#5 Icing on the Cake (8 page)

“I know you're not going to sell those,” I yelled out.

Ms. Pinky either didn't see me or ignored me. She went around back, completely ignoring me. The lady was crazy, and so was Slade. And
maybe so was I, more ready to leave a date than try and enjoy one. What a crazy night.

“Girls, it's time to go,” my mother yelled out the next evening when we had to accompany my parents to the Christmas party.

As the mayor-elect, my dad was the special guest, and he was on program to give a speech. None of us wanted to go. The designer Shelby was working with was having a Christmas party. Shelby and Ansli wanted to go to that. Avery was preforming at another party, and Slade wanted to accompany him. Sloan wanted to be at a Marks High School basketball game. Reese was playing, and she wanted to see him. I too had other plans I could have entertained. Paris called earlier, and his parents were going to take us to dinner. My parents weren't budging. They knew if they let one of us go our own way, all of us would have to be let off the hook.

“The limousine is here, girls. Your dad is not going to wait,” my mom called out.

“I'm down. It's the other four,” Slade said as she passed my door.

“I'm out too,” I said, remembering what she told me yesterday about not letting my sisters make me late.

I mean sometimes there just wasn't that much primping in the world. Shelby and Ansli had no excuse in my opinion because the two of them shared a bathroom. Slade, Sloan, and I had to share one bathroom. Yet when Sloan came down, it was the two older sisters who were taking the longest. When we got in the car, my mom was fussing at our tardiness, but I noticed my dad was so quiet. None of us had really seen him much the last week, he'd been so busy. The others didn't know what I knew about some of Dad's health issues.

I still wanted to ask him, “So did you get to the doctor? What did the doctor say? Do you need some medicine? Have you taken the proper rest? Talk to me.” But he could barely hold his head up. He was sweating. It was cold. In the bar of the limousine there were bottles of water. I took one, opened it, and drank a little.

“Anybody else want some?” I said, hoping my dad would say yes.

When he didn't, I just handed him a bottle. He refused it and handed it back to me. I was so frustrated.

As soon as we got to the Christmas party, my dad perked up. I could not explain it, but it was like he knew when to shine. He was waving, shaking hands, and doing everything a politician should.

I knew we were big time when we got announced on the loud speaker, “Mayor-Elect Stanley Sharp and his family!”

People stopped in the ballroom and just started clapping. I knew I was going to have to get used to the attention. However, I just wished people wouldn't make us into such a big deal.

“Yuri, there you are!” Ms. Pinky squealed coming out of nowhere.

I could have thrown up. What was she doing at the mayor's party? Why did I have to know her? I wanted to choke her for selling dirty cookies.

She continued, “Hello, dear! Your dad's gone up ahead, darn! But I'd love to meet your mother.”

“My mom's way up ahead too,” I told her.

“Well honey what good is it going to do me to work with you if I'm not going to get the perks in public? If all my friends around here see me talking to the first family-elect, my stocks stay up.”

“What are you doing here anyway, Ms. Pinky?”

“I'm a vendor for the city.”

“You?”

“Yeah, I cater a lot of the parties. I'm not catering tonight but … oh quit talking and take me up there to your mom.”

“I don't even see them anymore. I have to introduce you to them later.”

“Whatever!” Ms. Pinky said as she briskly walked away, heading to cozy up to someone across the way that she deemed important.

“That lady is a little snooty,” Sloan said.

“Yeah, you only know the half of it.”

“Watch your back with her.”

“I don't want to work for her,” I said, noticing she had sashayed on up to my parents on her own.

I realized she was not going to let me stand in the way of her own personal agenda. Sloan was dead on. Ms. Pinky had to be watched.

Finally, we got to our table. The table sat eight. There were seven of us in my family, so we had one extra seat. I didn't even want to stay there when Ms. Pinky walked over with my parents.

My mom said, “Yuri, look who's going to join us. Girls change up the seats so that Ms. Pinky can sit beside Yuri.”

I looked at Sloan like “don't you dare move,” but my sis had no choice. There I was, having to sit beside the phoniest woman in the city of Charlotte. She talked our ears off throughout dinner. I was so happy when it was my dad's time to give his speech.

My dad took the mic and said, “I love this time of year, the holiday season, so merry and bright. It makes me think of the future of this great city. The sun is shining our way,
Charlottians, and I am just honored to know our current mayor has done a great job. And I am honored and humbled that you all have given me a chance to pick up where he … where he …”

My dad started stuttering. Then he was shaking, and the next thing you know, he was flat on the ground. My mom stood in horror. My sisters were in shock. The crowd was in awe. I was miserable. Clearly, he hadn't gone to the doctor. Surely, I shouldn't have kept what I had known about his health to myself. As all of us rushed to the stage, I stopped dead in my tracks. I hated that I let my dad talk me into keeping his ill health a secret. I felt worse than horrible wondering why did I yield?

CHAPTER FIVE

“Get my girls out of here!” my mom screamed out, seeing the five of us in a panic. “Stanley is going to be fine. I just know it, but they need to go. Someone get them out of here now.”

All of us were utter basket cases as we watched our unresponsive father lie helpless. None of us wanted to move or go anywhere, but my mom was adamant. Though she was trying to be positive, she didn't want us seeing our father in this dire situation.

