“Britt, has a man named Gary called?” I asked.
“Isn’t he there yet?” I could hear irritation in her voice.
“No. I wondered if he’d called.”
“Mom, you’ve been stood up. Hang up and come home. Do not wait one more minute,” she ordered me.
“Okay.” I hung up and headed for my car. As I pulled into the driveway to the main street, I saw a Saab behind me flashing headlights on and off. The driver jumped out of the car and ran to my window.
“I’m just leaving,” I told him. “You’re a bit late.”
“No, I’ve been sitting right here waiting. I got here early. I never saw a Saab come in the driveway.” Gary had the same kind face that I remembered.
“There’s a second driveway right over there.” I pointed.
“Oh . . .” Gary seemed at a loss for words. “Can I still take you out for dinner?”
“No, I’m sorry. I’ve already called my teenaged daughter, and she’s expecting me home. She told me I’d been stood up, and to get home immediately.” I didn’t smile.
Gary looked disappointed as he buttoned his navy blazer against the cold. “Please, let me make it up to you,” he said. “You could call your daughter to let her know you weren’t stood up.” He looked at me hopefully with soft blue eyes.
I thought about how much easier it would be to just go home and grade papers. But part of me didn’t want to return with my tail between my legs. “Okay.” I rolled up the window and parked the car.
Inside Gary’s blue Saab, I called Britt. “He was here all the time,” I told her, “just watching the wrong entrance.”
My fifteen-year-old daughter showed no mercy. “Mom,” she said in her beeotchiest voice, “that’s lame. He should’ve gotten off his ass and looked for you.”
I was pretty sure that Gary could hear both sides of the conversation. “Well, we’re going out to grab a bite, and then I’ll be home.”
“Where is he taking you? Does he have a reservation?”
“Um, Gary, where are we going to dinner? Do you have reservations somewhere?”
“Momma, it’s seven thirty on a Friday night in Orange County. This better be good.”
From the look on Gary’s face, I knew the answer. “We’re just going to catch as catch can,” I told Britt. “I’ll be home by ten o’clock.”
Gary took me to a posh sushi restaurant in Laguna Beach, where I noticed that he looked young for his age and was dressed immaculately, very old-school East Coast. As we chatted, I thought, He looks older than me, but not that much older. In fact, his face is so pleasant that after I’ve had a particularly quarrelsome day with Brittany, he might actually look younger than me.
Afterward we went for a walk along the bluff, where it was windy and cold. “What do you consider a romantic evening?” he asked over the sound of crashing waves.
I looked out at the starry night and said exactly what I thought, no filter. “Romance doesn’t have to be about people. Enchantment can be about life. I think a gorgeous inky-black sky splashed with sparkling stars, a glass of wine, and the sound of birds roosting in the trees can be dreamy.” I paused for a beat. “Even when you’re all alone.”
Gary’s facial expression went from surprised to bewildered. His mouth opened and closed. “I see that you and your daughter are very blunt,” he said with a smile.
“We prefer the word ‘direct,’ ” I answered. “‘Blunt’ carries a negative connotation, as it’s often used to describe females who are forthright. ‘Direct’ carries a positive overtone.”
Gary burst out laughing. “Conversation with you is unpredictable. I like you, Deborah Ziegler. It’s cold, and I need to get you home to your teenager, but I’d like to take you out again.”
I was surprised. I thought I’d done a pretty good job of being disagreeable.
At sixteen, Brittany managed to wangle a yes out of me for a car. Now, that was a time when I should have put my foot down, but saying no would have been the equivalent of World War III. The car was the beginning of the real trouble.
“Just so you know, I’m going to go to a movie with some friends, and then spend the night at Helene’s.”
“Brittany, you can’t just add ‘just so you know’ in front of anything you want to do. You have to get permission.” This phrase of hers lit me up, as she would say, “like no other.”
