Here I Go Again: A Novel (18 page)

Pfft. More like her little
cha-ching
. There’s no way Charlotte isn’t her meal ticket.

ChaCha glances up from her phone, nods, and then gets back to her game of Angry Birds, currently being played at full volume.

Tawny continues. “ChaCha’s an international megastar. Everybody wants her to promote their stuff. Just yesterday, we heard from a manufacturer out of Japan who wants to pay her boo-koo bucks to be the face of their product.”

Nicole replies, “We would absolutely find your daughter opportunities to cross-promote, because that can be a powerful brand-builder. Look at what Rihanna’s done with Cover Girl and Michael Jordan with Hanes, just as two small examples. With proper execution, the celebrity becomes even more iconic, she’s exposed to new audiences on a variety of platforms, and product sales soar.” She grins and all at the table follow suit. Nicole has a way of making everything sound so nice. “Everyone wins. May I ask, what does the Japanese company want ChaCha to promote?”

“Condoms with Hello Kitty on them.”

While I choke on my water, Nicole smoothly suggests, “Perhaps we should weigh all her opportunities before partnering with any brands.”

Charlotte’s attorney and manager both mouth,
Thank you
, in unison, while Tawny pouts and bangs the table, spilling Bobby’s orange juice. Without missing a beat, Nicole hands him a stack of napkins. It’s like it’s impossible for her
not
to act like someone’s mom.

“Well, fuck me sideways. That’s why this one won’t let ChaCha do any club promotions in Vegas.” Tawny points an inch-long French-tipped nail toward the agent, who currently appears to be biting his own lip hard enough to draw blood. Then she gestures toward the manager. “And you! Thought you Jews were all about gettin’ paid, but, noooo. It’s all, ‘She can’t sell condoms; she’s a kid,’
and,
‘Maybe we should wait till she’s outta ninth grade to pose topless.’ Buncha Baptists, all of you. ’Cept for the Jew, of course.”

The attorney keeps glancing at his watch. Oh, buddy, I really, really hope your hourly rate is worth it.

Eventually, Nicole’s able to wrest control of the meeting away from Tawny and moves on to discuss crisis management. Somehow I suspect ChaCha’s going to need a contingency plan sooner rather than later with Discount Dina Lohan at the helm.

Every time Tawny opens her maw, the differences between her and Nicole become more pronounced. What on earth does Bobby see in Tawny, outside of her overt (to the point of grotesque) sexuality? Nicole’s all petite and athletic and adorable, with glossy brown hair and lashes that look fake but totally aren’t, a lot like Natalie Wood in
Splendor in the Grass
before her character went batshit over young hotty Warren Beatty and was admitted to a mental institution.

You know, that’s probably not the best example.

What I’m saying is that Nicole is lovely and light and lithe, all big eyes and high cheekbones and taut muscles. She’s elegant and thoughtful and moves like a dancer, always swirling around in full skirts and ballerina flats. In the five minutes since Mrs. Tawny Paulson stopped trying to extort money from MCPR, she’s thrust her hand in her blouse twice to reposition an enormous melon, and she’s presently panning for gold in her ear canal. With my pen.

When she tries to hand it back, I wave her off. “That’s okay. I have plenty more back at my desk.”

Nicole leads the discussion while I attempt to make sense of the situation. Deva did explain that any changes in the past would impact the future, but it never occurred to me that
this
might be one of the changes. I’m all conflicted by the questions this meeting has raised.

Is awful Charlotte saddled with this terrible fame whore of a stepmom because of me?

Further, does Nicole not have kids because I changed the past? I wasn’t a fan of her brood, per se, but I never meant for them
not to exist
.

Then again, if she never had her children or that life, she wouldn’t specifically miss them, right?

I really need to speak with Deva.

I hope she’s back soon.

 * * * 

O
ur meeting with Team ChaCha lasts an hour, and when we’re done, I’m less concerned with rips in the fabric of time resulting in one unholy pairing, and more concerned that Nicole talked this hateful child’s team into working with us.

“Shall we grab some lunch and discuss?” I suggest.

“Yay! I’d love to. I need to answer a few e-mails and I want to check in on Facebook real quick, but I’ll meet you by the elevator at noon.” We part and head back to our respective offices on opposite sides of the conference room.

