Shake Down the Stars (18 page)

I reach over and take her hand.

She turns and continues dabbing at her face. “It's not like I've never thought of any of this. It's just that I get tired like everybody else.” She gives my hand a firm pat and pulls back as she looks at me. “I can't believe you're here, Diaper.”

I push the plate toward her, and she nods and takes a cookie. I wait a moment before I ask, “What are you doing in the next few hours?”

She makes a face. “Not going to AA with you, I'll tell you that much.”

“I wasn't going to invite you to a meeting, Twin Peaks. I was actually wondering if you'd want to catch a movie.”

“A movie?” she says, as though I've invited her to a whorehouse.

“Yeah. You know, the place where you sit in the dark and stare at a big screen while you eat popcorn? What do you say? We'll drown our sorrows in bonbons and overproduced schlock.”

“I don't know, Piper Sniper.”

“Oh, come on. It's just a movie.”

“I usually hang around here on Sundays.”

“Yeah, I'm guessing you hang around here every day; that's the point.”

She clutches her robe. She looks increasingly irritated, but then her expression softens and she all but smiles. “You know what? Damn it all, a movie sounds like fun. I haven't been to a movie theater in a lifetime. I'll take a quick shower and we'll see what's playin'.”

“Great.”

I can tell even she's surprised by how quickly she gets up from the table. “I won't be a minute. Help yourself to tea if you want.”

She's already in the hall when she barks loudly, “Did you hear me offer you tea?”

“Yes, Clem.”

“Well, put some on. No sense sittin' there with nothing to do. It's in the top cabinet on your left. And don't eat all those cookies. We'll take the rest to the theater.”

“Yes, Clem.”

I listen as she climbs the stairs, mumbling to herself about what she should wear and how she needs to find her wallet, which has to be somewhere in the house; she knows it.

I
t's Saturday and I've been spending the morning working on next week's lesson plans. My juniors and seniors are still studying
Long Days Journey into Night,
while my freshmen will be starting
Of Mice and Men
, their last novel of the semester. April will be here in a couple of weeks, and the kids are already anticipating summer.

After the movie on Sunday, Clem and I had dinner together two nights in a row, and I managed to convince her to join me at the mourners' group. I don't know what it is about Deacon Morris and the people in that church rec room, but Clem found herself telling her story and has been attending the meetings with me ever since. We're becoming fast friends, Clem and I, and it feels—
good.
I still call Sherry on the occasion that I feel an urge to drink, but the calls are becoming less frequent. I'm not sure if I'll get Clem to come with me to an AA meeting, but she never drinks around me and says she's cutting back to a couple of glasses of wine a night. Thing is, I believe her. Not everyone who drinks heavily is an alcoholic, and even as bad off as she was, Clem may never have crossed over into the territory of good old-fashioned, I-can't-stop-drinking-despite-the-fact-that- I'm-destroying-my-life alcoholism.

I'm still working when I hear a sharp, rather mean-sounding knock at my door. I turn down my stereo and open the door to Hélène's pissed-off face. “Hélène?”

“Your
sis
tah promise me the day off, but what does she do? She goes to New York with that man, that Cur
tice.
I have no idea where your mother is, and I don't care what your sistah say; they are
not
Mrs. Calloway's responsibility. Her job is to clean the house, not look after the girls. They are not Tru's responsibility either. They are
her
responsibility. They need their mother.”

“I'm sorry,” I say, scratching my head.
“What?”

She rolls her eyes in a huff. “The girls are downstairs with Tru. Your sistah—she promise me the day off. She say she be back from New York this morning. But is she back? Of course she not back. She tell me to take them to your mother, but your mother is not home, so I bring them here. Those girls know I care. They know I will shed my own blood for them. But they need to know someone in their
family
cares.” She points her finger at me.

I hold up my hands. “Hey, I'm on your side.” With the wedding growing closer, Margot is proving to be more selfish than ever. I'm thankful I get to see the girls more often, but I also agree with Hélène: They need their mother.

Hélène says, “I know you already had them last week, but I need time off. What your sister think? I'm her slave? No! I'm going to LA. If you can't keep them, I leave them with Tru. That woman? Your
sis
tah? She crazy. She think of no one but herself.”

“It's fine if you leave them here. I'd love to have them.”

She looks me suspiciously up and down. “Good. I get them.”

I gaze around my apartment. I was planning on cleaning later, but now that the girls are staying with me, I can use their help. They need to learn that they don't exist to be waited on hand and foot.

