A Place Called Home (42 page)

“Then if you get the account it will be on its own merit.”

“Hell, yes.”

Case and Grant were immediately attentive.

Thea sighed. “You guys are like robber barons. My purse is on the sofa.”

Case pushed out his chair first and dashed to the living room to get it. He held it open for Thea so she could root out a quarter.

“Here,” she said. “Put it in the jar.”

“
You
have a jar?” asked Mitch.

Thea reached back in her purse. “Hell, yes.” She tossed a quarter to Grant. “Jar,” she said succinctly. “It was Emilie’s idea the first time she stayed with me.”

Emilie nodded serenely. “Aunt Thea has cable mouth.”

Mitch blinked. “Cable mouth?”

“You know. Like cable TV. The channels where you can say
anything
.”

Mitch gave a shout of laughter as Thea’s cheeks flushed with color. He ignored her glare and patted Emilie on her shoulder. “Good one, Em. Come on. Let’s help Thea clean up. We still have to get her car.”

Thea shook her head. “No. I really don’t have time for that. Drive me into town and I’ll get a ride to my parents’ house after work.”

“All right.” He sidled up to her chair and bussed her on the cheek. “Thanks for breakfast.”

Thea’s smile was still with her forty minutes later when she walked into the conference room at Foster and Wyndham. It faltered a little when she saw her father.

He stood. “You don’t mind, do you, Thea? I stopped in to see Hank and he told me about your presentation. He invited me to stay.”

“Did he?” Thea looked at the expectant faces around the table. “Well, good. Give me a minute, please. I need to get some things in my office.” She backed out of the conference room, shut the door, and took measured, even strides to her own office, trying not to look panicked.

Thea tossed her briefcase and purse onto the sofa and leaned back against the door. She drew in a deep breath and exhaled slowly through her nose. She tried it again, shutting her eyes this time. The exercise was only of marginal value. All she had to do to jump her heart rate and cramp her stomach was imagine facing her father in the conference room. Everyone would be turning to him after the presentation, looking for his approval. His opinion still mattered a great deal at Foster and Wyndham. Even new employees, who didn’t know him to see him, were thoroughly familiar with his reputation and exacting standards.

She could do this. Thea rested the crown of her head against the door.
She could do this.
The truth was, she had before. In her first eight years at the agency she had faced her father many times pitching ideas for new ads. It was also true that she’d never done it without some choice drugs. What she needed right now was something to dial down the intensity. Valium. Xanax. Maybe a handful of Ativan.

Thea’s fists clenched. Hearing papers crumple, she looked down and saw she was holding messages in her left hand—with no idea of how they came to be there. She realized Mrs. Admundson must have pressed them on her before she stepped in her office. Yes. A tranquilizer was definitely in order.

Or a painkiller. Something to mellow the senses. Vicodin. Someone in the office must have Percocet or OxyContin in their desk. That would give her a goddamn sense of well-being.

Breathe.

Thea sucked in air and let the messages flutter to the floor. She counted to ten slowly and then pushed off from the door in the direction of her desk. Before she could begin rifling her center drawer Mrs. A’s voice came over the intercom.

“Ms. Wyndham?”

“What is it?” Thea’s voice was uncharacteristically sharp. There was a slight pause before Mrs. Admundson continued.

“Mr. Foster is wondering where you are.”

“I’m here. Does he need a map?”

There was another pause. “Are you all right, Ms. Wyndham?”

“I’m fine. I need a few minutes.” Thea cut the intercom and picked up the receiver. She punched in ten numbers on the base.

Four rings, then: “Hey there. Unless you’re new to the planet—”

Thea hung up and tried another number. Two rings this time, then: “The cellular customer you are calling is currently not available or is outside the—” She slammed the phone down. No Rosie. No Mitch. There was no point in calling Joel. As supportive as he tried to be, he had never understood. Not really. Thea opened the shallow center drawer and began pushing papers and pens around. The paper clip tray tipped and spilled its contents. Markers. Scissors. Staple remover.

Her fingers dug a mint green pill out of one corner of the drawer. It was impressed with a V in the center. Thea palmed the Valium and kept looking. Loose change. Rubber bands. Stray business cards.

