Not Suitable For Family Viewing

by Vicki Grant

  Good old Selena. She was like this when she was a kid too. She tortured me but she always came through in the end.

  I open my grandmother’s obituary and there it is, plain as day, in the very first sentence. “Dora May Reiner (née Gotfrit), survived by her beloved husband, Harry, and chosen daughter, Miriam Ingram.”

  Miriam Ingram.

  There it is. The proof. There’s no “maybe” about it any more. Mimi used to be Rosie Ingram.

  And “chosen daughter”—that obviously means adopted.

  I check the date. Dora died just a month before I was born. She died in Brooklyn, just like Mom said in the book. Okay. That fits.

  I open the other attachment, the marriage licence, and check the date there too. I was almost a year old at the time of the wedding. Why did they wait so long?

  Maybe because of Dora? Maybe it didn’t seem right to get married when she was sick—or so soon after she died. I shake my head. Who knows? Maybe Mimi couldn’t find a dress she liked. Maybe she couldn’t lose her baby weight. Maybe Jean-François couldn’t fit her in for her eyebrow wax until then. Could be a thousand different reasons for it.

  I think for a second. Okay. What do I know for sure? Mom definitely had left Port Minton by the time I was born and…

  And that’s about it. The sum total of my “research.”

  Where did she hook up with Dad, then?

  I get out the yearbook again. I looked for Schwartzes before but Dad might have changed his name too. I go to the hockey section. Maybe Dad was the manager or the water boy or something. Maybe they got rings too. I look at the team picture. There’s a manager but it’s a girl, and the stick boy is a fat little blond kid who bears a striking resemblance to the coach, and none at all to Dad.

  I try to be systematic about this. I go row by row, look at each of the faces, check each of the names. Maybe I missed something before.

  No one even rings a bell—until I get to Percy Hiltz. I didn’t recognize him at first. By the look of the picture, he sweated just as much as he does now, but he was way skinnier then and had a whole head of thick red hair too.

  I really wish I could talk to him. I bet he’d know. I just don’t want to bother him while he’s so busy.

  I go back to the yearbook. I see the caption Roy Tanner, Captain. Debbie’s Roy.

  Maybe I don’t need Percy after all.

  I grab Rosie’s yearbook. I’m going to get my hair done.

  47

  Thursday, 2 p.m.

  You, You and Mimi

  “Love Crazy—Part 2.” Mimi’s celebrity guests continue to share more mortifying stories about the things they did for love.

  I know before I even see the van that Levi’s near. I’m not claiming to be psychic or anything like that but it’s true. I just know. I’ve got this little high-pitched hum going all through my body. It’s like the music in a movie that tells you to brace yourself, something big’s about to happen.

  I’m walking down Main Street to Debbie’s salon. The humming gets stronger. I look up and there he is, outside the hardware store again. He smiles at me and it’s like he just pushed the fast-forward button on the remote. I’m a robot. I immediately start to hobblejog over to him.

  He starts singing, “Go, Granny, go, go, go!”

  He makes me laugh. I can hardly wait to touch him, to tell him about the brick, the threat, everything.

  Damn.

  I stop. I can’t. I promised Mrs. Hiltz.

  He goes, “C’mon, Beulah! Don’t give up now! You almost made it!”

  Big deal. She’ll never know. I’ll make Levi promise not to tell too. I can trust him.

  But that’s what I thought about those girls at school too. I didn’t worry about their little cellphone cameras.

  I walk up to him. I swore I wouldn’t tell a soul.

  He looks at me funny. “Okay. What’s the matter now?”

  “Levi…” I say. A blue car pulls up into the parking lot. I recognize the screech of the tires. It’s Krystal’s car.

  “Yeah?”

  Do I need this now? What does she do? Keep driving up and down Main Street until she catches us together or something?

  Levi gives my arm a little shake. “Yoo-hoo! What’s up?”

  I’m sick of her. I’m not going to take this any more. Scaring me. Harassing me. Insulting me. He’s mine. I feel like a dog, marking its territory or something.

  I let the cane drop to the pavement, throw my arms around Levi’s neck and kiss him. I kiss him for a long, long time. I rub my hands through his hair. I squirm. I wriggle. I moan. I do all the Hollywood make-out moves I can think of.