“Dude, don’t go postal. It’s not a ginormous deal. Her mom’s okay with it. You can call her if you want, but she’s kind of a hot mess and you might not enjoy that conversation, especially if she’s had a drink or two. Although since you’re both single parental units, you might like her—even though she sports a whale’s tail sometimes.”
“Britt. A: Stop calling me ‘dude,’ damn it. B: What is a whale’s tail? And C: Give me Helene’s mom’s phone number, so we single parental units can chat.”
Britt smirked. “A: I can’t help the dude thing. B: Whale’s tail is a thong that shows above the waist of someone’s pants—though I bet you think that’s TMI. And C: Here’s the number.” She handed me a sticky note and slammed out the door to the garage.
I winced at the thong image and ran into the garage after her. “Buckle up!” I repeatedly motioned the action. “Buckle up!”
Brittany pretended not to see me as she backed out of the garage.
“I’m taking away car privileges if you don’t buckle up!” I shouted at the departing car.
Gary and I had been dating on Saturday nights for a couple of months when the phone rang at about 8:15 p.m. on a weekday. I was sitting in my pajamas grading papers at the tiny butcher-block bar in the kitchen, and Britt was doing her homework on the couch in front of the television. It was Gary, asking me out for dinner.
“Hi, Gary.” Having watched to see who it was, Britt started making kissy faces at me. “Go out to eat? Now?” I said incredulously.
“We’re already in our pajamas!” Brittany shouted from the couch.
“I teach school. I can’t start a date on a school night at eight thirty.” For some reason it irritated me that he didn’t get this about my life. “I’m in my pajamas grading papers.”
Gary mentioned that he hadn’t thought about how late it was before calling.
“Look, I know that you and your management team might go out for dinner and wine at eight or nine o’clock, but middle school teachers don’t. We’re early to bed and early to rise. Buh-bye.”
Brittany thumped her pen on her book. “Holy shit, Mom, you were really rude. Do you not like this Gary dude?”
I sighed. My instinct was to jump on Britt, to chastise her for the cursing. But honestly, this was as close to a good conversation as we’d had in weeks, so I held my tongue and decided to choose my battles.
“I like him well enough, but he doesn’t seem to get a teacher’s life.” I picked up my papers.
“He seems like a nice guy. Maybe you should lighten up a little. When are you going to let him meet your fabulous daughter?”
“I thought you’d rather I keep him out of your life.” I watched for a reaction.
“Gawd, Momma. If he’s nice, at some point I should meet him, right?” Britt waved her pen at me. “Does he like you? Does he think you’re pretty? Does he want to marry you?” Britt called out in a singsong voice.
“Don’t be silly. I’ve already told him I have no intentions of getting serious with anyone until you’re out of high school.” I banged my stack of graded papers on the butcher block and clipped them together.
Britt was quiet for a minute. “That’s okay by me. I don’t want a ‘dad’ in the house getting all up in my grille. But I’m okay meeting the guy.”
Britt and I had long, drawn-out arguments about curfew. They felt like water torture at the end of a workday. I could see each drop of water coming, but they never came in the same pattern or frequency. After hours of this, I felt like there was a hole in my forehead.
Now instead of picking Brittany up from high school, I dro
ve home to find her car already parked out front. I sighed. I wanted to see her, but I knew that there would be something wrong as soon as I entered the door. I was exhausted, and I felt like I was walking on eggshells.
Heading toward my room, I caught a glimpse of Brittany lying on the floor of her bedroom talking on the phone. Her elegant long, tanned legs were propped high on the wall, her grimy bare feet leaving a dark stain on the paint. Long honey-brown hair fanned out around her face, wadded gum wrappers tipping the halo of hair with glittering sliver. My daughter could chew an inordinately large amount of gum in one phone call. With a condescending glance—a gaze that could wither flowers—my daughter extended her leg toward her door. Flashing white bikini panties beneath her too-short plaid school uniform skirt, she firmly closed the door in my face, giving me no chance to complain about the nail polish stains on the carpet.
