by Josie Brown
After a long, hard day at work, Nina rushed into the mobbed school auditorium with her front-row-center ticket in hand—only to find Kat sitting in her reserved seat.
A hush fell over the milling crowd. Everyone pretended to look in other directions, but all ears (not to mention a few camera phones, including one that just so happened to be carried by the ubiquitous Rain) awaited Nina’s reaction. Stunned and trembling, Nina purposefully ignored Kat as she growled at Nathan. “What the hell is she doing here?”
Of course, he hadn’t meant to hurt Nina. He’d just forgotten the seating situation. In fact, he had hoped that he and Kat would be able to slip in and out of the play without too much fuss being made over them—
Before he could say a word, Kat smiled graciously and leaned in slightly so that her whispered response could only be heard by Nina: “I’m not leaving, so live with it—unless you want to make a scene and embarrass that brat kid of yours. Of course, if you do, Nathan will hate you forever.”
Later, half of those who were there—at least, those who knew Kat, aspired to know her, or believed everything they read in the fanzines—would claim that, if looks could kill, the actress would have been buried right there on the spot by the glare emanating from Nathan’s half-crazed soon-to-be ex. The other half—those who knew Nina, if only to exchange a few friendly remarks at the monthly SOA PTA soiree—would insist that she looked as if her heart had snapped in two, right then and there.
Both sides were right. And both sides would have been in agreement that what Nina did next was pure class. Taking a deep breath and holding her head up high, she walked slowly to the back of the auditorium, where she stood throughout the two-hour performance, ignoring the pitying glances cast her way.
Of course, to read Baxter’s column the next day, you would have assumed that Nina had threatened Kat’s life before running home to slash her wrists. Then again, who wouldn’t, after seeing the accompanying photo (courtesy of Rain and six other “anonymous sources”) of an angry Nina standing over a sweet, smiling Kat?
13
The Slap
No doubt about it, Jake hated Balloon Lips, which was what he secretly called Daddy’s new girlfriend.
He knew it was because of Balloon Lips that Daddy never came home anymore. She was also why Daddy had forgotten to pick up Jake for their last two Team Harte catch-and-throw dates. And worst of all, since his parents’ separation, Jake now had to spend every other weekend at Balloon Lips’s house, where he was forbidden to go into any room other than the one with the gigantic TV, or the room designated as his bedroom, which was all the way on the other side of the house from where Daddy slept.
With Balloon Lips.
Even when Jake was in the TV room, he wasn’t allowed to sit on the furniture, just on the floor. And not with any food or drink, either, because, as Balloon Lips once said to him out of earshot of Daddy: “This Oriental carpet is worth more than you’ll ever be, kid, so just suck it up.”
One Saturday, he took her words to heart and sucked up the only thing she allowed him to drink—that horrible fizzy water she bought by the case. Then, when he couldn’t hold any more liquids, Jake did what any little boy with a full bladder would do: He peed—although not in a toilet (heck, not one of the many adults floating around with those blue knobs crammed in their ears had even bothered to show him where the bathroom was!) but into one of the potted plants that filled the humongous TV room.
Being bad never felt so great.
So great, in fact, that the next time he had to go pee, he didn’t even bother to run to the plant. He just stood up and did it right there on Balloon Lips’s damn Oriental carpet.
Soon, discovering new places to pee became a game. The house had lots of nooks and crannies, so finding a nice, quiet corner wasn’t a problem at all. As the weekend went on and on (without Daddy, since Balloon Lips always pouted whenever Daddy left their bedroom to check up on Jake), he got bolder, choosing spots right out in the open, like the formal dining room, or by the back door.
That night, Daddy came to tell the little boy that he had to take Balloon Lips to some party, so to go to bed when that girl Rain told him to. Oh, Jake went to bed, all right: to Daddy and Balloon Lips’s bed—where he took a poo, right after peeing in some fancy shoes (named after some little boy’s train, “Jimmy Choo-Choo,” he thought) in her closet.
