Postcards From Last Summer (32 page)

“I
have to admit, this is the easiest money I've ever made,” Darcy said as she and Elle watched baby Maisy gurgle and coo for the cameraman. “Of course, the money's going into a trust fund for Maisy, but it's a fabulous start for her college fund.”

“Look at her, making raspberries for Jeff! We'll schedule a few more sessions over the next year,” Elle said. Videotaping baby Maisy as she slept had been her brainchild when she saw that the concept for one of the future scripts involved sleep. She'd presented the idea in the production meeting, and for once the executive producer gave Elle credit—at least for a few seconds. “I want to edit footage of sleeping children in, that's definitely my plan,” Isabel said. “And when we get to the concept scripts involving eating, laughing, etcetera, I want to do the same.” So Elle had been able to “hire” baby Maisy, and Darcy had been happy to bring her into the city for a short session at the studio.

“And your contracts should be in any day for the new Delilah voice-overs,” Elle told Darcy. “In fact, remind me before you leave and I'll see if Patrick has them ready for you.”

“I can't thank you enough.” Darcy's blue eyes sparkled with energy. “I didn't plan to audition for any roles until after the summer, but with those new contracts I'll have enough credit for Actor's Equity. Once again, Elle, you've delivered the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”

“Everyone helps each other in Woodchuck Village!” Elle proclaimed.

“Don't get cute with me. I've seen what it's like working for Isabel Slater.”

“Her bark is worse than her bite,” Elle said, tucking her clipboard under her arm and crossing to the cameraman. “How's it going, Jeff? Got what we need?”

“More than enough.” He stepped away from the camera. “She's a cutie. Take good care of her, Mom,” he told Darcy, who beamed with pride.

As the technicians brought down the lights, Elle kneeled beside the stroller and brought her face close to Maisy's. “Now you just give yourself a pat on the back and have a great nap during that ride home.”

Maisy squinted at Elle, the corner of her mouth lifting in a smirk.

“Are you messing with me?” Elle teased.

“Thanks, Elle.” Darcy unlocked the brakes on the stroller. “Tell Ricardo we said hey. Are you guys coming out to the Hamptons when the show goes on hiatus?”

“Actually, I have a devious plan up my sleeve. A trip to Puerto Rico.” She explained that, since Ricardo was so attached to his family there, she thought she'd surprise him with two round-trip tickets to his island home during the break. Elle thought it would be thrilling to steal him away to an exotic place, and she realized that acceptance from his mother was a key element if they were going to have a long, healthy relationship.

“Could be fun,” Darcy said cautiously. “But I thought he turned you down when you suggested the trip a few weeks ago.”

“Oh, he's gotten over that.” Elle walked them down the hall, past posters promoting the first two seasons of
Woodchuck Village
.

“When are you going to tell him?”

“Today's the day. Our flight leaves tomorrow night!”

“We'll miss you.” Darcy gave her a quick hug. “But have a great trip.”

“We will.” Elle waved good-bye to Maisy, then sighed as she turned face-to-face with a larger-than-life poster of Brownie Beaver waving in front of the windmill of Woodchuck Village. God, she loved that man!

That afternoon Elle was too wired to take her usual seat behind the director on set. She'd worked with the show's writers and Callie, the director, to plant the surprise about the Puerto Rico trip in the script, and she could barely contain herself as the puppeteers taped the scenes leading up to the big reveal.

This was the only way to take their relationship to the next level; Elle was convinced of that. It had been difficult to get Ricardo to let her move in with him, but she'd conquered that one. She'd even taken over a tiny corner of the medicine cabinet for her toothbrush and box of tampons. Although she only spent part of her week in Manhattan, she was happy to carve out some progress and move things forward, despite his roommate's glum reception.

But Ricardo's family was the turning point. He was very close to his mother, talked with her on the phone a few times each day, and he seemed to adore his younger sisters, three of them still living at home in a lovely sounding house on a cobblestone street in San Juan. Elle had dropped a few obvious hints about meeting these wonderful people, but, as usual, Ricardo had kept her at bay, vaguely saying that it would happen when the time was right.

