DAIR (13 page)

She looked so vulnerable, and I wanted to ravage her again, just like that.
 

“Heath found us,” she said quietly, and my entire body stiffened.
 
“This house is being watched.”
 

“I don’t understand.
 
How?”

“He made you the night you went out with Lourdes and has had eyes on us ever since.
 
He was actually being considerate, letting me have a little time with you, as long as I wasn’t risking myself, but he spoke to me tonight and said it’s time to go back.”
 

I shut my eyes tight, fists clenched.
 
“No,” I said firmly.
 

She didn’t argue, just washed off her makeup and got back into bed with me.
 

I must have slept deeply that night, because I didn’t rouse when she left.
   

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

I was sitting through one of my rare phone conversations with my mother.
 
She was going on about something, and all I could think, as I usually did, was what a strange woman she was.
 
Or strange to me, at least.
 
I’d never understood her.
 
It was hard to even relate in the most superficial way, most of the time, though luckily she didn’t require that of me.

We weren’t close; she’d always been too busy for that, even when I was in diapers, but you wouldn’t know it by our infrequent phone conversations.
 
At least on her end, the flow of information seemed endless, as though we did this every day, not every six months.
 

Though it should be noted that, for my part, I hardly got a sentence in.

She’d been an English professor at Columbia for over forty years—starting at a time when it was rare to see women on campus, let alone teaching—and showed no signs of ever retiring.
 
It was consuming work, always had been, and when she decided she had time to talk to me, she expected me to listen, even if we hadn’t spoken a word to each other in months.
 

She was the epitome of successful not only in her career, but in her marriage and her personal associations.
 

The one thing I knew with certainty about her, more than anything else, was her need for the world to admire her and her accomplishments.
   

When the notion of a woman having it was mentioned, Susan Johnson-Masters should have come to mind.
 
Married to a man as successful as herself, best friends with the first female vice president, a force to be reckoned with in academia, a feminist trailblazer, and the mother of a
very
successful author, to boot.
 

Of course, you couldn’t look too closely at that mother part.
 
A nanny or six had made sure that I, her only son, was fed and cared for, because she sure as hell hadn’t been around for even one waking hour of each day to do it.
 
And while I
was
a successful author, in her circles it couldn’t help but be noted that I wrote
fiction
.
 

It wasn’t that I was bitter about my mother’s role in my life.
 
I was a few decades too old to hold onto any mommy issues.
 
But her part in my upbringing didn’t need to be over-exaggerated.
 
Even she would have emphasized that her priorities had never included being a caregiver.
 

And even when I’d been very young, I hadn’t been bitter.
 
I’d always been made aware of the fact (by her) that my mother had a mission in life that was far more important than just being one boy’s mommy.
 

She had
so much
to live up to.
 
Coming from a distinguished family, married to old money, and close childhood friends with two of the most notable women in the nation, one who grew up to be the VP of the United States, and the other the outspoken activist wife of a powerful senator.
 

If I was brutally honest with myself, Tammy had been something of a rebellious statement to my mother, which accounted for some of her attraction, at least in the beginning.
 
She was no Susan Johnson-Masters, in fact many would say she was the polar opposite, with very few personal ambitions.
 

Back then, Tammy had fed me some lines about wanting to live a life with an emphasis on family, and my young, already work consumed self had eaten it whole.
 
Wouldn’t it be great to come home to someone who wanted to take care of my needs?
 

Years had turned into decades, and Tammy, who’d waxed poetic about wanting to be a mother, had somehow never quite been ready
just yet
for that step.
 

Twenty years later, and I was well aware that joke had been on me.
 

My mother’s voice brought me back to our conversation.
 

“. . . As though that poor, dear woman hasn’t been through enough . . . ”

Ah.
 
I didn’t have to wonder who the dear woman was, though I hadn’t been listening prior.
 
My mother and her two closest friends had achieved such a prominent, noted level of success that my mother had become accustomed to updating other people of each of their statuses before she was even asked.
 
She did this when she spoke to me not because she even assumed I cared, but out of pure habit.

Though, incidentally, I did care.

The purpose of the automatic, obligatory update was for two reasons, as I saw it.
 
One:
 
To remind one and all about her important ties.
 
Two:
 
To assure everyone that the three influential women were as close as ever.
 

The dear woman could only be Diana, the VP.
 
If she had said sweet, I’d have known she was referring to the senator’s wife, Vera.
 

It went without saying that these two forces of nature could in no way be described as either dear or sweet, but you couldn’t have paid me to tell that to my mother.
 

And of course,
she
knew they weren’t either of these things, but calling them that was yet another reminder about how special their relationship was, pointing out to whoever was listening that she knew a side of them both that no one else had seen or would ever be privileged to.

“. . . First her daughter and son-in-law die in a tragic accident, leaving her to raise all three of her grandchildren herself.
 
And soon after, her oldest grandson cuts all ties from her, turns
criminal
, and has to be hidden from the public,” she continued.
 
“And all before he was even eighteen.
 
She could do nothing but suffer in silence and let him go.
 
And then her granddaughters, those two beautiful, darling girls, both pass away, tragically, at such tender ages.
 