When they got home at dawn, Balloon Lips’s screams could be heard even as far away as Jake’s bedroom. It sent a chill through him. The four-year-old hovered in the dark under the blanket, not knowing just what to expect. But he could hear her coming, cursing and ranting each step of the way.
He prayed he was invisible, that when she flipped on the light he might vanish into thin air. At first he thought his prayers were answered when all he could hear was the sound of his own asthmatic breathing. But he was wrong. This he knew when she peeled back his covers, jerked him up by his pajama shirt, and slapped his face.
Just once, but hard.
His whimpers didn’t stop, even when Daddy picked him up, cuddled him, and drove off with him, far away from Balloon Lips’s evil castle.
Only when Jake saw Mommy’s face did he stop crying, because he knew he was making her cry, too.
Daddy didn’t cry, though, because he was too big of a boy for that. But Jake could tell he wanted to, because of the tears in Daddy’s eyes.
And that was the only reason the little boy would finally forgive him.
Usually the Sunday crowd at the original Urth Caffé on Melrose was too hip to stare at this celeb gulping down his Old Grandpa, or that starlet sipping her Spanish latte, even when such luminaries were practically sitting in one’s lap, which was most likely the case, considering how the tiny bistro tables were crammed onto the private patio.
Still, it was hard not to stare at Nina, whose old Honda Civic barely screeched to a stop curbside before she jumped out and stalked angrily through the cafe.
Spotting her prey—Kat, trying to look inconspicuous in oversize Prada shades (if that were even possible) as she and Nathan leisurely perused the Sunday Los Angeles Times—Nina strolled over to their table, picked up the actress’s very large mug of Manhattan Mudd, and tossed it onto Kat’s ostrich feather–trimmed Betsey Johnson cropped cardigan.
The actress’s earth-shattering screech was hard to ignore, as were the large, dark wet spots on her sweater, which was now clinging damply to her, giving her adoring public two more reasons to further contemplate her upper anatomy.
It was later reported by Serenity that Nina’s parting words were: “If you ever touch my son again, I’ll punch you so hard you’ll need at least three plastic surgeries to fix your ugly puss…” or something to that effect. Then she casually purchased a cappuccino on the way out while the actress very loudly berated her boyfriend for his choice in exes.
Kat’s payback was devious: She sent Nathan to pick up Jake under the pretense that she wanted to apologize to the little boy. Hoping that such a big move on Kat’s part would assuage some of Nina’s anger, he did as he was told.
As Kat suspected, just being in proximity to his father’s girlfriend brought the little boy to tears. That was exactly the look she wanted from him. After the so-called apology, Rain took Jake to the kitchen under the pretext of getting him some ice cream, when in truth her mission, as ordered by her devious mistress, was to take a close-up picture of the bruise Kat’s slap had created on Jake’s face—which she was then immediately to hand deliver to Riley, who would then promptly pass it on to Baxter, who led with it in the next morning’s column.
Because Nina’s new philosophy on the tabloids was based on that old adage “ignorance is bliss,” she wasn’t even aware that, once again, mud had been slung her way.
Besides, she was much too busy breaking up a fight between Mr. Baxter and Ms. Hannigan, the imperious attorney whose standing order of Beluga caviar was one of Nina’s many responsibilities, as both laid claim to the last of the sea bass.
So, when Tori whispered fervently into Nina’s ear that Sage Oak Academy was calling to inform her that Ylva had pointedly abandoned Jake at the school, which, now that it was six o’clock, was closing for the evening, Nina was thrown for a loop.
“If you’ll excuse me,” she murmured to the bickering customers before racing up the aisle to grab the phone. Frantically, she punched in Ylva’s cell number.
“Ja?” The Swedish au pair’s boredom was obvious, even with Elmo’s Happy Tapping playing in the background.
“Ylva! The school just called,” Nina hissed into the phone. “They say you’ve left Jake there. Why didn’t you take him home with you and Plum?”
“Because Vecca say you are child veeter. No more carpool, she say.”
“What? She called me a—a what?” Between Ylva’s accent and all the tap dancing in the background, Nina couldn’t grasp what words the au pair had mangled.