  Get the message, Krystal?

  I’m just starting to understand why they say that revenge is sweet when I hear this guy go, “You were supposed to be picking up some mortar, Levi, not some girl.”

  I jump back with my hands up in the air like a cop just pulled a gun on me. (“Robin Opal Schwartz, you are under arrest for impersonating a hot girl, moaning in public and unlawfully placing your big fat lips on an unsuspecting male victim.”)

  Levi doesn’t seem the least bit embarrassed. He just laughs and goes, “Don’t worry, Uncle Jimmy. Mortar’s in the van. I’m on my way. Just saying goodbye to Opal here, that’s all.”

  Jimmy shakes his head, slams the door of his blue car and heads into the store.

  I groan—and not in that Hollywood babe way either. I’m an idiot—and, as far as his uncle’s concerned, a skank too.

  Levi clicks his tongue. “Yowza! You’re some hot-to-trot today, girl. What got into you?”

  He sticks his neck right under my nose. “My new cologne, perhaps?” I shrug and move away. He moves in closer. “No. Seriously. Take a whiff. That it?”

  I go, “No,” and look away. I can’t believe I did that. I’ve got to get out of here before Jimmy comes back.

  Levi walks around in front of me. “What do you think it was, then?”

  I’m too embarrassed to even glare at him.

  “Hmm. I use their deodorant too.” He lifts his arms and sniffs his pits. “It doesn’t do much for me but…maybe the effect of the fragrance combined with the pheromones in my sweat was enough to send you into that—what would you call it?—frenzy? Yeah. That’s the word. Frenzy of lust and desire.” He starts moving his hips and making his lips go all rubbery like he’s some sleazebag sexpot and I can’t even pretend any more.

  I go, “Shut! Up!”

  That totally cracks him up.

  “No, not yet! I have another theory too. Or…or…” I try to cover his mouth with my hands but he keeps swivelling his head away. “Or did you perhaps mistake Jimmy’s car for Krystal’s?”

  I attack him like some crazed barbarian warrior.

  He’s killing himself laughing. “Bingo. Looks like we have a winner!” He puts on this tough-girl voice. “Back off, Krystal. Levi’s mine! Smooch. Smooch. Ooh, baby.”

  I’m hitting him and I’m laughing and I’m practically crying because I’ve made such a fool of myself but somehow that only makes me laugh more.

  He grabs both my hands and squeezes them against his chest, then clamps me into a bear hug. He says, “Oh, now I feel bad,” and I think he’s finally going to show me some mercy but instead he puts on this big pout and goes, “I was hoping for lust—but I’ll take jealousy. Don’t matter to me none. Heck, I wouldn’t even mind if you were just feeling sorry for me.”

  Levi and I are still hanging onto each other, cracking up, when Jimmy comes back out of the store.

  Levi wipes his face with the back of his hand and says, “Be right there, Jimmy.” Then he waggles his eyebrows at me and whispers, “Hey. Why don’t we see if we can make Krystal really jealous tonight?”

  I squeeze my teeth together to keep my face from flying apart. I close my eyes.

  He says, “I’ll take that as a yes.”

  I nod, then I sigh and go, “No. I can’t. I forgot…Mrs. Hiltz is taking me for a picnic in Port Minton tonight.
”

  Levi slumps against the van. He twirls his finger around like ooh, whoopee, lucky you.

  I say, “It won’t be very late. Mrs. Hiltz was in bed by eight last night. Maybe we could, like—you know—get together then?”

  Levi pulls me toward him. “Sure. Eight, nine, midnight, whatever. I’ll be waiting.”

  The sky suddenly gets darker. He looks up. A big black cloud is blocking the sun. “Oh-oh,” he says. “I better get out of here. Jimmy’ll kill me if it starts raining before I get this done.”

  He kisses me, gets in the van and waves. I never noticed before that his ears move when he smiles. (His ears, my heart.)

  I forget about the brick. I forget about Krystal. I forget about Jimmy and all the stuff he’s probably thinking about me. Who cares? There’s only room in my head for Levi.

