by Ewens, Tracy
“You know Pete, your father loved you so much, and I adored him, but he left us. He made that choice. This neighborhood, our circle, is not responsible. I’m not to blame and neither are you. He loved it here and wanted to make a life for us. We lost him somewhere along the way but stop trying to undo everything we’ve built here.”
“Mom,” he took her hands, and she sat down, “I’m not trying to undo anything. I live in New York now. I was asked to come home and put on this play. I’m helping, I just have a hard time being here. I don’t understand why he left, so maybe in the past I’ve blamed you or this place.”
“I’m not perfect, and I’ve stumbled more times than I can count, but I lost the only man I’ve ever loved. The sunlight is a little dimmer now, and nothing will ever be the same. Cut me a break. I’m trying to piece myself back together. I know I’ve hurt you, embarrassed you, but there’s no handbook on this stuff. Things turned ugly, but I,” she touched his face and continued, “I love you and your sister so much. There are no words. Love’s that way. A person can get sick with love. Your father, oh, I was so weak for that man, and then he was gone. Maybe I pulled back from you and your sister because my heart couldn’t take it, but, I’m here, I’m repairing myself, and we’ll be fine.”
Peter pushed away from the table, stood, and looked out over the yard. April could see the pain in his eyes and she knew so much of it was hers to heal. She had struck a chord, but Peter was not about reality since his father left. He needed someone to be the bad guy. He needed a villain. If there was no evildoer, well, that simply meant things were unfair or his father gave up. So Peter dealt in the abstract, kept it loose. That way he never had to really put himself out there.
“You need to stop judging everyone and assuming they’re judging you. This is your home, these are your roots.”
Peter stared straight ahead, cursing himself for stopping by. He saw this going differently in his mind when he had stormed in to talk with his mother.
“So how are you going to get her back?”
Peter’s head snapped to look at her. Shit, he thought, things just got worse.
“I mean I hope you’ve got a plan because she seems pretty content to leave your ass in the dirt. I can’t say that I blame her, you’re a slippery one. You really need to work on that.”
Peter laughed, he couldn’t help it. His mother was giving him advice, putting him in his place. Well, this was rich.
“Mom, I’m not slippery. I was working on a plan. Christ, I came back for her, and things were fine, but then she can’t get over what happened. She thinks I’m self-centered, that I’ll leave.”
“And what exactly have you done to show her she’s wrong?”
Peter fumbled, it was a simple question, but he didn’t have one answer. What had he done to prove her wrong? Well, he flew to New York without talking to her first. That was a brilliant move.
“I’m not sure.”
“You’re not sure. That’s a ridiculous answer. You know what your father would say, don’t you?”
Peter was pretty sure this was the first time his mother had ever casually mentioned his father since he died. He was really going to have to get used to this new April Everoad.
“He’d tell you exactly what he used to tell you before all those talent shows you put on. He’d sit you down and say, ‘Sure, this is going to be a challenge, but everything can be accomplished with a plan. You need to know your end game, son.’”
April laughed, “Oh, remember that. He was like some coach in a movie, and you would sit on that couch and look at him like he had all the answers.”
She was lost in her memory, and when she turned to Peter he was silent, looking out over the garden, and tears were streaming down his face.
She turned and wrapped her arms around him. It was like a dam broke somewhere. His mother held such sadness and love for him at the same time. Peter sobbed, and they both stood holding on to each other. The ache in Peter’s heart was soothed by her honesty and the memory of his father. He hugged her tightly and felt like he was giving her something back too. How long had she gone without feeling, without really noticing, her children’s hugs?
Peter sighed and quickly wiped his tears. He still had one arm around her as they walked into the house.
“It’s good to have you back, Mom.”
“Yeah, well you better fix this thing with Samantha and give me grandchildren. All this drama may drive me back to the bottle.”
