“We can’t let you know the bad stuff,” whispered Sabrina. “Gotta stay upbeat.”
Gus felt physically ill. She’d been expert at scraped knees and college applications and bad boyfriends, and she’d been justifiably proud of how she supported the family after Christopher died. But seeing her beautiful daughterscrying before her was too much.
“That’s not true,” said Gus. “My whole world revolves around you two.”
“No,” Sabrina said glumly. “We’re just stuck in your orbit. I told you I didn’t want Troy around but you didn’t care.”
“I do care,” said Gus, “and that’s why I asked him on the show. You love him, I know you do.”
“You talk a lot, Mom,” Sabrina said. “Yabber, yabber, yabber. Always tellingeveryone what to do as if you have some secret recipe for happiness. Well, I can’t be happy all of the time. And it doesn’t make it easy to tell you about the bad stuff.”
“So what do you want to tell me?” cried out Gus, though inside, her heart was breaking. Of all the things that had hurt over the years, her daughters’ criticisms cut deep. She’d spent her entire life trying not to let them down. How strange, she thought, to be known publicly for being so nurturing and yet fail to comfort her own children. She felt naked. Disappointed.
Her instinct was to end the conversation, change the subject, and do something with her hands to keep busy. Let’s bake a pie, she could imagine herself saying if they were at the house. Don’t we all love banana cream? And they would have gone along. Glossed over things. It’s what the Simpsonsdid. What they all did. She could see that now.
“I thought we were doing so well,” she confided, reaching out. She held each of her daughters by the hand and squeezed gently.
“Okay, girls,” she said, taking a deep breath and not caring that she’d begun to cry. “Lay it on and start at the beginning. We’re going to figure this out. I don’t know how. But we will.”
They sat there, holding one another on the bed and sniffling a bit, burstingto talk and yet not knowing where to start. Over on the desk, Gus’s cell began to ring, at the same time as there was a knock at the door. A voice called Gus’s name.
It was Alan.
19
He’d rehearsed What he Was going to say for the last hour. I’ve got good news, he’d say, and then hit her with the bad. Or perhaps he ought to just come right out with it. Alan had hired and fired, but he’d never had to do anything quite like this. Hell, he’d never had anything like this happento him before.
“Hello, girls,” he said, stepping into the room when Aimee opened the door. “I need a few minutes with your mother, please.”
They’d clearly been crying; maybe they’d heard it from someone else?
“We’re doing some family stuff right now, Alan, though it’s nice to see you, as always.” Gus was pleasant but cool. She and Alan had been in limitedcontact since her lunch with him almost two months ago. And the Octopus Incident had truly altered her impression of Alan.
“It’s imperative we talk immediately.”
“Alan, if this is about that game of tag this morning, I can assure no one was being particularly mean to Carmen,” said Gus. “Whatever she might have told you.”
“Uh, okay,” he said. “I haven’t seen Carmen yet but no doubt I’ll hear all about it. That’s not what I’m here to discuss.”
Gus looked from Aimee to Sabrina to Alan, who all waited expectantly; she felt a strong sense of déjà vu.
“A family shouldn’t have secrets,” she told Alan. “You can talk to me in front of the girls.”
“Up to you,” he said.
And that’s when the thought hit Gus: Alan was here to fire her. Carmenwas getting the show to cook up all the overcomplicated dishes she wanted to. That’s how it was going to come down: Carmen was sleeping with Alan and now Alan was going to crown her CookingChannel’s Foodie Queen. Well, it didn’t matter, did it? Gus was more than set, thank you very much. She’d tucked her pennies away with care. And now she could take her daughters and go get Hannah and say a firm goodbye to Gary Rose and his silly pseudo-therapies.
“I know what you’re going to say,” said Gus. “So don’t bother.”
“You do?” Alan appeared visibly relieved. “Did you get the call?”
“So that’s why my phone has been ringing?” Gus picked up her cell phone from the desk and flipped it open.
“18 missed calls” was displayed on the screen.
“Couldn’t wait to tell me, could you?”
“I just phoned once, but I didn’t leave a message.”
“That would have been tacky,” Gus said. “Don’t you think?”