  48

  Thursday, 3 p.m.

  Radio Mimi

  “The Right Place at the Right Time.” Author Tracy Hamilton discusses the chance encounter that changed her life and inspired her New York Times bestseller, It Can’t Be You.

  Debbie’s just finishing up someone’s highlights when I get to the salon. She takes one look at my black eye, squawks like some chain-smoking chicken and sends foils flying all over the floor. I try to help pick them up but she won’t let me. She sits me down and makes me tell her the whole “accident” story again.

  She and her customer cluck away about the decline of Western civilization for a while but eventually have to get back to deciding whether to go with ash blond again or try chestnut for a change. While I wait, I browse through the latest Us Magazine and daydream about Levi. I’m thoroughly enjoying myself until I see a sidebar about Mom (“Mimi’s Got Man Trouble! Her Ex’s Ex Tells All.”) I know it’s just garbage but it hurts. She’s my mother. She’s a human being. Why don’t they just leave her alone? I toss the magazine back onto the coffee table and wait my turn.

  Luckily Debbie takes my injuries to heart. She’s way gentler this time when she scrubs my head. She’s so nice I actually let her straighten my hair too. While she’s at it, I take out the yearbook. I tell her I’ve decided to focus my research on her graduating class. I ask if she could tell me a little about each person.

  It’s like asking Anita if she’d mind reorganizing my drawers. I’ve created a monster.

  She tut-tuts about the poor Bisters and makes some wink-wink comment about how she wished she got her claws into Percy Hiltz before he took off to see the world, but most of the stuff she talks about means nothing to me. I have to sit through these long stories about Janet who ran off with her best friend’s fiancé and Darville who died in the terrible car crash and poor Angie who has that environmental illness where she’s allergic to everything, including her husband, but who wouldn’t be, with a guy like Gerry? (Debbie gets hives just looking at him. She can’t imagine having his babies.)

  I realize I’ve got to come up with a way of hurrying Debbie along.

  I go, “Un-huh…un-huh…yup…yup,” until she takes a breath, then I point at Rosie’s picture and go, “And what about her? Where did she end up?”

  “Rosie Ingram? She didn’t go far. She lives just around the corner.”

  I go, “What?” My head jerks around so hard I hear my neck bones crack.

  She says, “Sorry, honey. Did I burn you?”

  I rub my head and act like, yeah, that’s the problem. I have to keep calm. “Are you sure? Rosemary Ingram?” I point at the picture in the book again. “She lives here?”

  “Yup. Well, she’s not Rosemary Ingram any more, of course. She’s Rosemary Crouse. But she definitely lives here. I don’t know why, but she does. She won some lottery a couple of years ago, and what does she go and do? Fly to Jamaica? Move to Hawaii? No. She starts up a daycare centre in Shelton. Shelton! Can you believe that? Thank God she did. I mean, me with four screamers. She definitely saved my life—and theirs too, for that matter. But seriously. Is that what you’d do if you’d won a pile of money? Look after somebody else’s brats? In Shelton?”

  I say, “No. I don’t think so,” but the truth is I’m not thinking at all. It’s like I was hit by some power surge that blew out all the memory on my personal computer. The screen’s gone black and there’s smoke billowing out the sides.

  If Rosemary still lives here, who’s Mimi?

  Debbie takes a hunk of hair and pulls it straight. (I wish someone would do the same thing with the mess inside my head.) She says, “Why are you so interested in Rosie anyway?”

  “Um, I…I just heard people talk about her, I guess.”

  “You did? That’s funny. What would people be saying about Rosie? She’s not the kind of person people usually talk about. She’s just this sweet, quiet girl, you know. Pretty ordinary.”

  Rosie’s more than that. I don’t know what—but she’s got to be more than that.

  I swallow. “Do you think there’s any way I could meet her? I’d kind of like to, you know, interview her.”

  Debbie takes both hands and smoothes the front of my hair into matching swoops. “Sure, that’s easy enough. What time is it?”

  I check my watch. “Quarter to four.”

  “She’ll still be at the daycare. You want to see her now? I could call her and ask if it would be okay.”

