If You Could See What I See (3 page)

The pink fainting couches were my grandma’s idea. My grandma said that when she was young and starting the company, she was often hungry and sometimes felt faint. Hence, we have pink fainting couches all over, “to remind me that I know where my next meal is coming from and to always be grateful,” she says.

Currently Sharon Latrouelle uses a fainting couch almost all day on the production floor because she gave her best friend a kidney and is still recovering. Roz Buterchof uses one, too, because she lost half a leg to cancer three months ago and needs to rest. Grandma paid her for the two months she was not in the office. Roz has worked for us for twenty-five years.

The company is wholly owned by my grandma. My mother, who is currently out on a book tour, as she is a nationally renowned sex therapist, doesn’t want the company.

Therein lies a huge problem for my grandma.

Who will take over?

I swallowed hard at the thought of what I knew she wanted me to do.

I looked into a mirror with an ornate white frame hanging on the wall of my office.

I looked like pale, worn-out, skinny crap.

I looked around my pink office.

I did not want to work. I did not want to inherit this company.

I wanted to crawl into a dark cave and hide.

 

“Oh, Meeegie! There you are, Meeegie!”

I smiled back at Kalani Noe. We were on a Skype chat. Kalani calls me Meeegie. As in, Meee Gee. She cannot say “Meggie.” She is the manager/owner of our Sri Lanka factory. I met her ten years ago; she’s about five years older than me. At the time of our interview her face was all beaten up.

She applied for a job at the factory as a seamstress. Her husband did not want her to have a job. A job meant independence. A job meant money. Both threats to him. Her lip was split in half. One eye was swollen shut, and there was a purple bruise down her left cheek. During the interview, she kept dabbing at her ear, which her husband had partially
bitten
off.

“Hello. I Kalani. I want work here. Please. I work good. No blood tomorrow on face. Yes? I work here?”

That was about the extent of her English.

It was good enough.

She worked her way up, she learned English, and she got rid of the husband because she had a job, and money, and independence. Later she bought the factory, partially with a loan from my grandma.

“I glad to see you, Meeegie. I glad!”

“It’s good to see you, too, Kalani. Wonderful, actually.”

“Meeegie, you back?” She put her hands to her black hair. “You work for Grandma company now?”

“Yes, I’m back, Kalani.”

“Oh me. Oh my. All these years. Now you back, Meeegie.” She waved at me, both hands. “You come home. Finally. Good girl. You good lady. I glad. Family. Stick together. You grandma need you. She old woman now, I tell her that. She too old.”

I pictured Kalani telling my grandma she was an old woman,
too
old. It wasn’t pretty.

“Here at factory me, my momma, brother wife, other brother number two wife, niece, five here, no kid for me. Ya. That too bad, but I have the many niece and nephew, right?”

“Right, Kalani.” Kalani had no children, she explained to Tory years ago, because her ex-husband hit her too many times “in the baby place, one time with bat, one time hammer,” and she could not get pregnant now. “How are you?”

Kalani was good, she told me, except that her brother’s number two wife had put a curse on her and now she had a rash because of the curse, so she cursed her brother’s wife with a “fat butt. Now she have fat butt. That from me. But my brother like. He like her fat butt. Not so good curse.” She sighed, crestfallen, then smiled. “Hey, Meeegie, I got boyfriend. Ya. He cute. Bang bang for me, but I no marry. He want marry, I say no way, Jose. That not his name. Name not Jose. I got that from Tory. You know, Tory?”

I assured her I knew Tory.

“You two no look like each other. That okay, that okay. She dark, eyes like gold cat, you pale, eyes like brown. Tory say she bad girl. She fun! She teach me okay be naughty.”

“Oh, Lord,” I muttered.

“She teach me women have pow—how you say—power. Women make decision. Not men. Men think with wiggly thing, balls knock together, you know? Women think with brain. Tory teach me men don’t have no good brains. I think she right. They think sex—money. Nothing else. Women they think business. Tory taught me, I the boss of my life, not no stupid men. I like it. I like being boss. I good boss to myself. No bad more husband for me. Last husband, he boom-boom my face, nose in wrong place on my face, see?” She pointed to her nose. It was indeed off at an angle.