Thea fanned out the cards and found her counselor’s number. She picked up the phone again and called. Almost immediately she was connected with voice mail. She was given the option of talking to someone else in the event her call was an emergency, but Thea didn’t want to talk to a stranger. What would she say? She unfolded her hand and looked at the small green pill sitting in the heart of her palm. It was as innocuous as an after-dinner mint. How could she explain that right now she was feeling very much like a little girl whose fingers were poised at the rolling lips of a wringer?

Who knew anything about that?

Thea hit the intercom button. “Mrs. Admundson? Would you please ask my father to come in here?”

The presentation came off without a hitch. For Thea it was the easier of the two she did that day. The one she made to her father, the one where she put the Valium in his hand and made him listen to exactly what frightened her, was infinitely more difficult and ultimately more rewarding. It was the first time she had ever been able to acknowledge that the monsters that scared her were the ones that lived inside. It didn’t matter that he was more than a little bewildered by her stream-of-consciousness confession or the passion with which she delivered it. She cared more that he was sitting on her sofa beneath the Warhol print he had always disliked and never once mentioned it. She liked that he gave her his full attention and that even when his mouth thinned in disapproval or disagreement, he didn’t interrupt her. She shocked him, she thought, when she told him how much his good opinion meant to her—but that she wouldn’t wreck her life being afraid of his poor one.

She was an addict, she told him, and though her explanation was not so different from the one she had given him before she went into rehab, she believed he finally understood what it meant. At least he nodded at all the right times.

George Wyndham wasn’t changed by what he heard. Thea hadn’t expected that he would be. She had put it all before him, without blame or censure, and she was the one who came to view life through a different lens.

When she came to the end, he simply sat there. His features gave so little away that Thea couldn’t have said if he was stunned or simply being stoic. His very stillness caused her to take a step toward him.

“Daddy?”

He had looked up at her then, regarding her with something that passed for a smile on his face. “You’re very forthright, aren’t you, dear?”

“I suppose I am.” It surprised her a bit, this admission. It was not how she would have characterized herself. “Yes,” she said with more assurance this time. It was like taking that first step in a new shoe and finding you liked the fit. “I am.”

“Good. It will serve you well.” He paused, halfway to his feet, brought up short by another thought. “But you’re not a lesbian?”

Thea burst out laughing. “No, Daddy, I’m not a lesbian.”

George Wyndham nodded once, straightening. “It wouldn’t matter to me,” he said rather gruffly. “But your mother would certainly drown in her Scotch.”

Thea sank into the chair behind her desk, slipped off her black-and-white Ferragamo heels, and put her feet up. She pulled the phone toward her, fit the earbud in place, and then began returning calls. Between the ones relating to business, she tried Mitch. She finally got him on her third attempt.

“How’d it go?” he asked right off the bat.

“Great. Wonderful. Not a single glitch. Oh, and my father’s relieved I’m not a lesbian, although he says it wouldn’t matter if I was.” She smiled to herself as silence filled the airway. “Kind of tough to know what to say to that, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, well, I’ve got a picture going in my head now that’s going to be hard to shake.”

Thea rolled her eyes. “You’re such a guy.”

“Thank you.”

“I just finished setting up a meeting with Carver Chemical. I’m flying to New York next week.” She glanced at the calendar on her laptop. “Thursday afternoon. I’ll be back Friday night.”

“You’re going alone?”

“I’m taking half the Blues with me. Hank might go. He’s pumped for this.”

“Are you going to drive up this evening? Case and Grant have a ball game.”

Thea’s disappointment was real. “I can’t, Mitch. I still have to pick up the Volvo and I invited my mother and dad out to dinner. It’s going to be late before I can leave the office anyway.” She leaned forward and began scrolling through her calendar. “Tell me when the next game is.”

“Thursday, a week from now, but you’ll be in New York. There’s nothing after that until the All Stars on the Fourth of July. That’s the season finish.”

Thea entered the information. “What time does the game start?”

“Five-thirty. But Thea, you don’t—”

“I’ll think of something,” she interrupted. “Now, tell me about the cartoon you’re working on.” That was when Thea leaned back, closed her eyes, and let herself be lulled by the sound of Mitch’s sexy, sandpaper voice.

