Life in a Fishbowl

by Len Vlahos

  At least Kingsborough would get what was coming to him. Sherman Kingsborough, Ethan knew, was being held without bail in a secure location, and he would soon go through the nightmare ordeal of trial, conviction, prison. “That poor jerk is in for a hell of a ride,” Ethan said aloud.

  “A hell of a ride,” he repeated. When he went through the scenario in his head again, he smiled for the first time in days. He let out a whooping laugh, the cackle loud enough to be heard by two girls Rollerblading along the boardwalk that bordered the Pacific Coast Highway.

  “A helluva ride!” he shouted as he picked up his cell phone again. This time, he dialed the number of a board member he knew over at the rival Global Television Network. Those guys, thought Ethan happily. Now, those guys have no soul.

  But it was not to be.

  Ethan Overbee shopped Busted, a reality show featuring Sherman Kingsborough, for nearly a year before giving up. No one was interested in Ethan or his show. He was persona non grata in the world of television production, and any project with his name attached was doomed to fail. With nowhere else to go and his tail between his legs, Ethan found his way to the last refuge of industry professionals. He was hired as the chief executive officer of the National Association of Television Executives.

  ***

  Sherman Kingsborough is serving a twenty-year sentence for attempted murder in the first degree. He’s writing a book about his experience. It’s expected to fetch a seven-figure advance.

  ***

  After the final episode of Life and Death aired, Deirdre and her lawyer drove to the main precinct of the Portland police station, where she surrendered herself to the authorities for the murder of her husband, Jared Stone.

  The district attorney, a seasoned law enforcement official and a skilled litigator, had contacted Deirdre’s lawyer after word of her mercy killing reached his office, and suggested a quiet, benign meeting to discuss options.

  He explained to Deirdre that while he didn’t agree with it, he had no choice but to prosecute.

  Deirdre was processed and then released without having to post bail. Given the nature of her crime, the DA agreed with the judge that Deirdre didn’t pose a danger to herself or society, nor was she a flight risk.

  She and her attorney rejected all offers to plead to a lesser sentence, each of which would have required her to serve at least six months in jail. Deirdre’s defense was funded by the right-to-die lobby, a group that was, thanks in part to Jared Stone, marshaling a significant war chest. They saw Deirdre’s trial as a test of both the law and of public opinion.

  The trial, which didn’t begin until almost a year after Jared’s death, lasted six weeks. Deirdre’s legal team pursued a unique strategy. She was, they contended, defending the rights of Jared Stone. They freely admitted that Deirdre turned off the ventilation machine and smothered Jared with a pillow, causing her husband to die. (They had no choice, as the prosecutors showed the video from every camera angle in the room save the one covered by a pillowcase.) Deirdre had wanted to keep her daughters out of it, but they were all over the police report, so both appeared as hostile witnesses for the prosecution.

  The DA made a simple argument: Deirdre Stone, frustrated by the intrusion of the television cameras—a fact with which he sympathized—had admitted to killing Jared Stone. Doing so was against the laws of the state of Oregon. The state had no choice but to hold her accountable.

  Church officials were called to testify about the nature of the care administered to Jared Stone on the set of Life and Death. The defense countered that the Church had used its influence to cajole the medical team into artificially prolonging Jared’s life, making him an icon to promote their political views.

  In the end, the jury sided with Deirdre. She was found innocent of murder. The double jeopardy clause of the US and Oregon State Constitutions kept the DA from filing a manslaughter charge—which he wouldn’t have done in any case—and for Deirdre, the nightmare was truly and finally over.

  Like Sherman Kingsborough, Deirdre is writing a book. It’s called House of Stone and is dedicated to the memory of her late husband.

  ***

  When the news stories spread about the events that night in Portland, Hazel was featured prominently. Until then, her parents had known little about her involvement with Jackie Stone. They were aware of her fund-raising effort but thought the matter had ended after that.

  Hazel wasn’t sure how they’d react, but the Hucks were good people. They saw tenderness and love in their daughter they had never managed to see before. As a reward, they bought Hazel a dog: a pug, whom she named Max.