“You have a nice nose, Kalani, and I’m sorry about the husband. He was a pig.”

“You no be sorry! He do it. I run away and he die in motorcycle accident, going fast, trying to hunt me. Like a hunter.” She mimicked shooting someone with a gun. “God good to me. He kill my husband, thank you, God. I live and I work for you and you old grandma and that funny Tory and Laceeey!”

“And we’re so happy you work for us, Kalani.” I tried to get her to talk about the factory, the designs, a few issues we were having with products, the dye, the shipments, etc.

But first she wanted to talk about American TV. “These TV shows about New Jersey. They true, they true? What about everyone have gun in America? That true you think? Everyone skinny, have fast car? And you find husband on TV show? Everybody do it that way? That how you marry?”

The employees were good. They make “good bras for you, Meeegie, you American women, big boobs. I can’t believe how big. Like rhinoceros. How you walk there, those big boobs?”

I told her it must be hard for some women, and I thanked her for all that she did for the company.

“Oh, thank you, Meeegie. I got house now, you know, years ago. Your grandma gave me extra money, I no know the word. Is it conus? No, not that word. Honus? No, not that word. Hmm. Oh ya. I know.
Bonus.
Start with b. Letter b. And I save, then buy house. My house. No bad men.”

I do love Kalani, and I have to be sensitive to cultural rules and not being offensive, but this time I pushed. “About the last order of the athletic bras . . .”

 

I am well aware that outsourcing can tick people off. Truth is, if we didn’t outsource some of our products, we could not survive. The labor is cheaper abroad, it’s that simple, and our competitors use it.

Are Americans losing jobs here because of it? Yes.

And no.

We do employ about seventy-five people here, some of whom sew specialty items, but if we made everything here in the States, would we go bankrupt? Yes. We could not compete against other lingerie companies. We could not afford the people we need, and their benefits, and all the tax ramifications involved. If we go belly-up,
everyone
loses their jobs, here and abroad.

Lacey goes abroad and checks on the factory, Tory does, too, and when I worked here I also traveled to Asia. We do not tell them when we are coming, we simply arrive.

We’ve had several factories over the years. We have done our best to hire only the factories that have a safe and healthy environment. When there are violations, we give them a warning, and when they don’t fix things, we move on. The problem with this, of course, is that when we move on, it’s the workers who may suffer if they lose their jobs because of our leaving. However, we cannot work with factories where the bosses are not adhering to our rules and regulations regarding employees.

We insist on a forty-five-hour workweek only. We do not allow unpaid overtime. There is no child labor allowed at all, there must be clean ventilation, breaks are mandatory, no harassment is critical, and a fair and friendly atmosphere must prevail. We pay far more than their minimum wage. We turn down thousands of women a year who want to work for us.

We were naive once years ago. We hired a factory that had male managers. The workforce was mostly women. There was harassment, threats—some of the women had been hit, and who knows what else. It ended up being an unclean, unsafe, and unsanitary environment. My grandma warned them. Tory flew over there and raised hell. She yelled, she threw a chair in anger, she pounded a table. She was livid about the treatment of the women and insisted that several of the male managers be fired.

The managers nodded their heads, up and down, up and down. “You the boss, you the boss. Ya. We do. We do it.”

They agreed to the changes we told them to make immediately.

Two weeks later, Tory and I headed back over for another surprise visit.

Same problems, same issues.

Tory and I gave money to all the women in the factory as a parting gift. We cut all our orders. The factory closed. In our defense, we could not possibly have continued our relationship with that factory. We could not support, morally or financially, a factory that disregarded the safety and health of the women.

However, we were friendly with a couple of the women who worked there. They spoke limited English, but they spoke enough to get across what happened when the factory closed: Many of the women ended up in prostitution.

Lacey came into my office semihysterical. Tory pounded in, raving. My grandma threw a pink lamp, then sank into an antique chair and cried. I have rarely seen her so upset.

It was heartbreaking. Absolutely devastating, although I hesitate to say it was “devastating” for us, when our employees ended up on their backs while we stayed safe and sound in America.

We were sickened.

