Alligators in the Trees

by Cynthia Hamilton

  “But…you act so tough and impervious,” Tobias said, struggling to reconcile his image of her with these very different self-perceptions.

  “I act cynical. I am cynical. But you can’t confuse cynicism with bravery. I haven’t had any long-term relationships, none that have lasted more than a few years, not even with my parents. I guess I’ve come to view deep involvements as guaranteed emotional disasters. It’s made me leery of taking any kind of risk,” she said.

  “But you were about to pick up and move to Florida. That sounds like a pretty risky thing to do,” Tobias reasoned.

  Priscilla snorted. “You know how that whole idea came about? I got sick and tired of lugging my winter coat around.”

  “So you wanted to move somewhere warm.”

  “That’s about it. How’s that for sound decision making?”

  “Were you really going to go through with it?”

  “Yeah, and I don’t know that I still won’t. I’ve pretty much run out of options here.”

  “Maybe you have options you never knew of before,” Tobias hinted. Priscilla merely smiled at the suggestion. She knew a charitable line when she heard it. “What about us? Does it make you feel anxious and frightened spending time with me like this?”

  She shook her head. “No, it doesn’t. You did scare me a bit at first—after you gave me the money, and before, when you showed up at my apartment. But now, no, I feel perfectly comfortable with you, which should scare me.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Like I said, I’m not used to things running so smoothly.”

  “Here’s to surprising smoothness,” Tobias said, lifting his glass. Priscilla picked up hers and drank to his goofy toast. “You know, if I were thinking straight, I’d get on the train with you.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “Why not? I’m virtually in exile in my own town, hiding from everyone I know. When I take a good hard look at it, nothing in my life is going the way I want it to.”

  “What about your wife?”

  “What about her? If I’m going to be honest, I should admit I’ve only stayed with her so we could drive each other crazy. Other than that, I don’t really have a use for her.”

  “Then you might as well divorce her,” Priscilla pointed out.

  “No, I kind of like the idea of moving to Florida and keeping her in limbo,” Tobias mused.

  “That’s ugly.”

  “You don’t know Monique,” he quipped. “No, Florida might just be the answer…”

  “What about your reunion?”

  “I’m growing colder to the idea by the minute.”

  “I thought you needed the money,” Priscilla argued.

  “Monique needs the money,” Tobias corrected her. “I could learn to make do with less. It’s got to cost a lot less to live there than it does here. I think Florida might just be the ticket.”

  “You’re nuts.”

  “Why am I nuts for moving there and you’re not?” he asked.

  “I didn’t say I’m not nuts,” Priscilla said. “But you have a life here, I don’t.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t like my life.”

  “That’s bullshit,” Priscilla countered. “You love your life. You love hiding and skulking and drinking champagne in the middle of the day—”

  “I can do that in Florida just as easily as here.”

  “Okay, you try it and let me know how you like it down there, and maybe I’ll make the trip myself,” Priscilla said.

  “Hey, wait a minute—Florida was your idea. I’m not going there without you,” Tobias said.

  “Now I know you’re full of bull. All I’ve heard out of you is how bizarre the place is, full of loonies and corruption.”

  “I don’t mind a few loonies, and corruption is everywhere.”

  “Okay, fine. Let’s head down to Penn Station right now and book our sleeper cars. It’s a long way down there, you know.”

  “I don’t mind,” Tobias said cavalierly. “It’ll give me a chance to enjoy the scenery.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “So I’ve been told.” Priscilla didn’t have the energy to call his bluff. She was so tired and relaxed, she doubted she’d ever work up enough enthusiasm at this stage of the game to make the haul to Florida. Even Brooklyn seemed too far in her current frame of mind. But if she wasn’t going to go through with that plan, she’d need to come up with another one quickly. Who could say how long the mercurial Tobias Jordan would feel like playing host to her.

  “Guess we’ll have to wait until tomorrow,” she said with a yawn.

  “Good thinking. How about a night cap?” he asked, heading for the liquor cabinet.

