Not Quite A mom

by Kirsten Sawyer

  Today, she steps back outside and wipes her fake-Ugg clogs on the mat. It’s a mat she has always despised. It says, “Never mind the dog; beware of the owner!” Chuck thought it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen. Tiffany hates it passionately, especially since they don’t even have a dog. Once her feet feel sufficiently clean, she steps back in the house and takes a deep breath.

  The house reeks of its normal stale cigarette and beer smell. It’s a scent that’s both sickening and comforting to Tiffany, but today it’s a bit different. Oddly, it seems that being left empty just overnight has added a musty stuffiness to the small house. As Tiffany walks through the living room, she finds the silence deafening. She looks into the galley kitchen on her way through and sees Charla’s coffee cup from the morning she left still sitting on the counter.

  It’s a stained and chipped mug that says “World’s Best Mom.” Tiffany had bought it for $4.98 and given it to her mother for Mother’s Day approximately five years ago. Tiffany and Charla both knew that Charla was not the world’s best mom, but Charla loved the mug and used it every single day. Tiffany walks the five paces it takes to cross their kitchen, which is really just a strip of linoleum surrounded by counters and cupboards at the edge of the living room. She peers into the mug and sees an inch of coffee sitting in the bottom. Her mother always drank her coffee black with four teaspoons of sugar. Occasionally Tiffany would take a sip and always regretted it because the normally bitter liquid was sweet enough to rot your teeth on contact.

  Tiffany pours the remaining coffee down the drain and carefully washes the mug, then sets it upside down on the drying rack under the window. Looking at the silly mug causes tears to well up in Tiffany’s eyes, so she quickly exits the kitchen and hurries down the carpeted hall to her own bedroom. Once inside with the door closed behind her, she falls face forward on her unmade bed and cries.

  After just a few minutes, she stands up, wipes her eyes, and retrieves a large overnight bag from beneath her lumpy twin bed. In it she packs all her favorite designer knockoff clothes. She knows that her aunt Lizzie is a successful career woman in Los Angeles and she wants to fit in as much as she can. Once her clothes are packed, Tiffany places a ratty stuffed frog, Mr. Ribbit, into the bag. She has slept with Mr. Ribbit since before she can remember, and while she would be mortified if anyone knew about it, she would also be devastated to leave home without him. Tiffany lugs the bag across the hall to the bathroom, careful to avoid looking toward her mother’s bedroom.

  Inside the grimy bathroom, Tiffany packs her toiletries in a clean, gallon-size Ziploc bag. Like any teenage girl, she owns gobs of products—Noxzema cleanser, Stridex pads, Maybelline cosmetics. She takes them all and stuffs them into her bag. She takes one last look around the bathroom, which smells of Chuck’s Old Spice and her mother’s Aqua Net, and then glances in the mirror. For a second, she doesn’t recognize her own reflection.

  Tiffany is a pretty girl and she knows it. She knows that she is one of the prettiest girls at Victory High. Her hair is L’Oréal Preference “Extra Light Natural Blonde,” and her eyes are turquoise blue, like her mother’s. She is skilled at applying makeup and almost never leaves the house without a generous application of Maybelline Great Lash mascara in “Very Black.” Her clothes are always fashionable and too tight in the right places. Today, none of this is evident.

  Her hair is a greasy mess, piled on top of her head in a lumpy bun, and her mascara is hanging in dark circles under her eyes; there is also a red pimple blemishing her heart-shaped chin. For a second she is mortified and considers getting into the soap scum–encrusted shower but decides that when Buck said to take her time, he probably didn’t mean that much. She makes a guttural sound of disgust before walking out of the bathroom. She starts down the hall toward the front door, then drops her bag and turns around.

  Tiffany walks briskly to the end of the hallway and into her mother’s bedroom without breaking stride until she stands in front of her mother’s worn oak dresser. She opens the top drawer, which contains her mother’s faded cotton underwear and torn underwire bras. In the back of the drawer is a small black velvet jewelry box. Tiffany knows that there isn’t anything of any value in it, but these are the pieces that her mother cherished. Inside are the tiny diamond earrings that Chuck gave her as an anniversary gift, the gold cross that her grandparents gave her as a high school graduation gift, and a tarnished sterling silver heart on a matching chain that Tiffany had given her for her thirtieth birthday. Chuck had actually purchased the necklace, but the gift card hadn’t given him any credit. Tiffany acknowledges that her stepfather was a good man as she tucks the little box under her arm and walks out of the room toward the front door.

