A Dizzying Balance

by Harriet E Rich

  Jen woke with a choking gasp, her heart beating wildly, and lay bathed in sweat while her breathing slowed. Disoriented, she looked around the strange room, then remembered. Her room. She was home even though it didn’t feel like home. Her shoulder was aching, and she sat up to reach for the carafe of water on her bedside table. Swallowing a pill, she leaned back against the pillows, relaxing as the pain gradually subsided.

  It was a beautiful room, spacious and sunny, with wide windows in two of the walls. The corner between them was a comfortable sitting area: white couch flanked by two mauve overstuffed armchairs and hanging above the couch was a big painting of large stylized blossoms, white and mauve and green. Apparently she had used its colors to decorate the room for the wall where the painting hung was pale green but the others white, carpet white, bedspread a dramatic combination of mauve and leaf-green, and floor-length drapes of wide green vertical stripes with narrower stripes of white and mauve.

  To her left, a small table and chair had been placed in front of the windows, and between the closet and bathroom doors on the right was a writing desk with shelves of books and photographs above. More photos covered the wall behind her – framed scenes from movies, groups of smiling people. Everything was fresh and inviting.

  She had looked again to the painting when there was a light knock at the door and a girl of about nineteen with blond hair in a braid down her back came in carrying a tray. “I didn’t know if you’d be awake yet, Miss Colson, but I’ve brought your breakfast. Everyone else has finished.”

  “Thank you, …” Jen had no idea what her name was. “… uh, thank you.”

  “I’m Betsy, ma’am,” she said, closing the door. “I’m not supposed to know about your amnesia, but I overheard Mrs. Kenting talking to Mrs. Grider this morning. Please don’t tell Mrs. Grider,” she said anxiously, “or I’ll get in trouble for certain.”

  “Of course, I won’t,” Jen assured her with a smile.

  “Shall I help you with the tray, ma’am?”

  “No, I’ll get up.” Jen slipped into a robe as the girl laid the plates out on the table.

  While Jen sipped her coffee, Betsy began to make the bed. “It must be awful, I mean, not being able to remember. If there’s anything I can help you with, just ask.”

  Jen looked around. “Everything in this room looks new.”

  “It is. You bought it all brand-spanking new two months ago when you moved …” her hand flew to her mouth, her cheeks flaming with embarrassment. “Oh, I shouldn’t have said that. Mr. Kenting would be so angry if he knew.”

  “Never mind, it’s all right.” She ate a few bites of egg to give the girl’s blush a chance to fade, then nibbling on a piece of toast, she waved at the painting. “That looks good hanging there.”

  Betsy had pulled up the bedspread and was smoothing it out with her hands. She grinned at Jen. “You were thrilled when you bought it. You said you knew the artist – Colby something or other – and you said you wanted to have it here in your room to enjoy.”

  “Well, Colby-something-or-other, I do like your work.” Jen smiled as she turned back to her breakfast. “Tell me a little about Mrs. Grider.”

  “She’s a dragon! All your work clean and neat or you do it over, and no two ways about it.” Betsy was putting things away, hanging up Jen’s clothes. “She’s been here for years, ever since Mr. Kenting and his sister were small. She helps Mrs. Kenting now since her rheumatism got so bad.”

  “Thelma’s?”

  “No, Mrs. Kenting’s,” she laughed. “Shall I take your dishes?”

  “Yes, I’ve finished.”

  Betsy stacked everything onto the tray. “Are you going out to your office to work today?”

  “My office?”

  “It’s behind the garage. The building with all the windows.”

  “Thank you, Betsy.”

  After the girl had gone, Jen sat for a while deep in thought. Betsy had given her a lot to think about. Then, with a shrug, she put it all aside.

  Her room was at the end of the wing and looking down from her chair, she could see sunshine reflecting brilliantly off the ripples in the pond. Directly below, there was a wide flagstone terrace with a stone balustrade running its length from the front of the house until it turned the corner to her right.

