A Lie for a Lie (12 page)

I liked the way he moved, and the voice was good, although the song didn’t show it off very well. I was surprised when Grady agreed with me, and stood to demonstrate some vocal technique that the young man copied effortlessly. This time when Grady patted him on the shoulder, it didn’t look like a rejection, and it wasn’t. After tearing apart everything he’d done but not with much vehemence, the young man, Bart Jackson, was told to come back tomorrow night with another song.

“I guess he has to pass some of the contestants, or the Idyll would end pretty fast,” I told Camille. “This way the pain just keeps coming.”

“You’ll be surprised, but there really are some good acts to look forward to.”

Those good acts weren’t among the next three. Tap dancers from our local studio were summarily shown the door. The first time a baton was dropped, twin twirlers in red spangles and white boots were hustled offstage. Afterwards Grady made it clear to everybody in the audience that he wasn’t there to judge anything that corny.

“What’s next, hula hoop marathons?” he screeched. He seemed to be getting more and more worked up, more and more disdainful, and unfortunately, the audience seemed to like it.

My hands were sweating. I wondered if the Price Girls were still backstage, or if by now, they had run for cover.

After a man in his forties who fancied himself the next Clint Black was rudely dismissed, Madison Sargent came onstage.

“This is too much to ask of me.” I squeezed my eyes closed. “This is one too many teenage girls to pull back from the brink of suicide tonight.”

“Listen and enjoy. Just between us, it won’t get better than this.”

Resigned, I opened my eyes to note that Madison, always a pretty girl, was transformed into someone more spectacular under stage lighting. She wore a filmy red dress that bared way too much chest for a girl her age, but with a teenaged daughter myself, I’ve suddenly become very opinionated on that subject. Her gold sandals had heels that made Lucy’s look demure. Her hair, normally straight, fell in magnificent highlighted ripples down her back.

“Wow,” I whispered.

“She does look good.”

Grady seemed to think so, too. Before she even began to sing, he told the audience that looking good onstage was half the job of entertaining, and Madison had nailed that part already. Madison smiled a smile I hope Deena doesn’t learn until she’s happily married.

I understood right away why Madison’s not in our church choir. Her voice is bluesy, throaty, a mature voice suited to R & B, not anthems, and she knew it. She said she had chosen Mariah Carey’s “We Belong Together” for her performance, and although she got something of a shaky start, she took off about a quarter of the way through and seemed to forget anything but the music. I sat there, hands gripping the arms of my chair, and gawked as she played with the notes, leaping octaves like they were inconsequential hurdles.

When she finished, the audience was silent. Then the applause began and built. It built more when Grady got to his feet, joined by his fellow judges, and applauded her.

“Well, well done,” he said. “You’re quite a talented girl.”

Once the applause died down Madison, flushed and triumphant, thanked him.

“It’ll be fun to work with you,” Grady said, remembering to look at his fellow judges for confirmation that they were as pleased as he was. “Come back tomorrow night with something else for us, Madison.”

Beaming, she left the stage. The glow I felt wore off quickly when the Price Girls were ushered in. I tried to tell myself the timing was good, that Grady would be so happy to learn he had caught at least one substantial talent in the Emerald Springs net, that he would be kind to the girls when he threw them back. They were only thirteen. They were cute as the dickens up there in their silly costumes. He would let them down easily.

I risked zeroing in on my daughter’s face. Clearly Deena wanted to be anywhere else, but I had to give her credit for standing there anyway and going through with this.

Grady smiled in a fatherly fashion. “So we have the Price Girls tonight? And what are you going to perform for us, girls?”

“ ‘Wannabe’,” Carlene said, stepping forward. Her dress was not quite as short as I’d feared, and tonight no thong was in evidence. She gave Grady a practiced, measured smile before she joined the other girls. Watch out boys of Emerald Springs, Carlene O’Grady was simmering nicely and just about to be served up at the banquet. I winced.

