by Ann Jacobus
“At the silver stall?” He’s not Arab. Maybe it was hard to tell with Kurt’s shades on.
“I don’t know him. Just ran into him once.”
“Where?”
“Out doing touristy stuff.” She doesn’t feel like sharing this info with Moony. She’s divulged too much for one day. Anyway, it’s her business.
“Think he’s following you?” Moony asks. “Don’t engage him,” he says sternly. “In any way.”
“Please. He’s not following me. It was just a coincidence.” She looks down at the sidewalk, then back up at Moony. “Don’t worry, I know my way around the block.”
FIFTEEN
Sunday afternoon, December first, Summer watches a Tibetan sky burial on YouTube while she unravels the crocheted afghan on her bed. She should be studying French and preparing for Moony’s impending visit but can’t focus on irregular verbs and political vocabulary.
The Tibetan family is bringing the bundled body to rest it on a few rocks so it’s not on the stone floor of the tower. Seated monks ring the area. Everyone sits out of the way so that the birds—vultures, actually—can do their work. Although they don’t show that part. It’s not morbid at all. Jhator is the practice of offering your body to animals as a final act of kindness. You don’t need it anymore. They get nourishment. Everybody’s happy.
The building buzzer sounds.
She startles, clicks off her computer and jogs out to the apartment door. The front entrance to the building is open during business hours, but locked at night and on weekends with a code pad. She already texted Moony the outdoor code. Once in the building, a second main door has a buzzer for each apartment and video camera for viewing visitors.
The video screen in their apartment is lit up and a black-and-white image of Moony’s face flickers there. She hesitates, then presses the intercom. “Come on up. Second floor. Only door.”
He smiles as she jabs the button that remotely opens the inside door to the elevator and stairs. She wishes she’d studied more French. He’s going to think she’s dense.
Oh, and sloppy.
She runs back to her bathroom, pulls a brush through her hair and dabs on some lip-gloss. Then she shoves a pile of folded, laundered underwear into her armoire. The front doorbell chimes. She trots out in time to see Ouaiba open the door.
“Monsieur Moony est là,” Ouaiba announces with a big smile.
Moony stands inside the foyer craning his neck at the fifteen-foot ceiling, the chandelier, the gilt mirrors, and the antique French furniture.
“Hey,” she says, grinning. Her anxiousness evaporates on seeing his face. They kiss cheeks. He’s the only person she’s liked doing that with. It’s not a great custom as far as she’s concerned.
“Bling crib,” he says.
She gestures vaguely at the room. “Thanks to all the brave chickens. Um, come on back this way. Mom’s got a soirée going on in the living room, best avoided. Tiptoe.” Last thing she wants to do is to expose him to Mom.
Moony has no cane today, but points to his right leg and thick shoe bottom and reminds her, “Tiptoeing’s not an option.”
“Right. My bad.”
As they walk past the open double doors to the living room, Mom calls, “Summer? Come in, darling, and say hello.” There are about seven or eight people in the huge salon, all gripping champagne flutes. A two-foot-tall cone paved with rows of beige caramel and pale pink strawberry macarons topped with icing roses sits on the coffee table.
Summer rolls her eyes and leads Moony in and introduces him to Mom. Mom holds out her hand and looks surprised when Moony offers his left to shake. Summer observes her mother sizing him up, a disabled Arab kid in a hoodie, and silently dares Mom to make any condescending comment or gesture. But Mom doesn’t.
A familiar but unidentifiable beefy, balding man bounds up, sloshing a crystal tumbler overfull with scotch. “Hello, gorgeous. I don’t know what that thing is in your nose there, but you sure shed some pounds, you skinny thing.” He grabs and hugs her, spilling more of his drink. Summer steps back, scowling. Too bad she can’t say the same for him. She didn’t recognize Wild Winston because he’s gained thirty pounds and lost most of his hair since the last time she saw him.
He adds, “And nice of you to get dressed up for this. Har-har.”
