CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Shanelle, Trixie and I are waiting by the elevator bank to go upstairs after dinner when who pops out of an arriving elevator but Mario Suave. All of us catch our breath. For Mario, who looks mighty fine in a tuxedo, is even more impressive shirtless in swim trunks with a towel slung over one naked shoulder. He is more than tall and buff and beautiful enough to give Keola Kalakaua a run for his torch-lighting money. Not to mention that he’s a heck of a lot more successful than His Highness will ever be.
“Good evening, ladies,” he says, and delivers one of his dimple-flashing smiles. For a second there I’m worried that Trixie might lose her balance. Mario’s brown eyes home in on me. “Happy, glad I ran into you. I was going to call you later.”
“You were?” I ask breathlessly. I guess I’ve been transported back to ninth grade.
“Pageant business,” he says, and winks at Trixie and Shanelle.
Even Shanelle is affected. She seems a little agitated as she turns to me. “Pageant business. Okay then, see you later,” and she grabs Trixie’s arm to haul her into the elevator before its doors close.
I am now alone with Mario. Unlike most men I know, he wears a fragrance. Must be the Latin thing. The scent is kind of heady and wonderful. He steps closer. I’ve got some height on me but I have to raise my head to look into his eyes.
Which I’m doing. Looking into his eyes, I mean.
They’re brown, with little yellow flecks, and deep and soulful and …
I clear my throat. “I never thanked you for the roses, Mario. They’re really gorgeous. It’s was very kind of you.”
It’s a second or two before he speaks. “It was my pleasure.”
We kind of stare at each other. It’s like a moment in the movies. Then he clears his throat and this time his voice comes out more businesslike. “I wanted to let you know that we need to do a shoot with you in your evening gown exactly as you were the night of the finale. Video and stills. Of course this year we didn’t get the usual shots of the winner but we still need them for promo and the web site.”
“Sure. Sounds good.” I try to match his businesslike tone but it’s not easy since I’m half panting. “When’s it scheduled for?”
“Tomorrow sometime. Here at the hotel, on the stage in the auditorium. Magnolia will get back to you with the specifics.”
“Magnolia.” I hesitate. “So she’s still employed by the pageant?”
He smiles. I get another flash of dimple. “Barely. You heard about that?”
“I saw it. The scene with Misty Delgado. I was having breakfast at the time.”
He gives me a once-over. “I can’t believe with that gorgeous figure of yours you’re patronizing the buffet table.”
He is a charmer. I heard he started out as a soap star on Spanish-language television and parlayed that into an American soap opera role. After that and one reality TV stint, he was golden.
People
’s Top 50 Most Beautiful list and one hosting gig after the next. Now
this
man has ambition.
“A girl has to eat.” I smile back. “So Sebastian Cantwell knows about Magnolia videotaping Misty Delgado with Dirk Ventura and uploading it to YouTube?”
“He told me Magnolia gave him a full confession. At least he hopes it’s full and that another shoe won’t drop.”
“Did she tell him why she did it?”
“Jealousy, basically. At least that’s what he thinks. She wanted to take the contestants down a peg, is what she told him.”
“I’m a little surprised Mr. Cantwell didn’t fire her.”
He winks as if he understands the
Mr
. is for his benefit but totally unnecessary between us. “He still may. But there’s so much going on right now, what with the investigation, that he doesn’t want to add a search for a new employee to the mix.”
“That’s understandable.”
He sidles still closer and jostles me playfully with his elbow. “So why don’t you join me?”
“Join you for what?”
“A little Jacuzzi. A little relaxation.”
I make the obvious mistake. “I don’t have my swimsuit with me.”
His eyes gleam. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
Ms. Prim takes over. I step backward to put some distance between us. “I need to get a good night’s sleep so I’m fresh for the shoot tomorrow.”
He nods. “Okay.” He moves away, smiling as he goes. “Have a good night.”
Then he’s gone, though his fragrance lingers in the air. I’m feeling positively weak-kneed as I enter the elevator.