That was one of the worst, if not
the
worst, time in our company’s history. We questioned everything we did, everything we stood for.

We are more careful now. We stringently enforce all labor rules. We give bonuses. We insist that the workers, almost all women, are treated with respect. Ninety-five per cent of our managers are women. If we had this many women working for us here, and as few men as we have there, we would probably be sued for discrimination.

We like the factory we have now, and we like Kalani. Most importantly, when we fly over—and no, we don’t warn Kalani—the factory is safe, the workers seem happy, and they all obviously love Kalani, who works hard but is truly a kind person. Plus, their numbers are fantastic.

That does not mean there are no problems.

Oh, how there are problems.

Small problems, gargantuan problems.

Often.

 

That night, after my dinner of popcorn and peaches, blended—I have odd tastes in food—I stared at the door of the closet in my tree house. Oh, what was hidden in there, behind Baggies, detergent, and sponges, was worse than any long-toothed monster hiding in any closet.

No one else knew what was there. Only me. I could hardly bear thinking about it.

3

H
e was trouble.

I knew it when I saw him standing in the doorway of his beige Craftsman-style home in a gray Army T-shirt and running shorts. He was barefoot. He was smiling. It was the smile that threw me and made me breathless.

“
You
live here?” The runner whom I had lusted over and called eye candy lived across the street from me? In this house with the white wraparound porch, the pillars, and the overhanging eaves that was so darn charming?

I could tell he was trying not to laugh. “I believe so, yes. Unless I’m a burglar.”

What a dumb question. He opens the door to his own home, a little after dawn, and someone asks if he
lives there?

He smiled down at me, and I mean
down at me.
He was about six feet six inches tall. I like tall men. Not heavy, but solid. Like a sequoia.

Yep.
Trouble.
“Damn.”

“I’m sorry?”

“No, I don’t mean damn, as in, I’m not glad that you’re here, not at all. I am glad. I mean, I don’t know you, but I am glad you live here in a house. I’m glad.”

He kept on smiling.

I wanted to slam my fist into my head and knock myself unconscious.

“Yes, I’m glad I live in a house, too,” he said.

He was wreaking manliness. Testosterone. Muscles. He looked like he’d been out in the sun a lot. Blondish hair. Thick, but short. He had a relaxed smile, and kind but sharp gray-blue eyes that look through you and in you and try to figure you out.

I had hit his truck with my car. With my boring, gray sedan that I bought two days after arriving. I hate the color gray.

I had pulled out of my driveway, gotten distracted by my breakfast, which was buttered noodles in a Baggie from last night that I was trying to eat, and I accidentally swerved too far across the street and hit it.

It was unfortunate. It was a black truck and looked pretty new.

I pulled away and did not enjoy hearing the screech of metal and bumpers clashing. I parked behind it and trudged up the driveway to the house. It was six thirty, but I saw a light on and thought I’d see if anyone was up and awake. If not, I’d leave my insurance card, my name and number, and an I-Am-Sorry note. The house was on a slight hill, with graceful maple and old, gnarled oak trees swaying around it and lots of green grass.

I was so embarrassed. “I hit your truck.”

“You did?” He raised his eyebrows but did not look mad.

“Yes, I’m so sorry. I live across the street, I moved in a couple weeks ago—”

“I know.”

“You know?”

“Yes.”

He kept smiling and held out a big hand. “Blake Crighton.”

“Meggie O’Rourke.”

“Good to meet you, Meggie. I’ve been meaning to get over to say hi.”

Oh yeah, he was trouble. Please be married. Please. Then I will endeavor to never think about you and I certainly will endeavor not to talk to you except to say hello and good-bye. I do not mess with other women’s men. I wanted to grab his left hand and check.

“Do you want to walk down with me and see your truck and the damage I did to it?”

“I’ll see it later. Do you always go to work at six thirty in the morning?”

His question was unexpected. He’s a guy. I thought he would have charged right down the driveway to examine his precious possession like a ticked off bull. “Yes. I like to get there before the disasters of the day start.”

“I understand.”