  I give this little tiny nod of my head. That’s all I can do. I’m practically paralyzed. Would I be better knowing or not knowing who Rosie Ingram really is? I feel like one of those fancy show horses that skid to a stop right before the jump.

  Debbie goes, “Oh, hey. What’s your name? I never thought to ask before. I’ve got to say who’s coming.”

  “Opal Schwartz.”

  Debbie goes, “Your name’s Opal? No kidding!” and heads to the phone.

  I get out of the chair and take off the cape. I have to lean against the counter for support. If Rosemary Miriam Ingram isn’t Mimi, then nothing makes sense. I’m back to zero.

  “It’s a go,” Debbie says when she returns. “Rosie was a bit shy at the idea of being interviewed but I said you were nice. I warned her about your accident too, so you don’t have to go all through that again. Don’t expect too much from her, though. She’ll probably just want to talk about some kid’s tooth falling out. Hope that’s okay.”

  I do my best to smile, and give her a twenty-dollar tip. She tries to hand it back but I won’t let her.

  One way or another the tip she just gave me has to be worth way more than that.

  49

  Thursday, 4 p.m.

  You, You and Mimi—BFF Special

  Mimi celebrates the joy of friendship with twenty of her best—and most famous—friends.

  I stand outside the daycare for a long time and just stare. Some lady comes out with her little girl and says, “Can I help you?” but she doesn’t mean it. She means, What type of nervous, sweaty creep hangs around outside a daycare centre? Whose child are you planning to abduct? She no doubt saw Mimi’s special, “Pervert-Proof your Kids!”

  I tell her, “No. Thanks. I’m just here to see Rosie.”

  She smiles at me but hangs around watching until I go in.

  I poke my head in the door just as kids are getting ready to be picked up. A little bell rings. A lady with beige curly hair and sort of see-through skin looks up and I know immediately. This is the real Rosemary Ingram.

  Who was Mom trying to fool? The glasses are different from the ones in the yearbook but the nose is the same and so is the look in her eyes. (Our biology teacher told us shyness is genetic. You understand that right away when you see Rosie. It’s pretty obvious she was born that way.)

  She notices me and lifts her hand in a little wave. She gives the kid she’s holding to another lady then starts moving toward me. She’s hesitant. It’s like she’s walking down the aisle but she’s not totally convinced she wants to marry the guy at the other end.

  She says, “You must be Opal. Opal Schwartz, is it?” You can tell she’s from Port Minton by her accent.


  I say, “Yes. Hello.” She’s got a sad little smile on her face. She’s standing in this mousey way but she’s staring right at me. It’s freaking me out.

  She goes, “Why don’t you come and sit down here where it’s quiet and you can ask me your questions?” It sounds like, “Wo-i don ya come and sit down he-yah…”

  I have to concentrate to understand her. How come Mrs. Hiltz doesn’t have an accent like that? She’s a Port Minton girl too.

  Rosie leads me into a neon yellow room with a string of letters dangling from the ceiling. The place is full of Duplo sets and giant stuffed animals and tiny little kids’ furniture. We sit on a bright blue sofa that’s about six inches off the ground. I feel like Will Ferrell in Elf but Rosie’s right at home. She’s not much bigger than a child herself.

  “Now what would you like to know?” she says.

  Let’s just get this over with.

  “Tell me about yourself,” I say.

  She blushes so fiercely I worry I might have blown it. She starts glancing around, as if she’s searching for an escape route. It makes me feel sorry for her. I don’t want her to bolt on me.

  I say, “For instance, high school. What was high school like?”

  “Oh,” she says. She seems to relax. “I thought you meant…” She shakes her head and stops. “High school…” She thinks for a second, then turns back to me. “Well. There were lots of dances and hockey games and things to do if you wanted to do them, I guess.”

  I make my voice all sweet. “Did you want to do them?”

  “Want to? Me?…Maybe, a little. Sometimes. But I never did. I’ve never been much for, I guess you’d say, socializing and that, eh? I’m timid. That’s why I like it here. With the little children. They take you for what you are. No one expects me to be much of a talker.”

  She looks at me again and smiles. Her eyes go back and forth across my face. It’s too intense. It’s like something a mother would do.