And all of this she bears in silence, the epitome of a strong woman, and perseveres in her political career, holding the second highest office in the nation, a great example to all women . . . ”

She always spoke in what I liked to think of as her projecting/lecturing voice, every phrase thought out and rehearsed just so.
 
She didn’t need to use it with me, but it was old hat for her at this point.
 

“. . . And now this, this
outrage
, these accusations of corruption, and ties to the mob, and even talk of a criminal investigation!
 
All with some mysterious person, this witness that’s gathered this so called proof against her, yet remains anonymous!”

“You were saying, the last time we spoke, that there was finally some speculation that the deaths of her two granddaughters might be related,” I interrupted her, because that was literally the only way I’d ever be getting a word in.

“I said that?
 
No, no, that can’t be right.
 
They died a year apart.
 
No connection, and that is all, sadly, water under the bridge.
 
The press will forever have a field day with those two untimely tragedies, but it’s no use now.
 
Now there is something new and
dire
to deal with.
 
Just as she’s finishing up another successful term, she’s become embroiled in a scandal.
 
They are trying to put her
behind bars,
Alasdair.
 
Can you believe that?”
 

“Well, it won’t come to that, if she’s innocent, right?”
 

I had my doubts about the innocent part.
 
I knew Diana well enough to at least entertain the idea that she could be guilty.
 
She was a formidable, terrifying woman, capable of eating her own young, as far as I could tell, but you could add that opinion to the list of things I’d never be telling my mother.
 

“Yes, yes, of course she’s innocent, but think of the damage this is doing to her impeccable reputation.
 
It is tarnishing her good name.
 
She’ll never be able to run for president, if this continues to escalate.”

I made a note to tell Iris about this latest scandal whenever she showed up again.
 
She abhorred politicians on principal, and I knew I’d get a kick out of her reaction to a VP with direct ties to the mob.
 

“Now I know you don’t like to get sentimental . . . “

Me?
 
She thought
I
was the one that didn’t like to get sentimental?
 
This was news to me.
 
Well, not news so much as the pot calling the kettle black.
   

“ . . . But, I don’t know, I think it’s all this thinking about what poor, dear Diana has been through with her grandchildren, and I just wanted to tell you that I love you.
 
And, well, you must know this, but I’m extremely proud of you.”

I felt instant remorse for my usual snarky thoughts about her.
 
I’d just heard her mission statement so many damn times that it was easy to apply it in a way that dehumanized her, when I should have felt
 
a touch more sympathy for the single hardest working person I’d ever met.
 
I couldn’t remember the last time she’d taken a vacation.

“Love you too, Mom,” I said gruffly, the words feeling hopelessly unnatural, even if they were the truth.
 

When we finally hung up, I found myself searching online for news reports about Diana’s granddaughter, Francis.
 
She was the older of the two girls, the second to die in a tragic accident, and the one I’d actually known, however briefly.
 

She’d had an impact on me, though I’d only spent a small amount of time with her.
 
She’d been in her early teens, but already brilliant, a prodigy, and she’d been absolutely thrilled to meet me on one of the rare vacations where our families had all gotten together.
 
I recalled spending one memorable afternoon with her, where she’d interviewed me for some school project.
 

When I’d heard of her death, I’d been stunned.
 
And crushed.
 
I couldn’t get over how tragic it was for such a bright young person to lose their life so early.
   

I started out looking for pictures, because I had this strange, crazy suspicion, centered straight in the deepest pit of my stomach, that I badly wanted to shake, but I wound up reading news articles about the accident that had taken her life, because it had never added up to me.
 

She’d died in a car accident, in the middle of a storm that had washed away an entire bridge, right as her driver had been trying to cross an overflowing river.
 

Two people and the car went missing, but only the driver’s body and the car had been found.
 
Based on that, she was presumed dead.
 

I delved deeper and found several reports from the fringe media, nothing mainstream, about possible foul play.
 
It was all very out there—marks where the bridge had been that suggested explosives were the culprit, though the police statement vehemently denied anything of the kind.
 

Of course, the report then claimed that the police were in on it, or at the very least had been paid off.
 

It made me feel queasy.
 
What had happened to that poor, sweet girl?
 

I had to move on from those crazy conspiracy theories, they got me too worked up, and so I moved back to my main purpose, which was finding a decent picture of Francis, though I couldn’t exactly put my finger on
why
I needed to see one.
 

At least, not at first.
 

When I found a close up picture of her young face, I wished I hadn’t.
   

Some strange memories started to flood my mind.

As though I’d blocked them over time and behind bitter grief.
   

Francis was a beautiful girl, with pin straight black hair and thick glasses that hid her clear, intelligent eyes.
 

My mind was suddenly a flurry of strange, forgotten memories.
 

Green eyes, I suddenly recalled, though not from the picture.
 

From memory, and not just years old memories.

My hands covered my mouth, nausea rising up, as I remembered another pertinent fact.
 
I could recall some vague conversation I’d had with young Francis about her dying her hair black, a rebellious act, as her entire family, extended and otherwise, were blond from birth to death.