Britt was caught up in the Orange County definition of beauty. She attended school with girls who had fake fingernails, expensive blond weaves, and blown-out hair. It wasn’t uncommon for these students to get breast implant surgery or a perky new nose for their Sweet Sixteen. There was a heightened anxiety about the appearance of their bodies, rather than their bodies’ abilities. This pursuit of physical perfection took more time each day than scholastics required. In spite of this, as always, Brittany brought home straight As.
With the car came a job. Brittany secured a front-desk position at a fancy golf club and restaurant in a nearby gated community. Soon after she began working there, from the smell of her clothing it was clear that she was smoking dope. I suspected that the source of the pot was someone at the golf club. When I asked Britt about the smell, she laughed. “The chair I sit in at the club smells like weed and tobacco, Mom. The daytime employee must be a toker and a smoker. The smell gets all over my clothes.”
I called her boss and tried to have a discussion about my concerns. The woman was a fan. “We all just love Brittany. She’s so efficient and dependable for her age.”
“I know that Britt is working with an older girl and is hanging out with her a lot. Is this girl a good influence? Do you know her well?” I felt like a creepy stalker mother, and I probably sounded like one, too, but I was so worried.
“Oh, you must be talking about Celia. She’s wonderful. I think she’ll be a good influence. They’re both top-notch.”
I hung up with the feeling that Brittany and Celia really had this gal snookered.
Gary and I invited Celia and Brittany to join us for a Zingaro Horse Ballet, with horses flown in from France. Zingaro (“Gypsy” in Italian) boasted performers from the internationally known French equestrian theater company in an avant-garde show combining horses and dancers. We took the girls out to eat beforehand. Celia was quite the charmer. She was funny, smart, and whimsically attired. Although I distinctly smelled pot on her clothing when I gave her a light hug, I liked her, in spite of myself.
Inside the enormous tent, the classical music was so loud and grating that I plugged my ears in some parts. Gary leaned over and asked, “Did you know that the show is largely Stravinsky?”
I had thought Stravinsky was a lovely classical musician whose music would play while women in floating white dresses sat astride their cantering sleek steeds. But the performers weren’t riding; instead, they were being dragged along in the dirt behind the horses in a crawling sort of motion. The horses were moving in graceful choreography. It was the performers down in the dirt that I found disturbing. The show was bizarre, and the girls were already giggling. I shot them a look. These were expensive tickets; surely things had to get better.
Then one of the slowly trotting horses lifted its immaculately combed tail and released a load of steaming manure into the carefully raked loam. We all stared in horror, sure that the performer behind the horse would modify his routine to avoid being dragged through the dung.
He did not.
Celia and Brittany doubled over in laughter—loud, attention-getting laughter. I looked around with wild eyes before completely losing control, too. Gary herded us out the door before we were kicked out.
In the car, we lost it again.
“I’m sorry! I completely lost my shit,” Celia sputtered from the backseat. She held up her hands in a mea culpa between guffaws.
“The horse lost his shit first, though,” said Brittany.
One Saturday morning, after a walk with a friend, I drove up the hill toward our house. Britt’s car was parked against the curb, and to my shock it had two spiderweb-like cracks in the front windshield. I checked the house. Not there. My heart thumped and my stomach churned as I dialed her cell phone. No answer. I got in my car and raced over to the emergency room. The front desk told me that Brittany and a friend had been in an accident, and neither had been wearing a seat belt. They were doing a brain scan.
I paced the room until they wheeled her out. Thank God the scan came back normal, with no signs of bleeding. They released her, warning me to watch for loss of memory, confusion, vomiting, or abnormal behavior. Britt said the other girl refused to go to the hospital, insisting she was fine, and had been picked up by a friend.
“Do her parents know?” I asked.
Brittany shook her head no. “Mom, it’s not a big deal. I wasn’t hurt. Steph wasn’t hurt. Don’t cause trouble for her. She and her Mom have enough issues.”
I could relate to that!
“How did it happen?” I asked.
