Diary of a Stage Mother's Daughter: A Memoir (12 page)

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Authors: Melissa Francis

Tags: #Biography & Autobiography, #Personal Memoirs, #Entertainment & Performing Arts

BOOK: Diary of a Stage Mother's Daughter: A Memoir
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When Mom picked us up at the end of the evening, she failed to detect any evidence of our misbehavior. This shocked me. In addition to the wine coolers, Dina and Tiffany had spent the night smoking clove cigarettes, which had a sweet, sickening smell to them. We’d doused our hair with Aqua Net hair spray to mask all the different illicit odors, but I never thought the trick would work.
 
 
After our riding lesson, Tiffany and I walked our horses around the field to cool them down. I patted Alondra’s muscular neck, and she snorted and tossed her head. Like a child who had spent an entire hot day in the pool, Alondra was gloriously worn out.
“Hey, so I saved you from spending the night at school today,” Tiffany said.
“Yeah?”
“Mom was lying on her bed eating chips and I asked her who was driving you home. She shot to her feet like I’d lit something on fire. So classic,” Tiffany said shaking her head in disdain.
“Yeah, I could tell she just completely forgot to come get me,” I said, stroking Alondra’s blonde mane. I hadn’t fully recovered from being abandoned at school. The helplessness I’d felt while sitting alone on the bench still stung.
“Don’t feel bad, I’m going to get thrown out of my carpool, she’s forgotten us so many times. Maybe I could set a timer for her in the morning. She does absolutely nothing all day long. All she has to do is pick us up!” Tiffany laughed, though neither of us really thought it was funny.
“I just don’t get it,” Tiffany continued. “I would be bored watching TV all day. There’s nothing on. Dina loves
Days of Our Lives
, but seriously, nothing happens on that show. You could miss it for two weeks and come back and they are all still in the same clothes, doing the same scene.”
“It would be awful to be on that show,” I agreed. “They do totally wear the same clothes for weeks. How do they keep the wardrobe clean that long? I guess they must have a dozen sets of the same outfit for emergencies or spills or whatever. And do they never get their hair cut? The continuity person must go crazy. It’s like that movie I did where it was the same day for the entire shoot.
Scavenger Hunt
. I spent weeks and weeks in the same pants and T-shirt. I never wanted to see that outfit again when that movie ended.”
Tiffany looked thoughtful as our horses ambled next to each other. “The cute guy from
The A-Team
was in that movie. What was his name? Dirk Benedict! Is that a real name? Either way, he was super hot. That movie kind of sucked though.”
“I know. It seemed like it was going to be funny.”
“I remember Mom laughing nonstop when she read the script. No one laughed in the theater though. But you were cute in it.” Tiffany dropped her reins altogether and her horse’s head sank almost to the dirt bridle path in front of us. “Mom is only happy when you’re working,” she said.
“I know.”
“She says, ‘We’re making money, not spending money.’ ”
“I wonder how much money we’ve made. Like, all together. Both us. Our whole lives? It must be millions.”
“She’ll never tell us.” Tiffany’s voice filled with contempt. More and more often these days I heard that tone in her voice whenever she talked about Mom.
“Do you have any idea how much we make a day? Or a week? Maybe we could add up how many days we’ve worked?” I wondered aloud.
“No idea. I’m not even sure Dad knows. Mom puts all the checks into our accounts at Security Pacific Bank. I wonder if the tellers would tell us if we went in?”
“Probably not. Ah, who cares.” I let Alondra’s head sink and dropped my feet from my stirrups, letting my calves stretch after the ride. I stretched my arms over my head, trusting Alondra not to run off while I twisted my tired back, vulnerably off balance.
Our horses lengthened their strides as we turned back toward the barn. The sun sank low behind the rolling hills and a gentle breeze blew in from the ocean on the other side of the mountains. The peace and tranquility of the night enveloped us.
“We’d better put them back in their stalls for the night. I’m sure Mom’s getting antsy,” Tiffany said as we reluctantly made the final turn and headed in.
 