Well, now was the time. Elle was crazy for Ricardo, and she longed to be part of his family, holding hands at the dinner table as they said grace, taking turns styling hair with his sisters, helping his mother deadhead buds in the lovely garden that blossomed and twined along their veranda.

She'd told Ricardo of how she'd always longed for a family, how there'd been no family dinners for the DuBois clan, with her father teaching late classes at the university and her mother on call at some hospital or embassy in a foreign land. With no siblings, there'd been no late-night talks or giggle sessions or games of hide-and-seek in the house. Just books, and her father's stinky cigars, and occasionally Mom's recordings of Italian operas, so baroque and brassy to Elle's ears.

Ricardo knew how much she needed this. Would it hurt to push him, just a little, to make it all happen now?

As the big moment of revelation neared, Elle circled one of the cameras, moving closer to the animals posed in the giant cabbage patch.

“Well, what could that be?” Brownie Beaver asked with a spry tilt of his head, definitely aware that they'd traveled off the script as Red Rabbit discovered a large letter inside a cabbage plant. Brownie opened the envelope, leafed through Elle's note and the travel folder containing the tickets, and paused.

“What's it say, Brownie?” Green Toad goaded him.

But Brownie shook his head, removing it. And suddenly there was Ricardo, eyes blazing as he glared beyond the cameras. “Can we cut? Please . . .” His dark eyes were distressed, his mouth a stern, straight line.

“Stop tape,” Callie, the director, shouted, then she took a step toward Ricardo. “Don't sweat it, Ricardo. It's a special surprise for you from Elle.”

Elle's heart pounded as she hurried onto the cabbage patch stage. “I wanted to surprise you,” she explained quickly, trying to defuse the doleful look in Ricardo's eyes. “And everyone agreed to help me. We thought it would be fun. You know, just squirreling around.”

“Please, don't reduce it all to juvenile lyrics. Did you think I would feel shamed into this trip if you presented the tickets in front of my friends and colleagues, in this unprofessional display of grandiosity?”

“No!” Elle insisted as the director turned away, pretending to check a note with one of the assistants.

“Why do you do this?” he burst out, then, as if reconsidering, lowered his head to stare sadly at the cheerful, chubby-cheeked beaver face in his arms. “You're choking me, Elle,” he said quietly. “I . . . I can't even breathe anymore, your fingers are so tight around my neck!”

“No, Ricardo!” It wasn't that way. He had total freedom.

Two of the grips who'd been hanging on set, waiting for taping to resume, now grew wide-eyed and receded into the shadows. Elle suspected that they were all huddled around the craft table, slathering peanut butter on celery sticks and taking odds on who would win this showdown, and knowing the delicacy of Ricardo's male ego, she suspected she was the dark horse.

“ 'Cardo . . .” She reached her arms out to him in a conciliatory gesture, but he refused to make eye contact. “Don't be angry. We'll be on hiatus, and you know how much I want to meet your family. When I hear you talk about your mother's garden or that spicy chicken dish she makes, or the way you stay up late and dance all night, it's just that . . . sometimes I feel like they're the family I never had, the family I always wanted.”

“They are not your family.” His voice was low, edged with frustration. “I say no, I try to hold you back when I need room to breathe, and you push right past me and go and buy the tickets. And this is just the latest. You pushed your way into my apartment, and let me tell you, my roommate, he is still furious. You get the theater tickets when I say I am exhausted. You tell all your friends that I play a beaver when I ask you not to. Every day, you push, push, push.” He bent over, as if he couldn't bear the weight of this burden. “I am here to tell you, Elle . . .” He straightened, his dark eyes rueful. “I cannot take it anymore.”

He swung round, his flapping, four-foot beaver tail nearly hitting her as he started loping toward the dressing rooms with uncharacteristic awkwardness.

“Where are you going?” she called.

“Out of here. Away from you.”

