Queen Takes King

by Gigi Levangie Grazer

  Lara shed a tear, then another. Then stopped by the side of the road, now slick with ice. She sat and cried it out. Why was she so scared? Isn’t this what she wanted? Was she wrong to jump off the party bus while it was still rolling?

  Lara wiped her hand across her eyes and maneuvered the car back onto the road.

  “YOU LOOK…” Lara tilted her head as if a word was going to drop from the sky into her ear.

  “Like a frikkin’ nutjob,” finished Sarah Kate, standing in front of her.

  Lara took in her ex-producer’s appearance. Black rubber boots swallowed the lower half of her bubble legs, baggy green pants tucked in, an oversize green khaki jacket. White apron peeking out underneath. Reading glasses on a chain around her neck. Hair wild, cheeks flushed. The whole ensemble coated with a deep, rich, pungent…mud.

  Which made sense, as they were standing in a damp, grassy field surrounded by goats. Several were nipping at Lara’s clothes; one tried to slip her purse from her shoulder. The goats were like unruly, hairy, long-faced, cud-chewing, clover-sniffing toddlers.

  It wasn’t just the switch from Anne Klein to Carhartt. Sarah Kate’s whole demeanor had changed; her eyes had lost their executive “hood.”

  “It’s the look on your face—” Lara told her, slapping a goat that was nibbling her on the butt. “Shoo! Go!”

  “I look stupid, right?” Sarah Kate said, smiling. “I know I’m down about ten IQ points already.”

  “No. You look happy. Or deranged. I don’t know how you do it. I’ve spent three seconds with these goats—they smell, they make strange noises, and they’re trying to tear my clothes off. They’re like a nightmare date.”

  “Do you have a cigarette on you?” Sarah Kate interjected. “My beau doesn’t like me to smoke. He doesn’t want me to die. Killjoy.”

  “Beau?” Lara’s eyes widened.

  “I got me a mister, sister,” Sarah Kate replied. “And he’s hotter than summertime in Dubai.”

  Lara’s eyes teared up, and she gave Sarah Kate a huge hug. All evidence had pointed to Sarah Kate living her life out alone, surrounded by her cats.

  “This calls for a celebration,” Lara said, and pulled two cigarettes out of her jacket pocket. She lit them up and handed one to Sarah Kate.

  Sarah Kate dragged on the cigarette, filling her large being. “Now,” Sarah Kate exhaled, capturing Lara in her sights, “can I say what you look like?”

  “What?”

  “Scared shitless.”

  Lara flung her arm around Sarah Kate’s shoulders, again. So solid. No equivocation. No ulterior motives. No looking over your shoulder for the more important profile. Was this what Truth looked like? A bountiful lady goat farmer? “Fair enough. I am scared shitless. Now get me away from these fucking goats?”

  Lara could see the main house, a ranch-style structure, and a hundred yards away, a large barn where she presumed the goats were milked. There was another building where, as Sarah Kate described at length, the milk was turned into rounds of cheese, wrapped and stamped, and sent off to boutique groceries.

  “Let’s eat some cheese.” Sarah Kate took her by the hand. They started walking toward the house.

  “Not crazy about cheese, either.”

  “Too bad, I’m stacked to the gills. I got cheese for years—cheese pancakes, cheese waffles, cheese and eggs, cheese sandwiches, cheese salad, cheese toast, cheese and crackers, cheese bath oil…” Sarah Kate put her arm around Lara and guided her friend onto the least resistant path.

  Inside, wrapped in the rough charm of the living room with wooden rafters, throw rugs under her feet, a soft chair to sink into, Lara accepted the mug of tea, wrapping both hands around the cup. “So, tell me about your man. Leave out nothing.”

  “He thinks I’m hot.” Sarah Kate grinned.

  “You are hot.”

  “Thank you. No, he really thinks I’m hot. They don’t get Vogue around here. There’s no People magazine. This man, he has no idea, no idea at all who Paris Hilton is, and I’m not kidding. If I told him I was a hundred fifteen pounds and five foot nine—”

  “You are five foot nine.”

  “Yes, but I was one fifteen in second grade—I mean, this man would believe me. And I think he’ll believe me the rest of my life.”

