“Franklin,” he mutters. “Not that it matters.”
Susannah doesn’t seem to hear him. She continues her show-and-tell, her signature gold bracelets clinking as she points to the page. “This is our brand new graphic for Charlie’s Crusade.” She shows it to me, then Franklin, her face fairly luminous with her outstanding achievement in marketing. “You see? We’ve run this by design, and Kevin, and of course the general manager. It’s green-lighted to the top. Do you love it? I mean, do you love it?”
“I-” I begin.
“And that’s not all,” Susannah continues. She turns to the next page on her clipboard and holds it up. “Here’s the end page. It’ll be the final frame of all our video promotions. ‘Truth. Justice. The Charlie McNally Way.’” She shakes her head, apparently unable to comprehend the extent of her prowess and the potential for her own success. “The demos are going to eat it up.”
“I-” I begin again, then pause to see if she’s going to allow me to talk this time. She’s looking at me, expectantly, so I continue. “Susannah, you know I’m thrilled with the promo campaign.” This is actually true, because if you’re getting promos, you’re not getting fired. “But I’m just the slightest bit concerned that we’re a little ahead of ourselves.”
And actually, I think ripping off the Superman slogan is embarrassing. I keep that to myself.
Susannah’s face is hardening unpleasantly. She snaps her folder closed, and her nails tap, briefly, on its lizard skin cover. “Ahead? Of ourselves?”
“It’s just that Dorinda Sweeney hasn’t agreed to do an on-camera interview. Yet.” I’m trying to temper my annoyance with my understanding of office politics. But protocol aside, the news department should be telling the promotion department what to do, not the other way around. “And as I’ve discussed with Kevin, if we promise the viewers a story and then it doesn’t make the air, well, won’t that be difficult to explain?”
Susannah looks downright combative. Gold buttons at her wrists flashing in the fluorescent light, she pushes up the sleeves of her black-and-white houndstooth bouclé cardigan, seemingly in preparation for her return salvo. Before she can open fire, Franklin’s phone rings.
He looks at me questioningly. I wave him to answer. The interruption will give us all a chance to regroup. Especially me.
“Parrish, Action News.”
Susannah turns her attention to Franklin. So do I.
He tucks the phone into his shoulder, picks up a pencil and opens his spiral notebook.
Still listening to whoever is talking, he holds it up to show me the word he’s just written: WILL.
I look at Susannah, whose semi-snarky expression telegraphs I told you so. Fine with me. If she’s right that would solve a lot of problems.
Franklin continues the frustratingly impossible-to-gauge one-sided conversation. I can’t see his face. His only reactions are murmured and emotionless “mmm-hums” and “okays.” He writes again, then holds the notebook up a second time.
It’s two letters.
NO.
CHAPTER 8
Ethan Margolis has sent Mom even more peonies. I can see she’s had the newer ones placed on her nightstand. The older ones, still in full pink-and-white glory in their frosted-glass vase, have been relegated to the dresser. A suburbanista in tight jeans hosts some interior decoration show Mom has on, volume off, brandishing paint swatches and gesticulating mutely at a lineup of couches. The chrome-and-glass heart-respiration monitor beeps softly as Mom gives me a play-by-play of her day.
Tiny welts of blue-black bruises now underscore her brown eyes. Even the frozen peas haven’t successfully held down the unavoidable puffy eyelids, overplumped cheeks and angrily red still-healing lips.
“Does it…hurt?” I have to ask, taking my assigned seat by her bedside. “It looks like it might.”
Mom shakes her head, wincing after her first motion. She carefully pats the pink blanket covering her, indicating where her thigh would be. “A little,” she admits. “The lipo. And the tummy thing. Those, I must admit, are making me a bit more uncomfortable than I might have expected. But you know, they’re making me take these pills, four every four hours, and so it’s not so bad.”
Then she holds up her left hand, waggling her fingers and points to the multi-carat rock sparkling dazzlingly on her ring finger. “Here’s my secret,” she says. “Every time I feel like complaining, I simply think-it’s all for Ethan and me. It’s all for the wedding, and our honeymoon. Then I ask myself, is it worth it? And, of course, it is.”
She pats the blankets again. “Hello, size eight,” she says, almost to herself. “I can’t wait till they let me have a mirror. And when all the bruises are gone, Ethan will get his first look at his bride-to-be.” She looks up at me. “Your appointment with Dr. Garth is soon, right? This week?”
I’m happy to see her happy, of course. And Ethan is a perfectly nice guy. It would be silly for her to be alone the rest of her life. I wrap my arms across my chest, stopped, for a moment, by the realization that unless I can untangle the Josh and Penny situation, it’s more likely that I’ll be alone the rest of my life than she will.
“When do I get to meet your Josh?” Mom asks. “And his little daughter?
She’s reading my mind, of course. I’m not even surprised. Maybe she could explain to me how I’m supposed to turn sullen into sunny, and bread balls into domestic tranquility.
“Have you ever seen him drunk?”
Now I’m surprised.
“Drunk?” I ask. I can’t even imagine where she’s going with this. “Him? You mean-Josh?”
Mother nods. Even puffy, I can see she’s wearing her “pronouncement” expression. Like Rumpole. She who must be obeyed.
“Before you marry anyone,” she says, reciting gospel, “you must see him drunk, sick and with his mother. If not mother, then offspring.”
I can’t help it. I’m fascinated. Where does she come up with this stuff?
“Drunk?” I repeat. “Sick. And-offspring? Offspring?” I’m about to laugh, but I know Mom will not be amused.
“Drunk, so you can see whether he becomes affectionate. Or angry. It’s undoubtedly going to be one or the other,” she says. “Drunk reveals your true personality, without any filter. Sick-same thing. Is he needy? A complainer? And how they treat their mothers and children is how they’re going to treat you. They can’t hide or pretend, that’s their true colors.” Mom reaches over, and almost pets the petals of one fluffy white peony. Peonies are her wedding flowers. I know she’s thinking of Ethan. And maybe, Dad. “Trust me on this, Charlotte.”
Reluctantly, I admit-to myself, of course-she may have something here.
“Well, Moms, is this your own philosophy? Or something from your pal Oprah?”
“It’s from your Gramma Nell,” Mother says, flickering a glance heavenward. “I promised her I would pass it along to you when I thought you needed to know it. And from the look on your face when you speak of your Josh, I decided it’s time for you to know it.”
I wonder if Dorinda Sweeney had ever seen Ray drunk, or sick, or with his mother, before she married him. I wonder if her mother, Colleen Keeler, cared as much about her daughter’s future as my mother seems to about mine. By all accounts, she forced Dorie to marry him. For money and security. What if Colleen hadn’t felt pressure to make sure her daughter made the “right” decisions? What if Dorie had said no? And no question, Dorinda saw Ray with their own daughter. Maybe she didn’t like what she saw, somehow. What if that’s when Dorie finally fought back? Took action to protect her only child? But from what?
“You know the story we’re working on about the woman who supposedly murdered her husband?” I say. “Protecting her daughter-if he was inappropriate, or something-that would be a motive, mightn’t it? From a mother’s perspective, I’m wondering, how far would one go to keep a daughter safe?”