  “More booze? I hate to tell you this, but I think you might have a little bit of a drinking problem,” Priscilla said, forcing herself to sit up straighter.

  “Well, I hate to tell you this, but you’ve matched me drink for drink,” Tobias reminded her. He poured himself a healthy portion of Maker’s Mark and brought it back to the sofa. “I’m sorry, did you want one?” he asked facetiously as Priscilla eyed his drink.

  “Just a sip,” she said, taking the glass from his hand. The flavor of the whisky burned over the dry, tart taste of the wine at first, but she liked the way it warmed her mouth and throat.

  “You take that one, I’ll get another,” Tobias said, already on his way to get another.

  “You’re corrupting me, you know that?”

  “If that’s the case, you’re awfully darn corruptible,” Tobias replied.

  “You’re probably right,” she admitted and took another sip.

  “How’d you get the nickname Sammy?” Tobias asked, as he resettled himself next to her. Priscilla chuckled at the memory.

  “I hated the name Priscilla. Everyone at school had names like Bobby, Sally, Tommy, Ricky, Debbie, Susie—and here I come along, PRIS-CIL-LA. I might as well have been named GOD-ZIL-LA. Priscilla is just too big and sharp a name for a kid. I decided it had to go. I came in from playing one afternoon and told my parents that from then on my name was Sammy. They told me Sammy was a boy’s name. I said I didn’t care, it was my name now.

  “At first they probably thought it was kind of funny, but I was dead serious. I scratched out Priscilla Vanderpool on all my books and replaced it with Sammy VP—I wasn’t all that crazy about Vanderpool, either. From then on, I refused to answer when they called me Priscilla.

  “Finally, one day they sat me down and gave me a talking to. They tried to convince me Priscilla was a very pretty name, and that I’d appreciate it for being different when I was older. I told them they were wrong, I wouldn’t like the name if I lived to be a hundred. That’s when they got a little bent out of shape.”

  “You were an ornery little thing, weren’t you?”

  “I’m sure they thought so, especially when I told them if I was going to have to live with the name they gave me, they’d have to get used to me calling them Alfred and Bubbles.”

  “Alfred and Bubbles? Were those their names?”

  “No—my father’s name was John and my mother’s name was Ellen.”

  “Where’d you get Alfred and Bubbles?”

  “Who knows? Kids come up with all kinds of crazy ideas.”

  “So, what’d they say to that?”

  “They started calling me Sammy, along with everyone else,” Priscilla said with a sneaky smile. “How about you—did you have any nicknames when you were growing up?”

  “A few…that I’m not going to mention,” Tobias hedged.

  “Oh come on, spill the beans. I won’t blab.”

  “Well, when I was a kid, my father called me Peanut Head.”

  “Peanut Head?”

  “I shouldn’t have told you,” Tobias said over her giggles.

  “Tell me the others,” she insisted.

  “No way. You laughed at Peanut Head, Priscilla.”

  “Priscilla is worse than Peanut Head, believe me. Tell another one.”
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  “As it happens, I picked a new name for myself, too, but somehow it didn’t catch on.”

  “What was it?”

  “Clint.”

  “Clint? As in Eastwood?”

  “I reckon.”

  “That’s cute. I like it,” she said.

  “What’s cute about the name Clint? Clint is a rugged, manly name. It is not cute,” Tobias maintained defensively.

  “I know, but it’s so cute that a little boy wanted to be called Clint,” Priscilla said. Tobias sat back and ruminated over her reasoning. He looked like he wished he had never brought the subject up. “Can I call you Clint?” she asked, pulling a pillow across her lap as protection.

  “Shut up.”

  “Why not? You like all that incognito stuff,” she said, putting the pillow over her face just as Tobias leapt onto her. The pillow offered no protection against his tickle offence, so she was forced to surrender.

  “Uncle!” she cried. Tobias gave her one last tickle for good measure. “Whew,” she huffed, reaching for her drink. “I guess we’ve settled the nickname issue,” she said, smoothing her hair down with her free hand.