  The house is basically a long hallway leading to her parents’ room, with her room, the bathroom and the living room/dining room/kitchen branching off. Tiffany walks straight to the front door, hardly stopping as she stoops to pick up her bag. Once outside on the front porch, which is cluttered with dying potted plants, Tiffany removes the key from beneath the stupid mat. She locks the door and bends halfway down to put it back before she changes her mind. She stops mid-bend and instead palms the key, squeezing her hand tightly so that she can feel the metal cuts digging into her palm as she walks back toward Buck’s truck. She can hear Green Day playing quietly on the stereo, but Buck looks like he’s fallen asleep with his head tilted back.

  The sound of the door opening makes him jump slightly, and he opens his eyes and turns the stereo even lower in one movement.

  “Everything okay?” he asks, looking like he feels guilty for having dozed off while Tiffany collected her things.

  “Yep,” she answers, but they both know it’s not the truth.

  9

  That morning when my alarm goes off at six thirty, I am snapped out of a dream. A dream where I am dressed in a Vera Wang wedding gown I once tried on at Neiman Marcus in a fit of fantasy—a dress with a price tag close to that on my used BMW convertible—standing in line at the Wal-Mart in Victory to buy condoms. For once, I am grateful to hear the piercing beep from my Sony Dreamcube.

  I quickly stop the beep, beep, beep before rolling over and looking at Dan, who is still halfway asleep. He looks so sweet and innocent in the blue poplin pajamas he keeps at my house. The night before had been a bit of a roller coaster. Dan’s announcement about his desire to move in together but not get married and definitely not have children for a while had thrown me…especially in light of the fact that much to my dismay I had just inherited a teenage child. But after that, he had been so sweet. We’d “celebrated,” and then Dan had ordered my favorite Chinese food to be delivered and we spent the night on the couch, cuddled up watching repeats of The West Wing. Around eleven thirty, he turned off the TV and kissed my forehead, which I thought was a signal that he was leaving, but instead he said, “Let’s go to bed.” I’d fallen asleep, wrapped in Dan’s arms, and hadn’t stirred until my alarm rescued me from my strange dream.

  “Good morning, sleepyhead,” I coo at my wonderful fiancé in bed beside me.

  “Five more minutes?” he begs me without opening an eye.

  “I’ll take the first shower,” I tell him and slide out of bed and into my robe, hoping that his eyes are still closed and that I am covered before he sees the bony structure that is my body. I sneak a peek back at him as I walk around the bed toward the shower and am relieved that his eyes are shut and his breathing is the heavy, borderline snore that means he is asleep.

  Once safely locked inside the bathroom, I neatly hang my robe on the hook behind the door. I wash off the previous day’s makeup—this is something that I normally do before going to bed, but when Dan spends the night, I always keep it on, lest he see me au naturel and go running for his life. After a shower, I carefully reapply the makeup as well as moisturize every square inch of my body and tend to my hair with a dryer and a round brush before removing the robe from the hook, putting it back on, and exiting the bathroom, which now feels
about 95 degrees.

  “Okay,” I say to Dan, who is now sitting up in bed checking e-mail on his BlackBerry.

  He nods, gets out of bed and heads into the steam-filled bathroom without taking his eyes off the little blue device.

  After I hear the water being turned on, I again remove the robe and toss it into a white wicker hamper in the corner. I stop to examine my body in the full-length mirror on the wall. I am so skinny…not good skinny, like thin and petite…I am bony and undernourished skinny. And believe me, I’m not undernourished; it’s just how I am. I have ribs that stick out, angular hips, and birdlike legs. I look okay in clothes because it can all be camouflaged, but naked it is not so flattering. I quickly dress for work in the secondhand Seven jeans I got on eBay and a shirt from Target. I once read that if you have one expensive piece of clothing on, people assume everything you wear is designer. Every day I count on this being true.

