by Melody Mayer
“I made all your favorites,” Mrs. Cleveland announced proudly. “Grilled baby squid in black-bean sauce, nori rolls, kalamata angel hair with baby artichokes, sweet potato fries, beef tenderloin stuffed with blue crab, pancetta-wrapped asparagus with lemon hollandaise, tuna tartar with Ethiopian herbs, Thai coconut-milk soup with tiger shrimp, an all-white root vegetable gratin, and for dessert, baked Alaska with coffee ice cream and Ghirardelli fudge. Oh, and Wolfgang dropped by with some lobster rolls and a dulce de leche cheesecake. He sends his love.”
“Holy crap, Mrs. Cleveland, you have outdone yourself. But no way we can eat all this. Call the women's shelter downtown and see if we can send over our leftovers.” Platinum collapsed dramatically into a white leather armchair at the head of the table and popped a piece of sushi into her mouth.
“I already did call, but they're getting food from some CAA party tonight. I'll see what else I can do.”
“So Platinum, what's next on your professional agenda?” the reporter asked through a mouthful of garlic smashed potatoes with white truffle butter. Kiley noted that her boss had poured herself a champagne flute of sparkling juice, not champagne. Was this a sign of change?
“Well, obviously, my first priority is to reacquaint myself with my beautiful children.” Platinum was deliberately low-key. She beamed at her kids, and they beamed right back. “But after that, I'm not going back into the studio for a while.”
“You're not?” The MTV reporter was surprised.
“Hell no. I'm branching out. Into literature.”
“The next Rimbaud?”
“The next Dr. Goddamn Seuss. I'm writing a children's book. All about a goose being falsely accused of a crime, and the vindication of justice. A platinum goose. I started it in detention.”
Okay. This was genius.
“But that won't happen until I've had a to-die-for guava-pineapple facial at LeSpa.”
“I don't want to hear about her and her damn facials!” Kiley heard the colonel's familiar voice thunder in the hallway outside the kitchen.
Platinum grinned. “Well, well, well, if it isn't Private Ryan himself. May I ask what the hell you're doing in my house?”
Oh yeah. Her boss was back. Sharp-eyed, loud-voiced, and a hundred percent tact-free. But the colonel didn't budge an inch. Meanwhile, the reporter and the camera dude grinned at each other. This was obviously the kind of footage they'd been hoping for.
“I'm here to try and talk some sense into you. You may have fooled the court, but you and I both know you don't know the first thing about responsible parenting. Therefore, I am here to suggest that you let me keep doing what I've been doing during your absence. Providing a strict, moral environment for your children.”
Whoa. Kiley watched the storm break over her boss's lovely face. Nobody told Platinum what to do, especially in her own home. Especially not a poker-up-the-yahooligan like her brother-in-law. Kiley braced for the inevitable explosion. But it never came. Instead, Platinum stood up, smoothed her cascading hair into place, and took a couple of steps toward her sister and the colonel.
“Susan, you're my sister. Feel free to hang out as long as you want. Colonel, I no longer require your assistance. So I will kindly ask you to go.” She looked at her watch. “By 1300 hours. That's in five minutes.” Platinum grinned her familiar mischievous grin. “And turn in your keys and your weapon on the way out and don't let the door hit you in the ass. You're getting a dishonorable discharge.”
“Just talk to them, okay?” Karen pleaded.
Lydia thumbed through a few pages in the Harper's Bazaar she'd gleaned from the mail pile on the counter and didn't respond.
Like any demanding chore, it had to be done sooner or later. It would mean sitting Jimmy and Martina down, buttering them up with all the high-octane, sugary snacks they could stomach— there were some advantages to not having Anya around—and confessing to them both why she was the world's biggest fool-lowlife-lying-sumbitch. Or words to that effect.
Well, confessing to Martina. Jimmy already knew why. For him, it would be a confirmation.
“All right. How about after Billy takes Jimmy to the skate park down in Venice?” Lydia sipped from her nonalcoholic piña colada smoothie. At least the new morning cook made superb breakfast beverages.