They walk inside with Tru, whose height and girth always makes my apartment feel half its size. He excuses himself as he continues to talk on the phone. I give the girls a hug. When Margot tries to pull away, I refuse to let her go. “It's been so long!” I tease. “I've missed you! Never leave me again!”

“It's been four days,” she says. “You've got problems.”

They head straight to the couch and whip out their phones like synchronized gun slayers.

“Uh-uh-uh. No phones today.”

“But it's important!”

“I don't care how impor—”

Tru taps my arm. “'Scuse me. Need to give you this.” He hands me a fat envelope.

“Thanks,” I say, feeling the weight of the bills and already thinking about lunch at Table Eight and dinner at Osenta. “What time are you picking them up?”

He holds up a finger and brings his phone to his ear. “Actually, Curtis would like to speak to you. She's right here, Boss.” He hands me the phone.

“Sister-in-law!”

“Not quite.”

Curtis chuckles in that way of his. I already know where this is headed but decide to wait it out. “So listen. Have you seen Margot's tweet?”

Margot is
so busy
lately she typically communicates through the twins—“Mom says hello”; “Mom says call her later”—or texts. Often she simply refers me to her blog or Twitter feed.

“Believe it or not, I also have a life, so no, I have not seen her new tweet.”

“We're gonna be a part of this cooking show. The best cake these chefs come up with will be one of the cakes at the wedding. We fly to SoCal tonight and tape tomorrow, so since you have the girls already, how about keeping them for—”

“Is my sister there?”

“She's on the phone.”

“Tell her I want to speak to her.”

I glance over at the girls, who are busy texting. I then look up at Tru while twirling my finger next to my ear. He grins before looking down at his feet. “Will you watch them a sec?” I whisper. “I'm going to step outside for a little privacy.”

“Absolutely.”

I step into the hall, closing the door behind me. “Put my sister on the phone!” I say through gritted teeth.

“Simmer down, Sis. You experiencing your monthly business or something?”

“Put her on the phone, Curtis.”

A second later: “Isn't it exciting?
Best Chef
wants us on their show!”

“It's great, Margot, but if you don't stop neglecting the girls, you're going to end up on a show about lousy mothers.”

“I thought you said you like keeping them.”

“I do. Of course I do, but don't
you
like them?”

“They know everything will return to normal after the wedding. Anyway, it would help so so so much if you could keep them for a couple of days. Please?”

“Curtis said you were picking them up tomorrow.”

“What's one more day? Mom is flying with us, or I'd give them to her.”

I feel my stomach drop when she mentions Mom. We're working on three months since we haven't spoken. Margot knows what happened and tried to lecture me on getting help, but I basically told her what happens with Mom and me is none of her business. She hasn't mentioned it since. Why would she? As long as Margot is happy, so goes the world.

“I have to work on Monday, you know,” I say. “I have this thing called a
job
?”

“I know that. Tru will pick them up on Monday and take them to school. Not a problem. Do you even know how big
Best Chef
is? This is all part of pumping my name before my show starts. I need to do this, P. It's very very important to me.”

I hear Curtis in the background.

“I gotta go, P. You can watch them, right?”

Watching them will mean missing AA tonight and tomorrow, but I'm not leaving them with Tru. “Yes, of course.”

“Thanks, Sis. I knew you'd come through. Love you, bye.”

I go back inside and return Tru's phone. “My sistah, my sistah,” I say, giving my best Hélène impression.

He smiles. “I'll get their bags.”

I walk to the couch and sit directly between the girls, who continue their texting without missing a beat.

“I guess you two know you're staying here a couple of days?”

No response.

“Are you two listening to me?”

“I'm listening,” Sophia says, eyes on her phone.

Margot continues moving her thumbs at breakneck speed. “I am, too.” I try to grab the phone, but she's too quick and pulls away. “Stop, Auntie P. You can be, like, so immature.”

“So, who are you texting? What could possibly be so important?”

“Nicole Liu,” says Margot.

“And Ashley Mulligan-Peete. Nicole heard that Ashley kissed Brendan Richards, but it's, like, so not true.”

“Brendan is dating Nicole,” Margot offers.

“You guys are ten! What do you mean by dating?”

“Boyfriend and girlfriend. Now we have to tell her that Brendan didn't cheat on her; we know Brendan, and he's not like that.”

“He's one of our best friends.”

“And he told us he's been, like, so faithful.”

“Isn't that a lot of drama for fifth grade?”

