by Nina Wright
The “why” didn’t much matter at this point. It was the “what happens next” that scared me silly. So far, all the increased estrogen in my system hadn’t added up to a single surge in maternal instincts. No matter how many visualization exercises I did with Noonan, I still couldn’t picture myself raising a child. Hell, I couldn’t even admit I had a dog. I certainly couldn’t keep track of her.
That morning was a case in point. Activating my overhead garage door while simultaneously shutting the door to my breezeway, I had balanced a mug of coffee, my laptop and my briefcase. I could have made it all work, even with the sun in my eyes. Except that Abra managed to bolt from the kitchen just in time to squeeze past the closing breezeway door, her sight hound mind fixed on the prize, a day of blissful play chasing shiny objects along the coast.
Before I could scream “No!” or—more appropriately—“Stop, bitch!” she had knocked me sideways, spraying my coffee like an arc of hot lava and scattering my bags. The sleek blonde beauty vanished into the dewy morning, ready to wreak havoc with tourists, if there were any. Abra lived to steal purses and jewelry. She was also inclined to seduce every male dog she met. My only solace was knowing that Fenton Flagg, Noonan’s estranged husband, was back in Texas, where Abra couldn’t corrupt his medical companion dog, Norman the Golden. Though well trained and devoted to Fenton, Norman had no will to resist Abra. My dog was one bad seed.
Full confession: I lived with and consistently failed to control a felonious canine. I frequently forgot to feed or groom her, much less track which side of the door I’d last seen her on. What the devil would I do with a baby?
These thoughts tumbled around my brain as I drove Broken Arrow Highway toward home. Leo and I had named our rural estate Vestige because it was built on land that once belonged to a large farm overlooking Lake Michigan. We’d saved the original tumble-down barn but built everything else from scratch—our house and out-buildings, our decks and dock. After Leo died, it had almost killed me to come home alone, but my young neighbor, Chester, made sure I didn’t do it often. Ignored by his musical superstar mom, he was only too happy to hang out at Vestige and attempt to reform Abra. Before Chester could reform her, or I could remember to spay her, she had provided a puppy for Chester.
I rounded a bend and hit the brake. Ahead of me, on the gravel berm, were Chester and that very puppy. The dog—whose papa was Norman the Golden—had recently celebrated his first birthday; Chester was eight but looked six and often acted forty. To my amazement, Prince Harry the Pee Master and Chester were running, and no one was chasing them.
I honked and pulled over about fifty feet ahead of them. I rolled down my window and waited for them to catch up. Chester waved and Prince Harry leaped straight into the air, acknowledging his share of Afghan hound blood.
“Hey,” I said, when the panting boy and dog arrived at my vehicle. “What are you guys doing?”
“This is what jogging looks like, Whiskey,” Chester said. “Didn’t you used to do it?”
“Before I wised up and got a bike. Why are you all the way out here? We must be a mile from The Castle.”
Chester consulted some kind of shiny techno-gizmo attached to one skinny ankle.
“Point-eight-nine miles, to be precise.”
Prince Harry proceeded to lick the gizmo as if it tasted like cheese.
“To dogs, this pedometer tastes like cheese.” Chester explained. “I bought it online, at Dogs-train-you-dot-com. It’s guaranteed to keep your dog running by your side, and to keep you running because the dog’s tongue tickles.”
Chester emitted a high-pitched giggle. Suddenly, I noticed something about my diminutive multi-millionaire neighbor that I’d never seen before.
“Chester, you broke a sweat. Why on earth—?”
“It’s an order, Whiskey. Direct from my headmaster.”
“Headmaster?”
For a nanosecond I wondered if he was referring to a new hire at The Castle. Until recently Cassina—Chester’s harpist/pop singer mom—and her paramour Rupert, who was Chester’s sperm donor, had employed a handsome though mysterious Scotsman to drive them around and fix their mistakes. MacArthur called himself a “cleaner.” On the side, he sometimes sold real estate, part-time, for me. Chester adored him, and I must admit, I lusted after him until the cleaner made his own mistake, which was a whopper. MacArthur somehow fell under the spell of my shrill ex-stepdaughter, Avery. He even had her sour face tattooed on his sinewy arm. One minute they were living together, with her twins, in a wing of The Castle, and the next minute MacArthur was gone. As far as I knew, he never even left a text message.