Before she could respond any further, the kids stampeded into the kitchen.
“Hi guys! You want something to eat? I can get Juanita to fix up some poached eggs, or bowls of cereal with real milk …,” Lydia said as the kids pulled two stools to the island counter. What did the kids know? And when did they know about it? How much info had Jimmy shared with Martina?
Quite a bit. Martina looked right at her with sad eyes. “Is the reason that Billy's so mad at you because you cheated on him with the golf pro?”
Ouch. Best to treat it like a flesh wound with an old bandage on it. One fierce tug, bleeding be damned.
She looked right at her cousin. “Yes, Martina. And then I lied to him about it. And he found out and he dumped me. I'm a jerk and I feel like swamp scum. Let it be a lesson for you.”
The kids just stared at her with cold eyes.
“Will you at least acknowledge that you heard me? It's hard to have a conversation if I'm the only one talking.”
Lydia snapped her fingers in the air. Nothing. Okay.
“But didn't you tell us that you should be honest with somebody if you really like them?” Martina asked, her voice small.
“I did, but—”
“You know what that makes you?” Jimmy scowled. “You know what it's called when you tell somebody one thing and do the opposite? It's called a hypocrite.”
Lydia sighed. At least the kid's vocabulary was on track. “Why don't we all go out for ice cream this afternoon, and we can talk about it some more? That'll be fun, right?”
Martina's eyebrows lifted into a look that could have passed for hopeful, but the reaction from Jimmy was quite different. He merely slid off his stool and stepped out of the kitchen. A moment later, his sister followed him. Great. Both kids were official card-carrying members of the I-hate-Lydia-Chandler fan club. And why not? After all, it was the second major breakup they'd been forced to watch without any say in the last two weeks. And while they knew better than to use their mom—who was off in New York for the U.S. Open—as a punching bag, their nanny cousin wasn't nearly so off-limits.
“Excuse me, Mom,” she told her mother. “I'm out of here.”
“I don't blame you. Don't worry. It'll pass.”
“I'm not so sure.”
Lydia got up from the table and moved into the hallway, gliding a finger along some of the mansion's featured mementos: the photo of Kat and Anya shaking hands at the French Open back when they were competitors; the teak totemic carving that had been a gift from Karen for their fifth anniversary; the weird gargoyle Anya had brought back from a trip to Russia. The moms did have a certain sense of style, but Lydia couldn't imagine accumulating so much stuff with anybody.
The doorbell rang. Lydia heard Jimmy run to answer it. She knew who it was and drifted toward the door like a condemned person who knew there was no choice but to stagger to the gallows. Billy was dressed for a morning with Jimmy at the skate park, in a Sonic Youth T-shirt and torn jeans.
“Hi,” she tried.
“Yo.”
It didn't take a doctorate in behavioral psychology to understand that Billy also wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. He rearranged invisible pebbles on the floor with his Vans sneakers. He clamped his hands beneath his elbows. His eyes wandered from five different knickknacks in five seconds: the antique umbrella stand, the walnut coffee table, the pair of porcelain pigeons, the Tiffany lampshade, the painting by Gustav Klimt. Anywhere to keep from looking at Lydia.
Fair enough. She couldn't do a thing if he wanted to react by smoldering. But seeing him so agitated wasn't easy, especially since it was essentially her fault.
Thankfully, Jimmy soon reappeared with his skateb
oard. Even before Lydia could unglue her tongue from the bottom of her mouth to wish them a nice time at the park, the guys were on their way. The only acknowledgment of Lydia's presence was the extra force with which Jimmy shut the door on his way out.
“It'll be okay.” Lydia heard her mother's voice behind her. “Kind of reminds me of accidentally violating an Amarakaire taboo. Even they eventually got over a grudge. Those boys will too.”
If her mom thought that her words would be comforting, she was wrong. But Lydia acknowledged the attempt. “Thanks, Mom. But if they had a million other people they could turn to, the Amas would've kept on grudging. I might get Jimmy back. He kind of needs me. Billy? He's gone for good.”
