Diamond Girl (10 page)

I screamed and sat down in the aisle clutching my ankle.

Petal yipped frantically. Milan sat up and stared at me like I had gone crazy. Christy said, “Oh no,” her standard response to everything, and Aunt Georgia lost it and started yelling at our one flight attendant, Amanda.

Amanda hadn’t signed on for emergency medical or, from the look of her manicure, for much of anything but trying to snag a Kelleher board member, and when she looked at my ankle, she ran hand-over-mouth to the bathroom.

Aunt Georgia rolled her eyes and yanked open the cockpit door without knocking.

“Something has happened to my niece. Who of you two is a trained doctor?” 

Milan had joined me on the aisle floor for support and I heard her choking laugh which she quickly disguised as a cough. The poor pilots looked at Aunt Georgia, terrified to be found lacking in medical degrees, and sputtered apologetically.

Aunt Georgia muttered about incompetence and, after a brief discussion about whether we should land at the next available airport somewhere in the 'God-forsaken middle of nowhere' or continue on to to New York, she told them she would handle it herself and slammed their door shut.

I’m sure those poor pilots would have been a lot less scared of a terrorist bomber than her. Aunt Georgia put the fear of God, and working for a commercial airline, into Amanda, and she and the girls got me settled onto the big couch at the rear of the cabin. Milan and Christy came back to sit with me, and Milan pulled out a joint, offering it to me for the pain. Aunt Georgia looked horrified and made a pointed gesture at the non-smoking sign mounted under the painting of Great Grandfather Kelleher.

Shaking her head in exasperation, she rummaged around her messenger bag and handed me two white pills, ordering Amanda to bring me a Pellegrino. The pain was making me shake and I swallowed them without asking.

Milan did though. “What are those?” 

Aunt Georgia sighed. “Oh, Percodan, I think, or Vicodin. I don’t know. She’ll be fine.” Milan nodded.

“Why do you have them?” 

Aunt Georgia looked at her narrowly. “Why not?” 

Christy moved closer to me and stroked my hair until the drugs lifted me on a warm current and I started to relax. These pills of Aunt Georgia’s, I reflected, beat Klonopin and Halidol hands down. I would have to talk to her about obtaining some of my own later.

Sleepily I watched her and Milan as they settled down near me and began a game of backgammon. I could tell Aunt Georgia approved of my beautiful, cool-headed friend, and the admiration was clearly mutual, because right before I slipped the surly bonds of earth - as they say in the commercials - I heard Aunt Georgia ask Milan what she planned to be when she was older.

Milan stared around the lush cabin and looked at the white mink laying discarded on the aisle floor. She smiled at Aunt Georgia.
“You.”

Chapter 11

The whole angry 'cut up wearing a cast' drama of my return to 800 Fifth Avenue was a disappointment. I kept telling myself, I keep telling myself, and anyone else who will still listen to me, that I don’t give a fuck what my family thinks, but I don’t imagine anyone, including me, ever bought that. Well, maybe my family, but they have their own stuff going all the time and so, really, I have always just played into their hands with my 'screw you' attitude.

With Kellehers, what’s on the surface is the only thing that matters. Then that is what I must be … makes sense.

I have to say that I must be a slow learner, because when I hobbled into the apartment, Petal’s little nose hanging outside the bag my aunt had given me for her, I was expecting, I don’t know, something.
Maybe not a 'kill the fatted calf' homecoming but at the very least an apology from my mother.

No one met me in the foyer and all the downstairs rooms were darkened. I heard some murmuring voices from far away and maneuvered my crutches toward the sound. Petal and I moved slowly down the long hallway, crutches squeaking against marble, then oak, past the dim formal living rooms and the library, the dining room and, finally, through my favorite room, the yellow and white breakfast area where I would eat with Daddy.

I shouldered open the swinging doors to the kitchen and was met with the startled looks of our cook, Avilla, and the butler, George.

George started to rise from his chair at the kitchen table. I smiled,
“No, it’s okay, George, I want to sit down too. Where is everybody?”

“Miss Carey, why are you in a cast? Oh no, here, please let me help you.”