 
When we pulled up to the house, our cocker spaniel, KC, did not come out to greet us. Usually when we pulled into the driveway, the headlights caught him hopping out of his dog bed, tucked into the protection of our front porch. He never failed to greet us.
I got out of the car and went over to the porch to see if he was there, just moving more slowly than usual. Nothing. Then I circled around the back of the house to see if he’d been accidentally locked in the backyard. He wasn’t there either.
“There’s a note,” Tiffany said, returning from inside the house. “Dad went to go get him from the pound.”
“The pound?” Mom sounded alarmed.
 
 
When Dad pulled up, KC jumped out of the passenger seat, his tail already wagging. He jogged over to us as we ran through the front door toward him. Mom stopped in the doorway.
“What happened? Why was he at the pound? Did he get lost?” she asked.
“Let’s go inside,” Dad said, looking over the fence into the neighbor’s yard below.
KC followed us inside the house, which Mom never, ever allowed. This was a special circumstance since we’d nearly lost him. He didn’t know what to do first, but rather than pee on the furniture, he wisely chose to head for the kitchen.
“Come here big guy,” Dad said, pouring dog food in a dish on the kitchen floor. KC looked no worse for wear, just shocked to be in the house. He wagged enthusiastically at the attention and wolfed down the food.
“The neighbors in front called the pound about the cats,” Dad explained.
We had a stray cat population gathering on the side of our house. I’d started feeding a few strays, and apparently they’d told every cat in the neighborhood, and the population exploded. They fought and made noise. Mom didn’t allow pets inside the house for more than a visit, so I couldn’t really separate the few cats that were ours and bring them inside to feed them. I kept putting food outside because I didn’t know what else to do, and the problem ballooned.
Our neighbors left a note complaining about the infestation. Then they came by to talk to Mom. She basically told them to get lost, but the truth was, we had no idea what to do now that the problem was out of control. The cats had congregated on our property and they weren’t leaving.
The neighbors threatened to call the animal pound, and frankly, we welcomed the help.
“The animal catcher decided the best way to get our attention was to take the dog,” Dad explained. “He’s groomed and fat and wearing a collar with his name on it. Clearly we’d miss him. They wanted to get our attention, but I guess they didn’t want to actually help with the cat problem. Or they couldn’t catch the cats, since most of them are wild.” Dad smoked a cigarette while he told the story.
My mouth opened in shock. They’d stolen the dog to punish us. It was my fault for enabling the cat population to flourish.
Mom’s face burned red with anger. “How dare they.”
“Who? The pound? It was actually pretty smart,” Dad said, taking another drag. “I asked them what they wanted us to do. I told them they weren’t ours. They just showed up looking for food.”
“And what did those assholes say?” Mom didn’t swear very often and when she did, she sort of tripped on the words as if she had a hard time forming them.
“They said the neighbors said they
were
ours. And it doesn’t matter what we say anyway because when the pound came by, all the cats were here looking for food.” He picked up a gallon jug of wine from where he kept it under the kitchen counter and poured a glass.
“Apparently, it’s not legal to have more than three cats or something,” he continued. “We need to have them fixed. I said they aren’t ours, and we can’t catch them anyway! I’ll pay to fix them, or whatever. That’s not the problem. We can’t
catch
them to do it. They didn’t give a shit. They don’t know what to do and they’re the fucking
animal control
. That’s their whole job! I told them to take them, and they basically ignored me. Fucking bureaucrats. They don’t have a clue.”
I hugged KC, feeling very lucky to get him back and frightened that I had put him in jeopardy.
“The Parkers. It’s their fault. How dare they call the pound. They’ll pay,” Mom warned ominously. She grabbed her purse and her keys and walked out the front door without saying another word.
We watched her headlights pull out silently, all wondering the same thing.
“What’s she going to do?” Tiffany finally asked.
“I don’t know,” Dad confessed.
“I saw her take a hammer and hit someone’s car in the parking lot outside the mall last week,” I said.
“What?” Their heads swiveled toward me and Dad looked shocked. Finally. He never seemed surprised when I told him about the scrapes Mom got into.
“Some guy beat her to a spot, and when she pulled up and yelled at him, he just cursed at her and went inside the mall. So she got a hammer out of the trunk and smashed it into his door, making a huge dent,” I said. I let the shock sink in.
“I was so scared someone was going to come and arrest us,” I added, reliving the incident.
“She had a hammer in the trunk?” Dad asked, as if that were the most shocking part.
“Yeah, she said she put it there for that reason. Because of the last fight she got into in a parking lot.”
Dad shook his head and then started laughing at the absurdity of the story. Then Tiffany and I started laughing too. Who ever heard of a suburban mom carrying around a hammer to punish her competitors in the parking lot? You had to laugh.
 