“I wish I could help, sweetie,” Karen said. “But I know something that might make you feel better.” She handed Lydia a bulging envelope addressed to her; the return address was Bel Air High School. “This came in the mail yesterday.”
“Don't tell me. They're trying to send me more goofy shirts.” Lydia ran a finger under the flap and looked at the mailing from her new high school. Inside were more papers, packets, pamphlets, and registration materials than she cared to see. It was like a treasure trove of Ama toilet paper.
“Do they really expect me to read all this?” Lydia asked.
Karen smiled widely. “No, honey. They expect you to fill it out.”
Back in the Amazon, Lydia had been schooled with her own set of standards, and was answerable only to her mother and father. English literature applied equally to the rare novels that made their way upriver and the air-dropped magazines she craved. Study about botany meant talking about biochemistry, since the shaman's herbs were at least as potent as conventional medications. The simple mathematics of Ama bartering doubled as anthropology and tripled as home economics. And pretty much all “core subjects” included what Bel Air High School would have parsed out as physical education.
“What's the big deal? I go to their school, they teach me what they want, and the rest is just details. Can't you fill this out for me?”
Karen laughed. “It's not as simple as that. You're going to have to start thinking about SATs, ACTs, and college applications.”
“How about the track team?”
Her mother looked at her blankly.
“Bad joke.” Lydia rubbed a point of tension that was developing between her eyebrows. She thought again how simple life was in the rain forest. You were born. You lived. You hunted. You died.
“Tell you what. Jimmy will be with Billy until the afternoon. Martina's about to go to the club with Faith. I was listening to the radio,” her mother said, “and KLOS says it's going to be beautiful. I could use a change of venue. Whaddaya say?”
Lydia smiled wanly. “Why not?”
Since Lydia didn't have a driver's license, and Karen's had expired years ago, X shuttled them to an outdoor restaurant at the corner of Sunset Plaza and Sunset Boulevard, a place called Café Med. It offered fine Italian cuisine as easy on the eyes as on the palate. The imported-from-Rome waitstaff and the imported-from-across-the-pond Eurotrash clientele were easy on the eyes, too. Not that Lydia was back in the market after Billy's have-a-nice-life. But it never hurt to look.
They sat under the awning of the shaded patio. Almost immediately, Lydia spotted a trio of soap opera stars from The Bold and the Beautiful, and two members of the Decemberists, but knew that stargazing was a concept lost to her mother outside of the night sky.
Karen marveled at the menu. “I remember this. Having options. We've eaten a lot of monkey and turtle meat lately. The peacock bass haven't been biting this summer. The river is too high.”
“You sound like me when I first got here,” Lydia said. After Karen gleefully decided on an arugula salad and a one-person pizza with four cheeses, and Lydia chose a sliced portobello mushroom sandwich on homemade Italian bread, she started to go through the materials from the high school packet that she had brought along.
It was daunting. There had to be two dozen memos, all of which dealt with a different aspect of the minutiae of high school. Earthquake emergency. Homeland Security emergency. Parking permits. (Like that would ever matter, she thought). Discipline code. Drug policy. The list went on and on. And on. Then Lydia scanned the list of required materials for all new students: school supplies, gym clothes, approved locks for her hallway locker and gym locker, insurance information, previous school transcripts (well, that wasn't happening), a photo for her ID card, and choice of meal plan and degree plan. Then there was the course work: Would she like the advanced placement English course, or the single-semester English IV course? U.S. history or world history? Physics or chemistry?
The boxed aphorism on the front page of the course catalog put it all in perspective. “Choose wisely. After all, we're talking about the rest of your life here.”
Great.
“If they need some information about your homeschooling, I can come in to talk to them,” her mother offered.
“That'd be good, I guess.” Lydia's voice was somber as a buff Italian waiter in black jeans and black silk shirt brought them their food.
“You okay, hon? You seem down.” Her mother tasted the pizza. “Wow! How's yours?”