I was happy enough to have George and Avilla fuss around me and get me settled on the chair, with my leg up on another one. Petal scrambled out of my bag onto the table and sat down, looking around her with her little bright raisin eyes.

Avilla murmured admiringly; George raised his eyebrows.

“This is Petal. Isn’t she gorgeous? Daddy sent her to me for my birthday. Is he here?”

They didn’t meet my eyes and neither of them wished me Happy Birthday, even though, in more of the pathetic irony that rules me, it was my birthday.

Avilla reached out and picked up Petal, taking her into the deeper recesses of the kitchen, muttering about finding her some steak.

My voice came out higher. “George?” 

He looked up, studying the copper pots hanging above us. “Yes, well, she is a lovely little dog, Miss Carey. Mr. Kelleher has perfect taste.”

“Yeah, I know, George. Is he here? I want to thank him.” 

“No, no not here right now, Miss Carey. Your father, well, he is living here again but he is not here at present, if you understand my meaning.”

“Uhm, not really, George.
So Daddy moved back home. Am I right so far?”

He nodded reluctantly. George is British and would take a bullet for
my father. Gossipy he’s not and, for that, he is the highest paid butler in the city, but this was my father, and George was pissing me off. 

“Okay, George, we’ll play twenty questions. Is Daddy in the city?”

“Oh no, Miss Carey. He is, I believe, in Antigua at present.”

“I see. Is he with Arianna?”

“Oh, I couldn’t say. I only know that he will be returning sometime later this month. I’m sure he will be delighted to see you.”

“Yup, me too, George.
I can tell he just can’t wait.”

“Miss Carey
…”

“What George?”

“Your father is a fine man. This has been a difficult time for him, returning to this house, finding out about your accident ...”

I pointed to my cast. “You mean my ankle but
...” I stopped when I saw the direction of his eyes. They were staring at the white wrappings on my wrist. Aunt Georgia’s concierge physician, who had met the plane, had redone my bandages at the same time he set my ankle. I felt the blood rise to my cheeks and self-consciously pulled down the sleeve of the hideous sweat-suit I was still wearing.

“Oh, so Daddy … he knows about
…”

“Yes, Miss Carey.”

“Oh, I see, uhm … are my sisters here?”

“No, Miss Carey.
After your mother took you to …”

“Kansas … I was in the great state of Kansas, George, home of Dorothy and Toto.”

“Yes, quite. At any rate, after that your mother was able to enroll Miss Kelly at a fine boarding facility in New Hampshire. She is doing wonderfully there, I understand.”

“George, I’ve only been gone a mo
nth. I ...”

His sad old eyes met mine squarely. “Please, Miss Carey.”

“Sure, George, of course, this isn’t your fault. I understand my mother quite well … no worries there. So is Lily gone too? Did she find a good school for a six year old, somewhere nurturing in Antarctica, where Lily can become well rounded?”

“No, Miss Lily is still here, though she and her staff are up at Tamerlane for a while …
just until ...”

“Just until mother is sure that the prodigal daddy is really coming
home, or until she can find a school that boards kids so young they haven’t lost their first tooth yet. Gotcha. So, George, where is my darling mother? I’m dying to see her. I know how anxious she must be about me, her oldest daughter, fresh off her escape from the crazy kid’s jail. Is she in the city?”

George sighed and stood up. “She’s here in the apartment, Miss Carey, in her bedroom. Come on, I’ll help you to the elevator … you’ll never make the stairs on crutches. Your old nurse, Sylvia, was let go while you were … while you were out of town. I’ll send up Cyprus, your mother’s new maid, to help you unpack and settle in.”

“No, that’s okay, George, I don’t need Cyprus. I don’t have any bags. This stunning ensemble is it, and hearing Sylvia is gone is almost as good a birthday present as getting Petal was. Will you bring up Petal after she is fed, maybe take her out? She isn’t housebroken yet, of course, but she loves to see new things.”

His face broke in the first smile I had seen since I had walked, or
hobbled, into the family mausoleum. “It will be my pleasure to take Miss Petal for a walk and introduce her to Fifth Avenue. Are you certain you can make it up to your room?”