  “Have we, Sammy?” Tobias said, testing the waters.

  “You can call me Sammy, I don’t mind. Almost everybody does.”

  “Except Frank,” Tobias reminded her, screwing his face up in an approximation of her former boss. “Bobbi! Bobbi! Pick up! Food get cold!” Priscilla laughed weakly and held the pillow in front of his face.

  “So, what’s going to become of us? Are we going to drink and eat ourselves into oblivion, until they throw us out of here for non-payment of your bill?” she asked, too woozy to really care about the future.

  “Don’t worry yourself about that. You’ve got enough money to keep us going for at least another week,” he said. “Here’s to tomorrow,” he toasted.

  “What’s tomorrow?” Priscilla asked, her speech getting fuzzier by the minute.

  “Tomorrow is another day,” he said, taking the highball from her hand. “But now I think it’s time for nighty-night. Better get you in bed before you land on your kisser.”

  Priscilla was a teensy bit hurt to find that her magic day had come to an end, but she let Tobias help her to her feet anyway. She didn’t want to pass out in front of him. That would not be a chic exit at all, she thought as she walked rather jauntily down the hallway with Tobias.

  “Can I get you anything?” he asked as he delivered her to her bedside.

  “Oh, my bag,” she said, vaguely remembering she last saw it in the living room.

  “I’ll get it.”

  Before Priscilla could get her bearings, Tobias returned with her duffel bag and a fresh bottle of water. “Thank you,” she said, taking both from him.

  “Okay, then. Hope you sleep like a baby,” he said.

  “I don’t think there’ll be any problem there,” Priscilla said, feeling suddenly self-conscious.

  “Goodnight,” Tobias said, backing out the door.

  “Goodnight.”

  Tobias turned off the lights as he made his way back to his side of the suite. He called room service and told them to pick up the cart and pushed it to the foyer. He had an aversion to seeing the previous night’s wreckage when he woke up. It had to be all those years of living like a heathen during his touring days.

  This was another sure sign he was getting old. That, and the fact he had escorted Priscilla to her bed without extracting even a peck on the cheek. He had been so keen on the big seduction, too. He was surprised at himself.

  He went to the kitchen and got himself a bottle of water and headed for his room for the evening. It made him go kind of cold inside entering this immaculate room, completely devoid of any personal touches. It was like entering a plush cell.

  He sat down on the edge of the bed while he contemplated sleeping on one of the sofas. It had been fine every other night, but tonight he was afraid of encroaching on Priscilla’s privacy. Not that she would notice; she was going to be out for the count any second, if she wasn’t already.

  Priscilla. Wow. He had not been prepared for becoming so fond of her. Fond: that was a strange word for him to use. But he was fond of her, wasn’t he? He did like her company, didn’t he? He liked the way she spoke, her opinions, her mannerisms and her self-confidence. He liked the way she looked. Cute. Pretty, actually, but in a very low-key way. Like her looks didn’t matter to her. Natural good looks. Large blue eyes, with that intrepid, no-nonsense gaze…soft brown hair to her shoulders… slightly turned-up nose…disarming dimples when she smiled…

  “Tobias,” Priscilla said tentatively from the doorway. Tobias swung around on the bed to face her.

  “Is something wrong?” he asked, getting to his feet.

  “No, I…didn’t want to end the night without thanking you… ”

  “Thanking me for what?”

  “For everything—for the best day I’ve had in years, for letting me stay here, for the song,” she said, studying the carpet.

  “It was my pleasure, on all counts,” Tobias said, hands in pockets. He also was finding it hard to make eye contact.

  “Well…you can’t ever know how much that’s meant to me…”

  “I think I’ve got a good idea,” Tobias said, managing a magnanimous smile. Priscilla looked directly at him and made a soft ‘humpf’ sound. She seemed to hesitate for a moment, then said goodnight.