  She walked to the other window and looked down to see that the flagstones and balustrade continued along the back curve of the wing. To the left of the house, a retaining wall had been cut into the hillside to support the flat surface of a tennis court and at the back corner of the terrace, steps led down and between flower beds to the concrete edge of a small swimming pool.

  Opening the window, she leaned out. She couldn’t see much to the right beyond the curving wall of the house but looking up, she felt a cool breeze blowing down from the wooded hillside above. Birds were singing and a squirrel running along the hill stopped suddenly, turned to look in her direction, then scampered up a nearby tree trunk.

  She smiled. Maybe the day wouldn’t be as bad as she feared.

  Dressing quickly, she went down to explore a bit and find her office. At the foot of the stairs, she turned left to stand under the bridge. As on the floor above, a long hallway stretched the entire curved length of the house from the end of one wing to the end of the other. Across this hall on her left was an open door and she peeked in hesitantly but there was no one there. It was an office, obviously David’s. Under the windows at the back was a large table covered by a scale model of one of the company’s construction projects with a smaller table holding rolls of blueprints. There were shelves and cabinets along the opposite wall and several side chairs were grouped around an oblong conference table to the right of the doorway. To her left was a broad mahogany desk with matching credenza and leather executive chair. Everything was neat and orderly, like David himself. A large blotter edged in leather, squared-off stacks of papers, the latest in flat-screen computer monitors, a gleaming brass desk lamp with green glass shade.

  The only jarring note was a picture frame lying face-down at the near corner of the desk. With a guilty look, Jen glanced quickly behind her, then stepped in to lift the frame. It was a wedding photo – she in a white lace gown with white roses in her hair, he tall and handsome in an elegant black tuxedo. They were smiling into each other’s eyes so much in love that Jen felt as if she were intruding on an intimate moment and her face was wet with tears. He had kept it on his desk, perhaps for years, and now he chose not to look at it. Carefully replacing it as she had found it, she went silently into to the hall and escaped through the glass doors at the back. Crossing the terrace and down the steps, she moved slowly among the flower beds of the lovely garden. What had happened to that beautiful couple?

  Where was that loving young husband? All she knew was that he had been replaced by an older, stiffer man, angry and cold, who needed to be reminded by his lawyer that anger toward his wife wouldn’t achieve his desired business ends whatever they might be.

  Of that loving young wife, she knew nothing. What had happened that they now slept in separate rooms? Before the accident, had they been, even then, just polite strangers going through the motions of a life together where love had faded slowly and sadly?

  Jen reached to break off one perfect white rose, lifting the fragrant blossom to feel its velvet softness against her cheek. She didn’t believe, wouldn’t believe, that the tender shining love in that photograph had died. As she tucked the rose into the pocket of her blouse, she tried to smile. Somehow, she would get through this and they could start again.

  Betsy had said behind the garage. To her right, Jen saw six large bay doors in a long two-story wood building that ran from beyond that corner of the house almost to the foot of the hillside. She crossed the wide parking area in front of it and walked around the near end to see a glass-fronted building set back perpendicular to the garage. There was only one door in the front so that limited her choices. With a little grin, she opened it and went in only to find
herself alone.

  She stood for a moment looking around at the one long room. A line of filing cabinets marched along the back wall with photos and paintings hanging above, and on top of the cabinets were plants, ivy and coleus and angel-wing begonias, each in a sturdy base of colorful Mexican pottery. The ceiling was high, and the front windows reached nearly as high. The far end was also windows and set beside them was the largest of four desks.

  “That would be mine, I assume.” She walked the length of the room and around to the chair. Taped on the phone was a note handwritten in small even printing.

  --- Jennette. Going to the post office. Also need some supplies and more plant food so I might be gone a while. See you when I get back. ---

  It was signed Colleen.

  No one had as yet mentioned a Colleen and Jen wondered who she was. Wandering around, she looked at each desk. The one closest to hers had to be Tony’s. If she had not already guessed from the overflowing in-basket and the piles of papers strewn haphazardly all across its surface in cheerful disarray, she still would have known. His coffee cup had once belonged to some place called Tony’s Bar & Grill.