“I say ‘child veeter’! You hurt Yake, ja? So now Vecca feel Ploom is not safe. Now I must drive every day.” Her tone clearly indicated that Nina was at fault for that unpleasant change in her circumstances.
Tears rose in Nina’s eyes. “How dare she say—why, I’ve never hit Jake!”
“The papers, they have the pictures. Brat Ploom calling. Bye-bye now!” Plum’s petulant appeal was silenced with a click from Ylva’s handset.
Pictures? In the newspapers? Nina grabbed a Daily Times-News from the newsstand. Scanning the lifestyle articles, she came across Baxter Quinn’s Hollywood Exxxposé column.
There it was, under the headline: “Battered Up: Nat’s Nina Is Slap-Happy with Son!” Alongside the photo of the bruised and tearful Jake was Quinn’s exclusive interview with Kat in which she tearfully recounted the two incidents in which her life was “threatened” by Nina—at the school play, at Urth Caffe—and then claimed that she now feared for the lives of “the two guys she loved most.” And herself, of course. “That woman is dangerous, and I have the photos to prove it!”
A smaller inset photo showed a close-up of Kat’s low-cut, coffee-stained cardigan. Her pose did little to call readers’ attention to anything other than her breasts.
Obviously, that was the point.
Omigod, thought Nina. So now everyone in the world thinks that I beat Jake?
Of course they did. There it was in black and white. It was all the proof they needed.
Heck, it had even persuaded the starstruck Becca (whose role as the Hartes’ carpool partner had finally paid off by allowing her to bask in Nathan’s newfound fame, too, albeit vicariously) to dump Jake in SOA’s after-school day care, without even a courtesy call to Nina.
The bitch.
She had to get out of there! She had to go, now, to Jake, so that he wouldn’t feel as if he’d been abandoned.
By a mommy whom the whole world thought beat him.
Tears streamed down her face. She looked around for Tori so that she could tell her she was clocking out. Then she remembered where Tori was:
Refereeing the brawl between Mr. Baxter and Ms. Hannigan, who now could be heard throughout the store threatening to sue Tommaso’s for breach of sea bass.
Nina ran back down to the fish department. “Stop it!” she shouted. “Please—please, stop it!”
They ignored her, as did Tori, whose high-pitched screeches weren’t helping the situation.
I have to get out of here…I have to get out of here…
Nina grabbed a cleaver from the fish counter, raised it, and hacked the bass in two. Picking up both pieces, she slapped one into Mr. Baxter’s open hand, and the other in Ms. Hannigan’s.
“There! Are you satisfied?” she roared at them. “Now…now you can both have the damn thing!”
All three of them stared at her, as if they’d seen a ghost. One thing was for sure: Whoever this person was, standing in front of them with a fish cleaver in her hand, she certainly wasn’t the sweet, quiet Tommaso’s concierge they’d come to know all these years.
No, I’m not that woman anymore, thought Nina. I’m a bitch who supposedly beats my son.
It was that thought, coupled with the realization that Nathan hadn’t cared enough to stop Kat, that took her breath away.
She fainted.
When she came to, Mr. Baxter was fanning her face with a fish recipe card, while Ms. Hannigan was yelling at the 911 operator to “get an ambulance here tout sweet, or baby, I’ll have you tied up in court until it’s time to meet your Maker…” while Tori was repeating the store’s address to her, over and over again, like a mantra—
It felt nice to know that a few people actually cared about her.
Nina tried to sit up. “Mr. Baxter, I didn’t mean to—” She couldn’t help it. The tears started streaming down her face again.
“Hush!” He whispered. “It’s okay, doll face. Just a little too much excitement.” He grinned down at her. “That Escada-wearing battle-ax didn’t know what a hissy fit was until you showed her how it’s done right—”
I’ve never seen him smile like that before, ever, she thought. The notion that Mr. Baxter could smile made her laugh tearfully.
Seeing her reaction, he chuckled, too. “Now that’s much better, babycakes.” He helped her to her feet. “So, give, sweet thing: What took your breath away? Surely not this little tiff.”
By now the others had realized that Nina had come to, and were anxious to hear the same.
