Family Affair (19 page)

“Everybody ready?” I say brightly.

“Almost everybody,” Trish says, after looking me up and down.

And we’re off—to nothing more spectacular than Duke’s on Sunset Boulevard. It’s a pleasant place, unremarkable except for the fact that it’s been a Foster family breakfast hangout since I can remember. I’m hoping the lack-of-planning aspect will be overwhelmed by the nostalgia.

Indeed, it might have worked perfectly, but the forty-five-minute wait for the table undercuts my pitch somewhat. And when we’re finally seated, there’s some rock star at the table next to us and nobody can focus on the menu because they’re all too busy trying to figure out if the person sitting with the rock star is a transvestite.

My mom thinks they’re both women. Scott has to tell Mom that she washed a T-shirt with that guy’s face on it probably a hundred times. The irony is that I used to make fun of this band solely based on the fact that this guy looked like such a chick—in his heyday, he was so androgynous it was almost uncomfortable watching his videos on MTV. And here he is sitting with another dude dressed up like a girl for completely different reasons.

Other than the sighting, breakfast is uneventful.

“That was good!” my mom says as we walk outside after we’ve eaten. “So good!” She’s in that peacemaker mode, where she sets herself in the middle of the tension and splatters positivity everywhere, hoping to get a little on everyone.

“Good, yes,” Scott allows. “Even excellent, maybe. But I’m not sure about big.”

I shoot a few eye daggers at him and everyone piles into the car.

“Trish,” Scott says, “you’re familiar with the concept of ‘big.’ A big event, a big plan, a big breakfast—”

She interrupts, “Big head, big deal, big pain in the—”

“Right!” he interrupts back.

“Would you consider that breakfast big? Because Brett was telling me yesterday that this was going to be big, and since Layla—”

“Not the breakfast
only,”
I say, with way too much energy for the moment. It’s clear I’m inspired by something poisonous deep inside: jealousy, inadequacy, vindictiveness, competitiveness. The day’s about to take a very dark turn. “That’s just the beginning,” I continue.

Right about now I’ve gotten myself halfway into the boat that’ll take me to hell. One foot is still on the dock. But I can’t do the splits. It’s all aboard the dinghy to damnation. Straight to Hades we go, boys. Anchors aweigh.

I get on the highway and take off east.

“Uh,” my dad says eventually, looking at his watch, holding it
at a little bit of an angle, as if to allow me to see, too. “I don’t mean to spoil the fun, but we’re kind of committed to being someplace in about fifteen minutes.”

“This isn’t the way home, that’s for sure,” Scott says, peering out the window. “Unless we’re doing the full circuit by way of China.”

“What’s up, Brett?” Trish says. “Where are we headed, seriously?”

“It’s a surprise,” I say. “To who?” Trish rejoins.

“Cell phones off!” I snap, a little too maniacally. “My
ex’s
rule!” And indeed, it is among the many amendments to the original Foster constitution, somehow devised by Layla, that cell phones are off on Sundays for the duration of any family outing. Mine will stay on, in case of emergencies, but no one else’s. Not if they want to play by the family rules.

I see Trish in the rearview mirror, surreptitiously trying to make a call, and I growl at her, “No! Off!” She and the others look horrified as I hold out the baseball cap I’ve been wearing to collect all of their phones. I don’t care if they think I’m nuts; this is
my
day. I set the hat full of phones down on the divider between the two front seats.

We’re cruising due east along Interstate 10, approaching Pomona and San Bernardino but toward nothing I know. This is an unbelievably deficient plan, but then most plans conceived in haste and out of one hundred percent pure, fresh organic spite usually are.

In the backseat I hear a promising conversation between Scott and Trish.

“This is an adventure,” my brother is musing. “Spontaneity is usually to Brett as tenderness is to you. But this is an adventure. It’s out there. I don’t know why you don’t see it as some sort of unpredictable, fun, zany—”

“Adventure, yes,” Trish says. “The word we’re both allowing is
adventure
. But right now, my keen anticipation is directed toward a shiny and respectable Chevron station, or a McDonald’s, or a Wendy’s and its frequently cleaned toilet. Because I
really have to pee and Brett’s not going to—”
“Trish,” Ginny says sharply.

“Yes, Mom?” Trish replies, and that’s as far as it goes.

“I bet we’re going to Knott’s Berry Farm!” Scott shouts after another mile of silence. He’s clearly excited.