Peter laughed and heard his father’s voice, “What’s your end game, son?”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Sam got out of the shower and dried off. She felt beaten up. She had decided last week after leaving the Everoad house that even if it was too late for her and Peter, Peter’s mom was sober, his sister was happily married, and somehow Sam knew Peter would be all right. He would go back to New York and find some lesser-than version of happiness, and she would find the same. She was resolved, but she was still crying.
Last night had been difficult because Sam and Henry had been dining at the Raymond when Peter walked in with Spencer and Julie. He’d acknowledged them and shaken Henry’s hand. Julie and Spencer even made small talk with Sam. They asked how she was feeling since the accident, told her they were excited and ready for the premiere, and that they both missed her. They finally took a table, Peter looked up at her a couple of times while they were eating, and when she couldn’t take it any more, Sam pleaded with Henry to take her home. It was all perfectly civil, perfectly distant, and completely awful. Sam fell asleep on the couch watching Some Kind of Wonderful. It was in her Netflix queue; she couldn’t resist torturing herself a bit further.
Sam had spent the last four years feeling rejected and— there were no pretty words for it—angry. Angry that her love was not returned, angry that she was not only rejected personally, but on some level professionally as well. When she was little, her father used to tell her to take her anger outside and that when she had kicked its butt, she could come back inside. Last night, some time before the movie started, Sam had kicked her anger’s ass. She let it go, and she realized that she loved Peter enough to wish him genuine peace and happiness.
Sam’s eyes were burning, and she was sure, as she cleared a spot with her hand on the fogged mirror, that she looked like Quasimodo. Sam’s face came into focus in the mirror, and she was thankful she felt worse than she actually looked. Some cucumbers, a little ice, and she would be fine by tonight. In time to cry at the premiere, she thought. As the benefits of crawling back under the covers rolled through Sam’s groggy mind, there was a knock at her door. Before she could get to the knob, a key turned and Piper, her old roommate from LA, was pushing her way through the door with bags and boxes.
“Good morning, sun . . .”
She dropped everything and looked at Sam.
“Okay, maybe not sunshine just yet.”
She touched her cheeks.
“We can work with this. Oh, Lord, we’ll have to start right away.”
“Good morning to you too. That key was for emergencies,” Sam mentioned as she grabbed a bagel from the bag Piper was holding.
“What the hell are you doing here, and God, why are you so chipper?”
Piper set everything down and smoothed her bright yellow sundress.
“Well, your luscious brother called me last night, and unfortunately, it wasn’t because he wanted to climb into my bed. He told me you needed me, but were too stubborn to ask,” she said, reaching toward her bags.
“So . . . I decided, that’s right, I made the decision, because you’re, well, you’re a mess. So, I decided that your little collection of black dresses would not work for tonight’s festivities.”
“Oh, Christ.”
Sam threw herself on the couch and picked the soft part out of the bagel. She closed her burning Quasimodo eyes and tried to will her friend mute. Why had Henry unleashed the fashion dragon?
“Don’t ‘Christ’ me. Henry called me last night.
”
Mistake, clearly a lapse in judgment, Sam thought.
“And he told me you’re being very adult about all of this. I get that you wish Peter the best, and you’re moving on, but honey, I’ve seen Peter, and, Lord, if there wasn’t the ‘never date your oldest friend’s ex’ rule, I’d be all over him.”
“Thank you, Piper,” Sam moaned from under the pillow she now had over her face.
“This is such a great help. Can we talk more about how sexy Peter is too? Maybe we can also talk about how brilliant he is and how talented. I’m so glad you’re here to help reinforce that I made the right decision.”
“Yeah, well I’ll never understand that one, but it’s your life, sweetheart. Do you have any coffee in this tiny little place?”
“Ahhhh! Try the little counter in the tiny kitchen. It’s on a little timer, so it should be all ready. Will it shut you up?”
Thick with sarcasm, Sam threw the pillow to the end of the couch.
“Nope,” she said, still talking as she went for coffee.