  I am filling my travel mug with coffee by the time Dan emerges from the bathroom, which now resembles a sauna.

  “What time do you have to be in court?” I ask, as I add raw sugar and organic milk to my drink.

  “Not until the afternoon,” he says, pouring himself a cup in a ceramic mug and drinking it black.

  “I’m sorry, I have to run. We’re shooting two shows today,” I explain as I kiss him good-bye and collect my bag.

  I struggle out the door, careful not to spill coffee on myself, and down to my car, hoping that there wasn’t any middle-of-the-night rain, since the car’s convertible top has a tendency to leak and I have forgotten to bring a towel down with me. The car gives me plenty of trouble, but I always dreamed of driving a BMW and I absolutely adore it. I set the metal container in the center console’s cupholder and put my bag on the seat next to me. I take a deep breath before starting the engine and placing my hands on the black steering wheel. My engagement ring catches my eye and I can’t help but smile…things are still going according to plan…for the most part.

  10

  The walls of my office are glass, and before I even enter the room I can already see the pile of work waiting for me. It’s a two-show day, which means it will be nonstop. I’ve been working at The Renee Foster Show! for all of the show’s eight seasons. I’ll admit, it’s not exactly what I thought it would be. After graduation, I got my first big (mid-size) break in journalism as a runner at the Los Angeles ABC affiliate, KABC. Renee was coanchor of the 7 p.m. and 11 p.m. newscasts and, obviously, she was my idol. Not only did she hold one of the most coveted positions at KABC, she is happily married to her college sweetheart and has two adorable little boys. Her life is perfect, and following in her footsteps would be ideal. After two years I’d worked my way from glorified go-fer to second assistant to the news director. I still wasn’t exactly putting my education to good use, but I was getting closer. Then Renee made her big announcement: she was leaving the news desk behind to host her own daytime news magazine show. When she offered me the chance to come with her as a junior fact checker, I jumped on it.

  At the time, I was under the impression that a daytime news magazine show would be what it sounded like…like 60 Minutes or 20/20, just during the day. The show turned out to be much more like The View, with more celebrity gossip than actual news, but eight years later I am the head fact checker and am generally able to convince myself that I am working in journalism and that someday this job could lead to my dream job as a news anchor…plus as head fact checker I get to do a brief on-air segment called “That’s the Facts.” For approximately sixty seconds, the camera pans over to me, seated behind a desk, and I give Renee a rundown on celebrity facts. I supply her with bullets of information on celebrity comings and goings, and then I say, “I’m Elizabeth Castle, and That’s the Facts, Renee.” Everybody’s got to start somewhere.

  I take a deep breath as I set my bag under my desk. I don’t bother to sit down, though. I grab the pile of manila folders on my desk and head down to the stage, looking through them and passing out assignments to the group of junior fact checkers who work in cubicles surrounding my glass office. The junior fact checkers are a peppy bunch of recent graduates with degrees in a host of liberal arts subjects. I both love and hate them because none of them is jaded yet and none of them thinks that eight years later they will still be working on this show.

  By the time I have made my way through the department, my arms are empty except for the red plastic clipboard that accompanies me wherever I go. I slip a headset over my mousey brown hair, which would be pathetic if not for a ridiculous amount spent on highlights every six weeks, and struggle to attach the transmitter to my waistband. The headset is a direct connection to my assistant, Hope. From the stage, I keep in constant communication with her, and she farms out all fact-checking requests on my behalf.

  “Hope, are you there?” I ask as I clunk my way down the metal staircase that connects our offices with the show’s stage. As I wait for a reply, I enter the cold soundstage and see that the audience for the first show is already seated. I cross through the show’s set, a space that is part home living room and part home office. The home office part houses the desk I sit behind for my on-air segment (seconds).

  “Good morning Elizabeth,” Hope chimes through the headset.

  “Good morning. Do we have any messages?”

  Hope rattles off a list of calls, most of which need returning but none of which are pressing enough to send me back up to my office this close to show time or even inspire me to have Hope connect me through my headset. In fact, most of the messages don’t even get my attention, except for one.

