My privacy was now toast.
A little digging here and there, and the reporters had my connection to Aiden Bridger nailed down via the Carmichael Children’s Book Award.
The reporters called, they sped on over to the island that night, they were nosy, pushy, insistent. What could have been one article by Aiden about me had now morphed into something uncontrollable, huge, and nationwide.
I moved out in the middle of the night and into Christie’s house. Brenda said she would bravely forfeit her high heels for my work boots and take care of the animals. “That’s how much I’ll sacrifice for you, my best friend. I’ll even put on those dirty garden gloves of yours and wear a floppy garden hat. Hoo boy.”
I couldn’t help getting a little teary.
The flurry of Christie’s home kept me somewhat centered. She was in bed because of pre-term labor problems, her husband was stuck out of town on business, worried sick about her, and I watched the three kids.
I could hide somewhat from the reporters on Christie’s fenced ten acres of property, but I couldn’t hide from the townspeople. The front page of our own newspaper soon ran the story in giant headlines: “Chalese Hamilton is Annabelle Purples, Famous Children’s Story Book Author. Whale Island Animal Lover Center of Online Controversy.”
My sister’s answering machine was jammed. A few people were ticked I hadn’t shared my work with them, others were amused or tickled at this juicy secret. Some were shocked. Overriding it all: was Aiden still my special friend?
I put my head between my legs.
“You gonna throw up?” Wendi Jo asked me.
I nodded. “Maybe.”
She dragged over a pan. “Always throw up in a pan, not on the carpet. That’s what Mommy says.”
“You’re very helpful, Wendi Jo,” I said.
“Yes, I am.” She gave me a hug. “Mommy said you’re in trouble because you drew a bad picture. Did you get a spanking?”
“The parents are having a fit,” my editor breathed. “We may have to postpone your next book. I feel breathless. I think it’s my heart, Chalese! My heart!”
“You may lose your contract,” my agent hyperventilated. “You may be done. Finished.”
“I have a nightmare on my hands,” my public relations gal whimpered. “Why did you have to draw Cassy Cat with a boob job and a cigarette? Why?”
I bounced Jeremiah on my lap as I took the calls. My life had collapsed, and, overriding the whole dismal, nerve-rattling, sickening fear of my family’s past being drudged up again and poured out for American consumption, I was drowning in Aiden-guilt and the unparalleled embarrassment those drawings would have caused him.
I left him a message. “Aiden, I’m so sorry. I’m so very, very sorry. Remember I told you I’m a clumsy elephant, a ridiculous, pathetic, writer. I don’t get out enough, I hot-flash, I talk to my dogs and half the time I expect them to answer back, I hang out with Brenda, who is a menace. Aiden, the pictures were never supposed to be on the Internet. They were private, a way to work out my…this…us…our…me and you…a mess…”
I hung up. What was there left to say, anyhow? That the drawings were a way to work out my bitter hurt, this life-sucking loss? That I wanted to erase my entire self like I did when I drew a caterpillar incorrectly?
“I’m fine, Mom,” I said into the phone. “You’re still in Los Angeles? I didn’t want to worry you, so I didn’t tell you. Yes, I’ll use an organic face cream tonight and lay with cucumbers on my eyes. Thank you for the box of blueberries and the new book on how to organically care for a stressed face…. Love you, too…No, I have no plans to make any more designs for your company right now…. Please, Mom…I’m fine.”
But I wasn’t fine.
Every morning since Aiden had left I woke up and this raging flood of grief came for every bone in my body.
Every evening the flood was still with me, after hanging around all day, making me cry at unexpected moments, my chest heavy, my mind slogging through sadness.
When I turned off the light at night, the grief was worse in the darkness because I was alone and figured I’d be alone for years. Maybe forever.
A forever without Aiden.
I would curl up with my pillow, flipping it several times when my tears soaked it.
Brenda slept with me a few times. “Want to dress up as bunnies or something?”
