offer the school. I’ll worry about the mistake she’s probably making with her job later.
“I’m going to find a way to make this happen for you,” Mom murmurs in my ear.
“I’m going to make you proud,” I say.
“You’ve alr
eady done that.”
I shower and dress in a unitard—in case they offer me an impromptu second audition—a fun poncho, and ankle-high boots. I gather all my dance and music stuff, and Mom packs apples for the L.
I can’t remember the last time we went anywhere like this together, as if we share a quest. Before the cancer, for sure.
She links her arm in mine—I let her in close this time—and together, we descend the front steps. Nana Adie’s voice filters down from the open window upstairs. She’s singing “Ray of Light.” Appropriate, I think.
Things definitely could be looking up.
And even if nothing comes of this visit, I’m not at Saint Mary’s today. That’s a win in my book.
I see something on the bottom step. Is that another moon? I pick it up before Mom sees it. The last thing I need is for Mom to start worrying about how the mysterious Dylan Thomas knows where I live.
Although . . . I wonder the same.
Did he cyber stalk me to learn our address?
I bury my uneasiness. He’s harmless. We’re fellow artists, potential collaborators, nothing more. If he wanted something more, wouldn’t he be lurking somewhere nearby, hoping to force contact with me?
I glance up and down the street, but don’t see anyone.
I shove the red-and-white checkered moon into my pocket.
Chapter 16
The L is crowded, so we can’t sit next to each other. Mom’s a row up, and if I were still a little girl, I’d be sitting on her lap. She glances back at me; I assure her I’m fine with a wave. Once she turns back, I open the origami moon.
The poem inside is inspirational, almost as if Dylan Thomas knows what I’m doing today. One line in particular pinballs around in my head: Keep your heart in the stars and your dreams in your arms.
I can’t stop thinking of it, of the images it evokes.
I snap a picture of the words and send it in a private message to Dylan on Lyrically.
Me: If you still don’t call yourself a poet . . .
Me: shame on you.
This settles it. I’m going to finish the song and play it at open mic night at the Factory.
And maybe Dylan will come, and I’ll invite the dean of admissions at the academy.
The lyrics will flesh out the musical notes I’ve arranged, and my performance will help prove there’s range to what I can do. Everything will fall into place.
If, that is, Dylan Thomas agrees to let me use his words. But if he does, I could tap into the stars in my heart: I’d really love to write an entire original score for a musical. He could write the lyrics.
I refold the moon, stash it in my backpack, and open a track in progress as the L stops at the next platform.
The guy next to me gets up, so I call to Mom to alert her to the empty seat.
“Whatcha up to?” Mom says as she slides in next to me, gesturing at my earbuds.
“I think I’m going to sing at open mic. And I’m going to write a musical about making it in this business. It’ll be about you. And me. And Hayley.”
“I love that idea,” she says.
“Sort of like Gypsy, without the neurotic mother and obnoxious costumes.”
Mom laughs. Her laughter is like a music box. It’s been so long since I’ve heard it. I love her laugh.
I lay my head on her shoulder. She leans her head against mine.
That’s when I realize the man from the platform—the one who was looking at the Sophias and me—is in the next car. He’s looking right at me.
When I look at him, he looks away.
“Mom?”
The train lurches to a stop at Webster.
“Yeah?”
I was going to ask her if she recognized the guy, but he’s getting off the train. Maybe it really is a coincidence.
“Love you.”
“I love you, too, baby girl.”
Chapter 17
“They were impressed,” Mom tells Nana Adie later as we all sit around the kitchen table. “Lainey really showed them what she could do!”
“Of course,” Nana says. “My granddaughter is brilliant.”
“And then there’s the bad news,” I say. “Grants are based on aptitude and need, and with Dad’s salary, there’s no way in hell I’ll qualify.”
Nana Adie frowns.
“But!” Mom raises a finger and turns to me. “I did the math again last night, and despite what his lawyers insist, my half of your tuition at the academy is almost exactly the same percentage of your earnings your father takes as your manager.”
Insert record scratch. “Wait. He charges me?”
“Standard fifteen percent,” Mom confirms.
“Why didn’t I know this?”
“He charges all his clients for his services, Madelaine. That’s what managers do. Why did you think he’d do anything different when it comes to you?”
“Well, because . . . I guess . . . ’cause he’s my dad.”
