No Lifeguard on Duty

by Janice Dickinson

  “You sound like you’ve been drinking,” Tony said.

  “No,” I said. “I’m stuffed up. I think I feel a cold coming on.”

  “You want me to believe that?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll believe it.”

  “Can we talk later?” I said.

  “I’m here,” he said.

  I hung up and had another drink. Savannah came home. We swung by Simon’s house, and I picked up Nathan and took them both to California Pizza Kitchen for dinner. I wanted desperately to order a glass of wine, but I restrained myself. I ate everything they wouldn’t eat: Pizza. Pasta. All the bread and butter. The remains of two ice-cream sundaes. When I took Nathan back to his father’s place, I hugged him so hard his bones practically cracked.

  “You okay, Mom?” he asked me.

  “Never better,” I said.

  I drove home and put Savannah to bed and started reading The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig. It’s a very funny story, and Savannah could never get enough of it. I had to stop a few pages in, to catch my breath.

  “What’s wrong, Mom?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” I said. “I love the way the Big Bad Pig changes.”

  “That’s no reason to cry,” she said.

  She was wrong. The Big Bad Pig could change, but I was never going to fucking change. I pulled myself together and finished the story and turned out the light and tucked her in.

  “Good night,” I said.

  “I love you, Mom,” she said.

  “I love you, too,” I said, and I crept out of the room and down the hall to my own. I lay on the bed, lost in deep, troubling thought, until sleep carried me away.

  The next morning, a Saturday, Savannah was back in bed with me, snuggling again. “I want to make my own birthday invitations,” she said.

  “Okay,” I said. And that’s what we did. We sat at the table in the den, Savannah and I, making the invitations on the computer. She wanted them to be perfect. She drew a little ticking clock in the upper left-hand corner. “Get it?” she said. “Time Machine. A clock. Time.”

  “Very clever,” I said.

  We printed out the invitations and she had me hand-address each envelope. “You have beautiful handwriting, Mom,” she said. “I hope I have beautiful handwriting when I grow up.”

  “Of course you will,” I said. “They have handwriting classes in Beverly Hills.”

  “Really?”

  “No,” I said, smiling down at her. “I’m just kidding.”

  “You’re funny, Mom.”

  We walked hand in hand to the corner mailbox, with our stack of envelopes. We were inviting every kid in her class, along with assorted hangers-on. She insisted on dropping the envelopes through the slot one by one, counting as she went. “Boy,” she said, “I’m really popular, huh?”

  “Yes,” I said. “A girl can’t get more popular than you.”

  On the way back to the house, I realized we hadn’t printed up an invitation for Birnbaum. Well, fuck him, I thought. He knows the truth now. Maybe he’ll do the right thing.

  Her birthday fell on a Thursday that year—February 24, 2001—but we were having the party a couple of days later, the following Saturday. Still, I wanted that Thursday to be special, too. I invited Nathan for dinner, along with two of Savannah’s best friends, and a good time was had by all. I sang loudly and embarrassed my kids. Everyone was laughing. When Savannah blew out the candles, I felt like I was looking at a Norman Rockwell painting. Or part of a painting, anyway. The good part. A bunch of happy kids. And me? I stayed on the fringes, trying not to ruin the picture.

  I crawled into bed that night feeling pretty good about myself—better, in fact, than I had in a very long time. For days now, I’d been running around like a typical suburban mother. We weren’t going to overdo it, I told Savannah. We weren’t trying to compete. But we still needed the expensive caterers for the peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches, and the helium balloons with Savannah’s name on them, and the Pokemon birthday cake from the best bakery in Los Angeles. As I lay there thinking about what I still needed to do, the phone rang. It was Michael Birnbaum. “We need to talk,” he said.

  We met for drinks the following night. He picked a nightclub that was loud and dark. I guess he didn’t want me to see his face. Maybe he was worried he might start crying. What is it about men and tears? The guy had a right to cry; he should’ve been crying.

