“Why? He was dating you, not me or Mik. If he liked you, what difference did your past make?” Lucy shook her head in disbelief.
“Well, he thought it made a difference. To him, instead of being the proud black woman he thought I was, I was a race traitor.”
Soleil ran her fingers through her short hair, mostly hitting her scalp. “And who tells someone their whole life story when they start dating, anyway? Like I’m going to meet some guy and say, ‘Oh, by the way, I was a teenage prostitute.’ No one is going to do that, nor should they be expected to.”
Lucy looked at her. “But wouldn’t you tell him that you were an alcoholic if he offered to buy you a drink?”
“No. Would you tell a date that you had been gang raped if he tried to kiss you?” Soleil caught her breath, as if she could draw the words back into her mouth.
Lucy turned pale. Mariah looked down at the table. Eve looked at Soleil and Soleil put her hands over her eyes and leaned her head back.
Lucy’s eyes traveled from Soleil to Mariah. “No, I would not tell a man I just met that I had been gang raped,” she said. “Why would I tell a man I just met when I never even had the courage to tell my mother?”
Mariah took Lucy’s hand from across the table. “But you told your father.”
Eve saw the look of recognition on Lucy’s face. She knew what her mother was trying to say.
“And he told you, didn’t he?” She squeezed her mother’s hand.
Soleil sat up straight. “And so we are back to the fact that men can’t be trusted,” Soleil said. “Lucy tells something to Mik in confidence, and he tells it to someone else anyway.”
“Of course he told her. That isn’t something he would have been expected to keep to himself.” Eve was surprised that she was defending her father.
“The only reason he told her was because he was too chickenshit to do anything about it himself. So what happens—Ricky dies, Lucy is hurt and those guys get away to try it again.”
“What?” Mariah dropped Lucy’s hand. “What do you mean, ‘again,’ Soleil?”
Soleil pressed her lips together and looked at Lucy.
Lucy looked into her lap. “The man that Faith sent to where I was held was one of the men that had raped me in San Francisco.”
“Louie Maggione,” Soleil said.
“How do you know?” Mariah asked. She looked at Soleil.
“He came over to Faith’s place while I was cleaning up. I threatened to shoot him.”
Mariah’s eyes bored into Soleil’s eyes. “With my gun! Are you crazy, Soleil? Do you really want to spend the rest of your life playing in the Chowchilla prison band? Is that what you want?”
Soleil stared back. “I would rather do that than spend thirty years being a doormat for some man!”
“Doormat! I spent more than fifteen of those thirty years trying to keep your crazy ass alive!” Mariah’s eyes narrowed as Lucy’s eyes widened.
Soleil tapped her pen on the table. “And why did you try to rescue me? To show your ex-boyfriend what a big person you were? To show that you were the long-suffering, understanding Mariah? Not only could you raise your child alone, you could raise your rival’s child, too.”
Mariah pointed her pen at Soleil. “Is that what you think? That I was trying to impress Mik? Do you think when I saw you at three years old, with bruises on your little arms, that all I could think about was how to make Mik love me? If so, they should have kept you at that hospital for another day.” She threw the pen down and crossed her arms.
Eve caught her breath and looked at Lucy.
Soleil stood up. “Well, why did you do it then? Because you loved me?”
“Is that so hard to understand? That someone actually loved you?”
“Yes, it is hard to understand. My mother used me as a pawn to get Mik away from you. And my father resented me because of it. He resented the fact I wasn’t Lucy. He resented the fact I wasn’t Eve. And he resented the fact that Faith wasn’t you.”
Mariah looked up at Soleil. “How do you know that?”
Eve continued to watch Lucy. Mariah and Soleil acted as if they had forgotten there were other people in the room. She could tell by Lucy’s face that she had never seen her mother this angry. Is this what she meant by the four of them clearing the air? The air didn’t seem to be clearing from where she sat. The tension was building.
“Faith told me. Just like Ricky called out Lucy’s name when she was fucking him.” She glared at Lucy as she spoke.
Lucy jumped up. “What in the hell are you talking about?”