Ah, Facebook! Yes! That’s where I need to go. I’ll look at her page and find out what’s going on with her, because clearly things aren’t like they were before. Whether or not that’s for the better is still to be determined. At no point in the past week did I consider that changing my past might drastically alter anyone else’s in any way but positive, so this is a bit daunting.

I settle into my desk in the corner office, with the entire Chicago cityscape behind me. But I’m not distracted by the view for once, because I’m on a mission. I boot up my laptop and make a mental note again to check on the tech appointment because this damn thing still isn’t running correctly. If Nicole posted any streaming videos, I can’t access them, but otherwise I should be good to go.

I decide pictures really are worth a thousand words, so I pull up her photo page first. In the previous-future, she had a million shots of holidays and playdates and birthdays and other toddler-related firsts. I was always very careful not to “like” it when she’d post a photo with a caption such as “Bobby Junior’s first bite of sweet potatoes!” showing a kid smeared with orange goo, because A) gross, and B) I saw no reason to encourage her to share more of the same. You’ve seen one toddler in the bath, you’ve seen ’em all. Plus, if she puts up kid pics, someone else will think it’s fine to put up kid pics; then everyone puts up kid pics and it’s suddenly anarchy. There should be a whole Facebook for people who don’t have children, much like there should be child-free restaurants. Ooh, or airlines! Seriously, how much would nonbreeders pay to ensure a screaming-baby-free flight? A lot, I’d imagine. I could publicize the shit out of any place that barred children and—

Ahem.

Anyway.

I still see a bunch of kid pictures on here, but it looks like they all belong to her brother, which is confirmed by her
Number One Aunt
T-shirt she’s sporting in this shot from the Lincoln Park Zoo. Okay, so she has no children herself, but at least she’s an aunt, right? That’s kind of the same, except your house stays clean and you don’t get hideous stretch marks.

So . . . her future is definitely different now, but am I to blame? It’s not as though I forced her to work for me, like, held her at gunpoint or anything. She made the choice that ultimately took her out of the situation where she’d meet Bobby. That’s not my fault . . . right?

I dig deeper into her profile. I click over to her wall. Looks like she’s “in a relationship” with someone named Emcee Peere of Chicago. Sounds like a swarthy club promoter, but hopefully he makes her happy. Seriously? Whew! For a second I worried she was alone with a bunch of cats in her altered life. Let’s have a look-see at Mr. Peere. I click and land on the MCPR Chicago page.

Oh. Pun on being married to her job. That’s not cute.

I can’t believe she’s not married, or at least dating someone. She’s a total catch! Now I’m really distressed—am I such a hard-ass that she feels like she’s married to her job? Or is she married to her job because there’s not a lot of stuff, like a husband and family, filling out the rest of her life? Beads of sweat break out over my lip as I begin to panic, so I try to talk myself down.

Nicole is upbeat and positive and happy, and she’s in control of her own destiny, not me.

I’m sure her life is fulfilling and I’m just being silly.

While I peruse her page a new post appears in her timeline, and it’s a shot of a black-and-white cat with a little spot over his lip that makes him look like Hitler. The caption reads, “Mr. Muffin—the number one man in my life!”

Well, fuck me sideways.

I tab through page after page of Nicole’s life and I find more of the same. There’s Nicole at an office party; there she is at a client event; there she is in another city on MCPR business. How’s she supposed to meet anyone when she spends all of her time in an office and an industry that’s comprised almost entirely of chicks and gay guys? More important, am I to blame?

What do I do here?

What’s my obligation?

Am I supposed to fix this?

Do I try to help her meet someone?

Deva, these aren’t ripples in time; they’re tidal waves.

 * * * 

“A
ll set!” It’s noon and I’m waiting by the elevator as planned. Nicole sashays up to me in her swingy jacket and grabs me for a quick hug. “I’m so excited! We never have the chance to just hang out and talk! What are you in the mood for, sushi or salad?”

I realize that future me is all trim and toned and healthy, but I haven’t quite gotten over my recent discovery of how comfort food reduces stress, and trust me, I’m stressed right now. Trying to figure out if I screwed up my best friend’s life is definitely ratcheting up my anxiety level, so the last thing I want is lettuce or raw fish. I’m going to broach some heavy subjects at lunch, so I need to be girded by as many fat grams and calories as possible.