She looks down at her old, too large Alcatraz T-shirt. A comeback involving his inability to remove his belly or put on another head of hair pops in her mind, but she just says, “Har-har yourself. This is my friend, Munir Al Shukr. Moony, this is Winston Thomason, Houston resident and chicken lawyer.”
Moony says, “Nice to meet you.” He shakes hands again with his left.
A catering woman offers them hors d’oeuvres. Summer takes the nearest, a gray slab with flecks of parsley spread on a thin slice of baguette.
Winston turns to her and says in a serious voice, “So how’s everything going?”
Summer says, “Fine. I’m working hard. Moony’s here, in fact, to help me with French. Yuck! Liver.” She spits the masticated hors d’oeuvre into a napkin then sticks it on the tray of a passing server.
Winston grimaces. Then says, “Are you on track to start up somewhere in January?”
“I don’t know.”
Winston’s eyebrows shoot up and his chin sinks back into his second one. Just answer him, she thinks. “Probably Jonesboro. We’re working on it. The college counselor is helping me.”
Moony’s staring down at the carpet. Mom pulls him over to meet one of the French guests.
“Awright,” drawls Winston. “Then we’ll see about transferring you. Assuming you keep your grades up.”
“Right,” says Summer, turning away. The other guests resume chatting all at once. They must have been enjoying the show.
She pulls Moony out of the room, grabbing two full champagne glasses from a tray on their way out.
“Sorry about the grand inquisition in there. I hate these things. They bring out the thirteen-year-old in me.”
“No kidding,” Moony says drily. “Jonesboro?”
“That’s where Arkansas State is.”
“You start in January?”
“Um, probably not. More likely next fall, at Whipperwill U. Or some place like that. At least, that’s the plan, for now.” She sighs. “First, I have to graduate. For that, I have to pass my French test.”
“Insha’Allah.”
“What’s that mean again?”
Moony smiles. “God willing.”
“It’s going to take more than God.” She pauses at her door, and turns to Moony. “My grandpa left me money when he died. But I have to graduate from a private high school and a four-year university by the time I’m twenty-two to get it. I’m already a year behind schedule, and they’re about to call in a hazmat squad.”
“Oh. Get to work, then.”
“I guess.”
They go to Summer’s room and she indicates an overstuffed chair for Moony. He examines the boxed set of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy on her dresser. “Nice.”
“It was my dad’s. I think he secretly wanted to be Aragorn.”
“Don’t we all.”
Dad took her to see The Fellowship of the Ring when she was too little. She got so upset when the Balrog pulled Gandalf into the abyss of Moria under the Bridge of Khazad-dûm, they had to leave the theater. And get chocolate ice cream. They watched it all the way through a couple of years later, though.
Moony sits. She holds out a glass of champagne.
“No thanks.”
“How come?” She drinks down half of hers.
“Walking pharmaceutical lab. Throw in alcohol, I’ll combust.”
“Well then. More for me.” She downs the rest. He’s staring at her. “What?” she asks. “Everybody likes champagne.” Her friend Grace drank it for breakfast. “Some university found links between champagne and cognitive health benefits.”
“Keep it in your flask?” He raises one scarred eyebrow.
> She looks at him a beat before answering. “No. I keep chicken bouillon in there.” She pulls back the blackout curtains so they have enough light to see.
“Can you conjugate?”
“Of course. Don’t look at me like that.”
“Wonder how you can function well, is all.”
“Lots of practice. I study better when I’ve had a drink.” He does disapprove. He’s wondering how much it all runs in the family. She sucks in her cheeks. If Moony really knew her, he’d probably march out of here. But she’ll show him. She knows how to be a good student. She places his rejected full glass and her empty glass at the far edge of her bedside table and then plops down on the king-sized bed.
“Now can I ask you something?” she says, kicking her shoes off and sitting cross-legged.
He answers warily. “Okay.”
“Why do you care?”
“Didn’t say I did.”
“Oh, fine. Feel free to pry into my personal life whenever you want, then.”
Moony sets his jaw. “Need the tutoring income.”