Ms. Pinky and the current mayor's wife escorted us out of the room. We couldn't leave
behind the mayhem. Many people were trying to figure out what was wrong with my father. Doctors who were in attendance had come up on stage. The five of us knew nothing except we were being shoved into a limo.

“Please take them home, sir,” the mayor's wife said to our limo driver.

But as soon as she stepped away, Shelby said, “No, no, no!. We're not going anywhere. They can get us out of the room, but they can't make us leave. Please wait a second.”

Ansli and Sloan were crying. Shelby and Slade were angry. I was still in shock. And when we heard an ambulance, we knew that wasn't a good sign. Our father needed emergency attention. This was serious. It felt like hours went by as we sat and waited for the ambulance to get to moving.

After ten minutes, the limousine driver let down the window and asked, “Are you ladies ready to go now?”

Shelby yelled, “No, did we say we were ready? Shucks! We're following the ambulance to the hospital when it leaves out. That's where
we're going, and that's when we're moving.”

“But I have strict orders to take you to your residence,” he said, recalling the mayor's wife's direction.

Shelby leaned to the window. “Man, can you hear? Those plans have been amended, and we have money if we need to pay you more.”

“No, no, it's covered. I just didn't know. I'm sorry,” he said in a calming voice, realizing she was going to tear him to pieces if he didn't concede.

“Yeah, you don't have to bite off the man's head,” I said to Shelby, wanting my sister to calm down. It was freaking me out that she was so upset.

“Don't tell me how to respond, Yuri. Don't tell me how to feel,” Shelby screamed.

“You don't have to jump on Yuri!” Sloan yelled back at her.

I shouted, “No, it's fine, Sloan. I can take whatever she's dishing out. This is a lot. This is hard on all of us.”

“Yeah, we need to stick together,” Ansli said, helping me bring peace to the growing chaos.
“We're family. Let's act like one.”

“If Dad is dead, what kind of family do we have?” Slade blurted out, quieting us all.

We were all way too stressed. Slade had a good point. If our dad was gone, we'd never be the same. It was taking the emergency crew an awful long time. Did that mean he was already gone? The waiting was torture.

Thankfully about five minutes later, the ambulance took off. Our mother had to be inside of it because we never saw her. Slade started praying. We grabbed on one another's hands, bowed our heads, and joined her. When all their eyes were closed, I opened mine. I looked up out at the sky and just wished I could go back in time. If so, I would have told my mother what I witnessed with my dad, and then maybe all of this could have been avoided. My heart was heavy as I knew this was all my fault.

We couldn't go as fast as the ambulance. So when we got to the hospital, the ambulance had already unloaded him. The five of us got out of the limo quicker than we'd ever gotten out of any vehicle.

Shelby rushed over to the desk, trying to find our mother. The four of us were circled together hoping for great news. Shelby didn't look pleased when she came back over to brief us.

“I think she's back there with him or something. Nobody is telling me anything. I don't know what's going on with our dad.” She went and sank on a nearby couch.

“If he was dead, we'd know,” Slade said, going over to Shelby to keep her uplifted.

“Yeah right, we'd know,” Sloan looked at Ansli and me and voiced hopefully.

Just then the mayor and his wife rushed into the emergency waiting room. He asked, “Have you girls heard anything?”

We all shook our heads. I saw his wife squinting, probably wondering why we defied her orders. I smiled her way hoping she'd not ask and just give us grace.

The mayor said, “Okay, I'm going to try and find some answers. Stay here with my wife. He's going to be okay.”

“So he wasn't dead on the scene?” Slade asked, sniffing.

“No, he still wasn't responding, but he was with us,” the mayor said. “And ladies don't worry, Charlotte has some of the finest physicians in this great hospital.”

The mayor was going on and on and on. I wanted to cut him off. We didn't even need a political speech. We knew Charlotte was great, but at this moment we needed to know that our father was okay. And if he couldn't tell us that, then he didn't need to tell us anything.

“I thought you girls were going to go home?” his wife asked us once the mayor walked away to go find answers.

“If it was your dad, could you go home?” Shelby stood and said to her.

“Point taken,” his wife said. “I just wanted to honor your mother's wishes. I do, however, understand. I surely would have come here too.”

We were all on edge. Seeing my sisters going through was eating me up even more. I needed space. I walked over to a corner to breathe.

Sloan followed. “What's wrong?”

“Same thing that's wrong with everybody,” I
said to her, unable to look her way. “I'm worried about Dad.”

“No, no, no, I know you. Something else is going on. It's like you're carrying the weight of all this.”

When she said that, I busted out crying. “That's because it's my fault.”

She tried to grab my hand. “What are you talking about?”

I stepped back and shared, “I knew Dad was sick.”

Then she stepped back and looked at me wanting an explanation. I had to tell all at that point. Sloan wouldn't let me if I decided to keep quiet now.

Tired of keeping what I kept a secret any longer, I shared, “I was with him a couple times, and he was faint and dizzy. He almost passed out, but he didn't, and he made me promise not to say anything but …”

Rolling her eyes, she cut me off and asked, “Wait, you knew he wasn't a hundred percent? You knew he was ill, and you didn't tell?”