  I explained again why I’d never told him about Savannah, how afraid I’d been of losing her. And I apologized for the way I’d treated him when we were together. “I’m really ashamed,” I said. “I have done a lot of things in my life I’m ashamed of, but this is at the top of the list.”

  “I can’t believe I have a daughter,” he said.

  “Will you forgive me?” I asked. He didn’t answer. “Will you come to her party? It’s tomorrow.”

  Michael took a long time answering. Then he shook his head from side to side. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I don’t think that’s the right place for it.”

  “Please don’t abandon her, Michael,” I begged. “Please don’t punish her for my mistakes.”

  “What must people think of me?” he said. “That I’m a five-minute dad?”

  “Nobody knows, Michael. I’m the only one who knows.”

  “No,” he said. He was angry. “I know.”

  “Why don’t you just say ‘This is great. I have a lovely young daughter. I’m a lucky man,’ and move on?”

  But he didn’t say it. He signed the bill and left without a good-bye. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I ordered a drink. And then another. And then I walked upstairs, to the disco, and sat at the bar and had a drink. I watched the people on the dance floor, kids mostly, and thought of the kid I had been. Christ, I was a middle-aged woman. Was I ever going to figure any of it out?

  I didn’t finish my drink. I went outside and got in my car and drove home.

  CLEAN AND SOBER

  The next morning, Savannah woke me up an hour earlier than usual.

  “Come on,” she said. “Today’s my party!”

  I only had a trace of a hangover, thanks largely to a megadose of aspirin the night before.

  “What party?” I said, but I was smiling. Savannah laughed. She couldn’t contain herself. She wanted me up and dressed and ready to rock and roll. We had to make sure we were at The Time Machine early, real early. So she dragged me downstairs and I made breakfast—Corn Pops for her, coffee for me—and we were there by eleven o’clock.

  The balloons arrived. The caterers arrived. The cake arrived. And then the kids arrived. And for the next four hours everyone had loads of fun. Including me. I looked at all those happy kids and thought, This is it. This is as good as it gets.

  I bought Savannah a new Barbie doll, along with the huge expensive dollhouse she’d been pining for since Christmas. (So I overdid it; sue me.) I helped her set it up when we got home, but not until after she’d bathed and changed into her pajamas. “I love it,” she said, admiring her collection. “That was my best birthday ever, Mom. Honest.”

  “Guess what?” I said. “They’re just going to keep getting better.”

  “Really!?”

  “Yes,” I said. I was going to make sure of it.

  I tucked her in and kissed her on the forehead and turned out the light. She was asleep before I left her room.

  I had saved one present for last, though Savannah didn’t know about it, and I wasn’t sure she ever would. I got back to my bedroom and picked up the phone and called my friend Tony Peck to make the necessary arrangements.

  “It’s me,” I said. “I’m ready to try again.”

  On Monday morning, after I’d dropped Savannah at school, I met Tony at the café on Sunset Boulevard. I stayed sober…for five miserable days. Then I tried again and failed again and tried again. But the periods between drinks began to get longer and longer, and there were times when
I actually felt like a human being. (A frightened one, to be sure, but a human being all the same.)

  It was during one of those periods that I invited Simon to lunch. He had remarried, and though I’d never really made peace with the idea that I could be “replaced,” in my sobriety I realized it had nothing to do with replacing me—it was about moving on, which is something we all need to do. So we made up. And I asked him if I could see more of Nathan. And he said sure, whatever I wanted, and he smiled at me. It was a nice smile, too. I’d always loved the little gap between his teeth.

  “I didn’t know it was going to be this easy,” I said.

  “Life can be remarkably easy,” he said. “We’re the ones who make it hard.”

  A week later, still sober, I called Michael. I took him to lunch, too. I wanted to face him in broad daylight, pores and all. We met poolside at the swank Peninsula Hotel, in the heart of Beverly Hills.