And that’s it! I can now reveal that the brilliant scamp has guessed my clever plan. I’m in the clear, and what’s better, winning points on the cheap. Fill the fam up on ice cream and corn dogs, and the ’rents might even get a senior discount!

“But then why are we going east on Ten?” Trish asks. “Knott’s would be south on I-five. Keep guessing.”

Gulp
. She’s right. If he’d blurted out that proposal fifteen or twenty minutes ago, I’d be golden. Now I’m toast. I think in a panicked moment that I’ll take an exit ramp and turn around, claiming I was taking extra precautions against blowing the surprise too early. Or I could triangulate south on … what? The 605?

“He could be taking the Six-oh-five south to throw us off the trail,” Scott suggests, holding fast to his dream.

“We passed that ten minutes ago,” Trish scoffs, and suddenly I want to jam a GPS down her throat.

When Scott’s phone rings, the jolt is like high voltage shot through the car. He lurches forward, grabs the phone from my hat, and smiles devilishly. “Hello?” he says, answering. “Yeah, sorry. He collected everybody’s cell.” Then he holds the phone out to me. “It’s Layla. She wants to talk to you.”

“Way to turn it off when I asked you,” I tell him. I take the phone and brace myself.

“Hello?” I say.

I can’t tell whether we’re in a bad cell area or the person on the other end is in a
really
bad state, or both, but it’s hard to make out
what she’s saying. Still, I’m getting the general drift. F this, f that, where do I get the f’ing nerve—that sort of thing.

“Look,” I say, “it’s my Sunday with the family, and just because you feel a need to wedge yourself in between me and them every bloody chance you get doesn’t mean I have to allow it. We both agreed to live by that mediation, and that’s what I’m doing. Even if it’s bullshit, me having to fight for my own family.”

A few choice words back at me, then my turn again.

“Well, it’s
my
Sunday, so we’re all going for a little …to get … to spend some time together. I don’t ask you for reports on
your
weekends.”

She’s saying more things I don’t care to hear (much of it accurate and richly deserved, but damn me if I’ll surrender now), so I give the phone back to Scott.

“What?” he shouts into the phone, plugging one ear against the road noise.

“Don’t tell her where we’re going, Scott,” I warn.

“I’d tell you where we’re going,” he says into the phone, “but I don’t know.”

“And don’t give her our location.”

“Hadn’t thought of that,” he says. “We’re going east on Ten toward … like, Ontario. If we didn’t have Mom and Dad aboard, I’d say maybe we’re Vegas-bound.”

“I
like
Vegas,” my mom says. “The dealers are very nice, don’t you think, Bill?”

My dad looks out the window. “If we’re going to Vegas, I’m going to need to stop and get underwear and a toothbrush. And I’ll need to borrow about a grand.”

Scott hangs up, and the car is agonizingly silent for a minute—or a year, I’m not sure which. Then it happens: I see my salvation. Green Hills U-Pick Orchard. Pomona. About ten or fifteen minutes ahead.

“You see? Apple picking! And berries. Surprised?”

“I think berry season is over, darling,” Mom says helpfully.

“Well, then, we’ll stick to apples,” I say impatiently. “But that’s what we’re doing. We’re going to this farm and picking our own fruit.”

“I wonder if I could pick myself another family,” Scott mutters, and I am astounded at how perfectly he reminds me of a despondent nine-year-old. I guess he really wanted Knott’s Berry Farm.

“Look, this is going to be
fun!”
I tell them.

“This is going to make for a hell of a story when I get back,” Trish allows. “Assuming we get back.”

Miraculously, as we pull up to the place, I see it’s a fairly authentic family scene: perfect sunny morning, fall in the air. I may accidentally have hit the jackpot.

But then … disaster.

“Looks like apples are out of season,” says my dad.

Thinking fast, I glance around and leap at the first opportunity I see. “No, no, I didn’t mean
apple
picking. That was just a ruse. The true surprise is that
we’re picking walnuts!
See? They grow those here, too.”

“I’ve never heard of that,” Trish says, staring at me.

“Me, either,” says Scott.

“Well, then, that’s why this will be so much fun” is my reply. “Who doesn’t like to try something new?”

Trish looks around, then sets off ahead for the main barn and the swarm of families apparently here either for the walnuts or for refrigerated cider and fresh donuts.