“Anyway, you may have accepted you don’t want Peter . . . oh, too harsh, that Peter’s incapable giving you what you need? Yes, that’s prettier, that sounds better.”
“Yes, much better,” Sam nodded, chewing on her bagel.
“Right, anyway, you need to knock him to his knees one more time, so he remembers forever what he messed up. Wait, are we sure he messed up, or was that you?”
“Oh, shut up please. I’m a little concerned about what’s in those bags.”
Looking again at the tight-as-sin yellow sundress Piper was prancing around in, Sam knew she had good taste, but Piper also had no problem sharing her body with, well, lots of people.
Piper made a face at the coffee and ran over to her packages.
“You need to wear . . . this.”
She pulled the zipper on the garment bag and pulled out the most indescribable dress Sam had ever seen, and she had been in some pretty great dresses. It was dark, but it shimmered; it was floor length, but sexy and understated. It was not black and Sam loved it instantly. Piper swept the dress back and forth in front of her as if she were waving a flag.
“Where, where did you get it?” Sam asked.
“Interested now, aren’t you? Well, the seamstress that does all of my dresses in LA, you know the one who works for Dolce?”
Sam nodded.
“She made this for a client, and at the last minute she started losing her hair, the client did, and I guess couldn’t go or checked into a detox place or maybe it was a . . .”
“What?”
Sam was sitting up now.
“Yeah, I don’t know, and I didn’t care, because when Silvia, that’s my lady, showed me the dress, all I could think of was you. I took it and then brought every shoe I could think of to go with it. This dress, this dress, Sam, is your goodbye. You can’t say goodbye to the love of your life in another damn black dress.”
She’d exhausted herself, it was a common occurrence for Piper, and she dropped into the chair across from Sam.
“Piper.”
“What? I’m not taking no for an answer on this one. There’s no way I’m going to let you. Sam, this is tragic and you need to look absolutely . . .”
“Piper.”
“What?”
“Thank you.”
Sam would have cried if she had tears left, but instead she plopped herself right in Piper’s lap and hugged her.
“Oh, honey. You’re welcome. You’re going to look so gorgeous. I really want you enjoy tonight. He’ll drool. I know you dumped his ass, and I can’t say I agreed with that decision, but he’ll definitely drool.”
They both laughed.
“Well, drool is good, right? We’ll settle for drooling, but we need a proper breakfast.”
“I couldn’t agree more. Let’s get you up and out. We have spa appointments this afternoon, and we need a few Bellinis before we get you all purified and beautiful.”
Sam felt better, she truly did. Tonight would be fine. She would say goodbye, make her peace, survive. The idea of Peter drooling one last time did have merit.
Before they left for the spa, Sam called Candice to make sure she didn’t need anything. Even though she had been away from the production, Sam was back to working in the office, and she’d received and reviewed the final programs. They were perfect. When they arrived last week, Sam had remembered when she and Peter proofed them before leaving for Catalina. That was a much better time, she thought. Why did it always seem like her life with Peter was in memories? Candice said everything was great and all Sam needed to do was show up.
After her day with Piper, Sam was shiny and manicured. Piper dropped her off at the house, but then had to leave for a date with her “man of the month” as she called him. He was probably way too old for her. Piper was great at giving advice, but she was clueless when it came to herself. “When a man’s children are older than you are, it’s a clear indicator that something is wrong,” Sam had said. Piper had laughed her off. Sam thanked her again and waved goodbye.
Maybe Sam’s parents were right, maybe she was always tired, because walking into her house she felt relaxed and pampered. She looked at herself in the mirror as she put away the yummy bath stuff from the spa. Leaning into the mirror Sam noticed the whites of her eyes seemed whiter. The spa agreed with her.
Sam didn’t really know how to relax. Maybe Peter wasn’t the only one running—except she was running in place, running herself ragged. Since she started working at the Playhouse, Sam had been going nonstop to prove, mainly to herself, that she wasn’t a trust-fund girl, that she had value and could be good at something. Looking at her exfoliated and glowing face in the mirror, Sam decided it might be time to give herself a break and to learn to relax.