“Oh…no! God, no…I—I just found out that—that people are saying I beat my son!”
“What, little Jake?” Tori was horrified. “Why, that’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard!”
“Yes, I know!” Nina picked up the paper she’d tossed down on the fish counter when she grabbed the cleaver, and handed it to Tori. “But there it is, in Hollywood Exxxposé. They’re calling me an—an abuser!”
Mr. Baxter glanced down at Nina’s nametag.
Suddenly he put two and two together. Unconsciously he dropped his precious sea bass on the floor.
“You…you’re that Nina?” Both Mr. Baxter and Ms. Hannigan exclaimed at the same time. For some reason, they both looked uncomfortable.
“I’m Nina Harte, yes,” she said proudly. She didn’t flinch at all under their sudden scrutiny. “My husband left me for—for Katerina McPherson.” Nina couldn’t help it. She started sobbing again. “Now she wants my child, too…even after she hit him!”
“There, there,” Ms. Hannigan patted her hand helplessly. “We can’t let that happen. We won’t let that happen! I will personally—I’ll sue that bastard who wrote that crap—”
“Nina, I’m sorry,” said Mr. Baxter sadly. “Please forgive me. I’m the one who—who wrote that awful crap…about you.”
“You? But how…” She didn’t get it.
“Nina, what I’m trying to tell you is that I’m Baxter Quinn.”
“Omigod,” murmured Nina, “You’re that Baxter? Baxter Quinn? But…I thought…Why are you saying all those awful things about me?”
The tears were streaming down her face again, but she looked him straight in the eye as she declared, “I would never hit my child. Ever.”
Why of course she wouldn’t. He could see that in her eyes.
Suddenly he realized what a fool he’d been. Both Riley and Katerina had been playing him like a fiddle!
Well, from now on, he’d be singing a different tune.
“I’ve made a horrible mistake! Just horrible! But I’ll make it up to you, I swear.”
“I’ll say you will,” growled Lavinia Hannigan. “Or else we’ll bury you, along with that Kat.” She handed Nina a business card. “Call me in the morning Nina. Oh, and don’t forget my beluga on Friday, okay?”
As she strolled off, Baxter Quinn murmured, “Something tells me Kat’s going to have her hands full with that one. But that’s nothing compared to what I’m going to do to her.” He smiled wickedly at Nina.
“I certainly appreciate the fact that you’re going to give a retraction. But the damag
e has been done, hasn’t it? I’m already being ostracized. Even people who know me would rather not be seen with me.”
“Nina, honey, the one thing I’ve learned in this town is that everyone loves you when you’re a star, and no one loves you when you’re down and out. Just watch how quickly Kat falls off that high horse she’s on now, when her star loses some of its luster. And I’m just the guy to throw a little mud on it.” He winked knowingly. “Speaking of which, I think this sea bass is now officially inedible. How about some tiger prawns instead?”
As she scooped the prawns out of the seafood case, Baxter plotted his revenge. For Kat, a choice item in tomorrow’s column would be only the beginning. For Riley, who broke out in hives followed by diarrhea whenever he ate shellfish, it would start tonight:
Baxter made one hell of a shrimp soufflé that came out of Riley almost as fast as the truth about Kat’s little game.
Saints Preserve Us:
And Nat’s Nina is All That, and More…
YIKES! Sorry, readers, I owe you—and Nina Harte—a big fat apology, so I’m coming clean, right here and now.
Nina, darling, I hope you’ll be able to forgive me for yesterday’s column, which was filled with a very big booboo, based on a lie told to me by a flaccid (in every way, believe me) flack of Kat McPherson.
Yep, you heard it here, folks, Baxter is self-flagellating. Usually that feels mmm good, but not today, coz it’s no fun being duped, and boy, was I ever!
Apparently that petulant screen queen has unsheathed her claws in an all-out publicity war with her latest himbo’s sweet soul of a wife, going so far as to blame this devoted mom for that horrendous slap mark—a TOTALLY unconscionable act—which this nasty kitty administered to Nina’s little boy herself. Talk about adding slanderous insult to bullying injury!