“Yes, I do,” said Alan. “Look, I’m really sorry. I feel responsible in a way.”
“In a way?” Gus was incredulous. “That’s rich.”
Alan laughed bitterly. “Or something,” he said. “It’s happened to me, too.”
“Oh, please, Alan,” said Gus. “I don’t think it’s quite the same.”
“No, it isn’t,” he said. “I still own the channel. That’s cushioned the blow.”
Gus appraised Alan closely. “I could just quit, make it easy.”
“What? First off, we have a contract. And second of all, what are you going to live on?” Alan looked around the room, then picked up the ice bucket and handed it to Sabrina, motioning that she should get some ice. Aimee joined her, hoping to give her mother some privacy with Alan.
“It’s the shock, that’s all,” he said. “Let’s get you a drink.”
Rummaging through the minibar, he pulled out a selection of tiny bottles.
“What’s your poison?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Gus. “Those things cost a jillion dollars.”
“It’s on the CookingChannel,” Alan said with a flourish. "C’mon, I’ll make it a double.”
“I thought I’d at least get a going-away party and a cake,” spat out Gus. “After twelve years it’s a drink from the minibar and the old heave-ho?”
“A triple,” Alan said, as Sabrina came back with the ice. “Drinks all around.”
“We’re celebrating,” Gus said to her daughter, feeling woozy even though she hadn’t had a drop. “Alan is firing me but I’m quitting first.”
"What?” said Aimee and Sabrina in unison.
“What the hell? Gus, have you seen the news today?”
“Hardly, Alan,” Gus said, a bit primly. “I’ve been running around on the lawn in capri pants. By your decree.”
“I only insisted on a weekend retreat, Gus,” he said. “The capri pants were optional.”
“I always thought I’d write a rather sentimental resignation letter,” she was saying, more to herself than to anyone. “Something handwritten, about how much I’ve loved the CookingChannel and how it’s changed my life. But that it was time to move on. Kisses and hugs and all of that.”
“Did your mother hit her head out there this morning?” Alan asked Sabrina.
“It’s been a rough day in general,” said Aimee.
“We’d have a clip show, all the bloopers. The kettle fire, of course.” Gus continued to talk. “That would have been fun.”
“Focus, Gus, focus!” Alan was shouting. He put a tumbler filled with an amber liquid in her hand. “Whiskey. Now drink up.”
“Why not, right, girls?” Gus tilted her head and gulped down the entire thing.
“Holy crap,” said Alan. “Slow down there, cowgirl.”
“You can’t tell me what to do anymore,” said Gus. “You are not, as they say, the boss of me. Anymore.”
“Yes, I am,” Alan said. He grabbed the remote control and flicked on a twenty-four-hour news channel, which had a “Breaking News” graphic flashing on the screen.
“
Looks like a lot of your favorite TV and Hollywood stars are out of a heckuvalot of cash
,” the perky newscaster in a blond helmet/hairstyle was saying.
“Turns out that popular money manager David Fazio was a con artist. Federal agents have been investigating—”
Alan pressed the mute button.
“You’re not out of a job, Augusta.” He soberly poured her another glass of whiskey. “You’re out of a lot of money. And so am I.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Aimee adjusted the TV to closed captioning, so she could read what the announcer was saying. It appeared that her mother’s investment manager had stolen from an impressive list of trusting celebrities. He, and the cash, had vanished.
“Here’s the deal: David Fazio has taken all our money and is sitting on a beach in Brazil with a floozy in a thong.” Alan added more ice to his glass.
“What?”
“Maybe she’s a brunette,” Alan said drily. “Maybe it’s the French Riviera. Either way, he’s run off with our cash.”
“Go slower,” Gus said, sinking into a chair. “Though I’m quite sure you’re mistaken. Last year I got a twenty percent return.”
“So did a lot of people. That return wasn’t from your money being invested,” Alan said. “It was simply taken from the new dumb schmuck investors who wanted to work with the guy who was the money manager to the stars.”
“I’m, I’m . . .” Gus found herself at a loss for words. Aimee came over and stood behind her, rubbing her shoulders.
“Your money isn’t sitting in a bank somewhere, Gus, nor mine, either,” he said. “It never was. He’s been using it, spending it, all along.”