“My phone rang, and it slipped out of my hand and under the seat. I reached down to get it and plowed into the back of this lady’s brand-new Mercedes. The cops came and called an ambulance when I said my head hurt.”
“Did the lady in the Mercedes go to the hospital?” I asked.
“No, she was getting her car towed when I left in the ambulance.” Britt sighed.
“Brittany, how many times have I begged you to buckle up?” I began to lecture, the volume increasing as I continued. “This has been an ongoing thing. Can’t you listen to me about anything? Are you determined to learn everything the hard way?”
“Please don’t nag me now, Momma. I can promise you one thing. From now on, I’m always buckling my seat belt. I did learn this one the hard way.” Her eyelids fluttered as we drove past her car, as if the sight of the cracked glass made her head hurt. “I won’t be fooling around with my cell phone, either.”
I was grateful that she only had a headache, no other injuries, and I believed her. She would never drive without a seat belt again. She had learned it the hard way.
Gary turned out to be a gentleman worth knowing. I’d told him that I would never marry again, but that if he wanted to hang out, I was fine with that. Magnanimously I mentioned that if he wanted to get married again, since he was older than me, he might want to look elsewhere. I’d also told him that he could never attempt to discipline Brittany.
“You’re not her father. I’m not bringing father figures into my daughter’s life at this stage in the game. She’s kind of spinning right now, and it wouldn’t be fair to either party.”
“It’s hard to hear her disrespect you, or listen to her statements that start with ‘just so you know’ and end with the door slamming,” he said. “But I’ll abide by your rules. She’s your child.”
“Yes, she is. I’m in this alone right now. Trust me, if there’s any hope of a relationship between you and Britt, you’ve got to bite your tongue and stay out of it.”
“Could I see you more than once a week?” Gary changed the subject. We’d been seeing each other for several months, but up until then, I’d limited my time with him to either a Friday or Saturday evening.
I thought for a second, and decided to go for it. “I’ve always wanted to take ballroom dancing lessons. We could try to take a mid-week class.” I was chuckling to myself, thinking that no man would ever sign up for that.
“Great. Just let me know where to be and what time,” Gary said.
He kept his word, and we started a Wednesday evening class at an Ar
thur Murray Dance Center.
Brittany summed up her opinion about Gary on a phone call to a friend. “This older guy’s really got it bad for my mom,” she said, “but I encourage it because it keeps her from watching me like a hawk.”
Gary and I were on our way to a dance class when I received a phone call from security at a fancy department store.
“Are you Brittany Maynard’s mother?”
“Yes.” My heart pounded. “Is my daughter all right?”
“Oh yes, ma’am. She’s fine. She and her girlfriend are sitting right here. Perhaps I should let her speak to you.”
“Momma.” Britt was crying. “We’re in trouble for shoplifting. I need you to come and get me.”
For the love of God, what next? “Tell the man I’m on my way.”
Gary drove me there and walked me to the security office, but stayed in the background as I handled the situation. My daughter sat alone, her tearstained face humiliated and contrite, her shoulders hunched in embarrassment. I was angry, but when I saw her sitting there, I was also sad. It didn’t seem like she thought very much of herself. This was not the confident and bold Brittany of middle school; instead, this was a mixed-up teenager. My daughter was bigger, smarter, and better than this moment in time. I needed to remember that.
I spoke with the security guard, who showed me the clothes Britt and her friend had stolen from several shops at the mall. I told the guard that I wanted Britt to return the items to each of the other businesses they’d shoplifted from, as well. We visited the stores, and at each I had her ask for the manager. Britt told them what she and her friend had done, apologized, and returned the clothing.
Brittany was wrung out when we returned to the department store, but grateful that her apologies had been accepted and no further fines had been inflicted. The guard handed Britt paperwork banning her from shopping in the store for one year. There was a fine, as well, in lieu of filing charges with the police. Brittany and I both signed the papers and found Gary outside, where he’d been patiently waiting.
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