His voice was so cold, so detached, I thought a glacier had removed itself from the North Pole and lodged between us.
I felt sick with pain and loss. I gripped my stomach. For the first time in my life, I couldn’t eat, which was not helping this calamitous situation, as I felt nauseous.
“Aiden, nice to hear your voice,” I said into my cell phone. “One second.”
I raced to the bathroom and slung my head over the toilet, then leaned my forehead against the rim.
I could hear Wendi Jo on the phone talking to Aiden when I stumbled back into the family room, leaning hard against the wall in my dizziness.
“Yeah, Aunt Chalese is in the toilet. She’s still in her pink doggie pajamas. It’s after Sesame Street, too. Mommy says no one should be in pajamas in the afternoon. I think she’s sick. No, my mommy’s in bed with the babies in her tummy. She’s sick, too. She eats lots of salsa. I the boss now…Yeah, I the boss. You stink, Aunt Chalese. Like throw-up.”
I grabbed the phone. “Aiden?”
“How are you, Chalese?”
“Aiden, I’m fine but—”
“Good. I think we need to come to some sort of agreement here. I know you didn’t want the article written, but we’re both backed into a corner. I’m besieged by reporters wanting to know why America’s leading children’s writer and illustrator hates me so much and how I ended up being lampooned by Cassy Cat and other assorted famous characters.”
“I understand. Please listen—”
“So I’m finishing the article now.”
“What? I thought it was already written.”
There was a deep, heavy silence.
“It wasn’t written?”
“Most of it was written, Chalese, but when I got back to Seattle after our last”—his voice trailed off, and I heard his exhaustion—“meeting, I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t do it to you. I know you want your privacy, and we were already involved. It was also inappropriate for me to write it. I’d compromised my integrity, my professionalism. I’m kicking myself for that. I don’t think I’ll ever stop kicking myself.” He stopped, swore, went on. “I told my editor to send someone else because I was emotionally involved with you.”
Not good. “How did that go?”
“Actually, I’ve known my boss for twenty years. He laughed. Then he told Jackie Consuelez the story was hers.”
“So you’re saying if my characters hadn’t hit the Internet, you wouldn’t be writing the story at all?”
“That’s right. But now other journalists are already digging, Chalese. Your story—your full story, father and all—will come out shortly. Mine will be first. You will have no more secrets. For my article, and I will be quoting you word for word, so think about what you’re going to say…” He stopped for a second. “Please tell me why you drew the pictures with reference to me?”
“Aiden, first, you know I have a soaring, estrogen-driven temper. You know I’m off half-cocked much of the time. I do bizarre, inexplicable things, and I am so sorry about drawing the pictures.”
“I’m giving you the opportunity to explain yourself, in your own words here, so take this seriously, Chalese. Don’t make it personal.”
I was so blitzed, so wiped out, I could hardly sit up. Why not put my emotions in a blender and hit Pulverize?
“In my own words, Aiden? I drew the pictures because you charged into my life, turned it upside down, gave it a shake, and left me on the floor. Got that?”
“I think I do. But I can’t print that.”
“You also kissed me until I couldn’t see straight, made me laugh until I hurt, indulged my idiosyncrasies
, clicked with my quirky brain, showed me kindness I had rarely seen in a man, hugged me close, treated me like I was someone special instead of a head case, never suggested I change, loved my animals, appreciated the people in my life, as weird as they are, and you held my hand as if you meant it. Got that?”
“I think I do. But I can’t print that, either.”
“Finally, you are the only person I talked to about my father outside of my family, Gina, and Brenda, and you wanted to smash him for what he did to me. You stood up for me, you believed what I said, you were emotionally open to discuss it. We cried together. You love sunsets, too, and you’re a sucker for a romance movie. Don’t think I didn’t see the tears in your eyes that one night. You kissed me as if we had time for a thousand tomorrows. You are so masculine, you’re such a man, rough on the edges, toughened up, and I am so attracted to that, but I can also talk to you like a friend, a best girlfriend. Got that, too?”