  The desk beyond Tony’s had nothing on it but a blotter, a phone and a name plaque that read Aaron Klinger. Another mystery.

  The last desk, opposite the door, was neat and business-like with an office-supply catalogue opened to a page showing various brands of toner cartridges. Behind the desk, the doors of a copier stood open. This, then, was Colleen’s.

  Walking back to her own desk, Jen sat and tried to relax. She swiveled her chair to look out both walls of windows. To her left there was only a narrow stretch of grass before the woods began but someone – her? – had hung several bird feeders from the lowest of the branches. She saw a blue jay swoop down onto one, scattering a small group of sparrows that flew like leaves in the wind away and into the underbrush.

  There was a long table in the middle of the front wall with several chairs around it, and through the glass beyond, she could see down the drive with trees to the left and the open field to the right. The office was set far enough behind the garage so that she couldn’t see the house at all. The area along the harsh blank wall of the garage had been softened by a planting of small palm trees and shrubs with colorful pansies set in a long low flower bed edged by small fieldstone blocks. She felt comfortable here. It would be a pleasant place to work, peaceful and private.

  Turning back and looking across her desk, she saw what appeared to be a script in her basket with a sheet of violet stationery clipped to it. Even from where she sat, she knew this note wasn’t from Colleen. It had been written in deep violet ink, the handwriting flamboyant, the signature large and stylish. Nikki. Jen leaned forward and picked up the script.

  --- Jennette, darling, you’re going to absolutely love this. Read it and we’ll talk. The lead would be perfect for either of us, but let’s not squabble over it. ---

  She chuckled. “In other words, Nikki whoever you are, you want this part like crazy and you’ll fight tooth and nail to get it.”

  The title was Exit, Laughing. Jen was deep into the first act when the door opened and a small woman in her mid-forties came in carrying a box and two bags as well as her purse. She was wearing a brown tailored suit and cream-colored blouse with low-heeled brown shoes that matched the purse. Her brown hair was short with touches of grey in wings on either side of a central part and she was pretty in a faded sort of way. Jen thought that she might even have qualified as beautiful in her youth.

  “Jennette, welcome home!” She smiled warmly and dumped her packages on her desk before hurrying down the length of the room. Seeing the questioning look on Jen’s face, she pulled a chair up to the other side of the desk and sat. “Tony told me all about your amnesia because he knew I’d have to know. What a thing to happen! I’m Colleen Williams, your personal secretary and general all-around crisis solver. It’s good to have you back.”

  “Thanks, Colleen. I saw your note, so I knew that this is my desk, but that’s about all I do know.”

  “No problem. Tony said he’d stop by this afternoon but in the meantime, he asked me to explain a little about the company and what we’ve been doing lately. I see you found the script Miss Hall left for you.”

  “Miss Hall?”

  “Veronica Hall. She’s an actress and the two of you have been friends for years, ever since you worked together in your third movie. When you started SailingStar, she was one of the first actors you hired.”

  “And SailingStar is …?

  “SailingStar Productions. You said that there were so many good screenplays that you wanted to be involved in but that you were too busy to do yourself or that weren’t right for you as an actress. Would you like some coffee?”

  “Yes, thank you.” Jen looked around but there was nothing that even remotely resembled a coffee pot. “Do we have to go over to the house?”

  Colleen laughed and stood up, pointing to two doors that Jen hadn’t noticed, one on either side of the rank of cabinets. “This one is the bathroom with a shower and dressing room. We all keep clothes here in case we haven’t time to go home and change. That one is the kitchen. I’ll make fresh coffee. The pot I made earlier must be mud by now.”