In front of Blake, for that second, I wished I were the person I used to be. I was wearing no makeup except for a smidge of lipstick, as usual. I wore it only so my lips wouldn’t feel chapped. My tight blond curls were back in a ponytail. My hair was too long and resembled a horse tail. I was wearing a white T-shirt and jeans that were too big, so I’d wrapped a leather belt around myself. I was wearing sloppy brown boots.

My hair used to have a braid woven here or there between the curls or, now and then, streaks of color, a blue streak, a purple streak, a feather. I used to wear dangly earrings and colorful or sparkly scarves, high heels or awesome boots, tight jeans, and this ethnic, natural jewelry.

I don’t anymore.

“Do you deal with disasters also?” I asked.

“On a regular basis.”

“They can make for a tiring day.”

“Yes. No question.”

He was a stud. An in-charge sort. Would he have to be in charge in bed? I got a graphic image in my mind—him on top of me—and felt myself get a bit sweaty. “Here’s my cell number and my e-mail, and my work number, and my insurance card, and when you want to drop your car off to get it fixed, let me know and I’ll get a rental car for you here, or a truck. Would you prefer a truck?”

“Neither. I have another car. I’ll drive that.”

“I’ll let my insurance agent know what happened and that you’ll be calling.”

He grinned at me.

“You’re taking this amazingly well,” I said.

“It’s a minor accident. No big deal. And I had a chance to meet the new neighbor.”

“It’s been an enormous thrill, I’m sure.”

“Yep. It has. Do you want to come in for breakfast? Then I can prove to you in my own kitchen that I’m not a burglar.”

“Breakfast?”

“Yes. I’m making eggs. I don’t cook well, but this is one thing I can do.”

Breakfast? With him? “Uh, no. I actually have to go to work. I like to be on time for my disasters.”

“Can you go late?”

He smiled at me. I smiled back. Shoot.

“I . . . I can’t.” I took a deep breath. He scared me. Not scared me in a way that made me think he would leap out and swallow me whole or brandish a bazooka, but he was breathtaking in a ride ’em cowboy sort of way. “I have a meeting this morning, and people will probably end up angry and, if my sisters are in the same room together, they may start throwing things, like broken mannequins and bras, so I need to get in . . .”

“That sounds like a rather dicey situation.”

“Yes. It is. They are.” I was so embarrassed. I used to be able to talk to men, to flirt. I was confident. I was fun and sure of myself. I could even be witty and sexy. That was all, all gone. I wasn’t fun. I wasn’t sure of myself. I sure as hell wasn’t witty. Sexy? Ha.

“I’m sorry again about the truck. I’ll make sure I don’t smash you again.”

He grinned back. “No problem. And welcome to the neighborhood.”

“Thank you.” Please be married. Please. He put a hand up—his left hand—on the door jam. No ring.

“Shit,” I muttered.

“Hey, don’t worry about it.” He shrugged his shoulders. “These things happen. Are you sure you don’t want breakfast?”

He thought I was upset about hitting his truck.

It was almost funny.

What did he say his last name was?

I watched my mother on TV at work while answering e-mails, planning an agenda for a meeting with my sales staff, and making notes on what to say to calm down a currently pissed-off buyer for a major department store who got into it with the ferocious Tory.

My mother, Brianna O’Rourke, was on a popular talk show promoting her new book,
Couples and Coupling
. Her red curls were flowing down her shoulders. She was wearing a cheetah paw print dress and black heels. She’s sixty-one and looks forty-five. She’s the size of a ballerina with a size D chest.

She appears so sweet. Light green eyes like Grandma’s, soft features, and one of those smiles that is twice the size of everyone else’s. If you didn’t know, you’d think she was a cross between a Southern belle beauty queen and an Irish elf.

Then she opens her mouth and words like
oral sex, stroking slowly, clitoris, orgasmic rhythm,
and
petting gently, petting hard
come out. She would sell thousands of books before the hour was over.

“Look here, Betts,” she said to the host, a brown-haired funny gal. “Sex should be kinky.”

I groaned.

The audience laughed.