She put on the kettle for hot water. Piper had instructed her to only drink hot green tea for the next three hours until she left for the theater. Sam put on John Mayer and followed directions. After about a half hour of sitting on her couch, John Mayer proved too sad, too introspective, so she changed playlists. By the time she was finishing her makeup it was Lady Gaga. Even if she understood what the hell she was singing, there was no way she was crying to Lady Gaga. Gaga was safe. “Absolutely no crying” was another Piper Rule.
The dress was strapless with a heart-shaped neckline. The base of the dress was dark purple and then a sheer, silvery blue tulle flowed from a crystal-encrusted bodice that fit Sam perfectly. The same crystals then dripped down into the skirt of the dress as it fell to the floor. It looked weightless, but was actually quite heavy. Her shoes were barely-there sandals made of the same crystals. Piper was good. She was very good.
Sam’s dark hair had dried into her natural wave, and she swept it up loosely into a side knot. Diamond earrings her father had given her when she graduated from high school and a gorgeous clamshell purse Piper had found in Santa Barbara completed the look. Sam did her own makeup because she didn’t wear a lot, and every time she had it professionally done she walked out looking like a clown. Standing in front of the mirror, Sam took a deep breath.
No more green tea. Another Piper Rule: “Once the dress goes on, no more tea, no food, nothing.” She was kind of a scary control freak, and what was really sick was even though she was gone, Sam still followed all the rules. Good friends seem to have that power.
Sam stood up straight, looked in the mirror, and smiled. She did look beautiful. She could count on one hand how many times she had said that about herself, but tonight was one of them. She felt good, alone in a gorgeous dress, but good.
Her mom and dad had offered to go with her in the same car, but Sam had arranged her own driver on the off chance that she needed to make an escape. She put two Altoids in her mouth. That doesn’t count as food, does it? The driver knocked at the door. She grabbed her purse and was off like Cinderella, but it was different, very different.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The Pasadena Playhouse was completed in 1
924. The pamphlets the Playhouse distributed during tours and the blurbs in all of the programs explained that the playhouse was Spanish Colonial, designed by Pasadena artist and architect Elmer Grey. The theater company was actually started years earlier, in 1917, by Gilmor Brown. He produced plays out of an old burlesque house called the Savoy. Brown’s company rose to such prominence that the citizens of Pasadena raised the funds to build what was now the Pasadena Playhouse. The theater was built by, and has always been loyally supported by, the community of Pasadena.
The Playhouse has housed productions by some very famous writers, everyone from Fitzgerald to O’Neill. It has a proud history, and even though the theater sat dormant for almost seventeen years when Sam was very young, it would always be a legend and an important part of the community. As with all theaters, the Playhouse had some very difficult years. Financial nightmares, internal struggles, temperamental actors, and times when all hope seemed to be lost, but the Playhouse always managed to pull through and be there for its audience. It was a place where Pasadena’s community and people from other areas came together to escape their own drama and slip into a world of make-believe.
Sam loved what she considered her theater for so many reasons. New York and Los Angeles, San Francisco and London all had wonderful theaters, but the Playhouse was special. The first time she ever heard Shakespeare’s words spoken, Sam had been in very itchy tights, sitting in her theater. When she came home from her Hollywood dream, lost and confused, the Playhouse had inspired her to make her own way, to create a job that now perfectly suited her. She had worked tirelessly to ensure the theater was run efficiently and maintained with loving care. She helped Candice and the rest of the staff fill its seats with laughing school groups and aging arts patrons. They were a team, she and the theater.
Standing in the lobby, Sam felt grateful and so sad at the same time. Six months ago, this theater had brought Peter back to her, and tonight Sam would watch his play, laugh, cry, and then she would let him go. Things didn’t work out, but the Playhouse was still here with its glittering lights and warm wood to give her and Peter one more night of magic before the curtain fell and life went on.