Plan C (4 page)

“Don’t be
hard
on me!”

“Very funny. Look, I’ve been traipsing around all week with clients at Sotheby’s. I need a glass of wine and some good gossip. Come to a late lunch.”

“I don’t do lunch, Kitty. I don’t have time.”

“C’mon. Call in sick. I’ll buyyyyyyyy…”

“I can’t come to lunch. I’m about to be arrested.”

“What?”

“My stepson threatened to call the police.”

“Again? But its Tuesday,” says Kitty. “Aren’t they only there on weekends? Hasn’t their mother figured out you aren’t part of her
paid
staff.”

“Aren’t I?”

“Just where the hell is she now?”

“Tennis lessons, meditation clinic - take your pick. Oh no, wait, wait… she’s away on a
rebirthing
retreat.”

“Are you kidding? Is there such a thing?”

“Yes, and according to the brochure, you too can be
rebirthed
in a week.”

“Okay, that’s just gross.”

“Hey, look at the bright side,” I say. “It took Rosemary nine months to be born the
first
time around. Now she’s rebirthing herself in only
seven
days.”

“Maybe she’ll rebirth herself into a woman who can find a job.”

“She works at working out,” I reason. “She must have a rock-hard body.”

“Give me the chance to workout, I’d just lie down on the couch until the urge passes,” says Kitty.

“A nap sounds good about now.”

“Did you finish the article?”

“Yes. At least my fingers got a workout,” I say, then reading the title to her from my computer screen:
“Be Careful What You Wish For: A New Man, A New Life and his Kids, too.”

“I like it.”

“Yeah, well let’s hope my editor does, too. My journalism career is being destroyed by bloggers.”

“Why? Blogs aren’t so bad,” says Kitty. “I read them all the time.”

“My point exactly. But they don’t have editors. They don’t do research. They barely spell check. They just spout opinions.”

“Okay, forget work. But are you going to do what I told you to do?”

“I can’t. They can’t get anybody to fill my shift.”

“Which shift? I’m confused.”

“So am I. So many jobs, so little time,” I say.

“You’re like God. You’re everywhere.”

“Except on the seventh day, God rested.” I hit the power-down button my computer.

“I already told you - why don’t you take some time off? Go up to your cottage. Visit old friends on the Cape.”

“Can’t,” I say. “I’ve been meaning to tell you…”

“I don’t like the sounds of this…”

“The old cottage is on the market.”

“But that house has been in your family since…since…”

“Since, um, 1950,” I say, throwing my water bottle, cell phone and some Advil into my purse.

“Since 1950? You can’t sell! Your Grandma will roll in her grave!”

“Well then Grandma is finally getting some exercise, I guess.” My hands fidget with my briefcase, shoving papers into it. “Look Kitty, something’s gotta go…”

“Can’t Rosemary sell her
damn
mansion? Does she really need six bedrooms? How long are you and Ben going to be her yoga mat?”

Just then I hear a sound much like that of perhaps two-hundred thirsty buffalo stampeding a dusty plain.

“What the hell was that?” asks Kitty.

“Oh, it’s just the twins.”

“The twins? You mean Rosemary’s Babies!”

The blinking red sign flashes the words “
On air!”
as I swing through the glass door of the television studio. Instantly, I’m reminded of Sister Ardeen, an old nun from grammar school, who would reprimand me by leaning in, her bad breath under my nostrils. “Shhhhhhh!” she’d say, grabbing my face, the smell of freshly peeled oranges on her fingers. “You use your quiet voice, Lady Jane.” Only recently I discovered that Lady Jane was King Henry the VIII’s great- niece, who had a nine day reign as Queen of England before being beheaded. See, there are worse things than being late for work.

My producer, Maxine, can be seen at the end of the soundproof hall, tapping a pen against an armload of files. Pretty and annoyed until the sight of my smiling face registers relief on hers. She looks so happy in fact, you’d think she just got a negative reading on a pregnancy test.

“What the fuck?” she says laughing but with authority. This in itself is amusing since she looks about twelve.

“Sorry, sorry. I know, but I’m here now,” I whisper, motioning toward the weather girl delivering her forecast under the hot stage lighting. “We’ve got time, right?” I glance at my wrist watch. “Is makeup empty?”

