Chore Whore (26 page)

“Lucy, Tommy Ray's not here. His plane never arrived!” I whisper. “They're closing the airport for the night. Can you call his cell and see if they got delayed somewhere?”

Lucy stares at me without uttering a word. Her beauty transforms into horror and ugliness before my eyes. She reaches her hand up to her head as if she's going to faint, and brings it down as hard as she can, openhanded across my face. My cheek burns.

“You witch!” she screams. “You've ruined my wedding, you horrible, vile witch.” She lands on me, pelting me in the face as the crowd gathers around to watch. I'm horrified when I hear Blaise screaming out for me. Lucy scratches me with her freshly painted nails, leaving marks down my arms and neck.

I can't hit her in front of her mom and dad and a priest! This crazy woman is supposed to pay me, and I'll surely never get paid if I hit her.

“Have you lost your mind, Lucy?” I growl. “Get off me!” I grab one of her flailing arms and bite her as hard as I can. She wails in pain, then hits me even more viciously across my back and head.

Jesus, why isn't anyone helping me?

Finally, pushing his way through the crowd, Blaise jumps on Lucy and pulls her head back. She screams at him to stop and he clinches his jaw and pulls harder. Clumps of hair and flowers are coming out of her head and into his fists. He straddles her and cranes her face back to meet his.

“No one hurts my mom!”

“Get off me, you little brat!” Lucy cries out.

Suddenly, Luke, Lucy's dad, intervenes and pulls Blaise, who's yelling and punching, off Lucy, and Lucy, who's screaming bloody murder, off me.

“You bitch! You're fired,” Lucy screams, pointing at me.

“You can't fire my mom!” Blaise yells out with equal fervor. “She quits!”

“Forever, Corki. I never want to see you again! How fucking dare you ruin my wedding! What are you? Jealous? Jealous of my relationship with Tommy Ray because your own husband left and never came back? Huh?” she screams as she kicks her dad away.

The guests suddenly gather around Lucy.

Unbelievable! I get attacked in front of everyone for nothing I've done and they go to rescue her! Beryl sweeps by me. “You better go on home now, honey. You've done enough for one day.”

I gather up Luella from her crazy son's wedding, grab Blaise and get the hell out of there. Blaise is furious and I can barely see straight to drive back to Imerovigli without plunging down a hill.

It's six
A.M.
and I haven't heard or seen Lucy or any member of her entourage for twelve hours. Blaise and I rest our luggage on the tarmac as we wait to board the flight out of my favorite island; I doubt I will ever return. My eye is black and aching. I've had enough of movie stars to sate me forever. The faster I get away from these people, the faster I can begin to create a normal life for us.

I'm mad at myself for not punching Lucy into the stone pavers and really angry that she brought up Basil, something I told her once in confidence. Still, I'm hurt that I worked harder than I ever have to create a truly lovely wedding and then got treated like her whipping boy. The venom with which she attacked me has jarred me to the bone.

Our plane lands on time
in Athens but the outbound Lufthansa flight is full. I show the woman behind the counter our full-fare tickets and we are put on an Alitalia plane bound for San Francisco via Milan. San Francisco is close enough. Five hundred miles from home will be more comforting than being halfway around the world with a bunch of maniacs.

On board the Alitalia flight, Blaise quietly watches the screen at the front of the cabin, which shows where our plane is in midflight against a map of Greece, Italy and the Adriatic and Ionian seas. Our plane hugs the Greek coast heading north before crossing the sea. I lean on the window watching the sea and wonder how this event has affected Blaise. He hasn't spoken one word since last night. I put my arm around him for the remainder of the trip, and this one time, he doesn't remove it.

We arrive at Malpensa Airport in Milan, potentially the most poorly named airport in the world. Malpensa. Bad thoughts. Bad thinking. It's apropos at the moment, but I don't want to get on a plane with anyone else who has bad intent.

As Blaise stands with the Italians at a tremezzini stand munching on a broccoli-and-shaved-Piave-cheese sandwich drizzled in garlic-laced olive oil, I get out the world cell Lucy provided for me in time of emergencies and use it—all I want. I call my mama and tell her everything. I call my sister Prudence in Menlo Park and tell her we're headed her way and can she pick us up at the airport. I call Veronique's world cell and tell her the whole story.