“As kinky as two people want it to be. Think of it as a game. Not a board game, unless you’re stacking checkers up on each other’s buttocks. Not a tennis game, unless you’re playing it naked. No, kinky sex is a fun game. Use your imagination. You can always use toys and costumes. What’s wrong with dressing up as a Thong Princess? You don’t know what a Thong Princess is? It’s a woman wearing a thong, a tiara, a push-up bra with sparkles, and high heels. She carries a soft and furry wand so she can encircle the man’s . . .” and then I heard one long
beeeeeppp
from the censors, which meant that my mother became too graphic.

The host was laughing, and blushing.

“You’re blushing,” my mother accused her.

“I am not.”

“You are! Listen here, Betts. Sex is nothing to be embarrassed about. We’ve all grown up hearing about the bad in sex: unwanted pregnancy, diseases, open sores. Some of us were taught in church that sex was bad, for sinners. You sure as heck didn’t talk about it, right? But what we’ve created in this country is a puritanical guilt and fear about sex. When you are in a committed relationship, when you’re using effective birth control, when you’ve both been tested for diseases and come up healthy—let it fly.” My mother flapped her arms like a bird.

“Let sex fly. We have to bring originality back to the bedroom. Do this one at home.” She put her fingers up in quote marks in the air. “New Position Night.”

“Wow,” the host said, marveling. “I don’t think I could do that for more than three Saturday nights. . . .”

“You can!” my mother announced, her sweet innocence shining through with that red lipsticked smile until she said, “Let’s talk about the frog and the dog position. First off, the man must . . .” and
beeeeeppp
went the censors.

“Another position is the Rocket Ship. Now, some women, with their buttocks on such full display, might feel some embarrassment. If that’s you, slip on some lace and silk. This is how you do it,” and
beeeeeppp.

I groaned. “Oh, egads, Mother—”

The hostess said, “I’m learning a lot today.” She fanned herself with her hand.

“Good. You can take it home with you tonight. If I can add one more thing . . . rip out your old bathtub and put in a nice long tub for two. In a bath together you can use oil to full effect. Get up on your knees and have your partner take some warmed-up oil and . . .”
beeeeeppp.

I wasn’t even embarrassed, not that I would take a bath again in my whole life because of the drowning nightmares.

When I was in middle school, my mother started to make a name for herself as a nationally renowned sex therapist. Unfortunately, she didn’t talk only about communication, date nights, giving each other a compliment a day, making time for romance, all the boring stuff “experts” drone on about.

Oh no. She had to delve in deep and graphically. She used plastic, anatomically correct models. She used bananas and donuts. She used an occasional whip and whipped cream. She talked about vibrators, how to use them, when to use them together. Again and again she harped about “happy in the bedroom, happy in the home.”

Tory, Lacey, and I heard kids gossiping about us, laughing. We were called The Kids Of The Sex Mom.

It was humiliating.

In our defense, and to make up for our mother, Lacey and I wore prim, proper clothes. Crew neck sweaters. Jeans that were not tight. Tennis shoes. No makeup. Tory dressed, however, in her words, “high fashion, elegantly slutty.” We all played sports, hard, and we played to win.

Then our mother would arrive at Back to School night. Black leather skirt and jacket, cleavage out, and that toothy smile and innocent Southern belle/Irish elf look.

She was mobbed by other parents.

We wanted to hide.

I blew my mother a kiss as the show ended.

We are as different as a whip and whipped cream.

I love her with my whole heart.

 

My grandma said that being around all the lingerie was what turned my mother on to romance and sex.

My mother said that was quite possible. The deciding factor, though, for a career outside the business, is that my mother and Grandma cannot work together.

My mother said she could not work with Grandma in the business because “I would kill her.”

My grandma said she could not work with my mother, “or I would have to visit the insane asylum on a weekly basis and take up serious drinking.”

They love each other; they cannot work together.

It’s like watching two bulls charging at each other at full speed in high heels and exquisite jewelry. Bulls can’t charge well in high heels, but you get the idea.

My mother went to college and took a class in psychology because a man she was interested in was taking it. She was hooked. Not on the boy, although she said there was a romance. She was hooked on psychology. She became a licensed therapist and started working with people, quickly finding the dynamics of marriage, a union she would have no part of, fascinating. She combined her practice, which was soon incredibly successful, with a column on love and sex.