  “The rest of your life?”

  Sarah Kate looked at her, her gaze clear. “Yes, I said it.”

  Lara breathed in that line. Oh, she thought, how life does surprise us on occasion. “One question,” Lara said. “Does he think the goats are beautiful, too?”

  Sarah Kate laughed. “That’s just mean.” And then they were both laughing. “But you know what? You know what? I think he does,” she said. “But hell, I do, too.”

  They sat there for a moment. Teacups warming their hands. The waning light on their faces.

  “Maybe I’ll have a child,” Sarah Kate said.

  “Oh, shit,” Lara replied. “Of course you will. And I’ll be the godmother. The seriously underqualified godmother.”

  They reached to each other at once and held hands and looked across at the pasture.

  “But I miss it,” Sarah Kate said. “Don’t think I don’t miss it.”

  “You do?”

  “The thing is, Lara. There are no easy answers. You come to me, my child—you’re looking for an answer here. You’re looking for it in me. In my life. But this isn’t your answer. This isn’t even your question. There are choices, and then you live with the choices. Part of me wants the newsroom to call, to need me. I still leave my cell phone on my nightstand. I leave it there even though I know it’ll never ring.”

  “Well, the service does suck up here.”

  “You make a choice and live with it. You’ve made one. Now you live with it. You’ve bitched and moaned since I’ve known you. Now be a grown-up. Don’t use Jacks to save you. You’re a big girl.”

  Lara looked at her.

  “I know, you’ll tell me you know that already. But what you don’t know is that you’re always going to disappoint someone in your life. Just don’t disappoint yourself.”

  “I fucked everything up, didn’t I,” Lara said, her voice at a whisper. Fear squeezing her throat.

  “Well, did you shoot before you knew you were aiming at yourself? Or was that the point?”

  Lara’s eyes searched the beamed ceilings for an answer. She had to escape the cage; if she shed a little of her own blood in the meantime, so be it.

  “Did you want a proper drink, by the way?” Sarah Kate asked, peering at her. “I didn’t even think to ask.”

  “No. I’m good.”

  “Mmmhmm. There’s hope for you, yet,” Sarah Kate said, and then, “Do you still love him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Loser.”

  “Guilty.”

  A phone rang, echoing through the house. Sarah Kate rose to get it. “Could be important—got a mama goat at the vet—she’s down with the blackleg.”

  Lara nodded and sat alone.

  Sarah Kate came back, her face alert, eyes wide. “It’s for you,” she said.

  “What?” Lara asked, blood rushing to her head as she stood up. “What is it?”

  “You must shit diamonds, girl. Your dream just landed.”

  VIVIENNE accepted Serendipity. She accepted the charred veggie burger and frozen hot chocolate and watching her mother sneaking Gitanes on the curb, and filling up on Diet Coke (how was it even possible they were related?) and her father’s eyes darting to the BlackBerry nestled on his lap. She accepted Dylan’s Candy Bar for postlunch baggies of candy corn and Dad barking into a cell phone and Mom’s pinched face as she looked at rows upon rows of sugary brightness. She even accepted her mother rushing off because of ballet gala crisis #738, stranding her alone with her father.

  But now Vivienne had reached her limit.

  “I am not going in there!”

  Vivienne, fists rolled up and hissing through her teeth, was pitching a fit under a red awning; the massive
American Girl Place on Fifth.

  Jacks tugged her toward the doors—“Come on! We’re going to miss the show.” He was holding a brochure. “Look, you buy a doll and dress the doll and sit with the doll in your lap and watch the show. It’s great, it’s fantastic, it’s very professional, by the way. You’ll love it!”

  “Dad, I swear to God, I’m going to scream—”

  “What about Bitty Bear? He’s in the show, too, it’s going to start in a few minutes. C’mon, you love stuffed animals.”

  “You made me give my animals to poor kids!” Vivienne yelled. Like a sharp-eyed major-league batter, she caught something fast and fleeting in his eyes.

  “Oh my God,” Vivienne said. “You didn’t give them away to poor kids! You threw them away!”

  Jacks’s face flushed with recognition. “You had allergies…,” he stumbled.

  “I didn’t have allergies—you have allergies!”