“Corki,” she says with compassion in her voice, “this is one of the worst things I've ever heard!” I can hear Roberto in the background talking to her. Before I can respond, she continues. “Corki, there's a bus at Malpensa that will take you to the train station in Milan. Why don't you guys come to Portofino for a few days? Roberto has a small apartment that isn't being used right now. You're welcome to stay there. Come! We'll take you out on his boat.”

I think for a moment and accept her offer. We gather our bags and head toward the airport bus stop. On the bus ride into the city, I call my sister again and cancel the pickup at San Francisco.

Portofino, with all its beauty and solitude, beckons so strongly I can taste it.

Five hours later
we sit on Roberto's docked “boat,” as Veronique called it. I call it the biggest yacht I've ever been on.

“It's one hundred and fifty feet long, Mom,” Blaise beams. “That's what Mr. Tratelli told me. This is so incredibly cool.”

I sit in the hot tub sipping a diet soda that tastes similar to the sea in which we're floating. I'm being pelted, not by Lucy, but by six jets of pulsing water beating every knot I've accumulated in my back over the past four weeks. I feel my tension floating away.

“And he said that if I want,” Blaise goes on, “when we go out to sea, I can steer the boat. He'll even tell the captain to teach me about navigation by the position of the stars. Is this cool or what?”

I can barely find the breath to answer.

“Mom, are you listening to me?”

“I am, Blaise. It's cool,” I say nonchalantly.

Blaise looks bored for a moment. “I'm going off to explore,” he says and scampers off. I watch him go until he grabs hold of the doorframe and swings into the cabin.

The waiter, a small effete Armenian man named Teymour, approaches me with drinks balanced on a tray.

“Ma'am, would you like another drink?”

I smile at him and shake my head. “No thank you, Teymour. I've had enough.”

He bows slightly and leaves.

Veronique and Roberto
join me in the hot tub, where we all sit quietly taking in the Italian sun. I ponder the graciousness they showed in inviting us here on a real vacation, and break the silence.

“I can't thank you two enough for this. Can I please cook you dinner tonight?”

“I was hoping you would,” Roberto says, smiling without opening his eyes. “Marcello, one of the cooks, can take you to market in Santa Margherita Ligure if you'd like.”

“I'd love that.”

After a dinner of lobster,
pasta with mussels, and white beans with roasted tomatoes, Roberto proposes a toast. Blaise loves this tradition and stands to meet all the other clinking glasses. Out of the dark galley comes candlelight. A brightly lit birthday cake is suddenly in front of Blaise, much to his amazement. With all the excitement, we both forgot that today is his eleventh birthday, but apparently Veronique did not. He shrieks with childish joy and surprise and blows out all eleven candles with one breath.

As we eat the delicious almond-flavored cake with vanilla gelato, I admire Roberto, who, I must confess, looks devilishly handsome with his tanned Italian skin and white linen shirt.

“Corki,” Roberto says my name with a roll of the r that I wish was part of my everyday accent. “My lovely Veronique told me of your struggles this past week.” He raises his glass of champagne. “Here's to freedom and starting life anew.”

“Here, here!” we all say and I take a sip.

“Thank you,” I say, nodding. “This is very kind of you to invite us here. This has all been lovely. Thank you so, so much.”

“You are most welcome,” he says.

I tuck Blaise into bed
at the “small apartment,” a three-bedroom, three-bathroom villa overlooking the harbor of Portofino. A flickering bulb resembling a candle's flame softly lights the room. Blaise pulls my arm so I'll sit down with him. He sleepily stares at me.

“Mom, you remember when Mr. Barba called?”

“Yes.”

“It wasn't Mr. Barba.”

“Yes it was. I talked to him. He had a cold.”

“No, Mom, he didn't,” Blaise looks down, embarrassed. “It was me.”

“But I—”

“Mom, I'm so sorry I made you cry. I never knew I was hurting you like that. You didn't seem to care about me that much. It seemed like your work was more important than me.”

“That was you, Blaise?” I stare at him with my heart pounding rapidly. I reflect back on “Mr. Barba” coughing and not being quite as eloquent as he was the first time I'd spoken with him. I think of how I poured my soul out in a steady stream of sobs.

“I was just going to pull a trick on you, that was all. I wanted to see what you'd tell Mr. Barba, and then, well . . .”

“Well, you found out,” I say, smiling and embarrassed.

“I sure did.”

“Blaise, I'm doing the best I can. I know sometimes it doesn't seem to be enough, but you mean everything to me.”