Emilie tugged on the back of Mitch’s T-shirt hard enough to choke off his
batter-batter-batter-swinnng
cry.

“Whoa! Em. What is it?” He pulled his shirt back in place and glanced at her. She was pointing to the entrance to the field, her mouth parted and her eyes wide. When he followed the direction of her finger, he saw what had rendered her speechless. His own jaw went a little slack.

It wasn’t every day a woman in a Chanel suit and a ball cap wriggled her way through the crowd at the concession stand and came away carrying three footlongs with everything and a cardboard holder of drinks.

Mitch watched Thea’s parents each relieve her of a hot dog and then follow her past the dugout and toward him and Emilie in the bleachers. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.” Although he said it under his breath, and with a certain amount of reverence, he caught Emilie’s look and knew she wasn’t fooled. “I’ll pay later,” he said, hopping down. Dust puffed around his Nikes as he hit the ground.

“Surprise,” Thea said, handing him the drink holder but keeping a good grip on her footlong. “What’s the score?”

Mitch found his voice. “Two - zip. Bottom of the first. We’ve already been to bat. The twins are in the outfield. You made good time.”

“Nice sports update. You do the weather?”

He ignored that and held out his free hand to Thea’s father. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon.” Translation: Not in this lifetime. Mitch nodded to Patricia Wyndham who was holding her hot dog in two hands and looking as if she had no idea what to do with it. “May I help you to your seats? It’s pretty crowded today. The Squirts and Little Rotary always draw a lot of spectators. We’re up on top.”

Thea had more difficulty than her parents. After all, they had just come back from walking the craggy moors of Scotland, while she was wearing a narrow Chanel skirt that did okay on the gentle incline of her office treadmill, but couldn’t be wrestled into modest coverage while climbing the bleachers. From where Mitch stood behind her, it was a great view.

Patricia Wyndham waited for her husband to spread a handkerchief on the rough wooden seat before she sat down. It was a tight squeeze between Emilie and George. “I don’t know why we couldn’t have gone to a real ball game,” she said. “Doesn’t the agency still have a box?”

“This is a real ball game,” Emilie told her matter-of-factly. “You have a hot dog, don’t you?”

Patricia blinked. “I was speaking to my husband.”

Emilie shrugged. “I know.”

Mitch tried to catch Emilie’s eye but she deliberately ignored him. Thea tapped Mitch’s knee and shook her head. “I don’t want her to be rude,” he whispered.

Thea cocked an eyebrow at him. “My mother’s the one being rude. Let them work it out.” Out of the corner of her eye she saw her father was actually smiling.

There was no time to appreciate the moment. The batter hit a ground ball, which took a bad bounce past the shortstop and the second baseman, both of whom were watching the sky for UFOs anyway. Case, sharing center field with his brother, remembered to run for the ball but overshot his mark and went flying chin first into the grass. Grant managed to dig his uniform out of his behind just in time to get his glove back on. The ball was now just lying there. He picked it up but didn’t appear to be entirely certain what to do with it.

Thea jumped to her feet and began yelling directions to him along with every other parent in the crowd. “Second base! Throw it to second!”

Emilie shot up and hopped onto her seat. Unencumbered by a hot dog, she waved her arms madly. “Second, Grant! Second base! Hurry!” She reached down and pulled on Patricia Wyndham’s arm. “Come on! You’re missing it! This is the good part!”

The footlong wobbled in Patricia’s hands but she gamely got to her feet. She was witness to Grant overthrowing second base and being a hero anyway because the runner was already on his way to third. The third baseman snagged the ball and there was some dashing back and forth before a tag was made. “It does seem like the good part,” she said dryly, sitting down again. “I believe you missed it, dear.”

“No, I didn’t,” George said.

Patricia followed the direction of his glance. Thea was still on her feet, arms raised, dancing in place and cheering at the top of her lungs. The ball cap had been refitted backward and the Chanel suit had dust on the jacket and skirt and a splinter in the hem. A dollop of ketchup and relish spotted the left sleeve. Her face was flushed. Strands of hair fluttered at odd angles on either side of the cap. Her eyes were almost feverishly bright.