Blueprints: A Novel (12 page)

“He’s right.” She didn’t blink. “It’s our family that’s associated with
Gut It!
One of us has to host it, and they don’t want me to do it.”

“But that’s not
right,
” Jamie cried. “They’re discriminating against you because of your age. You have to fight.”

“Oh, I plan to,” Caroline informed her, “but will I win? Doubtful. Let’s open our eyes here, Jamie. When I look at the rest of the entertainment field, this isn’t unique.”

“But you love your role on the show. You haven’t been this happy since—”

“—the divorce.” Caroline raised her chin and said, “So here’s a question for you. I’ve gone out of my way all these years not to put you in the middle, but I need an honest answer. How hard is your father pushing for this?”

Jamie did feel sandwiched. She chose her words with care. “He says he wants it for me. He keeps telling me how good it would be for my career.”

“Brad clearly agrees with your father. And they’re right. This would be a great move for you. You’ll make a fabulous host—and you’re ready. It didn’t occur to me, not once during the Longmeadow taping, but when I look back on it, you hosted more scenes than you ever have before.”

“It didn’t occur to me either, Mom,” Jamie came back in a beseeching voice. “That’s what I’m trying to say. It’s only in hindsight that I can see what they were doing. I didn’t plan it.”

“Jamie!”
Caroline shouted. “You were instrumental in choosing the next project and securing new sponsors. You brought in Taylor Huff, who is
your
contemporary. You even narrated segments on the hand-crafted built-ins that I made. How could you not see what was happening?”

“Did
you
see it?” Jamie asked. Her stomach was churning.

“No, because you’re my daughter, so I wasn’t threatened. Besides, I wasn’t in on your meetings with Claire. But you did tell me you were meeting with her. As I recall, it was practically every Tuesday morning.”

That was damning, Jamie realized. “Honestly? I just thought she wanted my perspective on things. I thought she was picking my brain.”

“You also took her shopping.”

“For shoes, because she has zero taste.”

“You went to a concert with her.”

“Because you hate Nine Inch Nails, and she got complimentary tickets.”

“You told her you and Brad were honeymooning in Paris. You didn’t even tell me that.”

Jamie was livid. “
She
mentioned Paris.
She
said it would be a good place to honeymoon. I agreed with her because there was no point in arguing, but if I haven’t picked a date for my wedding yet, how can I plan my honeymoon? Claire is a bitch, Mom. She’s making trouble.” She had a bizarre thought. “Are you
jealous
?”

“Of Claire Howe?”

“Of her thinking she’s my friend. She isn’t because (A) I have no time for friends and (B) you’re the only friend I need.”

“I’m not jealous. I’m just looking at the evidence and thinking that there’s no way you could have spent that amount of time with her without knowing on some level what she was planning. You’re too bright to have missed all the signs. You had to have known, even subconsciously, but you said nothing to me. This is my
life,
Jamie. Shouldn’t I have been involved in the conversation?”

“
Yes,
but it wasn’t my call, Mom. I guess I’m
not
so bright, but I did not know what they were doing until Thursday morning. I said I’d be the one to tell you, because Claire is abrasive and Dad is a bulldozer”—her voice rose—“but was I seriously supposed to tell you when you were recovering from surgery? And on your
birthday
? Was I supposed to tell you on your birthday that you were being replaced because of your age? Give me credit for sensitivity, at least.”

“But you do want this job.”

“Not at your expense. If it didn’t mean replacing you, of
course
I’d want it. It’s a dream opportunity. Who
wouldn’t
want it?”

“There you go.”

“That doesn’t mean—”

“Call it subconscious, but you were lobbying for it.”

“No, Mom. I’ve been doing what Claire wanted me to do. I’m the dunce here. I just went along.”

Caroline stared at her before whipping the goggles off her head and tossing them on the table on her way to the door. “Poor Jamie. She didn’t plan any of this. Well, poor Jamie is the one who stands to gain here.” She stormed toward the house.

“You sound like Grandma.”

Caroline whipped around. “Who was paranoid at the end because she suffered from
dementia.
Hah! The truth comes out—I am an old fool.”

“Mom,” Jamie moaned as Caroline whipped back and strode on, “I can’t do this. I
hate
confrontation.”