I laughed and pointed at the staff elevator. “Yeah, George, I’ll be fine. Maybe, when you bring Petal back, you could send up some lunch?”

“My pleasure, Miss Carey.” He gently saw me into the elevator and, before the doors closed, he smiled softly at me. “It's wonderful to have you home, Miss Carey, and Happy Birthday. I wish ...”

I shook my head. “Don’t, George; don’t make any wishes for me. I’ll be okay.”

I pressed two instead of my own floor and maneuvered my way down the short corridor to my parents' suite. I didn’t knock, just stumbled into the darkened room in all my bright yellow glory and crutches. My mother stirred in her Charlotte Thomas sheets. The huge room reeked of her cloying scent and her anger.

“Carey? Jesus, what are you doing here and what are you wearing?” I moved over and sat down on the bed. She slithered to the other side. I turned on her bedside lamp and pushed up my sleeves. “Oh this, isn’t it fabulous? I picked it up in Kansas … and these?” I waved my wrists over her face. She squeezed her eyes shut. “These are my new bracelets. Like ‘em? You know, Ellen, today is my birthday.
Yup, fifteen. I can see you didn’t have time to shop. Should I maybe call Harry’s and have a couple of Martin Katz’s little armbands sent over as your late gift to me?” Martin Katz was doing some outrageous work in diamonds for Hollywood stars. His diamond bracelets were stunning in a retro way, and running a cool million apiece. I sighed loudly. “I know it’s extravagant, but I’m going to need two, one for each cut. Is that okay? I’ll tell him to put it on your charge. That way, when Daddy asks what you got for your first born, you can show him the bill.”

She didn’t open her eyes. “Go ahead, I don’t care. You’ll look ridiculous wearing them at your age, but it’s not my business.”

I answered her in exaggerated Marcia Brady tones. “Oh golly, thanks, Mom. You’re the best Mom ever!” 

She looked at me, her dark eyes cold. “I’m glad you think so, Carey. Now, as to your staying here, right now it’s not the best time for me. Your father and I are working through some issues and I was thinking that you might want to stay with your friends for a while, maybe the little Marin girls?” 

“Sure, Ellen, glad to do it, but I think maybe I’ll take them somewhere for a couple weeks. I don’t feel like doing the whole hotel thing right now. You don’t want me getting photographed with these on, do you?” I raised my bandaged wrists again.

She shuddered. “No, I don’t. That’s clever thinking, Carey. Yes, by all means take a little vacation; you and the girls. Consider it an extra birthday gift from your father and me.”

I looked away from her so she wouldn’t see the expression in my eyes. “Fine with me, Ellen. Will you want to call Dwight?”

“Dwight? Who’s that?”

“It’s my school, Mommy, you know, the place I have been attending for the last three years! Well, with the exception of my recent little … would you call it a vacation? Is that what you have been calling it, what you’ve been telling people?”

“Fine, Carey, express your hostility, act like a pathetic child. Of course I remember the name of your school. You just caught me off-guard. I’ll make arrangements. As to what I’ve been telling people, why I haven’t told them anything. No one has noticed you’ve been gone at all, Carolyn.” It was a good hit, I’ll give her that.

I stood up shakily. “Right, okay, well, thanks, Ellen. Always a pleasure. I’m going to go upstairs now. I’ll assume it’s all right with you if I stay tonight? I’m tired, my friends are tired, and I imagine they will want to talk to their parents before we just take off.”

My mother gave me a genuine smile. “Oh, of course, you can stay tonight, Carolyn. This is your home, don’t be ridiculous.” She gave a little laugh. “And I wouldn’t worry about your little friends talking to their parents. You can all just go as soon as you decide where
you  want to travel to. I’ll have my secretary notify Dwight for them as well. I understand the elder Marins are wintering in Los Angeles. Karen Marin is pregnant again. I hear it’s a boy, so I don’t imagine she will be returning to the city this winter. In fact, I know she won’t. I’m sure she’ll be very grateful to me for arranging this little amusement for her daughters.”