She chuckles. “Whatever you’re charging, it’s not enough.”
SIXTEEN
Later the next evening, after a long day at school and a deep, fortifying shot of vodka, Summer marches into her mother’s room. She has some questions.
Mom’s seated in her gray marble bathroom, wrapped in an oversized terry-cloth bathrobe. She’s stroking moisturizer upward on her thin chicken neck. Not someone Summer should be intimidated by.
“Oh, there you are,” says Mom, as if she had called Summer in. “You know I’m leaving tomorrow, don’t you?” Camus lies at her feet. He shows Summer his teeth. With his underbite, he’s ridiculous, not menacing.
“Yep. You mentioned it.”
“Winston’s going, too. And I have two invitations to hear the poet laureate speak at the US ambassador’s residence tomorrow evening. Since we won’t be here, I thought you might like to use them.”
“Okay.” It’s not exactly a big windfall, but she’s surprised Mom thought of her. “Thanks.” Mom’s sure spending a lot of time with Winston lately. “Um, thanks for the shirts and jeans, too.” Yesterday, Mom set her up with a personal shopper at one of the old grands magasins department stores. It was an exercise in frustration on so many levels, but she did find stuff afterward at the Gap across the street.
“Did you and Winston have a chance to chat?” Mom talks to Summer’s reflection in the giant mirror as she smooths on liquid foundation.
“You could call it that. Why is he here again?” she says to the back of Mom’s head.
“Trust business. He wants to know about your progress toward your diploma.”
“I know. We discussed it. I keep telling you guys, every day, that I’m working and that things are fine.” Despite everything, she doesn’t really want to disappoint Mom again. But if things aren’t fine, then it may not matter anyway.
“Darling,” Mom says to the mirror, “he and I both are worried that if you forfeit the terms of your grandpa’s will, these vultures will fight us even harder than they already are.”
Vultures. “What happens if I … forfeit?”
“I believe the money’s meant to go to an ‘eliminate the whales’ charity.”
“No! Really?”
Mom chuckles without wrinkling her face. “No, not really. But some right-wing foundation.”
Mom’s trying to head her off. Summer demands, “And what about you?”
“What about me?”
“If I get the money, do you get any?” She puts her hands on her hips. That would sure explain why Mom gets so worked up about all this.
“No,” Mom says with a prim expression. “My grandmama and your father left me very comfortable and I have my work, even though it’s hardly lucrative. But you would certainly be able to take care of yourself.” She chuckles. “And anyone else you could think of.”
“Oh.” That would be good, Summer thinks. She likes money and knows she’s too wimpy to get by without it. Maybe that’s all there is to it. Mom just wants her to take care of herself. She has been for years, emotionally anyway, if not financially. It’s no secret that Adrienne never wanted to be a mom in the first place.
“How is it with Dr. Garnier?” Mom asks.
“Fine. She’s, uh, well dressed. We were going to discuss Dad’s death last session, but we didn’t have time.”
Mom doesn’t bite. “Have you made some friends?”
“Yes. Loads of them.”
Mom takes a sip from her drink, then backtracks. “I know you feel like we’re riding you hard about your school and the will. I suppose we are. But it’s a lot of money at stake. A lifetime of financial independence. What’s being requested of you is not that difficult.”
Summer bristles. “How do you know? How can you say that? Maybe not hard for you, but it is for me.”
“Don’t raise your voice. Why is it hard?” Mom asks evenly.
“I don’t know. Studying is so … I can’t focus. Anymore.” Or care, she thinks. What’s hard is to describe how she feels lately. If she could only use one word, it would be “gray.” Or one phrase, Trapped in a giant cobweb of blah. Nothing is exciting. Not parties, not clubs, not movies or TV, not new shoes or a convertible. Not even Disneyland Paris.
Moony is a bright spot, but she’s not even sure about that anymore. Explaining any of this to Mom is not worthwhile.