  “A Buck Platner called asking for our address here. Do you know who that is, Elizabeth? Can I give him the address?”

  A sick feeling shoots into my stomach as I answer, “That’s fine, Hope. Call him back whenever you get a chance and give him the address. No rush,” I add hoping that she won’t get around to it for days or even weeks, but knowing that Hope is far too responsible to wait any length of time. Part of me had hoped that perhaps my out-of-sight, out-of-mind approach might rub off on everyone else involved, causing them to forget about the whole guardianship issue; then it would all just disappear as if it had never existed.

  “Wishful thinking,” I mutter to myself as I approach the hair and makeup area where I see the back of Renee Foster’s head in big rollers. “Good morning, Renee,” I say and make eye contact with her unmade-up face in the light-framed vanity mirror.

  “Oh, Elizabeth, thank God you’re here,” she says, as she says every morning. “It says here that Halle Berry’s dog is a Lhasa Apso,” Renee says holding up the thick stack of papers that are her show notes, “but I saw it in the hallway and it looks more like a Shih Tzu to me.”

  “Lemme find out for you, Renee,” I say calmly as the show’s makeup person starts applying a thick coat of foundation to her face. In need of the day’s second cup of coffee, I walk over to the craft services table. “Hope?” I say into my headset.

  A few seconds pass before she says, “Sorry, Elizabeth. Buck Platner called again and I was just giving him our address.”

  “Crap,” I think to myself, but I say, “Can you confirm what breed Halle’s dog is?” “Crap,” but this time I say it out loud and Guadalupe, our caterer, thinks I am referring to the coffee. After reassuring her that my crude behavior has nothing to do with her, I take a big sip of the coffee; it is crappy and it burns my tongue.

  I’m thinking about the papers that will soon be on their way to me when Hope’s voice booms in my right ear, “Halle’s dog is a maltese.” I’m picturing Buck Platner, exactly as he looked in high school, wearing a letterman jacket, laughing as he puts the papers in a manila envelope and telling the postman to rush them to me. “Elizabeth!” Hope calls, and it jerks me back to reality. “Did you hear me? The dog’s a maltese.”

  “A maltese? Are you sure?”

  “Positive. I just got off with her manager’s assistant who conferenced me in with Halle’s dog trainer. The dog
is a purebred maltese.”

  “Who was on that?” I ask, needing to know which member of my staff ineptly supplied Renee with the wrong dog breed.

  “Christy,” Hope answers

  “I knew it,” I seethe, and with that, my mind is one hundred percent on my work and I take off to give Renee the correct information.

  I sit down in the empty salon chair next to Renee and go over all the information for the entire show, including everything I will be sharing with her during “That’s the Facts, Renee.” When I share them with her on-air, she will act interested and surprised, but in fact not a single item will actually be news to her. We have spent the past week deciding together exactly which facts will be announced in today’s rundown.

  “Okay, Elizabeth, sounds good,” Renee says as she rises from her chair with flawless hair and makeup and removes the black drape that had covered her from the neck down, revealing a black velour Juicy warm-up suit. “I’ll see you out there,” she calls over her shoulder as she heads to her dressing room.

  I watch her for a second and then look back down at my clipboard as a loud voice booms overhead, “FIVE MINUTES TILL SHOW TIME.”

  “Okay, Elizabeth, let’s touch you up,” Marcela, the makeup artist, says to me.

  I nod appreciatively, and she dabs powder on my T-zone. I receive only a fraction of the makeup that Renee does, but Marcela is so talented that it does wonders for my appearance. When she is finished, the voice booms, “ONE MINUTE TILL SHOW TIME.”

  As I head back to craft services for another cup of coffee, I hear the audience-warmer introducing Renee and the audience going wild with excitement. With another crappy although now not as hot cup of coffee in hand, I head to the wardrobe room, where I have my choice of the items from Renee’s last-season wardrobe that she didn’t like enough to take home with her. I select a black-and-white tweed Moschino jacket with silver buttons and put it on over my T-shirt. Since I sit behind a desk, there is no need to change anything from the waist down.