 
A few hours later, I heard Mom pull back into the garage and come inside the house. She went directly upstairs into her room. Dad huddled in front of the television downstairs in the den, where he spent almost every night, watching television until way after we all fell asleep.
I got out of bed and stole into Tiffany’s room, which was right next to mine. “What happened?” I whispered. Her light was off but I knew she was still awake.
“I have no idea. I don’t care. Go to bed.”
I couldn’t stand it. I went down the hall into Mom’s room. I crept in and sat on the edge of the bed. She saw me, but didn’t look directly at me or say anything. I knew something bad had happened, because she just stared at the TV and didn’t meet my eyes.
When she didn’t say anything for a while, I stood up preparing to leave.
Then I saw the collar in front of the TV, reflecting the light. I took a step closer to get a better look at it. I felt my mom studying my face while I tried to work out what had happened.
“It’s Coco’s. The Parkers’ dog. I took her in my car, and I drove her out to the pound in Simi Valley. And I turned her in. A lost dog. Like KC.”
I calculated what that meant in the silence that followed. She had the collar, so the pound had no idea whose dog it was.
“But they don’t know who to call to rescue Coco,” I said, looking at the collar.
“That’s right.” There was an edge to her voice I rarely heard, but I knew enough to get away as fast as I could when I heard it.
 
 
Without the collar, the pound had no idea who the dog belonged to, no name, no one to call. And Simi Valley was miles away, much farther than a dog could go on foot. The Parkers would never think to look all the way out there. They’d assume Coco got lost on her own, and they’d drive through the neighborhood or go to the dog pounds nearby.
They’d never find her, and the pound would eventually kill her with the other strays that weren’t lucky enough to find a home.
Coco was a sweet dog, but old and kind of matted. She loved a nice pat on the head or one of KC’s dog treats. She was friendly but reserved now that she had aged. She was not the kind of dog that would ever get adopted by a family looking to rescue a pet. She would never speak up and save her own life.
Mom had effectively murdered our neighbors’ dog as revenge.
 
 
I got in bed and cried into my pillow. I wanted to tell the neighbors, leave them a note, so they could save Coco’s life. But I was so scared of what Mom would do to me. The Parkers would confront her or report her, and she’d know who had told on her. Who knew what she’d do to me then?
Coco was going to die. And, one way or another, the situation was completely my fault. I’d created the problem by feeding the cats, and now I was too frightened for myself to stop the consequences. I wanted to help Coco—how could I live with myself if I didn’t? But if I saved that poor helpless dog, and Mom found out I’d betrayed her, as she inevitably would, who would save me?
No one. I couldn’t risk it. Poor Coco.
CHAPTER EIGHT
 
I
went into Tiffany’s room and sort of wandered around, looking at her things. She’d plastered her walls with posters of her favorite bands like a typical fifteen year old. Billy Idol made three appearances around the room, clenching his fist and snarling his lip on the cover of his trademark album
Rebel Yell
. He was by far her favorite. But other superstars of 1984 also made the cut: U2, Madonna, Adam Ant, the Psychedelic Furs, and a few throwbacks like the Sex Pistols. She’d recently developed a strong taste for punk mainly because the wild look and frenzied beats made Mom nervous.

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