  Hazel drifted away from Azeroth. There were just too many real-world adventures to spend time chasing zeroes and ones in the form of dragons and gold. Her newfound celebrity brought her more attention than she wanted at school. But it also opened up new avenues of friendship. Before long she was dating a boy by the name of Richie McGill. He played drums in a punk band, and he worshipped Hazel.

  She and Richie fell in love. Both were accepted to schools in Boston—she at Emerson College, he at Boston University. The following fall, the car loaded with their belongings, and Max the pug, they moved north.

  Jackie and Hazel did finally meet two years later when Jackie was scouting colleges. The online friends were each thrilled to be in the other’s company, and Hazel delighted in showing Jackie around Boston. But, truth be told, the two young women didn’t have that much in common. They kept in touch for more than a year after that meeting but eventually drifted apart. Time and distance, as it often is, was too much to overcome.

  ***

  Outwardly, little changed for Megan Stone. She was the queen bee before it all started, and in the aftermath of the unprecedented media coverage, she was the queen bee still. The other popular girls at school flocked around her, and the popular boys wanted to date her.

  But Megan was different. Not only were she and Jackie talking again, they were friends. As often as not, Megan would decline an invitation to a party with the in-crowd to spend time with her big sister. As she looked back on the events of those several weeks, she was in awe of Jackie, of the strength and courage she’d shown in standing up to the network, and in standing up for her father.

  And it wasn’t just Jackie, it was Deirdre, too. Megan did all she could to be supportive of her mother during the trial. They were, as a family, closer than they had ever been before. And that, more than anything, made Megan miss her father.

  ***

  Maxim Andreevich Vasilcinov went from nobody to rock star overnight. News of his involvement in the Stone family saga—it was the biggest story on the Internet for one solid week—made its way to Saint Petersburg, and to Max’s school. Suddenly, everyone wanted to be his friend.

  At first, Max was overwhelmed and didn’t know how to act. But before long, he realized that he simply needed to be himself.

  Three weeks later, when the world was returning to a measure of equilibrium, Max was summoned to the headmaster’s office. Max had never been called to the office before, and he racked his brain as he made the walk down the long hall- way, trying to figure out what he might have done wrong.

  “Ah, Maxim,” the headmaster said when Max entered, “please, please come in.”

  There was a woman in the room, a grown-up. Max thought she was very pretty, even glamorous.

  “This is Miss Pretaskaya,” he said, “from the Moscow Polytechnic University.”

  “Please,” she said, extending her hand, “call me Luba.”

  Max shook her hand and sat down.

  Luba explained how his footage from The Real Family Stone of Portland, Oregon was the talk of the film program at the school, and asked whether Max would have any interest in a scholarship to study film and television when he completed high school.

  Max fainted.

  When he came to, he accepted. He would go on to be one of the most successful directors in the history of Russian cinema.

  ***

&
nbsp; Jackie Stone went on with her life. A day never passed without some reminder of her dad—a song on the radio, a reference to a card game they used to play, just an undefined scent on the wind. As time wore on, the memories blurred and the pain of loss eased. That’s not what Jackie wanted—she wanted to feel hurt, anger, and sadness for the rest of her days. She thought it was the only way to honor her father. But that wasn’t how the world worked; while time doesn’t necessarily heal all wounds, it does provide just enough scar tissue to allow people to move on.

  After the ordeal of her trial was over, Deirdre asked Jackie if she could have anything, what would it be. “The only good things that happened in the last year are because of you, sweetheart,” Deirdre had told her. “Tell me what you want.”

  It didn’t take Jackie long to answer.

  Three months later, after their visas had been issued and processed, Max and his mother crossed the security barrier at the airport in Portland, Oregon, and into the terminal. Max walked right up to Jackie, who was trying to look around him for the boy whose photo she had so often seen online.

  “Solnyshko,” he said. Jackie was startled; it took a second to focus her attention on the boy standing in front of her. A bit overweight, unruly hair, a complexion like the surface of the moon.

  “Max?” she asked.

  “Da.” His answer was one of resignation. “I did not know how to say to you that I am not boy in picture.”

  Jackie started to laugh, and Max hung his head in shame. He was taken aback when Jackie threw her arms around him in a hug that would have made a Russian bear proud.

  “I am not understanding,” he muttered into her shoulder.

  “Oh, Max, I am just so happy to see you.”