We're silent for a moment, then I run my hand through his dreadlocks.

“Mom . . . we'll be okay, right?”

“We'll be more than okay, Blaise,” I say, trying to forget that I now have no idea how we will survive financially.

I kiss him on the forehead and sit with him until he falls asleep.

Home isn't quite as sweet
with a throng of reporters and photographers sitting on my front steps eagerly awaiting our six
A.M
. arrival. I prepare Blaise for the onslaught of questions about to be thrown at us as we sit in the sedan that brought us home from the airport.

“Blaise, you see those guys in front of our house?”

“Yeah.”

“They're the paparazzi. They're going to shove cameras in your face and yell taunting questions. Remember how we play blind? Now we're going to play deaf, dumb and blind. No matter how they try to provoke us, we'll walk through them like Moses parting the Red Sea, understand?”

“Yeah. Why are they here?”

“They're waiting for us because they want to ask me questions about Lucy. Since I'm not going to lie for my clients anymore, I'm just going to keep my mouth shut . . . at least until Lucy and Tommy Ray pay me what they owe.”

Before I can prep him anymore, Blaise bolts from the car, whizzes past the crowd and disappears around a corner of our fourplex. He darts to the left where there's a storage room under the stairs rather than going up the staircase to our apartment.

Good for him; he got away!

The driver gets our luggage out of the trunk and opens the door for me to get out.

I've never in my entire career as a personal assistant been asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. I don't know why; most assistants are asked to sign immediately. But I took my own unspoken oath twenty years ago. I swore to protect my clients' personal information and never reveal anything about them to anyone . . . especially the press.

I put on my sunglasses—a defensive tool. I won't have to look anyone in the eye and no one can see my blackened one. I'll walk straight on through, just as I told Blaise to do.

I get out of the car and the paparazzi are on me within seconds.

“Are you aware of the breakup of Lucy Bennett and Tommy Ray Woods?” one calls out.

“Is it true that Tommy Ray Woods was last seen in Mexico City with his costar, Damienne Beauté?” another asks.

If that's true, it will be a stab in the heart to Lucy. She used to baby-sit Damienne!

“Did Tommy Ray dump Lucy Bennett at the altar? Is it true?”

“Is it true Jock Straupman is moving to Paris permanently?”

That's a new one. I'll have to check. I'll pick up the National Enquirer when I go to the grocery store. They know half the goods on my folks before I do!

“Are you aware that Lucy Bennett was seen yesterday on the island of Pantelleria with the singer B. C. Collins?”

That's another new one, but it wouldn't surprise me. She doesn't mess around when it comes rebounding. It's her specialty.

“Corki, are you aware of any of this?”

The paparazzi quiet as I turn around to face them. Suddenly I hear a hiss, then a spurt, and a geyser of water shoots straight out of the bushes, drenching the cameramen and forcing them backward to protect their equipment. I look over toward the room under the stairs.

Blaise has turned our unruly, good-for-nothing-until-now sprinklers on the sharks.

As I stand in the water, getting thoroughly soaked, the cameramen dash out to the street to avoid the wild jets of water shooting everywhere. Blaise peeks out from behind the door and gives me the thumbs-up. Smiling at my son, I pick up a magazine from the ground and look at the front cover.

“Can you explain that?” a reporter calls out.

There I am on the wet cover of a popular weekly magazine, standing next to Lucy on the balcony overlooking the caldera. The picture was taken two seconds before Lucy attacked me.

It's seven
A.M.,
but with the paparazzi circling our apartment like a pack of dogs circling their kill, I can see that today, even though it's the last day of school, would be a very good day for Blaise to be there.

I make espressos for us both, a once-in-a-great-while treat for Blaise, who would probably fall asleep without one. By eight
A.M
. we are sneaking out the back door, firing up Bella and burning rubber out of the backyard without bothering to get out and close the gates after us.

· · ·

Dr. Castillo greets Blaise
with a smile. Besides being a fine principal, she's a good actress.

“Welcome back, Blaise.”

“Thank you, Dr. Castillo. I'm happy to be back.”

Dr. Castillo and I raise eyebrows at one another.

As I pull away from
the school, Shelly calls on my cell.

“Corki, I was hoping you were home.”

“We just arrived. I have so much to tell you, it's crazy.”

“Same here. Atom's in the hospital,” she says. “The doctors say he'll be okay, but apparently it was shaky for a while.”