I watch their thumbs whiz across the keypads as they go about brokering peace accords between their posh friends. Tired of waiting, I snatch their phones and hold them high in the air.

“Hey! You can't do that!”

“I just did. No phones today.”

They start to protest, but ignoring them, I put the phones in my purse, go into the kitchen, and take out a broom and a cleaning rag. They stare up at me as though planning twin curses. “Time for a quiz. Sophia, do you remember what this is?” I hold up the broom and watch as she rolls her eyes. “Margot? Do you recognize this?” She crosses her arms dismissively. “If you haven't figured it out, you two are helping me clean my apartment today. The entire apartment. Top to bottom.”

They look at each other before returning to shooting their twin-powered glares on me.

“Like, why don't you have a house cleaner, anyway?” Margot asks.

“Yeah, why don't you just have somebody else clean this place?” Sophia adds.

“Are you two going to
pay
someone to come and clean?” I ask, hand on hip.

They look at each other:
“We could!”

“This isn't about me, you two. It's about you learning responsibility and how to take care of yourselves.”

“Seems to me we're taking care of you,” Margot says.

I give Sophia the rag. She takes it apprehensively with her face turned away as though I've handed over a dead skunk.

“Get up. We're cleaning. This'll be fun. I'll even put on some Beethoven.”

•   •   •

“O
h God,” Margot says. “It gets worse.”

My apartment is now officially spotless except for two full trash bags sitting in front of the door, waiting to be taken downstairs. We head for the bins out back. Mrs. Mathews calls down from her apartment window when she sees us, “Hey, you twins! How you
durin
'?”

“Fine.”

“You helpin' your auntie with the trash?”

“Yes.”

“Ain't that nice. You two sho 'nuff look alike. You ever get confused by who you is?”

The girls stare up at her curiously.

She eases herself farther out the window. “You know, Mrs. Sanders broke her hip. Yeah. Fell down, and it done broke something good. And you know Patrick got that new car. He's leasin' it. Gotta pay for it every month. Uh-huh.” We wait as she continues telling us the day's news. All she needs is a ticker beneath her window announcing the stock market averages and Dow Jones returns. Her attention is diverted when her downstairs neighbor, Deborah, appears on the stoop. “Deborah, I know you hear your phone ringing in that apartment of yours. I know you hear it, 'cause I can hear it ringing myself! Why haven't you picked it up?”

“I knew I'd see you in a minute! What did you want?”

“You coming over for dinner tonight?! Anthony is bringing the steaks!”

Deborah and Mrs. Mathews continue shouting their conversation, and the twins and I are forgotten. I'm ready to suggest we go back inside, when two men pass pulling shopping carts filled with trash bags, each bag stuffed to capacity with cans and bottles. The carts are so full, the men use all their strength to make their way down the street. The taller one wears a towel around his head to keep the sun off his face. He could be a nameless drudge in any period stretching back to ancient days.

“Why are people always pulling shopping carts around here?” Sophia asks.

“Yeah. What's in them?” Margot asks.

“They collect empty bottles and cans and take them to the recycling center.”

“Why?” Sophia asks.

“They get money for each can. That's how a lot of people get money.”

“Really?”

They silently watch the men trudge up the street as if seeing ghosts.

While I sometimes bemoan their upbringing, I can't blame them for the limitations of their ivory-tower existence. I rest my hands on their shoulders. “We should get back inside and wash up. You two hungry yet?”

“I am,” Sophia says. “What about Osento?”

“I'm tired of Osento,” Margot says. “Let's go somewhere else.”

I think of the wad of cash upstairs but then realize I don't want anything more than a burrito and chips. “You know,” I say, “there's a perfectly good taqueria up the street. Why don't we just go there?”

“What's a taqueria?” they say in unison.

Oh. My. God.

•   •   •

H
ours later, we're having dessert at Benoit, a French restaurant in the city. The taqueria went over surprisingly well for lunch, but after spending the day at the Academy of Arts and Sciences and Golden Gate Park, the girls wanted their typical four-star prix fixe meal for dinner. They each order dessert in perfect French. San Francisco Stargazers meets the third Saturday of every month at Pacific Point, and since we're already in the city, I'm thinking that it would be nice to stargaze with someone other than myself. Only problem, the girls have never warmed to stargazing no matter how many lessons I've given, and I can't imagine them jumping up and down with glee if I suggest spending an hour staring at the stars before heading home.

I wait until half of their dessert is finished and the sugar has kicked in before broaching the subject. “Hey, you two, I just thought of something fun we could do.”