  The two teens spent a week together touring every part of Portland, and even drove to Seattle for a day. They held hands, but they never kissed. It just didn’t feel right to either one of them.

  When Jackie bade him good-bye at the airport, they both promised to stay in touch and to meet again.

  It was a promise they would keep many times throughout the course of their lives.

  Jackie followed in her father’s footsteps. She majored in public policy at Hood River State College and pursued a career in politics.

  She would visit her father’s grave every year on the anniversary of his death. For a while, Megan and Deirdre came with her, but after a couple of years, they lost the impetus. Jackie never stopped going, and never forgot her father. He was with her, always.

  ***

  While the high-grade glioblastoma multiforme had no progeny in the traditional sense, its seed had been planted in Megan and Jackie Stone. It was there in the form of a slight but identical variation in each of the girls’ DNA. It was a marker waiting to be noticed. The hammer on a pistol, waiting for a trigger.

  But not all markers are noticed, not all triggers pulled. It would be many, many years before either girl would find out whether her own dormant Glio would awake.

  But those are stories for another time.

  Acknowledgments

  This book was a long time in the making. The story went through several iterations before it ever reached a publisher’s desk. In the first draft, Glio wasn’t even anthropomorphized … he was just a brain tumor.

  I played, I tweaked, I wrote, and I rewrote. And along the way a tribe of friends and family provided invaluable feedback. I offer my heartfelt thanks to the following early readers of the manuscript:

  All one hundred students at the 2014 Denver Publishing Institute, Bob Almassy, Carol Almassy, Bobbi Gilligan, Tom “71” Gilligan, Carl Lennertz, Tess Murch, and Matt Strollo.

  Thanks to my bookseller friends Janet Geddis, Paul Hanson, Allison Hill, and Christine Onorati for reading the early manuscript, and for their never-ending support.

  Thanks to Katya Gonella for providing advice on the Russian phrases used by Max.

  A huge thanks to my editor and publisher, Cindy Loh at Bloomsbury Children’s, who believed in this project from the start, who treats me like a rock star, and who made this book better. Editors are the unsung heroes of the publishing world. And it’s not just Cindy; I owe a debt to everyone at Bloomsbury. Special thanks to copyeditor Wendy Dopkin, senior production editor Diane Aronson, and executive managing editor Melissa Kavonic for cleaning up my mess; designer Jessie Gang and creative director Donna Mark for the beautiful cover; Erica Barmash, Lizzy Mason, Cristina Gilbert, and the entire marketing team for helping this book find its way to your hands; and thanks to eagle-eyed intern Jessica Mangicaro for spotting all of my World of Warcraft mistakes. (I did play the highly addictive game for three months as part of my research, reaching level twelve before realizing I was supposed to be writing, not questing.)

  Thanks again to my intrepid agent, Sandra Bond. Sandra has been a stalwart friend and supporter since before I had a career.

  And, as always, thanks to my family—Kristen (always my first and best reader), Charlie, and Luke. Without them, this all means nothing.

  Copyright © 2017 by Len Vlahos

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the events, incidents, names, characters, companies, businesses, executives, and organizations portrayed in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  First published in the United States of America in January 2017

  by Bloomsbury Children’s Books

  This electronic edition published in September 2016

  www.bloomsbury.com

  Bloomsbury is a registered trademark of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Vlahos, Len.

  Title: Life in a fishbowl / by Len Vlahos.

  Description: New York : Bloomsbury, 2017.

  Summary: Fifteen-year-old Jackie is determined to reclaim her family’s privacy and dignity by ending a reality television program about her father’s terminal brain tumor.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016022364 (print) | LCCN 2016030157 (e-book)

  ISBN 978-1-68119-035-8 (hardcover) • ISBN 978-1-68119-036-5 (e-book)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Family problems—Fiction. | Brain—Tumors—Fiction. | Cancer—Fiction. | Terminally ill—Fiction. | Reality television programs—Fiction. | BISAC: JUVENILE FICTION / Family / General (see also headings under Social Issues). | JUVENILE FICTION / Performing Arts / Television & Radio. | JUVENILE FICTION / Social Issues / Friendship.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.V854 Li 2017 (print) | LCC PZ7.V854 (e-book) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016022364

  Book design by Jessie Gang

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