Lydia stared at the portobello mushroom sandwich dripping with fresh lemon juice and garnished with peach slices. It should have been delicious. But her appetite was gone.
“Talk to me, Lydia,” her mother urged.
She did. The words tumbled out of her faster than she intended them to, thoughts running into each other, muttering the way some of the Amas did when they chewed too many coca leaves. “It feels like pretty much everything is going to shit. I mean, last night my friend Esme was talking about how she quit working at the Goldhagens' and won't even be going to high school. So she won't be there with me. The only girls I met hate Kiley. They could decide to hate me, too. What I did to Billy proves that I'm an idiot, which is exactly the way the kids think of me. Why would I think that when Kat comes back she'll even want me to be their nanny? I don't do pity parties, Mom. I don't. But right now, I wouldn't mind an invitation.”
She pinched her fingertips, swallowed hard, and forced a smile before glancing around the restaurant to see if anyone had witnessed her miniature breakdown. Fortunately not. The soap opera trio was deep in conversation, and the musicians were huddled over some contracts spread out on their table. Good. At least her humiliation wasn't public.
Her mother rubbed her chin, then scooted her wrought-iron chair closer to Lydia. “I'm honored.”
“Huh?”
“You're not a girl anymore, Lydia. I'm honored that you'd share your feelings with me. It's not like your father and I gave you a normal upbringing.”
Lydia looked across Sunset Boulevard, and then south into Los Angeles. The day was clear; the city spread out like some sort of enormous mother ship. She wondered, Who's to say that this is normal and the Amazon is bizarre? Los Angeles had its own tribes and strange mating rituals. In some ways, Amazonia made more sense.
It was a thought funny enough to make her laugh.
“What's so funny?” Karen asked.
“What would the head shaman think of this place?” Lydia said.
“He'd probably want to order everything on the menu,” Karen declared.
Lydia laughed again. “What am I going to do when you go back to the Amazon?”
Karen raised her brows, frowning. “I've been wondering about that myself, sweetie. And to be honest, I kind of like it here. I don't know if I want to leave so soon.” She picked up Lydia's sandwich as if it was made of gold. “Sure, it's a little smoggy. But you can eat bread here without baking it yourself.”
“That's true,” Lydia allowed. “But it also has little cousins that think you're the enemy.”
“Martina and Jimmy, you mean.”
“Exactly.”
Her mother had ordered an iced tea—she half drained it before she answered. “Can I give you some motherly advice?”
“
You can give me any advice.”
“If you take a bite of that sandwich.”
“Fine.” Lydia took a huge bite. Fantastic. Then another. And another. By the third bite, she decided she was ravenous.
“I forgot my camera,” her mother lamented. “I'd like to take a picture to show your dad.”
Lydia handed over her cell. “It's nothing fancy, just a Sam-sung. But you can take pictures with it … after I hear your advice.”
Her mother sighed. “You'll have to teach me how to take a cell phone picture. As for the advice, it's pretty simple. Jimmy is going to stay mad at you for a long time. He feels betrayed, and he thinks Billy is his bud. Your best ally, though, is Martina. She's pretty wise for a girl her age.”
“She's a baby!”
“That doesn't mean she's not wise. She grew up with Anya as one of her mothers. She's used to adversity. Here's my advice.”
Lydia leaned forward to listen to her mother's simple words:
“See if she can help you.”
Jonathan and Tarshea.
His hands pulling off her clothes, the length of her underneath him as he stared down into her eyes and—
She felt like throwing up. She'd felt that way ever since she'd walked in on the boy she loved—had thought she loved—who was cheating on her with—dammit to hell!—the girl she'd championed and helped bring to America.
How, how, how could she have been so wrong, so stupid, so utterly ingenuous? All the feelings she'd had five years ago, when she'd found that her very first boyfriend had only pretended to love her so that he could use her in a drive-by gangbanger murder, came rushing back to her.
She had trusted Jonathan. Loved him. Lied to the Goldhagens and defied her parents to be with him.
Nothing—nothing could feel as bad as knowing he didn't care.