“I think I do.” His gravelly voice cracked. “That’s not going in the article.”
“And now you’re ticked off, rightly so, and you’re gone. I’m here. You’re there. And we have this whole, huge incident to deal with because I am a schmuck. Put that part in. Write ‘She is a schmuck.’ I think we’re done here.”
“Chalese—”
I hung up.
I had to.
I needed to go back upstairs and rest my head against the toilet seat before I lost it.
Strangely enough, overnight the pictures on the Internet had increased my sales, even while a few parents railed against my turning their favorite horse into a gambler who talked about screwing.
My editor called. “My heart is better, you’ll be relieved to hear, no thanks to you. Your book is late. Get it in.”
My agent called, and I did not hear him slurping a martini in the background. “Book almost done?”
My public relations gal called. She did not yell at me or gnaw her nails. “Can’t wait to see the next book!”
It’s all about the numbers.
Of course, the pictures were still gathering interest, online and in the press, in chat rooms, et cetera.
Cassy Cat and her boob job sure got me into a lot of trouble.
Aiden’s article came out the next day. I got up, ate two chocolate-chip cookies for a healthy breakfast, then sat down on Christie’s deck, with a stunning view of the south side of the island, to read it. Out in the distance, past Christie’s grassy field, I could swear I saw water spurting from a whale’s blowhole.
The truth about my father came out in glorious detail. One of America’s best-loved children’s book writers and illustrators had an infamous crook for a father.
Not simply a run-of-the-mill, stupid-headed bank robber. No, my father outdid them all. He was an “investor” who tossed zillions of dollars of people’s money into things they really needed: his yacht, his many homes, his vacations with his mistresses, his Swiss bank accounts, his extensive gambling jaunts. The article also detailed the domestic-abuse charges, my mother’s hospital trips, and that Christie and I had been taken into protective custody.
He also wrote how my mother willingly sold everything we had to reimburse my father’s victims, that we changed our names, moved to Whale Island so we could disappear, and how she became a maid who later started a successful company on her dining-room table.
My father had been out of jail for ten years. He was presently “whereabouts unknown.”
Aiden’s article also discussed my crash through Stephen’s skylight, my minor arrest record because of a variety of pranks that he detailed with humor, added the islanders’ very charitable opinions of me, the design of my farmhouse-style home, my animals and the adopting-out that I did, and my small business with the jams and jellies called “Wild Girl’s Jams and Jellies.”
He talked about Christie’s pregnancy and the twins, and even listed a few of her food cravings, which made even me laugh.
Aiden quoted Brenda, who was uncommonly circumspect. “She is my best friend. She will always be my best friend. She went through a hellacious childhood and survived with class and grace.”
He quoted me frequently throughout the article, including how I felt as a child, attacked by the press, mocked by friends, living in a dangerous home. He wrote of my love of children’s book writing, how drawing and writing had taken me away from my fear, and how I wanted my young readers to think and dream and believe they could make the world better.
In all, despite the raunchy pictures I’d drawn of my characters, and the mockery of Aiden, I came off as a decent, caring person who had simply wanted to hide herself away from a childhood filled with difficulties.
He explained those raunchy pictures with great humor, stating, “I invaded her privacy, told her I was on Whale Island to write an in-depth article on her that not only would reveal a past she had worked hard to hide but would reveal to her friends on the island that she was the famous Annabelle Purples. I would have been upset, too, although I would not have been able to draw such superb pictures to get revenge. Stick figures are my specialty.
“To be honest, when I returned to Seattle to write the article, I told my editor I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t invade Jennifer Piermont/Chalese Hamilton/Annabelle Purples’s carefully cultivated privacy. Unfortunately, that was about the time a young friend of Hamilton’s put her drawings on his MySpace page. That incident forced my hand, and, I believed, as did Hamilton, that since the article was going to be written now anyhow, by other reporters, it would be best if I did it. By then, I knew Chalese and her history.