I continued cautiously, “Did Cassina hire a replacement for MacArthur?”
Prince Harry whimpered softly, as if the name stirred a fond memory. Chester blinked at me from behind his round wire-framed glasses.
“I’m talking about the headmaster at my school.”
“Oh. Your headmaster gives orders?”
“He calls it homework. But Mr. Vreelander makes it sound like an order. He used to be career Army.”
“I thought teachers gave homework,” I ventured.
“Not at my school. And that’s the problem, according to Mr. Vreelander. He says we’ve gotten soft at The Bentwood School. This is Mr. Vreelander’s first year as headmaster, and he’s cracking the whip.”
Chester mimed doing exactly that. In response Prince Harry performed a perfect back flip.
“Things are changing big-time,” Chester said. “Now we have to learn stuff.”
“But you’ve always learned stuff. You’re the smartest third grader I know.”
“Thanks to my personal assistants.”
“Assistants?” I asked, stressing the plural. “How many do you have?”
He held up three fingers.
“One to tutor me in math and science, and the other to tutor me in literature and fine arts.”
“That’s two assistants,” I pointed out.
“My third assistant keeps my calendar and feeds me. She’s a Cordon Bleu chef. Everything I know about cooking, I’ve learned from her.”
While I couldn’t personally vouch for the first two assistants, I owed a great deal to the third. Using the meager contents of my consistently under-stocked kitchen, Chester often created elaborate meals.
“You’re saying the only way you’ve learned anything at The Bentwood School is by hiring personal tutors?”
“’Til now. But the headmaster is shaking things up. That’s why Prince Harry and I are out running. Every student in the Lower School is required to jog two miles a day. Mr. Vreelander says our whole student body is out of shape.”
“Is Mr. Vreelander’s body in shape?” I inquired.
“Judge for yourself.”
My gaze followed Chester’s index finger to focus on a broad-shouldered Spandex-clad cyclist heading straight for us. Other than a helmet, he wore no more clothing than would be required for a summer afternoon workout. I appreciated every bulging muscle.
“That’s your headmaster?”
I stepped down from my vehicle for a better view.
“Buff, isn’t he?” Chester said.
“That’s one word for him.”
Other words included “taut” and “hot.” But I didn’t go there. Instead I observed aloud that the headmaster may have been buff, but he wasn’t following his own order to run.
“That’s because a landmine in Afghanistan blew out his knees,” Chester explained. “He’s got titanium knees now, but he can’t run. So he bicycles twenty miles a day no matter what the weather.”
I couldn’t imagine anyone bicycling twenty miles along the coast of Lake Michigan in winter weather. In real winter weather, that is, not the fake Florida stuff we had right now.
“Keep running, son,” the headmaster said, briskly saluting Chester as he sailed past, a yellow and white Spandex blur.
“Yessir!” shouted Chester, returning the salute. “Whiskey, I gotta go. Next week is the
President’s Fitness Challenge, and I need to improve my time.”
Prince Harry yipped his encouragement.
“You’re sure you don’t want a ride to The Castle?” I said. “I’m going your way.”
Chester studied my stomach, which wasn’t rude since my stomach was eye level.
“You might want to work out with us,” Chester suggested.
“I’m pregnant, not flabby,” I reminded him. “That belly contains a baby.”
“A baby who will be healthier if you exercise every day.”
“Which personal assistant taught you that?”
“I saw it on the Oprah Winfrey Network.” He sighed heavily. “Starting next week, the headmaster’s restricting how much TV we can watch.”
“Wait a darn minute,” I said. “Schools can’t control what you do in your own home.”
“Sure they can. It’s called homework. Teachers at The Bentwood School never gave any, but Mr. Vreelander is giving it now. He’s changing everything. We’ve got new rules, new policies, a new curriculum and new textbooks. We may even have to wear uniforms.”