Eve didn’t want to hear this.
“Yeah, she told me before you and Eve showed up. He never loved Faith. It was always you. And that CD proves he still wanted you after all of these years.” Soleil’s face reddened.
“What CD?” Lucy asked.
Soleil continued to look at Mariah. “He would have married you. He would have finally married you and made Lucy legitimate. Then we could all be one big happy family. Isn’t that right?” Soleil was starting to shake. “And then I ruined it. I killed him! I killed my father!” Tears started rolling down her face.
Mariah jumped up and ran over to Soleil. She put her arms around her. “No, you didn’t, Soleil, you didn’t kill Mik.”
Soleil cried into Mariah’s shoulder. “Yes, I did. I went over there and cussed him out. Then he called Faith and she gave him the drugs that killed him.”
Eve looked at Lucy again. She still had that deer in the headlights look on her face.
Mariah cupped Soleil’s face in her hands and wiped her face. “No, Soleil. Mik was already dying when you got there.”
Lucy stood up. “What in the hell is going on? What are you talking about? Who killed my father?”
Eve was confused. She looked at the three women standing around her. “Someone needs to start at the beginning. We all need to sit down and talk rationally.”
Mariah and Soleil looked at her. Mariah nodded her head. “You’re right, Eve. Let’s sit down and discuss this.” She led Soleil back to the table. Lucy sat down, but she never took her eyes from the pair.
“Okay. Now I need to sort this all out.” Lucy ran her hands through her hair. “What CD are we talking about? How did my mother get a ring? And how did Mik die from a drug overdose?”
Soleil wiped her eyes. “When I was going through the things in Mik’s studio, I found a CD recorder with a disc inside. It was Mariah and Mik rehearsing together.”
Mariah continued. “On the CD, Mik asked me to marry him. He said that he planned to divorce Sally. Of course, I didn’t believe him. He said that he wanted all of us to be a family—me, him and you girls.”
“He was planning to divorce Sally? Why?” Lucy asked.
“I think that Sally liked it better when he was using drugs. She could control him then. Marriage to a once-famous rock star, even one that was a drug addict, was good for her career. It gave her an edge, gave her street credibility. But she didn’t want him to get his career going again. She was afraid any comeback would ruin his legend. She wanted to remain the wife of a legend.”
“So he told you he was getting a divorce? And you believed him?” Lucy blinked back tears.
Eve thought that it was strange that Lucy didn’t believe. It was the one thing she had always hoped for, that Mik would marry her mother.
Mariah looked at her daughter. “When we were rehearsing, he told me that he had asked Sally for a divorce. He showed me that ring.” A faint smile crossed her lips. “I never gave him an answer, and I didn’t accept the ring. But he mailed it to me. I put it in a drawer in my bedroom. I couldn’t bring myself to send it back.” She held out her left hand, as if imagining the ring on her finger.
“Then what happened?” Lucy asked.
“Well, Sally was in the running for the lead in a new movie. It promised to be a blockbuster, a big family movie with a holiday release date. She was supposed to play the mother, a wholesome, traditional mother. From w
hat I heard, she really wanted that part. She wanted to appear wholesome and traditional. And that meant no messy divorce. No druggie husband. No interracial stepchildren.”
Soleil stood up. “I don’t know what you are talking about. I know what I did the night that Mik died.”
This was getting stranger and stranger, Eve thought. “What did you do, Soleil?” she asked.
Soleil grabbed her pen and paper. She wrote something on the paper, walked over to the suitcase and threw it inside. “I had an abortion at fourteen,” she murmured.
Lucy glanced at the suitcase. “We all know about that, Soleil.”
“Yeah, but you don’t know what I found out the day of Mik’s death.” She put down the pad but held on to the pencil. “I had gone to the gynecologist a few weeks before that day. It was the first time I had seen a doctor since the night of the abortion.”
“You mean you hadn’t been to a doctor in eight years? No pap smears, no birth control pills? What were you thinking?” It seemed to be Lucy’s night to ask questions.