  “You had a rash—”

  “I had poison oak!” Vivienne said, her back sliding against the cool beige marble. “Oh my God. It’s coming back to me—one night you walked into my room, tucked me in and sneezed, and the next day all of my animals were gone!”

  “Did you want to be eaten alive by dust mites?” Jacks reasoned. “I cared about your well-being!”

  Vivienne turned and pressed her forehead against the store window, where she was eye to eye with a doll with crisp black bangs, high cheekbones, and delicately slanted eyes. Aiko. The girl who had left her. The girl who was never happy. Why? Vivienne had given her everything. Sex, home-cooked meals, money, gifts. Her pride. The last was her pride. She had nothing left to give. Would you like one of my kidneys? How about a lung? Please, take the patch of skin tattooed with your name…

  The tattoo keeps me lonely, Vivienne thought. A life sentence. But she was better off. Signs told her so—a change in the weather, a white dove (where did it come from?) cooing on a windowsill.

  The kiss from that boy.

  A sign.

  A kiss changes everything. It told her she was better off. Would someone please break that news to her heart?

  “I want to go home.” Vivienne didn’t want to fall apart here, in front of the convention center for eight-year-old girls.

  “Please,” Jacks said, “let’s try. Buy one doll. Please. It’s important to me. I need to do this for my little girl.”

  Her father’s face suddenly appeared old. She’d read somewhere that narcissists escape the aging process, while their loved ones succumb to gray hair, wrinkles, ulcers, eating disorders (hi, Mom!), cancer. So maybe Jacks Power wasn’t a true narcissist, maybe there was a piece of him snatched, safe and pure, from his wretched childhood, from those who molded this train wreck of a father.

  “Please?”

  Her father had kissed her mother on the cheek when she’d left. How old would Vivienne be when she stopped hoping they’d get back together?

  “Fine,” she said suddenly.

  Jacks flashed his famous grin. “That’s my girl!”

  Vivienne pushed herself up, pulled her ski hat over her ears, and entered the store head down.

  43

  THE GOOD BISHOP’S FINAL MOVE

  FINALLY. HOME. Cynthia had a moment to herself to wonder about the day’s events: Jackson’s abrupt turn-of-face, the bizarre impromptu family outing, the crisis at Brooke Astor Hall (Margot and Bruce Harold Raymond going head-to-head). Cynthia hadn’t even had time to check in with Vivienne to see how the remainder of the Daddy-and-Me afternoon had gone. She’d returned none of her calls from the day—two alone from Robert Jordan.

  Good God, she’d almost forgotten about her new friend, the Female Orgasm. She must bring her around again!

  A knock came at the door. “Madame,” the French butler said.

  “Come in,” Cynthia said.

  “Sorry to disturb you, madame.” This butler had been with them for years. Cynthia knew nothing of his personal life. Nothing of children, a wife, a lover, a fondness for dogs. Nothing. His one prominent streak of personality was the color of his hair. He dyed it, Cynthia surmised, every few weeks—a blinding platinum blond.

  “Yes,” Cynthia prompted. She suddenly felt certain she would sell 740. Why did she need such a big place? So many rooms? A French butler?

  “A Miss Miriam Ludwig called. She wanted to know if you would be attending the memorial service.”

  “Memorial service?” Cynthia asked. “For whom?”

  “For a Dr. Gold, madame,” the butler said.

  CYNTHIA didn’t remember the sound she made through the fingers clasped over her mouth. She didn’t remember sending the butler out or flopping onto her bed, holding a pillow to her face while she screamed. She didn’t remember calling Jackson until he arrived at her bedside.

  Goldie was dead.

  How could she not have been concerned about him? Was she so self-involved that she couldn’t have read the signs? Everyone knew his heart wasn’t on speaking terms with the rest of his body—and yet, his heart had worked well enough to heal anyone who came into his office. Goldie was all heart. From the top of his bald head to the bottom of his Converse tennis shoes. His heart had finally let him down.

  No more hugs.

  Goldie. The one consistent person in her life was no more. She’d have to fight on alone.

  “Cynthia,” Jackson said. “Cynthia, I’m here.”

  She looked up. Jackson was standing over her. What was he doing here? What was he doing here and yet had he ever left their bedroom? Had he ever really left?