“You already wear a school blazer.”
“I’m the only one who does.” Chester shrugged. “I bought mine online because I liked the brass buttons. Almost nothing is required at my school. Except tuition, which is steep.”
“How steep?”
I had always wanted to know what it cost to attend The Bentwood School, an elite academy for the super-rich dating back as far as my grandparents’ day.
Chester motioned for me to bend down, which wasn’t as easy as it used to be before the bundle in the middle. He whispered a five-figure number in my ear.
I whistled.
“The Bentwood School is just a day school, right? No boarders?”
Chester nodded.
“And it’s K through 8?”
“Preschool through 8,” Chester corrected me. “Preschool parents get a twenty-percent price break. But they have additional fees for paper products. Those kids tend to be wet.”
He had barely finished before an oncoming cherry-red Mercedes convertible, top down, issued a sustained honk and swerved toward the berm where we stood. Instinctively, I threw myself in front of Chester and Prince Harry. I was protecting Chester on purpose; the dog just happened to be there.
A petite blonde bombshell with shoulder-length poker-straight hair and enormous breasts exited the Mercedes. She tottered toward us on five-inch heels, texting on her smartphone. I could only hope she hadn’t been doing that when her car stopped six feet away.
“Chester!” she shouted without glancing up from her phone. “Don’t you dare try to protect him. Which way did he go?”
3
Chester gulped. “Uh—hello, Ms. Kellum-Ramirez. How are you on this fine day?”
The woman, who was not yet thirty, tore her eyes from her smartphone. Her white-blonde bangs were so straight and long that they collided with her thick, surely fake, black lashes.
“Don’t talk to me like that,” she snapped. “Call me Kimmi, like a normal kid. I don’t know where you get that formal crap.”
“From my very first personal assistant—my nanny.”
“Whatever,” Kimmi said. “Which way did the headmaster go? And don’t pretend you haven’t seen him. The PTO is tracking him.”
“Why?” Chester asked.
“Why what?” Kimmi said.
Distracted, she was texting again. That gave me time to consider her dress, which matched her vehicle: expensive, red, sexy and small. Very small. The bodice dipped low enough to expose two perfectly orb-shaped breasts, the kind God never gave women. The hemline was a foot above her knees. Kimmi Kellum-Ramirez also wore lots of shiny gold and diamond jewelry, including rings, dangly earrings, tinkling bracelets and gobs of necklaces. If my errant Afghan hound were nearby, Kimmi would be Abra-bait.
“Why are you looking for Mr. Vreelander?” Chester said.
“We need to talk to him. To set him straight.”
After Kimmi pushed the send-button, she noticed me.
“Who’s that?” she asked Chester.
“That’s Whiskey.”
“You have a personal assistant who gets you booze?”
“I’m Whiskey Mattimoe. I’m a Realtor.”
“Chester has his own Realtor? Great. That will be Vreelander’s next requirement.”
She resumed texting.
“That’s not how it works, Ms. Kel—, I mean, Kimmi,” Chester said. “Mr. Vreelander isn’t raising requirements because of anything I do.”
“Ha! You learn things. Now he expects every kid to do that.”
“He just wants the school to be stronger,” Chester said.
“And as a result, our children are abandoning their PlayStations and Xboxes. Vreelander’s got them outdoors, running around like they’re—they’re—.”
“Regular kids?” I offered.
“Poor kids,” she revised. “Underprivileged. Forced to use their bodies and their minds. It makes me sick.”
Just then, another vehicle—this one a sky-blue Mercedes SUV—arrived from the same direction Kimmi had, and screeched into place alongside her. The driver didn’t seem to care that she was blocking one half of Broken Arrow Highway.
“Where is he?” she shouted through her open window.
“Chester won’t tell,” Kimmi replied, crossing her arms over her chest and glowering at my small neighbor.
“Leave Chester out of it,” I interjected.