Mom resumes, “Dr. Garnier should be able to help you with that. But you’ve got to make a big effort here, Summer. To throw all that money away—a huge gift like that, would be like throwing away … your whole life.” She gazes at Summer in the mirror.
“Why are there so many flipping strings attached? Why can’t I just get my GED? Then an online degree or something?”
Mom says lightly, “Everything has strings attached, darling.”
“Right.” Mom’s love and approval falls into that thousand-dollar category: Things with Strings Attached.
Summer reminds herself that Mom’s mother ran off with a tennis pro, when poor Mom was only seven. And Aunt Liz was five. Another fascinating but verboten topic.
Mom continues but looks like she just sniffed an off wine. “Also because your grandfather was a very controlling man. He didn’t want you to turn out like your dad.”
“Jesus.” Summer wishes for the thousandth time she had siblings to divert family attention. And the whole toxic thing between Dad and Grandpa. She didn’t see Grandpa much, and doesn’t really remember or was too young to understand it.
“There was so much antagonism between them that I’m sure in their next lives the two of them will be sent back as Siamese twins.”
“Conjoined. And I don’t get it.”
Mom blinks at her reflection. “They’d have to learn to live with one another. Settle their bad karma.”
“I didn’t know you believed in reincarnation,” Summer says.
“I’m just saying.” Mom sighs. “Was there anything else?”
Yes, there is. She plunges ahead. “I wanted to ask you about Dad.”
Mom’s elbow juts in the air, holding the curling iron in her bangs. She shifts to see Summer at a better angle in the mirror, one thin eyebrow raised.
“How did he die? I mean I know his death certificate says brain hemorrhage. But what exactly happened? And why?” Their housekeeper had realized he was locked in the bathroom, she knows that much. Summer had been spending the night with a friend and was taken to the hospital before they took him off life support.
“Your father’s drinking problem had gotten serious. He had alcohol-related complications.”
“What complications?”
“Liver issues. Esophageal bleeding.”
“What does that have to do with the stroke?”
“He had certainly been drinking that day.” She pauses. “He … may have had a reaction to some meds he was taking. And he fell, too.”
“So—wait. Did the stroke cause the fall?”
“We don’t know.”
“Then he went into a coma.” Summer’s feet are planted on the gray carpet, hands back on her hips.
“He did.”
“And no one found him for a while.”
“Yes.” Mom bows her head. She had been at the country club the whole day. Scores of witnesses.
Summer presses, “So what are you saying?”
Mom closes her eyes. “His death was complicated.” She sets the curling iron down, then turns to look at Summer in the flesh. “His depression, which he refused to deal with, affected everything. His drinking. How he took care of himself—or didn’t.”
Mom raises her eyebrows at Summer. Summer’s own eyes in the mirror are wide with surprise. “He was depressed?”
“I thought you knew this.” Mom frowns.
“I am not Sylvia the Psychic!” Summer explodes, throwing up her hands. “You’re the only one who could tell me and this is the most time we’ve spent under the same roof for decades! Plus you never will discuss any of this.” In truth, she had suspected that Dad was depressed, as a therapist at St. Jude’s suggested, but it’s still weird hearing it now. In the context of his death.
Mom forces her breath out her nose. “Wally wrestled with depression off and on since he was a teen.” She pauses and looks at Summer pointedly. “It runs in his family.”
“Wasn’t he getting treatment?”
“Dr. Kong prescribed him antidepressants, but he wouldn’t take them properly. And, there were his issues with Grandpa.”
“Yeah, why was Grandpa so mean to Dad?”
“Mainly because your dad tried to stand up to him,” Mom says with a sigh. “Grandpa stripped him of authority and all his shares in the company.”
“Grandpa took Dad’s shares in the company away?”
“Yes. With a bunch of expensive legal wrangling. And put them in trust for you.”
“Those were Dad’s?” It’s a punch in the jaw. Summer sits down on the hydrangea-blue upholstered bench.
Mom shakes her head and says softly, “He just seemed to lose all energy and will.”
“You could have saved him. You should have had his back!” Summer’s voice quavers.