“Yes, thank God,” says Maxine. She grabs my elbow and leads me by the arm to the makeup room. “We’ve got about ten minutes. Then you’ve got the monkeys coming in.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean monkeys. Literally. The whole second hour.” Maxine reads from her schedule. “Barry Bosco and his Bubble Blowing Bonobos.”

“God, we’ve hit on hard times.”

“But it’s ratings week,” says Maxine.

“My point exactly. Wait, did you say bonobos? Aren’t they those insatiable little --?”

“Fuckers? Yes. They fuck all the time.”

“I’m sure I’ll be quicker than a monkey. In makeup I mean.” I fall into my swivel chair. An unrecognizably tired and pale complexion looks back from the fifty-thousand-watt mirror. “On second thoughts, it might be easier to make a monkey look good.” I give a warm hello to the makeup woman as she drops a black drape over my blouse. She stands back, foundation brush in hand, studying my face to determine where to apply her transformative magic. The real magic is the fact that this woman still works here. She probably applied eyeliner to Ed Sullivan, maybe in this very chair when television was still black and white and had rabbit ear antennas.

“You know you look fine,” says Maxine, handing me my script. “Every frigging stage hand drools whenever you walk by. You just need some time off.”

“No. I need more hours. One show a week isn’t cutting it,” I say, peering at my crow’s feet as the makeup woman dabs my brow.

“I’m working on it, Libby,” says Maxine. “But with these cutbacks…. they just let twenty people go in the editing room. And then with the producers down, I’m being four people now.”

“I know the feeling,” I say.

Maxine glances at her script copy. “I made a change to your cold open and your guest intro for the nurses.”

“Nurses?” I ask, twisting toward her abruptly, causing the makeup woman to accidentally run her eye liner wand across my cheek. She takes my face and moves it back to the center, signaling me to look in the mirror when I talk to Maxine. “Nurses?” I ask Maxine’s reflection.

“Yes, duh, nurses! We’re doing the nursing shortage in America, remember? It was your idea.” Then, mimicking me, “Where have all the nurses gone?”

“Oh god, is that today?” I drop my notes in my lap. “I’m sorry. I thought we were doing stress.”

“Don’t you have enough of that?”

“I’m being serious. That pre-menopause segment,” I say, hardening my voice into anchor mode. “Pre-menopause. Is it the change?” I shift profiles. “Or something else?”

“Colon cancer and fibroids is next week’s show,” says Maxine, slamming me on the head with her papers.

“Okay, I can wing it today,” I say, fluffing my hair. “Love nurses. What would we do without them?”

“That’s your point exactly. Use the prompter.” says Maxine. “And then go home and get some sleep.”

Moments later, I’m set and wired, the mic running up my back and clipped to my collar, an ear-piece running in a different direction through my buttonhole. Eventually it finds my ear. My set director cues me as the set guys dodge floor wires and move the prompters closer to my face-still exhausted-looking underneath all my perky makeup. Do we really need close-ups?

“Ready, Libby? We’re on camera one,” says Maxine, listening through her own ear-piece to the big producer upstairs. I readjust my posture, paste on my enthusiastic newscaster smile, and touch my head to flatten a piece of static-electric fly-away, as she lifts her fingers in front of my prompter, and then lowers them, counting me down, “Five, four, three, two and…”

“Welcome to ‘Top Talk,’ where we talk about issues important to women. I’m Libby Crockett in New York.” And then, switching camera angles, “What would you do if one of your
elderly
parents or your
small
child were
rushed
to a hospital only to find there’s a nursing shortage? Back in the sixties and seventies there were only three things a little girl wanted to be ‘when I grow up’ – a stewardess, a teacher or a nurse. So where have all the nurses gone? Joining us today is the Head of Nursing…”

Ten minutes later it’s a wrap and a miracle. I haven’t once slurred, despite the four hours of sleep I had the night before. Dodging floor wires, I totter toward the exit on the kind of black stilettos that do wonders for your calves so long as you don’t try
something crazy like walk in them. Out of the corner of my eye I can see the “Top of the Hour” anchorman at his desk, with tanning-booth leather skin and enough dental bleaching to re-blind Ray Charles. He smiles into the lens, trying to sound part persuasive and part serious, as he delivers the hourly update of breaking news.