“Which of his personal assistants is that?” The second driver leaned out her window to frown at me. Unlike Kimmi, this one wasn’t sexy. Or even young. I’d call her plain and over forty. Without a trace of make-up, she sported shaggy dark hair and a scowl.
“That’s his Realtor,” Kimmi said.
“We have to get our kids Realtors now?” the second driver asked.
“She’s not my Realtor. She’s my neighbor, who happens to be a Realtor,” Chester explained, hopping anxiously from foot to foot.
The women weren’t listening; they were comparing geographic coordinates on their smartphones. A third vehicle, this one a silver PT Cruiser pointed in the direction I had been driving, pulled up alongside the second vehicle. Broken Arrow Highway was now completely blocked.
Kimmi minced over to the new arrival and animatedly explained directions through the passenger side window. A discussion ensued, with Kimmi relaying information between the two drivers. As she did so, several vehicles whose drivers just wanted to get somewhere converged on us from both directions. The original drivers ignored them until horns bleated and the second driver leaned out her window and screamed an obscenity.
I covered Chester’s ears with both hands. When she graced us all with her middle finger, I shifted my palms to cover Chester’s eyes.
“You need more than two hands,” he said. “Don’t worry. I already know this stuff.”
At that point, the driver of the PT Cruiser—whose face I couldn’t see—said, “We’re on it.” and peeled away. The second driver wheeled her SUV around to follow.
Kimmi told Chester, “Vreelander can’t hide for long.”
“He’s not hiding,” Chester said. “He’s getting a workout on his bike.”
“He’s going to listen to us. There’s no way that asshole is cutting the Christmas play.”
“You do a Christmas play at a secular school?” I asked Chester.
“We do A Christmas Carol. I play Tiny Tim every year, but Mr. Vreelander wants to cancel the production because the other kids aren’t even trying to learn their lines.”
“Who cares about the stupid words?” Kimmi fumed. “It’s about how good the kids look. I spent three hundred bucks on my daughter’s costume. She’s gonna be the Ghost of Christmas Past, whether Vreelander likes it or not.”
With that, Kimmi wobbled away on her absurdly high heels. They may have functioned effectively as FM shoes, but they offered poor traction on gravel. She gunned her Mercedes and roared
past us, spraying small stones.
I used one hand to shield Chester’s face, the other to protect my belly.
“What a witch. I can’t believe she’s a mother.”
“They all are—Ms. Kellum-Ramirez, Mrs. Wardrip, and Mrs. Lowe. The kids call them Kimmi, Robin and Loralee. They run the PTO, but they really run Bentwood.”
“They run the school?”
“They run Mr. Bentwood, School President. He’s the grandson of the founder. Mr. Bentwood wouldn’t give the previous headmasters much power, but he let the mothers do what they wanted. Until the board hired Mr. Vreelander.”
“Why the change?”
“Recent graduates of The Bentwood School aren’t doing well, Whiskey. Most can’t pass admission tests for private high schools.”
“You mean—?”
Chester nodded gravely. “Our alumni are ending up in public school.”
4
“Alumni of The Bentwood School … in public school?” I couldn’t believe it.
Chester nodded grimly. “Some don’t even get into college.”
“No way. Your school produces surgeons, moguls and politicians.”
“Not lately,” Chester said. “Since 2004, most of our graduates matriculate into Magnet Springs High and then into Lanagan County Tech. The girl who cuts my hair went to Bentwood.”
“You get a hundred-dollar haircut,” I reminded Chester. “Anyway, that won’t be your story. Where do you want to go to high school?”
His cherubic face darkened. “Cassina thinks I should go to boarding school. She believes in the value of going away.”
Out of sight, out of mind. That was more Cassina’s parenting style than her educational philosophy.
Chester continued, “But I might not have to leave. She wanted me to go away for elementary school, and I won that battle.”
“How?”
“I didn’t leave. For almost six months Cassina thought I was at Cranbrook in Bloomfield Hills when I had actually enrolled myself at The Bentwood School.”
“Wait. How could you do that?”
Chester rolled his eyes. “Sometimes, Whiskey, you are so naïve. But I find it refreshing.”
“Answer my question.”