Lisa began the piano intro, the drums beat, and the girls began to bounce. And bounce. Then their arms began to swing, for the most part together, and they began to sing. Or at least I think that’s what it was. The sound was part rap and part melody, and one sounded as unsteady as the other. They took turns with lines, just the way the Spice Girls did on the “Wannabe” video, which they had watched ten thousand times. Some were better than others. Deena, at least, could be heard, but I wasn’t sure that was a good thing. Finally the beginning was over. I believe it lasted approximately six hours. Now they stood in two lines with Maddie in the middle between them and began to dance and sing the chorus.

The chorus was surprisingly good. Together, with one another’s voices to rely on, they gained courage and began to project. Then, all too soon, they went bouncing their separate ways around the stage again. Deena, who hadn’t done gymnastics since she was nine, did a credible flip over Tara, who had dropped to all fours. Amazingly they kept singing, and her wig didn’t fall off. Finally they finished and ran behind the curtain.

“Is my heart still beating?” I thrust my wrist toward Camille.

“They are adorable. He’ll be kind.”

He wasn’t, of course. He called the girls back out, and they returned to a healthy round of applause.

“Well, girls,” he said. “You have considerable energy, and you know how cute you are, don’t you?”

I knew from his tone that this was not a compliment. Judging from their faces, some of the girls had figured that out, too, but Carlene stuck her hand on one hip like a Paris streetwalker luring a john—or would that be a jacques?

“We just can’t help it, we’re cute without trying,” she simpered.

The audience laughed. They, at least, were enjoying themselves.

“Well, being cute’s just not going to cut it in the Idyll,” Grady said with a cold smile. “I don’t know who told you that you ought to go for the gusto here, but they ought to be shot. Cute as you are, this is not a junior high talent show. So scat. Go back to school, learn to sing and dance, add a few pounds in the right places. Then come back in a couple of years.” He paused for effect. “Just please, don’t come back if I’m the judge, okay? Never step on the same stage with me again.”

The audience was laughing. Grady sounded as if he was teasing, a fatherly sort of teasing, but I was close enough to see the impatience in his expression and hear the edge in his voice. The girls were, too. Even Carlene lost her bravado and stepped closer to the others.

“Go. Scat. Good girls. Leave. Be gone. Out of here.” He made shooing motions with his hands, and the girls turned tail and left the way they’d come. Quickly.

“Ouch,” Camille said.

“Double ouch.” I considered leaving to go backstage and be with Deena, but I was fairly sure May was already there, and maybe Carlene’s mother, Crystal, as well. Nothing would be worse than to make too much out of this. Tonight I would remind Deena that she and the others had enjoyed some good times rehearsing the act, and that their friends probably thought they were cool to have made it this far.

I did think, though, that wearing a dark wig onstage had been an inspiration.

And now that I’d figured out what I would say to my daughter, I wondered what I would say to Grady Barber the next time we were face-to-face.

That moment came sooner than I’d expected. I left my seat at intermission. Backstage I found that the girls had already gone. May and Crystal had taken them out for pizza to celebrate their grit and determination, pizza being the adolescent equivalent of Spider-Man Band-Aids.

I hoped I could catch up with them since I’d also missed Ed and Teddy, who had gone home after the Price Girls were sent offstage in disgrace. If Grady needed anything for the second half of the night, he could get it himself. When nobody was watching, I left by the side door. I nearly tripped over Grady and Madison, who were talking in the shadows.

Grady moved away from her the moment I appeared. But the fact that he had to back away seemed more suspicious than the tête-à-tête itself.

“We’ll work out a time,” he said when I drew closer. He smiled at Madison, and sent me a cooler version. To my credit, I didn’t stick out a foot to trip him as he walked past me and back inside.

“You were spectacular,” I told her. “I had no idea you sang like that.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Wilcox.” She looked flushed, and just the tiniest bit unhinged.

“Are you heading home?”

“I need to get some sleep and figure out what to do tomorrow. Maybe not in that order.”

“I’ll walk you to your car. Unless you’re waiting for your mom?”

“We drove separately. She’s going to stay and watch my competition.”