  She headed for the farther door and Jen got up to investigate the bathroom. It was a large room with a window in the center of the back wall. To one side was the bath and shower area, to the other a line of closets with the dressing room beyond. And each closet door had a small card with their names inked in Colleen’s neat printing. Opening the one labeled Jennette, she saw a built-in dresser with shelves above and a rod with hanging clothes – two evening gowns, several suits and dresses, and a group of slacks and blouses. Below was a shoe rack with evening slippers, heels, flats and sneakers. She went out and down the length of the office to stand in the kitchen doorway. Colleen was putting her purchases away in a supply closet to the right.

  Looking through the window above the sink Jen could see nothing but trees with the far end of the garage just visible through the branches. “That coffee smells good.”

  Colleen’s voice was muffled. “It’s not ready yet. I’ll bring you a cup when it’s done.”

  Jen went back to her desk and a few minutes later, Colleen followed her carrying two mugs and a crystal vase. “I thought you might like some water for your rose. I don’t know how you can drink your coffee black,” she said, as she sat down again. “I like mine with lots of milk and sweetener.”

  “The doctor said I shouldn’t, but I’ve gotten used to it, and this is certainly better than hospital coffee.” The white rose looked much happier drinking in the water. Jen took another sip from her mug and settling back into her chair, she pointed to the empty desk. “Who’s Aaron Klinger?”

  “Your vice-president. His office is in town at the sound stage and he only comes up here once in a while for meetings and brain-storming sessions. You have an office there, too, of course. Sometimes we work here, sometimes there. He’s in charge of the business and financial end – you do the creative side. He’s been with SailingStar from its very beginning and so have I, almost. I worked for two years at the sound stage but when your workload got too heavy, you asked me to help. It was crazy when I first got here. I’ve enjoyed straightening things out.”

  Jen waved her hand around the room. “It’s all neat and organized now. All except Tony’s desk, that is.”

  “There’s no organizing Tony,” Colleen looked at the sea of papers on his desk with a grimace, “although, heaven knows, I’m trying to. But that’s another story. I’ve made a list for you of all the projects that we’ve finished, and one for everything that we’ve started, and a third for the ones we’ve been thinking of starting. They’re in your basket – oh, and I’ve got a bunch of messages for you.” She hurried to her desk and came back with two handfuls of little pink notes, sorting through them as she walked. “I’ll take care of these, Tony will handle these this afternoon, and you’ll have to call on
these, but they can wait for a couple more days.

  “This one’s from Aaron. He had to go out of town and won’t be back for a week, something about meetings with potential backers. Mr. Kenting called over this morning to say that he’ll be at one of the construction sites all day, but that he’d like you to join him in the living room at four-thirty. And this last one is from Dr. Addoms. She’s talked again with Dr. Smith, the surgeon, and sent him your X-rays, but you need to call him at this number to set up an appointment. And she said not to be fooled by his name. He’s the best in the business.”

  Jen threw up her hands in mock horror at the pink stacks on her desk. “My head’s spinning. Is it always this busy?”

  “This is nothing.” Colleen picked up the two largest piles. “Tony and I have dealt with as much as we could while you were gone, but now that everyone knows you’re home again, the phone will start ringing off the hook.”

  “It’s been so quiet this morning.”

  “Only because I switched the phone over to the answering service before I left for the post office.”

  “Then please don’t switch it back just yet. I don’t think I’m up to talking to anyone today.” So much for pleasant and peaceful. She sighed with regret.

  “Okay. I’m going to put that stubborn copier back together and make a few calls.”

  While Colleen wrestled with the machine behind her desk, Jen phoned the surgeon’s office and made an appointment for the following afternoon. Holding her hand over the mouthpiece she called to Colleen.

  “What’s the fax number here? The Doctor’s nurse has to send over some forms for me to fill out.” She wrote down the number as Colleen gave it to her and repeated it over the phone. “And, Colleen,” she said as she hung up, “I’ll need several close-up photos from different angles if we have them.”

  “I’ll put together a packet for you.”

  “Thanks.” With that out of the way, she wanted to get back into the script but decided that she’d better look over the lists that Colleen had prepared. She eased out of her sling and tossed it aside in order to get more comfortable in her chair.