“My God, what happened?”

“Well, let's just say the drugs we were so afraid the big, bad wolf was going to give to the kids didn't come from Compton. They were sitting right here on Esther's kitchen counter. She left her Xanax out and Atom swallowed a bunch of them. He's not talking yet, but they've stabilized him. They had to pump his stomach.”

“Oh no!”

“Esther's been so busy with her event planning, I think someone needed attention and someone got it! Handyman Dwayne found him on the floor in the hallway. Liam's in pieces. You know him, Mr. Best Dad in the Universe. He hasn't been back to the studio since. He's at the hospital, hasn't left Atom's side and has no intention of leaving. Esther, on the other hand, is falling apart. She's crying one minute, screaming the next, all from her bed, all in a tranquilizer haze. I can't work hard enough to keep her happy, which sort of leads to the good news in all this.”

“Which is?”

“Which is that I won't have to much longer.”

“Why?”

“I've received a scholarship and I'm going back to school to get my master's degree.”

The moment I get home,
I type out my invoices on the slim chance that I'll actually get paid. To Lucy, I also submit my six-hundred-dollar phone bill that's been outstanding for a while. Thank God her business office gave me her credit cards to pay for hotels, flights and per diem, otherwise I'd be out way more cash than I already am. Within five minutes of faxing my invoices, I get a call from Debbie, who pays Lucy's bills. She is sorry to tell me this, but she has been given specific instructions not to pay any of my invoices.

That bitch!

So, not only am I out my six hundred for the phone bill, but two weeks' worth of pay. I'm fuming. An hour later, I get a call from Harvey, who pays Tommy Ray's bills.

Same thing.

I pace my living room, trying to figure out a way to get the money that is owed to me. Finally, my neighbor calls to ask what I'm doing up there. Trying to wear a path in the hardwood floors? And why is the front yard flooded?

I explain the situation. “Are those the same folks you just moved into that place in Beverly Hills?” she asks.

“Yep.”

“Sounds like you need to go on a ‘shopping spree' and get what's due you.”

Hmmmm. Interesting perspective. I lie in bed and think some more. I don't realize I'm asleep until the phone wakes me.

“Hello,” I say, groggily.

“Corki Brown?” a male voice asks.

“Yes?”

“Bob Caplan, National Enquirer,” he states. “Looks like you might be out of a job, huh?”

“What?”

“Judging from the cover of Peo—”

“Yes, I saw the cover,” I say.

“Have you seen the layout?”

I sit up in bed.

“No, just the cover.”

“Well, it's just on the newsstands this morning. You were caught, on film, being . . . well, it looks like, assaulted by Lucy Bennett.”

“No!” I say in disbelief.

“Yes, that's what it looks like.” Bob is quiet for a moment. “I hope you have a nest egg.”

“Why?”

“Well, the cover and inside story is all speculation. To be frank, Corki, I'd pay dearly for the whole story told from your perspective.”

“I'm sure you would, Bob. But I can't do that. You know I can't.” If I talk, I know I'll never be hired as a personal assistant again. I suddenly wonder if he's taping the conversation.

“It could be worth twenty-five thousand dollars, especially with pictures,” he says, tempting me to forget my morals.

“Bob . . .”

“Thirty. I could go up to thirty if it's juicy. It looks very juicy. Do you have any bruises or anything like that? If it's visible, I might even be able to squeeze out thirty-five.”

I'm silent as I think of the money owed me.

“Listen, Corki, all this will be forgotten when the next scandal hits the papers. Lucy and Tommy will find solace in someone new, and you'll have a little nest egg for yourself.”

I feel as if my soul is up for auction.

“Bob, I'm sleeping. Can you call me another time?”

I gently hang up, knowing good and well that I just openly invited him to figure out what my soul is worth.

I cogitate on the stories I have sewn up inside of me: Jock and his proclivities—all of them—young girls, guns, child porn passed off as art, secret rooms; Lucy and her endless fodder for front-page stories—the sex pictures, the romps, the wedding fiasco, her secret code to the panic room, her past affairs with married men, her attempts at purchasing people—her punching and scratching and lies and deceit.

I have to call Bob back and tell him that he should never, ever call me again. I pick up the phone and it is dead. I call the phone company from my cell and am told that my phone has been cut off for nonpayment of $633.19—the $633.19 I spent arranging the wedding—Lucy's wedding.