  “I want you to get to know your daughter,” I said. “She’s a terrific human being. And you’re not so bad yourself. So don’t let me down.”

  He didn’t let me down. He agreed to come over the following Sunday, in the early evening. But he asked me to prepare her for his visit.

  I kept wondering what I was going to tell Savannah. I practiced in front of the mirror. “Sav—good news! I found your daddy!” Or, “Sav, does the name Michael Birnbaum mean anything to you? Well, don’t worry, it will.” It all sounded pretty lame.

  Finally, Sunday morning rolled around. I could no longer put it off. Savannah and I took the dogs for a long hike, and I told her the whole truth, more or less. I told her that I’d been involved with more than one man when she was conceived, and that I didn’t know which one her father was, and that by the time I’d found out it was too late: I was no longer involved with any of them. “But I had you,” I said. “And I didn’t want to lose you. And I decided I would raise you on my own.”

  “Wow,” she said. “He didn’t even want to visit me?”

  “Oh, honey—that wasn’t it at all,” I said. “He didn’t even know you existed. That was my fault. I never told him about you.”

  “But you’ve told him now?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  She took a beat. It was a lot to handle. “And he wants to visit?”

  “He’s coming for dinner tonight. But only if it’s okay with you.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Tonight. Late this afternoon.”

  She thought about this some more. “I’m a little nervous,” she said finally.

  “I can understand that,” I said. “But you have nothing to worry about. He’s a terrific guy. I think you’re going to like him.”

  “Do you think he’s going to like me?”

  “I showed him pictures. He said he’s never seen a more beautiful little girl. And I’ll let you in on a little secret…”

  “What?”

  “He’s a little nervous, too. He wants to make sure you like him, too.”

  She thought about this, then stopped to dig a pebble out of her sneaker. “Do I have to call him ‘Daddy’?” she asked.

  “No,” I said. “You can call him Michael.”

  “Good,” she said.

  We made arrangements to meet at the Santa Monica Pier in front of the lemonade stand, and Michael arrived at 5:30 sharp. He was visibly nervous. I loved him for it. He actually reached down and shook Savannah’s hand and told her it was nice to meet her.

  “I’m not going to call you ‘Daddy,’” Savannah said by way of introduction. “Not for right now, anyway.”

  “Okay,” Michael said. He was smiling. He was grinning.

  “Would you like a glass of lemonade?” she asked, pointing to the drink.

  “I think so,” Michael said.

  “Well,” she said, “come with me.” She took him by the hand and led him to the counter and started ordering lemonade for Mom and Dad. I watched them from a short distance.

  We sat outside, just the three of us. It was a warm, breezy night in Southern California. The three of us sipped lemonade. Savannah talked nonstop. She wanted him to know everything about her life. She told him about every kid in her class. Told him about her birthday party. Described everything in great detail, from the Pokemon cake to her “most favorite” presents.

  WITH MICHAEL BIRNBAUM AND SAVVY.

  “I have a brother,” she said. “Nathan Fields.”

  “Do you see a lot of him?”

  “He’s here all the time!” she said.

  “That sounds nice,” he said.

  “He had two hamsters,” she said.

  “Oh God!” I said. “Please don’t tell him that story.”

  “My mother was supposed to take care of them one week,” she went on, completely ignoring me. “Nathan was away with his dad.”

  “Savannah—”

  “Mom forgot to feed them. So one of them ate the other one. Or part of him, anyway. It was gross.”

  Michael gave me a look.

  “All right,” I said, shrugging my shoulders. “I’m not perfect.”

  “My mother used to be a famous model,” Savannah said.

  “So I’d heard,” Michael said.

  “She was the original supermodel,” she said.

  “That’s what I’d been told,” Michael said, and he looked at me. He was nice to look at.

  “I hope we’ll be seeing more of you,” I said.

  “Me too,” he said.

  When we walked him back to his Porsche at the end of the evening, he asked Savannah for a little hug. She gave him one—just a little one—and said, “That’s enough.”