I couldn’t help myself. Curiosity is as much a part of me as cellulite and hangnails. I wanted to know what they’d been talking about, and darn it, I wanted to know why Grady had been standing too close to her.

“I bet Grady was complimenting you on your performance,” I said, having learned never to ask an adolescent a direct question.

“He says I have a lot of talent.”

“He’s right about that. I’ll bet you want to pursue a showbiz career.”

“My mom thinks I have what it takes.” She paused. “I always thought I’d be a teacher. I’m good with kids.”

“You help out in the nursery at church, don’t you? I’ve heard you’re terrific with the babies.”

“I like to sing, though. Grady—Mr. Barber—says I have some things I need to learn.”

“He would know,” I said, keeping my voice light.

“He’s going to coach me a little. Give me a few tips, if I want them.”

I wondered if any of the other contestants were being granted this special favor. Madison seemed to realize how this had sounded.

“He says he always does this for the top candidates, but only if we want him to. I guess he’ll be helping some of the others.”

This had been related to me in confidence. I wondered if I had a right to bring up the issue of favoritism with Veronica. But wouldn’t Veronica defend Grady no matter what I said? Maybe this was part of their agreement. Still, I felt uneasy.

“That would certainly give you an edge,” I said, again making certain I didn’t weight my words.

“Oh, he says it won’t guarantee I’ll win, or even get into the finals. He says coaching is just something extra he does, because people reached out to him along the way and helped him realize his dreams. He feels he owes the same to others.”

St. Grady, again. I believed this explanation as much as I believed that at the end of the Idyll, Grady would donate his fee to the new pediatric unit. I wondered if he took his cut down the line when the contestants with the most potential actually made it to Hollywood, Nashville, or the local recording studio. Then he could point out that they’d gotten there because of him, and ask for favors.

Or maybe the favors began a lot earlier in the process.

I didn’t know how to warn Madison that Grady might not be as benevolent as he sounded. We’d reached the parking lot, and I waited until she opened the door of a vintage Mustang.

“I know you’ll always enjoy using that voice of yours,” I told her. “But teaching’s great, too. The important thing is to do what your heart tells you. Show business can be pretty cutthroat. I know you have good sense and you’ll be careful.”

“It’s all so exciting.” She smiled, then she reached out and gave me a spontaneous hug. I waited until she drove away. And for once, I was glad my curiosity had gotten the better of me. I had a new reason for keeping an eye on Grady Barber. And I was exactly in the right position to do it, too.

I survived the first week of the Emerald Spring Idyll, largely because Fred calmed down and remained as Grady’s assistant. By Sunday I was ready to sit quietly in church, only parting my lips to sing hymns and greet my neighbors. The Idyll was down to ten contestants, and the audience had grown for every round. Madison was still in, of course, as was Bart Jackson. The rest were an assortment, from a middle-aged folk singer to a group called Catahoula Hounds who sang Cajun music with a rollicking accordion. We all knew that at the end, this would be a showdown between Madison and Bart, but in the meantime we’d had a variety of entertainment styles. This didn’t make up for the process, not in my opinion, but it did make things more interesting for those captives who, like me, had to attend most of the performances.

Deena had recovered nicely, so relieved her days as Sporty Price had come to an end that she smiled more than she had for weeks.

I settled into the service, enjoying our pleasantly cool sanctuary, Esther’s organ prelude, the opening readings and prayer. Halfway through Ed’s sermon, however, I was pretty sure Deena’s good mood was going to change quickly—in fact the moment Deena got wind of the story her father had chosen to introduce his topic.

I waited until the crowd had passed through the door stopping to chat and shake Ed’s hand before I pounced on him. “I can’t believe you used Deena in your sermon!”

Ed looked bemused. If I’d critiqued his sources, or his use of one theologian versus another, he would have understood right away. But I could see he couldn’t connect my tone to anything I’d said.

“She’s going to be mortified.” I lowered my voice. “Then she’s going to be furious.”

“No.” He shook his head. I knew this expression well. He wasn’t defensive, just convinced he was right. This, of course, is the problem with being married to somebody who stands in the pulpit every Sunday.