“We still have to tape the scene . . . with the correct ending, of course. Just a little bit different, but we knew you'd be able to pick up the lines in no time.”

“I'm finished, Elle.” He reached back to lift his tail over the director's chairs.

“But what about the tickets? 'Cardo . . . can't you just, just this once . . .”

“No! You go. Take one of your friends.”

“What about you . . . and your family?” She felt herself sinking fast. “I just wanted to meet them. Ricardo . . . we're going on hiatus. What do you want to do?”

“I want you to leave me alone,” his voice rang out clearly as he left the stage area. “I'm going to Disney World.”

I
t would be Tara's last trip to the Hamptons, at least for a few weeks, until she figured out her law school classes and got back into the rhythm of a student schedule, especially since she'd heard that the old intimidating practices of yore were still very much alive in the Torts lecture hall, especially for first-year students. She didn't mind buckling down and looked forward to being in an academic environment again, but it was wonderful to have one last weekend of freedom, cruising in her mother's borrowed Beamer convertible since her car was in the shop.

Lindsay was going to take the train out after work, and Elle promised to make lemon twisters for anyone who showed up. Beyond that, the weekend would be a lazy, pitch-in affair, with nothing planned and no demands beyond the strain of a stiff game of Scrabble or a real-estate trade in Monopoly.

A line of red lights loomed ahead—beach traffic, she suspected—and Tara pressed on the brakes and rolled to a stop. As soon as the truck in front of her moved up, she could see that it was pedestrian traffic gumming things up, some sort of demonstration. The protestors didn't have the road closed, exactly, but the crowd billowed into the street just enough to make negotiating treacherous without nicking a handbag or the billowing sleeve of a choir robe. They were singing “Amazing Grace,” and Tara could make out a few female voices belting out some bluesy riffs.

Great. Stuck in a slow-crawling revival service.

She bit her lower lip, maneuvering carefully as heads turned and stared at her. Women nodded at her and commented to their friends. An older man scowled. A young man shook his head, heavy with disapproval. Although sunglasses shielded their eyes, she knew what they were thinking: there goes the fashionably thin woman driving her expensive convertible without a care. The electric blue BMW convertible sparkled obscenely, the glare off the hood shouting: “I'm rich and greedy!” Tara felt the heat of humiliation suffuse her face. She wanted to shout that this car was borrowed, that she worked hard for a living, that she suffered her own share of racial issues. She didn't deserve their scorn.

If Tara could have turned around and peeled out of there, she'd have done it in a flash, but as it was it seemed that it would be fastest to proceed ahead and inch her way through to the front of the pack.

One of the protestors broke away from the crowd and darted ahead, narrowly missing the front bumper of her car. The young man jogged ahead, as if on a mission. Tara maintained her steady pulse on the brakes, trying to focus on the squeak of a wagon wheel and the cry of a baby in a stroller over the quiet hum of the engine. A minute later the jogger returned, leading John Sharkey, walking at a good clip in his Sunday best.

Of course. She should have known he'd be at the center of all this.

“Tara.” He stood in front of the car, forcing her to slam on the brakes.

“Thanks for the heart attack.” She pushed the car into park and got out, waiting beside the door for him to come to her.

His shirtsleeves were rolled up politician style, and the cotton of his shirt was starkly white against the chocolate brown of his skin. He squinted against the sun, and Tara suspected he had forgone shades in anticipation of media shots; John had always said sunglasses made a brother look too slick and elusive. “Sister . . .” he said, giving her a stiff hug. “I'd like to invite you to join our quiet little march. We're protesting the Savant Greens Country Club's policy of not promoting people of color to upper-level management.”

“This is about the Savant Greens?” Tara felt stung with surprise. “But my parents are members there.” It sounded so lame, when what she really meant was that she felt that people of color were welcomed there.

“Yes,” Sharkey said, smiling smugly, “I imagine they're happy to take your money. But giving back to the black community is another issue altogether.”