“What I was thinking, dear Lucy, is that I did not want to have to explain what had happened to me.”
Lucy opened her mouth to ask another question, but Mariah jumped in. “You almost bled to death after the abortion when Faith beat you.”
Soleil nodded. “So I went to a doctor because I was having irregular bleeding. During the examination, the doctor noted that it felt like I had some scaring on my uterus. I had some tests done. That morning, I went back for the results. I found that I was sterile, thanks to my wonderful mother.”
Lucy put her hand over her mouth.
Eve took a sip of her ginger ale. The ice had melted.
Soleil picked up her glass, looked at it as if she didn’t recognize it and took a long draw. She swallowed loudly and wiped her mouth. “I was so mad. Even though I wasn’t planning to have children, I was so angry that the option had been taken away from me. I left the office and went over to Faith’s apartment. I wanted to cuss her out, but she wasn’t home. Then I went to Mik’s place. He was home. So I cussed him out for not coming to my rescue when I called him that night. As usual, he had no excuse. But that night, he called Faith and asked her to bring him some heroin. She shot him up and he died.”
“That’s not what happened.”
The three sisters turned to look at Mariah.
“How do you know?” Eve finally spoke up. She knew Mariah had the answer.
Mariah sighed heavily. “I know because he called me after Faith left. I went over there. Sally was on location for a movie. She left three days before she was needed on the set. Just enough time for the poison to do its job.”
“Poison!” Lucy exclaimed. “What poison?”
All eyes remained fixed on Mariah.
“When Sally wasn’t there, Mik kept himself occupied with a bottle of brandy. The bottle had poison in it. He had been drinking steadily since she left.”
Soleil nodded. “He was half cocked when I went over there in the afternoon.”
“After Faith gave him the drugs, he continued to drink. Then he called me late that night, begging me to come over.” Mariah’s lower lip started trembling. “When I got there, he was fading in and out of consciousness. He told me he was dying. He wanted to leave something for you girls. He made three CDs, one for each of you. He gave them to me to mail, which I did as soon as I left. Then he called Rani and left a message on her answering machine.” Mariah looked at Eve. “He called Deidre, too.” Mariah sniffed back tears. “Then he told me that he loved me and that he was sorry we would never get married. Then he passed out. I called 911 and left.” Mariah shook her head and looked around the room.
Soleil put her arms around Mariah. “And then he died on the way to the hospital. They saw the works when they picked him up, so they just assumed it was nothing but another rock star junkie overdose.”
Lucy moved over to sit on the other side of Mariah. “Sally refuses an autopsy, becomes the poor, grieving widow and her career is saved.”
Eve went over to Mariah and started rubbing her shoulders. She could feel the tears running down her face and she saw she was not alone.
Lucy looked up at her. “My CD is in San Francisco and yours is in Pittsburgh.”
Eve looked at Soleil. “Did you receive a CD?”
Soleil shook her head. “No, I didn’t. Wait a minute. I did receive something a few weeks ago, but I never opened it. I was getting ready for the concert and I forgot about it. I didn’t recognize the handwriting and there was no return address.”
“You have to play it. As soon as you get home,” Lucy said.
Mariah looked at her with red-rimmed eyes. “Soleil, play the CD when you want to. When you feel comfortable enough to do so. You have gone through enough for one day.”
Soleil kissed her on the cheek. “I’m so sorry for what I said to you. I’m sorry I took your personal belongings. I love you, Mariah. You have always looked out for me. And I know you did it because you cared. Please forgive me.”
Eve leaned over and kissed her other cheek. “We all owe you an apology. You have been carrying all of this around with you for months. It must have been tearing you apart.”
Lucy hugged her mother tightly. “I’m sorry, Mariah. I’m sorry for not sharing things with you, for taking advantage of you.”
Mariah sighed again. It was a different kind of sigh. “I’m glad you know now. Nothing can ever be proven against Sally, but she will have to live with what she did.”
Eve thought about Brad. “Maybe that is why she gave money to Brad. Maybe she felt guilty.”