  “Goodnight,” Tobias answered, walking with her toward the door. Before either of them reached it, Priscilla turned and, grabbing his face in her hands, kissed him—a real kiss, not the peck Tobias regretted not giving her. Priscilla pulled away, out of breath, eyes searching his.

  “Priscilla, I don’t want you to do anything you might regret,” Tobias said softly.

  “Yeah, but I might regret not doing it worse,” she replied. Having performed the requisite amount of due diligence, neither one of them seemed able or willing to hold themselves back any longer. It was all they could do to make it to the bed before collapsing in a tangled heap.

  Thirty-Five

  The night and morning passed with excruciating slowness for Philip. He sat on the balcony well into the wee hours of the morning, devising and refining the best plan for dealing with his scheming wife and backstabbing attorney. He went through the charade of going to bed, once he had rehashed his many grievances with the lying louts, but sleep never overtook his whirring brain.

  Surprisingly, he did not feel like a zombie once the alarm clock went off at six; if anything, he felt more centered and in control than he had in a long time. He tried to put thoughts of Marianne and Martin out of his mind as he made Caitlin’s breakfast and helped her get ready for school. Though he kept his composure in front of his daughter, he was chomping at the bit to get into his office and put his agenda into motion.

  Once he arrived at Glessner & Associates, he had a certain amount of real work to attend to, critical issues that would shape the future of his career. But once he had dealt with or delegated the most urgent matters, he closed his door and told the receptionist to hold all his calls for the next ten minutes. With a completely serene demeanor, he picked up the phone and dialed the number for Schnabel, Hermann, Stanton & Fink.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Glessner—Mr. Fink was called away on an urgent business matter,” Martin’s secretary unwittingly lied. “Would you like me to take a message and pass it on to him when he returns?”

  “Ah, no…that’s fine. I’ll call him on his cell phone. Thank you,” Philip said, disconnecting without waiting for a reply. Exactly as I suspected, Philip thought as he looked up Martin’s cell phone number. He was fairly certain Martin wouldn’t take the call, thereby allowing Philip to set the stage for maximum effect. After listening to Martin’s factory-defaulted greeting, he began:

  “Martin, hi—it’s Philip. Your secretary says you’re out of town on business. Darn…I was really hoping to get hold of you. (Big sigh.) Well, a lot has happened in the last couple of days…
I don’t know where to start, but I’ll try to keep it brief. You probably haven’t heard yet, but we’ve found out what caused the collapse of The Phoenix and, better still, how to save it. You’re not going to believe this, but by the end of next week, the repairs should be completed. Which of course means I’ve just lost a whole lot of aggravations, which is why I’m calling you.

  “Obviously, all settlement negotiations need to be halted, as the building will be completely inhabitable once the structural problems have been corrected and signed off on. We’ll figure out settlements that will compensate for out-of-pocket expense and aggravation, but there’ll be plenty of time to assess that once the owners are back in their units.

  “That’s issue number one. Issue number two is the divorce. Now that The Phoenix will be saved—and my reputation along with it—I’m going to do my damnedest to reconcile my marriage. Like we were saying just the other day, our women like to think of us as invincible, and I let Marianne down. No doubt she suffered a lot of humiliation because of this business with The Phoenix. But that’s history now. The problem was caused by a defective product, which the manufacturer readily concedes.

  “So in reality, I’m completely blameless for what happened. Now Marianne’s shining knight can come back and sweep her off her feet again. In a year’s time, this episode will be completely forgotten. Anyway, we’ll talk more about this when you get back into town. I’ll speak to your secretary and she can tell me who I need to speak to about The Phoenix issue, in case I don’t hear from you until next week.

  “And I’ll give Michelson a ring and tell him that I’m reneging on the marital settlement agreement. As it turns out, Marianne is also out of town for a few days, but I don’t want that shyster billing any more hours on my scorecard. I’ll sit down with Marianne the minute she gets back from her folks’ and sort everything out with her. Anyway, there you have it in a nutshell. Sorry this was such a long message, but life has gotten very complicated the last couple of days. Talk to you later. Goodbye.”