“I wouldn't be so sure about that.” Images of the staff at Savant Greens passed through her mind. Max, the attractive head waiter whom she and friends had crushed on, whose meticulous sense of order and suave sense of fashion had prompted the girls to speculate about his sexual preferences. People of color were employed there—a handful of African American caddies, a few bar waitresses, some of the locker room staff . . . they didn't seem to be treated unfairly. Had they been passed over for promotions? Tara didn't know, but she did have to wonder if a protest like this would bring backlash toward those people, none of whom she'd recognized in the crowd. Yes, she knew that wrongs had to be righted, but was this the way? Intimidation and negative attention?

“We are here on a mission, in defense of people of color.” Sharkey lifted his chin, his eyes hard, black stones. “I would expect you to join us in this, Tara.”

“It's not quite as simple as you'd like to make it,” Tara said. A woman behind Sharkey looked on with interest, her brows arching, but she kept moving down the road. “These issues are complex, and they affect a multitude of people in different ways. I'm not sure your approach is the most beneficial to people of color.”

“Mmm.” His eyes went to her shiny car, the back loaded with two coolers. “That and you've got somewhere you need to be?”

“That's not fair. I should be entitled to live my life, even if it doesn't coincide with your mission.”

“I wouldn't be so sure. Not when you're a member of this racist establishment. A resident of this closed community.”

“For a man who specializes in affirmative action, you throw that R-word around a little too easily. I'd be more careful before making false claims about racism.”

“And ignore injustice? Live like a fat cat in this bastion of racism?” He gave a mock sigh. “Okay, sister. I hear ya. You just tuck in there with your eyes closed. Ignorance is bliss.”

“I am not ignorant,” Tara ground out, facing him squarely and balling her hands into fists. In that moment, she hated John Sharkey.

He held up his hands defensively. “It's okay. We're cool.”

“Listen to me, Sharkey. You might think you have all the answers, but apparently you don't know a few facts about the history of the Hamptons.” She pointed down the road. “Keep heading east, toward the south fork, and eventually you'll hit Montauk, where a ship of forty-nine men captured in the Atlantic slave trade waited on the
Amistad
, a ship they'd won in a mutiny. Forty-nine slaves whose case made it to the U.S. Supreme Court, with the help of a few whites, I might add. You may have forgotten that little history lesson, but they won their freedom and returned to their homeland. A hard-won victory for people of color, I'd say.

“And since you've targeted a country club, let me point out that the Shinnecock Hills course, just down the road that way, hosted the second U.S. Open Championship in 1896. And did you know that John M. Shippen Jr., an African American laborer who helped construct the course, played in that tournament? The brother finished in fifth place. Way back in 1896. So don't be talking to me about bastions of racism, Mr. Sharkey. Racism exists, but so do leaps and bounds toward equality.”

“Amen, sister!” a passing woman called out as she mopped her face with a handkerchief.

“Amen is right.” Sharkey let out a forced chuckle. “Sounds like someone woke up cranky today.”

“No, someone woke up armed with some facts.”

The end of the line of protestors was passing them now, but the people in the crowd, who no longer seemed allied against Tara, remained silent, watching and listening.

“Sorry to interrupt, Mr. Sharkey,” said the young man who'd jogged up to get Sharkey, “but we gotta go.”

“We do.” Sharkey wiped his brow with the rolled-up cuff of one sleeve, suddenly not so crisp or cutting as he shot one last look at the convertible. “Don't want to keep the media waiting. Drive carefully.”

Is that the best you can do?
Tara thought as he turned away and joined the end of the parade. But really, did she expect him to say he was sorry? Not Sharkey. He wasn't a big enough man to manage an apology.

And all this was affirmation that she was better off without him in her life. Back in the car, she eased ahead to the end of the group, where she threw it into park again, got out, and reached into the cooler in the back.

“You must be thirsty,” she said, tossing a bottle of Gatorade to one of the young men who'd scorned her. When he thanked her, she asked him to give her a hand passing out the drinks. While she wasn't on board attacking Savant Greens, she did recognize thirsty people. Sometimes, you just had to pick a small, tangible battle that you could win. Thirst, be quenched!