“What about Prosecco?” I suggest, thinking about the wonderful Italian place in River North. “I’m buying.”

Come on. It’s the least I can do.
Hey, bestie, sorry I altered your fate—have some bruschetta on me!

“Sounds fabulous. We haven’t had carbs in ages. Want to cab it or shall I drive?” Nicole asks.

I’m probably going to need a cocktail, particularly if I determine that I laid ruin to her life. “Let’s take a taxi,” I suggest.

Upon arrival, we both order glasses of wine and peruse the menu. Such is my state that I pretty much want to order one of everything. I want steamed mussels and clams tossed in saffron cream sauce with chunks of
pane italiano
to sop up the drippings. I want burrata, the mozzarella that’s so fresh that it’s semisolid, and I want to pair it with salty prosciutto. Oh, or carpaccio so rare that it’s still a little blue. I’m in the mood for pasta with truffle oil and asparagus, and I want to wash it all down with something bubbly, because maybe food will tamp down my guilt.

What I don’t want is to have this conversation, but after Nicole saved my (chewy, smoky) bacon from the fire today, I feel like I have no other choice.

We order our first course—avocado and poached lobster salad—and I broach the subject. “Some meeting today, right? How much did you hate the kid?”

“Charlotte? She was adorable!” Nicole protests.

“Were we in the same room?” Charlotte, or rather ChaCha, was many things . . . but adorable? No. “Did you not witness her breaking wind and then fanning said fart toward Seraphina to determine if she could ‘smell the Chipotle in it’? Not adorable.”

For the record, I was also not charmed when she burped the alphabet (at Tawny’s behest), blew her nose on her manager’s napkin before tossing it back on the table, or called me “what’s-her-tits.”

“Aw, Liss, she’s sweet underneath it all, just a little misguided. Right now the whole world is bending over backward for her and that has an impact, especially at her age. I’m sure fame took her by surprise, and as she gets used to it, she’ll settle down.”

So Nicole’s Team Charlotte even without knowing how linked they were in the previous iteration of our lives? Super.

“Besides,” she continues, “I think Tawny’s overzealous, not evil. I saw women like her all the time when I was teaching. They didn’t achieve what they wanted in their own lives, so they placed the burden of success on their children. There’s a lot of stage moms out there, and not just for those trying to get their kids into the entertainment business. Sometimes they’re just as bad about sports and academics. Like, remember that Texas cheerleading mom who hired a hit man to kill another cheerleader’s mom so her daughter’s rival would drop out of the competition?”

I nod. Back in the day, Mamma was all, “A li’l extreme, but I lahk her style.”

Nicole nibbled a piece of lobster before blotting her lips with a linen napkin. “Certainly Tawny’s not that intense, but the thought process is the same, all about advancing her kid. Time after time, I’ve seen moms so intent on making their children well-rounded that they’d drag the poor things to jujitsu followed by Mandarin lessons in between soccer, gymnastics, cello, and Irish dancing and then not understand why Junior didn’t have time to get his math assignment done. I’d tell them, ‘Give him a break; he’s seven!’”

I pick at a piece of bread, smearing it with an olive tapenade. “Would the moms listen to you?”

“Once in a while yes, most often no. Charlotte’s stepmom’s no different from most. A bit more colorful, perhaps, but ultimately I feel like she’s trying to balance her own need for approval with what makes Charlotte happy.”

“You’re a frigging saint.”

Nicole simply shrugs in return.

“How would you do it?” I ask. I’m not sure I want to look her in the eye for this, so I pay close attention to the patterns I’m tracing on the tablecloth.

Nicole sets down her fork and leans forward. “Do what, exactly?”

“Go about the whole being-a-parent thing. I mean, you never went that route, so maybe it’s not important to you?”

Please say it’s not, please say it’s not, please say it’s not.

“Funny you should mention that.” Except, judging from Nicole’s expression, it’s far from funny. “I had a doctor’s appointment last week. I’d missed my last couple of periods and I was hoping for good news.”

“Wait, I thought you weren’t seeing anyone seriously right now.” So now Facebook is a lie, too? Great.

“I’m not. I . . . tried artificial insemination. I’ve been trying to get pregnant ever since my thirty-fifth birthday.”