At the back steps, Caroline whirled around again. “Life lesson here. Confrontation is what happens when you are less than honest and you get caught.”

Jamie was losing it. Her relationship with her mother was more important to her than anything else in the world. “Okay,” she said, trying desperately to stay calm, “I’ll do anything to make this right. I don’t care about
Gut It!
Let it be canceled. Is that what you want?”

“Excuse me? Are you putting the burden of that on
me
?”

Jamie threw her hands in the air. “I can’t win. What do you want me to say? Okay.” She was beyond reason. “I wanted this. I planned it. Is that what you want me to say? It’s not true, but do the words make you feel better?”

Caroline trotted up the back steps. At the door, she shot a look back, but her gaze was so forbidding that Jamie couldn’t take another step. All she could do was to watch her go inside and close the door.

*   *   *

Driving back home, Jamie was beside herself. For the first time in her life, something stood between her and her mother. It wasn’t a person or even a wall, but more like that screen door slapping hard in her face. She could still see her old mom—same wavy hair, same green eyes, same strong arms—but now on the far side that she couldn’t reach. Anger was so not part of her mother’s usual behavior that Jamie didn’t know how to begin to handle it.

“How’d it go?” Brad asked, sounding concerned. He had been trying her, but it wasn’t until she was inside her clean, neat, sleek white condo that she found the wherewithal to call back.

“She totally blames me.”

“This is not your fault,” he said innocently enough.

“No? I played into Claire’s hands. I played into
Dad’s
hands.” She began wandering. “I should have seen it coming, but I didn’t, and she’s right, I’m the one who stands to gain from this. She used to trust me. Forget that now.” Her feet stopped moving. “When you called her, Brad, what did you say?” Whatever it was hadn’t helped, but she needed to know.

“I told her how worried you were.”

“About her.”

“Yes. That’s what I got from you.”

She felt a spike of frustration. She knew that Brad wasn’t good with parents, but this was as much about his understanding Jamie as anything else. “Did you not tell her that I think this change is a mistake?”

“It isn’t a mistake. It’s a carefully crafted move to improve the show’s ratings—”

“—which haven’t declined. So it’s a preemptive move.”

“That’s how successful ventures work. They have to stay one step ahead.”

“This isn’t a corporate venture. It’s a family show. Does that not count for anything?”

“It’s more than a family show.” He barely paused. “By the way, did you hear the forecast? Bad storms are moving in.”

Jamie couldn’t have cared less about the weather. “
Gut It!
is about MacAfee Homes, and MacAfee Homes is about family. When it comes to the show, Caroline is the matriarch. She’s the glue that holds it all together.” With a quick breath, she begged, “I need you to hear me, Brad. I don’t want this job. Maybe in the future, but not now. My mother earned it, she does it well, and viewers aren’t complaining about the way she looks. If they’re firing her because she’s too old, that’s grounds for a lawsuit.” She paused, got no reply, finally asked, “Don’t you think?”

“Actually, they’re within their legal rights. Her contract runs from year to year. They’re not kicking her off the show. They’re just shifting the cast around. And I mentioned the weather because if we get torrential downpours, having dinner in Boston tonight may not be smart.”

Their reservation was at a restaurant on the waterfront that had opened earlier that spring, but Jamie couldn’t think about dinner just then. “Claire admitted it was about age.”

“It might be, but this is entertainment. Actresses audition for roles all the time and fail to get them because they’re too old. Do you see them suing? I looked into precedent, Jamie. Caroline can sue, but the case will be tossed out before it ever reaches a court, and she’ll be out fifty grand for the attempt.”

“MacAfee will cover it.”

“We won’t. I asked.”

“Asked
who
?”

“Theo. Roy wanted to know. Neither one of them wants that kind of publicity. Listen, I know you’re upset, but stand back for a minute. If she can’t win this, wouldn’t it be better to accept the inevitable?”

“You mean, go out with dignity?” Jamie mocked.

“Yes,” he insisted with more enthusiasm in that single word than in any of the others preceding it, which annoyed her all the more.

“Okay, Brad.
You
stand back. Suppose I take this job. Suppose I hold it for a dozen years, and maybe the show has moved through a handful of mutations but is still going strong, and we’re married with three kids—”

“Two kids.”