  He bent down and kissed her face and ran his hand gently over her hair.

  “I came here as soon as I could, left a meeting with some majors.”

  “Thank you,” Cynthia managed.

  And then he kissed her. And she let him. Why? She let him because that’s what you do. That’s how the story is supposed to end. This is what everyone wants—politicians, nuns, schoolteachers, bus drivers, Page Six (well, maybe not Page Six), financiers, street musicians, waitresses, PTA moms, the FedEx guy; everyone wants the Happy Ending.

  Cynthia had heard the admonishments, mostly from men: “You aren’t who you think you are without your mate.” “Do it for the children.” “This is your marriage. You need to hold it together.” “But he’s a good guy, really, deep inside.” “He loves you. He just doesn’t know how to act accordingly.”

  And:

  “Don’t you want to dance together at your daughter’s wedding?”

  She’d given up on her daughter’s wedding a long time ago. (Although, on Sunday mornings, she secretly took solace in perusing the New York Times weddings section. She loved the photographs of the gay and lesbian couples. The younger lesbians—the pretty girl and the potato-faced girl. The older lesbians with spiky hair, wire-rimmed glasses, PhDs, no makeup.)

  Cynthia wished there were a nicer name for lesbians than…lesbians. Something more civilized, like…girlians. Femians. Fays? Female gays?

  But the lesbians’ proud, smiling faces had nothing on the photos of the male homosexuals, the ones who’d been together a lifetime before tying the knot. Oh, they were wonderful. Their heads touching, their jowly faces flush with love and pride. And the plethora of bow ties! It was all Cynthia could do not to kiss the page.

  A kiss.

  A kiss changes everything.

  Moments later, Jacks and Cynthia were naked. Moments after that, they had performed the one act that seemed unbearable only that morning. Sex with her husband? The man who had humiliated her? On a national scale?

  Never!

  There’s the old saw about sex bringing the living to life, in the face of death. Death makes us want to confirm our breath. We can fuck, therefore we exist.

  “I still got it,” Jacks said.

  Cynthia’s head was on his chest. Oh, the love of the familiar. Jackson was the serial killer of her emotional health, but Cynthia knew his body, his scent, his warped mind, and could still find comfort in his embrace.

>   “I’m amazed at how good that felt,” he said.

  Cynthia peered up into his nostrils. They flared as he spoke.

  “So, we should call our lawyers,” he said. “And then we should notify the press. No, no, let the lawyers do that. Let them do that, fuckers, they’re getting paid, let them do something. Do you know how much this has cost me already? Fucking Penn and that creep Ricardo—putting their grandchildren’s children through college. No, through law school, so they can screw our grandchildren’s children!”

  Cynthia waited, enjoying the entertainment value.

  “We should go somewhere big, public, arrive together. As a family. We should take Vivienne. She’s pretty. I hadn’t really noticed before. Maybe she’s lost a little weight. A few more pounds, she’ll be in business.”

  Jacks was on a roll. He was on a roll in a speeding car on a smooth highway. Cynthia waited and wished she had had the foresight to sew her vagina shut. But then, she mused that she’d had a lot of sex in the past forty-eight hours. A fine testament to the work of dear Dr. Gold.

  She stood and started picking her clothes off the floor.

  “Wait,” Jacks said, “wait wait wait. Oh, baby, this is good. When’s your event? The ballet when dancing always goes on too long?”

  “That would be my life’s work. The New York Ballet Theater Fall Gala.”

  “Hey, oh yeah, I just heard something. Insider stuff. Fred Plotzicki might have to file for bankruptcy protection.”

  Cynthia spun around. “You’re kidding.”

  “Nah. His company was leveraged out in the sub-prime mortgage business. So much for Mr. Finance Genius. There’s nothing like when an enemy gets his—except when a friend gets his, right?” Jacks laughed.

  “Not enough that you should succeed, it’s that your friends should fail,” Cynthia said slowly.

  “Yeah. So, we’ll pop in together, to your show.” Jacks sat up. “And then we’ll make our announcement.”

  “What announcement?” Cynthia said coyly. She knew, but she had to make Jacks say the words. Was she cruel? A little. Could you blame her?