Soleil stood up. “I could use a drink, but instead I will get us some more ginger ale.”
She went into the kitchen with the ice bucket.
Lucy took Mariah’s hand. “I think that you should wear the ring. That’s what Mik would have wanted.”
Mariah nodded. She looked at Eve.
Eve nodded in return. “It is a beautiful ring. You deserve it. Why don’t you wear it tomorrow when you go to Lieberman’s office?”
Soleil returned with more ginger ale and more ice. “I forgot all about that appointment tomorrow morning.”
Mariah looked like she was momentarily somewhere else. “You have to be there tomorrow. We both do.” She took a small sip from her glass.
“More surprises?” Lucy asked.
“The last of Faith’s surprises,” Soleil said.
Mariah stood up. She still shook slightly. “I think I have unloaded all of the baggage I can for one night.” She looked at the suitcase. “Sorry I didn’t write it down.” She sighed deeply. ”I’m going to bed.”
Eve straightened up and Lucy stood up. Lucy looked at the suitcase.
Mariah took Lucy’s hand. Then she took Eve’s hand in her other hand. Soleil placed the bottle on the table. Eve held out her other hand. Soleil took the hands of both of her sisters.
“Remember, we still have each other,” Mariah said softly.
“Isn’t this a fucking Kodak moment,” Soleil said dryly.
All four of them laughed bitterly and looked at each other.
Lucy
Lucy watched her mother go into the house. Her revelation was almost unbelievable. Her father had been murdered! Murdered by his own wife. She looked at Eve and Soleil. She didn’t know what to say. It was too much to even think about. The classical music seemed out of place now. The candles flickered slightly.
She looked at the closed door. She started to get up.
Soleil put her hand on her shoulder. “I think she wants to be alone right now,” she said softly.
Lucy ran her fingers through her hair. She looked over at Soleil. “I can’t believe this.”
“Sally Fountaine is more of a bitch than we thought,” Eve said.
“You should have done more than punch her in the nose,” Soleil said to Eve.
Lucy glanced at Eve. “No matter what we did to her, it won’t bring Mik back. What goes around comes around. She will
get hers someday.”
“Shut up with that karma bullshit, Lucy. That cunt will probably become a big fuckin’ movie star, make lots of fuckin’ money and live happily ever fuckin’ after.” Soleil shook her head. “Racist murdering whore.”
“She hates us, doesn’t she?”
“Of course she hates us, Lucy. She hates niggers, don’t you know that?” Soleil picked up a pen and pointed at Eve. “But if Eve hadn’t hit her, they would be best friends.”
Eve picked up her pen and threw it at Soleil. “Do you think because I’m white I would like Sally Fountaine? When she called me about Mik’s memorial, she told me how she felt sorry for me because my father left my mother for ‘those black bitches.’ Do you really think I am like her? Do you really think I would choose to be with her right now, rather than you, Lucy and Mariah?” Her blue eyes looked gray in the candlelight.
The fire in the fireplace was dwindling. Lucy was afraid of the conflagration that was building before her eyes.
Soleil stood up. “Come on, Eve. Tell me what you really think about your black sisters before you go back to your white life in Pennsylvania.” She put her hands on her hips. “What are you going to tell your mama about us, huh?” Soleil’s eyes matched Eve’s dagger for dagger.
“I’ll tell you what I think, Ms. Soleil DeSalle. I couldn’t stand you the first time I met you. I couldn’t stand you because we are too much alike. Race has nothing to do with it. Remember, you are the one that called me a ‘white bitch.’ I have never thought about color.
“I was pissed off because both of you had a father. Both of you could call him or visit him. I never thought of Mik DeSalle as my father. He was just some guy that stopped by every few years and brought me presents. He wasn’t my father.” She looked at Lucy. “I didn’t go on tour with my father. I didn’t call my father when something went wrong. I didn’t have a father at my graduation. I was jealous and angry.”
Soleil still glared at her. “Boo fuckin’ hoo.”
“Shut up, Soleil. Let Eve talk,” Lucy admonished. She knew how hard it was for Eve to say what she felt.
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