“But the statements . . .”
“Fake,” Alan said, coming around with little bottles to top up everyone’s drinks.
“Alan, I’ve been David’s client since you introduced us. And he’s beaten the stock market every year. I had some trouble reaching him this morning but this news makes no sense,” she said.
“Fazio played us all,” he explained. “He used our funds to try and attract new clients with expensive parties and flashy dinners, then, once he had their money, too, he took it all.”
“I can’t believe this,” she said. “How did you find out?”
“The story broke this morning. Some reporter called me for background. And let me assure you, there are far bigger names caught in this guy’s trap than you and me.”
Alan squatted on his heels to be at Gus’s eye level. “Call your lawyer immediately,” he said, ticking off an imaginary list with his fingers. “Aimee, I want you to help your mother take stock of what’s where. Go through her papers. The good thing is that you’ve got the house, and you’ve still got the show.”
“There’s only a handful of episodes left in this ridiculous mini-season you ordained,” said Gus. “Then what?”
“Then anything you want,” said Alan. “You’re a smart one, Gus. Use this anger to fuel the show to new heights of ratings glory.”
“How?”
“Hey, I’m just the president of the channel.” Alan stood up. “You’re the creative around here.”
“What about Carmen?”
“She adds a certain spice to the show, don’t you think? I’ve made a lot of mistakes but she’s not one of them.”
“So you’re serious about her, then?”
Alan shrugged. “I guess,” he said. “But right now I’ve got to focus on the situation at hand. We both just lost a heckuva lot of zeros and I’d like to make some back.”
Chutes and Ladders. That was the game Sabrina had been trying to rememberfor Gary. Going up one, two, three spaces and then oops, all the way back down.
The memory of Christopher playing with the girls came back to her swiftly, a sudden spark in her brain. Gus opened her eyes: she was under her covers, the curtains closed. Was it night? she wondered, until she looked at the clock and saw it was only 4 PM. There was a faint scent of whiskey, waftingfrom the half-empty glass on the bedside table, and she recalled Alan, and the news, and her rapid drinking without benefit of lunch. Aimee and Sabrina had tucked her in, she recalled, and it had felt nice, being looked after. It reminded her of long ago.
Her head throbbed.
Christopher had been enthusiastic about Chutes and Ladders but would always—always—manage to turn the spinner so that he could land on a chute before he got to the top and then slide, slide, slide down behind the two of them. “I don’t believe in teaching my girls how to lose,” he would say over her protests. “I want them to be outrageously confident.”
Christopher had wanted her to be outrageously confident, too. Would he have been surprised to see her on television? She thought so early on but as she’d gotten older she’d come to suspect that maybe he wouldn’t have been surprised at all. His belief in her success never wavered, and he’d seen her through all her various attempts at different careers, when she was still intent on figuring out what it all meant. Life.
He’d converted part of the basement to a darkroom so she could do her own prints, putting in a sink and everything, and stayed up all night helping put the wicks into the swirly multicolored candles she made in her kitchen and sold in a nearby boutique. She had imagined a line of housewares even then, she thought wryly, not wishing to get out of bed now.
All that, even after he’d abandoned his career ambitions in journalism to make supporting her and the girls his number one priority.
“You gotta do what you gotta do,” he would say.
She appreciated it, inasmuch as she needed to eat and sleep and buy shoes for the girls, but secretly she had judged him for giving up so easily. She’d lacked compassion, she could see that now.
In the weeks after he died, she focused bitterly on all the ways in which he was difficult. How he was often late for work, and how he interrupted her when he felt she’d gone on too long.
It had been simpler somehow, to hate him for abandoning her. What she hated most of all was the knowledge, deep within her bones, that he had taken so much of her happiness away with him. That even those moments of sheer joy—when Aimee won a soccer game, when Sabrina won the lead in the school play—would be accompanied by the twist in her stomach and the inevitable guilt. She hated him for leaving her behind, and she hated herself for all the moments she had been petty and selfish with him.
She hated him for not being able to forgive her. For not being able to make her feel better. For leaving it all up to her. Gus had not been able to see her way to the future but stumbled blindly forward because there was no other direction to go.