  “Thanks for coming,” I said.

  “You’re welcome,” he said.

  “When will we see you again?” I asked. I had promised myself not to ask, but I couldn’t help myself.

  “I’m pretty open this week,” he said. “Next week, too. I’m sort of, like, you know—available.” He smiled that Michael smile again. “At the moment, I’m pretty much open for the rest of my life. For her, anyway.”

  “You bastard,” I said. “You’re going to make me cry.”

  He didn’t kiss me good-bye. He waved as he drove off, and I closed my eyes, squeezed Savannah’s hand, and thanked God for a perfect evening.

  FAMILY

  Every day I am closer to becoming the person I want to be. I am becoming myself. I wake up in the morning and I look forward to the day ahead. I look forward to breakfast. I look forward to the drive to school with Savannah. I look forward to sitting home nights with a good book. I look forward to weekends with both my children. I look forward to Savannah’s gymnastics class and Nathan’s baseball practice. Sometimes I believe I even look forward to their whining.

  LOOKING LIKE THE FLORIDA GIRL I STARTED OUT AS.

  At the end of the day, we are a family. Families come in all shapes and sizes. The permutations are endless. And this is my family. It’s not a traditional family, no, but it’s a real family. And I love my family.

  When I was growing up, my parents weren’t good to me. There wasn’t any love there. I didn’t feel good about myself. So I spent the better part of my life looking for reasons to feel good about myself. If a man wanted me, I felt good about myself. If I got the cover of Vogue, I felt good about myself. If I made lots of money, I felt good about myself. And, sure, those are wonderful reasons to feel good. But they aren’t enough. At the end of the day, life isn’t about having other people telling you that you’re wonderful. That’s too goddamn risky. Because down the line there’s always the chance they might stop telling you you’re wonderful. That they’ll stop wanting you for the cover of Vogue. That they’ll stop loving you. I understood this, sure. But for a long time I couldn’t accept it. All I remembered was what that one shrink had told me—that I didn’t feel lovable; and it was true. I didn’t feel lovable. And it frightened the hell out of me.

  It also made me angry. I was angry about what had been done to me as a child, and the more I thought about it
the angrier I became.

  One afternoon, not all that long ago, feeling particularly angry, and wallowing in self-pity, I broke down and drove to the local liquor store. But I stopped myself at the door and got back in my car and went home. And I dug up an old notebook and began to write.

  The words just poured out of me. I wrote about my anger. And about my pain. I wrote about all the things I’d been told but had never truly understood. This whole business about the familiar, for example, how we re-create history because we think we can fix it: I’d been doing that my whole life. I’d been looking for men I could turn into my father; men who wanted me as he had wanted me, for sex; men who treated me as he had treated me—as worthless trash.

  And suddenly it struck me: I was still seeing myself through my father’s eyes. I was still letting my father define me.

  Yeah. There it was. My epiphany. One moment—a blinding flash—and you fucking get it. Well, no. Not quite. Just because you understand a problem doesn’t mean you’ve conquered it. But it’s a great first step.

  It had taken me forty years to figure out that I’d spent my entire life seeing myself as my father had seen me. He told me that I was worthless and unlovable, and I believed him. I was a fucking child, for God’s sake—of course I believed him. There was one version of Janice—his version—and I’d been clinging to it since the beginning: I’m worthless. I’m unlovable. I’m only good for sex.

  I thought, If only I could stop seeing myself through his eyes.…And I wrote that down—words that changed my life: Stop seeing yourself through his eyes.

  Simple words, yes. But they really, truly changed my life.

  In the weeks and months ahead, I kept writing—working, unknowingly, on what would eventually become this book—and learned more about myself than I had in the preceding four decades.

  I learned that change is hard, for everyone. And that if I wanted to change, I was going to have to fight like hell. And I did. I fought because I was tired of waking up in the morning and looking in the mirror and seeing the Janice my father had defined for me. It was time to create my own definitions.