“
Three
kids, and I’m over forty and maybe not so slim after the kids, and they decide they want someone twenty-five so they’re easing me out, how would you feel then?” Silence. “How would you feel if they did that to
you
?”

“I’m in a different field.”

Jamie simmered. “The correct answer would be ‘I’m a man. That would never happen to me.’ And you’re right. But how unfair is that? Your dad is bald, so
you
could well be bald. Think MacAfee buyers will ask for a younger lawyer? No, they will not, because your age gives you authority. It suggests knowledge and experience. Well, the same is true of Caroline MacAfee.”

“Jeez, Jamie,” Brad burst out, sounding bewildered, “what do you want me to say?”

Jamie could think of a dozen things, but she refused to spoon-feed him. Either he felt the cause or he did not.

Right now, though, she wanted to get off the phone and go to yoga. There was a class at one, and after a disastrous time earlier with Caroline and now a disappointing discussion with Brad, she needed a break. Granted it was barely ten. One was a ways off, and the class wasn’t far. But she had plenty to keep her busy, starting with the drawings for a residential project, for which she needed to visit a stoneworks company that MacAfee hadn’t used before but that carried the fieldstone she desperately wanted to use on this house.

“Gotta go,” she said.

“We have to keep talking. We don’t agree yet.”

“Brad, we’re not going to agree on everything. I need to go to yoga.”

“Watch the weather.”

“Okay. I’ll call you later.”

*   *   *

Concentration was a problem. She couldn’t sit still to work on the drawings, didn’t see the fieldstone she wanted, and when she got to yoga, the instructor was so like Caroline in age and looks that Jamie had to keep her eyes shut. Without a visual example, she was distracted and kept reverting to shallow breathing.

Brad had been right about the weather. By the time her class was done, the morning’s clouds had darkened to slate. Her mood was correspondingly grim. She needed Caroline.

As she drove home, she called. “Mom?” She paused. Nothing. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Caroline said. She didn’t sound it, but at least she had answered the phone.

“About this morning—”

“I don’t want to talk about it, Jamie.”

“We were both upset.”

“Right, so I’m not going there. Let it rest.”

“Nothing gets resolved if it rests.” She realized she sounded like Brad.

There was a pause, then a quiet “When it’s raw, it does, unless you want to do more damage?”

Invitation? Dare? Threat? Jamie felt like she might cry. “No,” she conceded and swallowed, but an ominous lump remained in her throat. She had to clear it to ask, “What are you doing tonight?” It was a petty question, but it kept the connection going.

“Having dinner with Annie, Linda, and Dawn.”

That was good. Jamie didn’t want her alone. “Dawn?”

“From the nail shop. Like Linda. Their husbands are all going to Fenway.”

“The game may be rained out.” Jamie thought she heard distant thunder, until she saw a truck roll around the corner a block ahead. “Okay. Well, be careful.”

“Yup.” No
You be careful, too,
no
We’ll work this out,
no
I love you, baby.
Just
Yup,
and the call ended.

eight

Jamie was bereft, which was why she caught a little breath of hope when she turned onto her street. Parked in front of her condo was Jess’s silver SUV with its yellow
TODDLER ON BOARD
cling-on decal in the back window. Seeing Tad was the one thing sure to distract her.

When the SUV started to pull away, she honked and waved.
Wait! I’m home! Wait!
The SUV stopped. After pulling into the garage, Jamie ran back outside with her eyes on the backseat.

“Hey, Taddy!” she called, waving at the shadow that would be the boy, then at the real one when the window smoothly lowered. His milk-chocolate hair was a mop of soft curls that were longer than Roy wanted but shorter than Jessica did. His eyes were an even warmer brown, his little cheeks red as ever.

“Mamie, Mamie!” he shrieked.

She reached for the door just as it clicked to unlock, and shot a thank-you smile at Jess. Only Jess wasn’t the one unfolding from the driver’s seat.

Seeing Roy, Jamie felt a stab of dismay. He was the last person she needed right now. Granted, he wasn’t looking as together as usual. He wore running shorts and a baggy tank, and his hair was messed. But his eyes were sharp, anger focused on her.