She raises a brow. “He’s your manager.”
“But you don’t get paid for what you did for my career when I was little. You did it because you wanted good things for my future. Why would Dad charge me?”
My dad’s always made calls to put me in front of the right casting directors in the right venues and at the right time. But it was usually Mom’s responsibility to take me to meet every casting director, to take me to all of my lessons—until she had to go back to work. Now I take the L, or Dad sends Giorgio in the limo. And he’s paying for that limo out of his percentage of my earnings.
“Well, he gets your foot in the door,” Mom says. “He definitely works for that percentage.”
“But—if Dad earns x amount and tuition is almost exactly x amount, if he’d donate what he earns back to me—it’s like I’d be paying for myself to go to school then.”
“That’s one way to look at it.”
“So you’re saying that we should ask him to put his fifteen percent toward my tuition?”
“No. I’m saying that if you didn’t have a manager, you wouldn’t have to ask for that fifteen percent back. We’d still be putting away the majority of your wages for your future, and you could put the extra toward school.”
It takes a minute for me to catch up to what she’s implying. “You want me to fire my father?”
“We don’t say fired in this business. We say we went another way.”
“What other way can we go? I mean, I still need someone to get me auditions. I still need someone to make calls, to follow up on the auditions.”
“I can do it. I’m familiar with his system. I know how it works. I can get your foot in the door. I can follow up—”
“You don’t have connections anymore.” The numbness returns to my fingertips, and a heavy feeling settles in my chest, as if an elephant just sat on me.
“Maybe not like I used to. But you do. Your resume will speak for itself now. Lainey, what you’ve managed to do in such a short about of time . . .”
“I don’t know, though. Firing Dad?”
“Aren’t you always saying that you don’t want to get parts based on who your dad knows?”
“Yeah, but . . .”
“Let me try it. And if I can earn enough—if I can help you earn enough—you’ll be able to go to performing arts school next year, even if your dad delays the court case for eons.”
“You want me to replace my current manager, my father, with you.”
“Yes, baby.”
“On a whim.”
“It’s not a whim. It’s a means to an end. You deserve to go to that school. This is the best way. I can fill out forms online to incorporate my new business, so once you tell your father—”
“I don’t know how I’m going to do that,” I manage to say. At least I think I say it. But my ears are clogged with the shazams of panic.
“Lainey.” My mom sounds like she’s underwater.
“No. I can’t. Mom, it’s not like I don’t trust you, but . . . fire my dad?”
I flinch away. “I can’t be constantly forced to choose between the two of you!”
“But you’re not,” Mom says. “You’re choosing you. Don’t you see?”
“Nice rationalization, but you’re not the one who has to actually do it.”
“He probably knows this is coming. I’ve already been trying to discuss it with him. But we’ll explain it to him together, if you want,” Mom says. “I’ll go with you.”
This only brings more panic. “You mean . . . the two of you? Together?”
“When will you go?” Nana asks.
“I don’t see any reason not to go right now,” Mom says. “As long as he’s in town.”
“Could we just . . .” My fingertips still feel numb. I’m tempted to take my pulse just to make sure my heart is still beating. “Can we wait until after New York, please? I don’t want to ruin things.”
For a long time, Mom doesn’t reply.
The clamor in my ears gets louder. Of course, Mom doesn’t care if New York is ruined. Dad ruined whatever she had planned, so maybe it’s poetic justice.
It’s getting harder to breathe.
Finally, Mom places her hand on mine. “Sure. That’ll be easier for you, so that’s what we’ll do.”
Chapter 18
Choosing between my parents.
There’s no other way to describe what’s about to happen.
No matter the rationalization, no matter the soundness of Mom’s reasoning, I’m still going to have to sacrifice my relationship with my father if I want to get into performing arts school.
I snap a picture of my steps from the kitchen to my bedroom and post to Instagram: Walking between boulder and bedrock. My message thread with the Weekes twins is the only thing keeping me calm.
McKenna: First, I can’t believe your dad won’t make this happen for you.
McKenna: Second, there has to be another way.
McKenna: You can’t possibly give your dad the ax.
Brendon: BUT you can’t possibly not come to our school next year!
Me: So what do you suggest, wise ones?
McKenna: For now, we concentrate on callbacks.
Brendon: And we have a blast in New York this weekend!