…“Leading today’s stories, families in Brooklyn are mourning the loss of one of their own in the death of Officer John Gonzales, a twenty-year veteran who was shot in an apparent bank robbery. He was the father of two. His wife, Juanita Gonzales was pregnant with their third child. Funeral services will be held Friday. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Boys Clubs of America at the number on the bottom of your screen.” The newscaster shifts his papers on the desk in front of him. “Severely beaten in a garage stairwell and left to die in a pool of blood, a young immigrant is rescued by a parking attendant in downtown Manhattan. Anyone with information please contact your local authorities.” He switches cameras again, “And in other news… After a head-on collision on the West Side Highway, a young couple was air-lifted to…”

Okay, maybe I should stop my whining. Maybe I already have. I am, after all, alive, thank God; not beaten, shot, mugged, air lifted, or left in a stairwell to die. Up until now I have had the normal life of being a parent, burying parents, buying homes, building homes, losing homes, birthing children, graduating them, paying mortgages, paying credit cards, and paying off that car loan. I was surviving in this recession, even if now I was just treading water with no lifeboat in sight. I’d weathered multiple career changes, ex-husbands and lovers. I had survived a terminal illness that made me appreciate my own mortality, so much so, that I helped raise money to build a cancer wing for children
who weren’t so lucky. I am lucky. I have a job. I have actually several. I have – well, a life.

In fact, my minor woes cushion my bank account since I write how-to articles for women’s magazines – the kind you flip through on the glass table at the dentist’s office - which eventually end up as topics on my women’s TV show. But nobody ever warned me about the woes of stepfamilies. Wasn’t the only surprise left in my life supposed to be raising grandchildren? Or spending my Social Security check on the early-bird special?

I detour to the ladies room, no sound of anybody in the stalls, and pick one, turn to clasp the lock and then lift my skirt in order to squat, pee and reflect. You do a lot of peeing after age forty. And c’mon…reflecting. There are worse things in life than Ben’s two tyrannical seven-year-old boys. Little kids, little problems: big kids, big problems (though wait a minute, the white-suede sofa?) With my Scarlett and Madeline, I had been through my share of big teenage problems, from missed periods to missed curfews with me pacing the floors after midnight waiting for them to crawl in through the bedroom window. I watched their adorable kitty cat posters come down and the rapper posters go up. I’d learned to enjoy loud rap music and those “bleeping” reality shows. I’d been through their drama-queen issues over the Heartthrob, the Jock, the Geek, and the Rebel - the bad boy on the motorcycle - who would peel out of my driveway with Scarlett clinging to his waist. I remember running out the front door after his rumbling engine to scream out, “Wear a…” helmet! And a condom! But they were long gone.

But far more humiliating- in a way I’d now find flattering- was being called the neighborhood “MILF” – you know: “Mom I’d Like to Fuck” - by my daughters’ drooling and adolescent male friends.

And speaking of adolescent boys, if Ben’s twins are only seven years old, doesn’t that mean I’d be going through
their
teen years in less than ten years? I wince at the thought. They’ll be part of the first generation to grow up online. When I raised my teens we would outsmart them. Now we had to out-tech them as they sat buried behind their “do not disturb” bedroom doors chatting with Joey, the online psycho killer who’s doing life in Attica.

Lowering my skirt I unlock the stall and move to the pump dispenser at the sink. Of course in the old days, when my girls were young, a boy had to go through a parent to get to the daughter by calling the phone on the kitchen counter. Now he could just call your daughter’s cell phone and plot their runaway wedding behind the parents’ back. And the music! Yikes. When my girls were growing up ‘N Sync made suggestive romantic overtures. Today’s songs want to “Lick, lick, lick you like a lollipop.” Nothing like putting it right out there. “Oh well…” I mumble inwardly. Just brush it off like lint from a jacket sleeve and move forward. What else can we do?

I pick up the pace down the hallway, realizing I’ve come a long way in the ten years since my Cape Cod newspaper articles bore headlines like “Boy Scout Boating Trip Cancelled after Vessel Strikes Dolphin.”

Rounding the corner back to the makeup room, I’m startled to see several bonobos. One swings between the swivel chairs, rearranging the makeup brushes on the table. Another uses a drape as a mask to play his version of “blindman’s bluff,” shielding
his face as he bounces off the walls. The last two seem quite content having intercourse on the counter - the male taking the female from behind. Over the chaos, the makeup woman screams out to me, “The Union’s gonna hear about this!”