“Where are you going?” my dad calls out.

“Look for a gift shop,” she says dryly. “If I’m going to be with Brett all day, I’m going to need one of those
I’m with Stupid
T-shirts.”

I am out-of-my-head pissed. My teeth lock together and my whole face tightens; I can feel it from my jaw through my pony-tail. I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it … well, I’m not going to take as much of it as I’ve been taking.

I sit in the car for a second, speculating on where they’ve gone. Let’s see. They’re headed east on 10? Brett’s in charge. Now, going on the evidence of the past five years, when it comes to devising interesting places for excursions, his imagination doesn’t extend much beyond the multiplex.

As I drive, I wear an expression that frightens even me when I see it in the rearview mirror. I cut off a guy in a pickup truck, and he guns it to get even with me and glare or flip me off or something. But as he draws even, he sees the face I’m wearing. He then pretends he’s just looking around, minding his own business, and is suddenly intensely interested in a billboard advertising
The Valley’s Leading Lady for Real Estate!

Damn straight, buddy
.

Then I remember something beautiful. Scott signed me up on a website that lets people follow where he is, using the GPS on his phone. I told him it was totally obnoxious and a little unsettling:
Why would anyone want people to be able to follow their every move on the Web? I imagined tech-savvy high-school kids telling their skeptical parents this would be a great way to make sure they were keeping out of trouble on a Saturday night, then linking the tracking site to a little GPS they’d leave in a friend’s bedroom while they went party-hopping. But at this second, I’ve become a big believer. I just hope he’s logged in and active.

C’mon, please
.

Bingo!

The best things in life are free, they say. Though this day actually wasn’t—if we do the picking, why are the damn nuts so friggin’ expensive?—miracle of miracles, the next few hours are nice. Odd, yes, but very nice. I’d even go so far as to say
fun
, despite the jokes. (“We don’t need any more nuts in this family,” my brother keeps saying, cracking himself up.) My mother loved the experience, my father liked it, Trish tolerated it and had some laughs, and Scott came away a happy young man, especially after stuffing himself with fresh, warm donuts and drinking himself stupid with cider.

Heading home, we’re driving along, looking like a flashback to a Chevy ad from the fifties. We’re feeling the breeze from the open windows on our faces, hair blown back, smiles all around, when out of nowhere, the Grim Foster appears. It’s Layla—or at least her car—and she’s closing in fast. I roll up all the windows.

If you haven’t seen
The Ring
, I won’t spoil it for you. But she’s like that goony girl in the nightshirt, coming up at supernatural speed in the rearview mirror. I mean
creepy
fast. I blink, and she’s transported closer. I look ahead, then to the mirror, then back to
the road, and in the three or so seconds it takes, she’s jumped forward as if carried along in time-lapse photography.

Now she’s alongside our car. And she’s motioning for us to pull over.

Mom waves at her.

“Look!” she says. “It’s Layla. Isn’t that a nice coincidence?”

Pull over, Brett. You can’t run. It’s time for a good old-fashioned ass-kicking
.

I can’t hear her, but I can see her. Layla’s hysterical, going off like a howler monkey in the cage of her Jeep’s passenger compartment. It’s mayhem in my car as my dad and Trish demand that we stop the car and talk to her, if only to prevent a rollover.

We take an exit and pull in to the parking lot of a gas station, parking way in back. Layla is close behind.

As I pull to a stop, the scene in my car is practically a coordinated attempt at a prison break. Scott is doubled over and moaning. Trish is telling me to “Open the door, quick, I think Scott’s ill.” My mom is saying I’d better follow Trish’s advice. And then Layla’s there, standing stiff, knocking on my window.

“You need …” my mom tells Scott. “Oh, what’s that thing you take when you need to go to the bathroom?”

“An emetic is for throwing up. I think it’s a diuretic,” my dad suggests.

“Hell, no, that’s for taking a leak,” I snap.

“I think it’s called an enchilladic,” Trish offers.

“That’s not even a word,” I scoff.

Dad shakes his head at me, then pops out of the car. “Layla! We’re rescued!” he says.

“Rescued”?
And at this moment things get appreciably worse. Somehow we’ve invited a police presence. Two troopers have stopped filling up their cruiser with gas and are now watching our exchange. This is always a cause for some scrotum tightening, and I’m worried that this incident will soon escalate to a gun battle, given Layla’s howls.