“As for the drawings? If I thought there was a chance she’d give them to me, instead of flinging them at my head, I’d beg her for them so I could frame them proudly.”
I should have been breathless with panic, sitting there on the deck, but I wasn’t. This golden peace embraced me as the sun rose in the sky, the rays dancing over the ocean. Yes, it was devastating to have my whole life exposed…and yet there was relief, too. I had to admit it.
I would do no more hiding, no more cowering, no more tap dancing around my past, worried that all would come to light. There would be no more evasiveness to others about what I did during the day. There was nothing more to hide. As Brenda and Christie and I had discussed ad nauseum, Christie and I were not responsible for our father or his actions. The family secret that had been written into my blood was out. On the Internet, of all places. I exhaled, breathed in, exhaled.
It was over.
I started to embrace the golden peace.
My editor called and didn’t harangue me with his upcoming heart attacks. “Not a bad article, kid,” he told me. “Not bad.”
My agent called me, chortling. “The publicity! The publicity!”
My public relations gal giggled. “Have any more scandals in your background? It’d be awesome if you did.”
And my website, the URL of which Aiden had listed? Bombarded.
Some people wanted to help the animals. Some people wanted to buy my jams and jellies.
I called Aiden and thanked him.
He did not return the call.
Brenda threw her laptop through the French door in my studio. Luckily it was open. It went flying over my deck and crashed onto the lawn.
“Splendid,” she said, breathing heavily. “It was a cursed laptop anyhow. Where is my black Zorro mask? I have a date.”
Chapter Ten
“There’s something wrong,” my sister whispered to me over the phone a few days later. “I can feel it. My back hurts. I’m cramping up. It’s too soon, Chalese, way too soon. And there’s blood. Oh no no no. I’m bleeding, I’m bleeding.”
I flew out of my house with Brenda close on my heels. She had returned from a date and was wearing a white Princess Leia Star Wars outfit. It did not stop her from coming with me.
On the way I picked up the doctor, a friend of mine and Christie’s from high school, and we sped toward her home. The doctor didn’t even look twice at Brenda’s hair, b
raided and coiled on the sides of her head.
Christie’s husband, Cary, was stunned with fear and grief, the children crying.
Dr. Lana Shoemaker took over in an instant. She worked to stop the bleeding and called for a helicopter.
Within an hour we were at a hospital in Seattle, my sister hemorrhaging, those dear babies’ lives in danger.
“She may need blood,” the doctor told me, a stricken Cary, and my trembling mother.
“We’re sisters. I’ll donate,” I said.
The doctor nodded. “Good.”
“In fact, I’ll give her all my blood.” The doctor’s eyebrows shot up into her blond bangs. Why do I say things like that? But it was the truth. I would give Christie all of my blood in a second. I’d funnel it out myself if I had to.
My mother swayed, and I grabbed her. She had been on her way home from San Francisco, flying into the Seattle airport, and had driven directly to the hospital.
It was hard to reconcile my tailored, gracious mother of today with the woman who had lived with my father. As she told us later, “That woman was young, naïve, and trapped in an emotional torture chamber. She could no longer think for herself.”
My mother never remarried. She instead focused her energy on us, her housecleaning, and her own small business at home. From her dining-room table, with a hope and a prayer for a better life, she made jewelry, mostly from sea glass and shells at first. Christie and I helped. When those streamed right out of the local tourist shops, we made more. With more help and more prayer, she expanded her market to Seattle. We added beads and crystals and hammered metals.
When those hopes and prayers morphed into reality, she took another deep breath, told herself she could do it, and found other markets in Portland and San Francisco. We added semiprecious stones.
Pretty soon we couldn’t keep up with the orders, and Mom hired women all over the island to make the jewelry. A manager followed, then an assistant manager. I phased myself out of the business after I sold my first book, but still did a few designs here and there.
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