Was that a proposition? Kinda felt like one. What is it about Hawaii? It’s one giant bacchanal here. Maybe even more so than Vegas. But it is kind of fun having gorgeous men around who say charming things and send roses and give smoldering looks. Doesn’t happen in Cleveland with any regularity.
Just so you know, I am a happily married woman. But sometimes, I can’t help it, I do wonder what my life would have been like if I hadn’t gotten pregnant at seventeen and married Jason. I adore Rachel, don’t get me wrong, and Jason is my first love, but who might I have met if I’d gone on to college? Played the field a bit?
I guess I’ll never know.
The next morning I strap myself into my polyester and spandex workout gear. My goal is to reacquaint myself with something called exercise, with which I have not been familiar since the morning of the pageant finale.
I arrive at the hotel fitness center to find all the treadmills taken but one. I guess a lot of Type A’s come to the islands. Maybe they’re the only ones who can afford it. I’ve just upped my speed from a jog to a run when my cell phone rings. I figured I had to bring it with me because Magnolia might call to say that the shoot is shockingly early. In that case I’d have to cut my workout short. What a shame that would be.
But it’s not Magnolia. It’s my daughter. “What are you doing that you’re breathing so heavy?” she asks me. “Oh, gross, you’re not—”
“No, I’m not,” I pant. “I am”
—p
ant—“on the treadmill.”
“It’s kind of disgusting how you sound. You should do something more core-strengthening anyway, like Pilates. Or yoga. More cerebral.”
When I work out, I don’t care about my core or my cerebrum. I care about my butt and my thighs.
“Anyway,” Rachel goes on, “that’s not what I’m calling about. I’m calling about your prize money and my education and that whole thing.”
“Rachel”
—p
ant—“you know I told you that if you want to stay in state, if you’re really sure about that, I’m okay with it.” Okay is the operative word. My daughter has killer test scores and fantastic grades. I wish she wanted to try for a private university, especially now that I could actually pay for it. I bet she could get in.
“I know you told me that.”
“I just want you to make the most of any educational opportunity you get.” Pant. “Really push yourself.”
“Mom, I totally get that you want me to have what you never had. And I’m glad you’ve given up the idea that I have to go to school with a bunch of privileged geeks.”
“Well, I still think it’s very valuable, the connections you make at the better universities. They’ll last your entire life.”
“Mom, do you ever listen to me? I mean, seriously. Connections don’t mean diddly to me. I don’t know what I want to do with my life but it’s going to be something where I’m judged on my merit, not on who I know.”
“Honestly, Rachel”
—p
ant
—“s
ometimes I wonder what planet you live on.” That slips out before I can stop it.
“See? There you go again. Sometimes I think you never, ever listen to me.”
Don’t I? I’m hearing her now; I must be, because the words she’s saying are making me crazy.
In my panting silence she speaks again. “Okay, I’m going to tell you something and I don’t want you to freak.”
That sentence alone makes me freak. I press the treadmill’s big red emergency stop button and grasp the handlebars. “All right. I’m listening.”
“Don’t freak.”
“Just tell me.”
“I’m not sure I want to go to college next year.”
“Oh God.”
“I’m not saying I don’t want to go at all, ever, but there’s something else I think I want to do first. And it won’t cost you a dime.”
“Rachel—” I’m clutching the bars.
“I want to travel the world. And help people.”
“What people?”
“People in developing nations who are downtrodden because of the West. I’ve found this group where you can go abroad and volunteer for a lot shorter time than the Peace Corps makes you do. Plus I couldn’t get into the Peace Corps anyway because I’m too young.”
“The Peace Corps?” I guess I shriek this into my cell. I notice people staring at me from adjoining pieces of fitness equipment.
“Not the Peace Corps. This is a different group. But it lets you go to all kinds of cool places, too, like Morocco or Tanzania or Guatemala—”
“Guatemala?”
“Oh, gotta go. AP Physics is about to start. Talk to you later.” Click.
“Oh God.” I try to catch my breath. Why can’t this be easier? Why can’t Rachel do what I want her to do? Go to a great college and get an impressive degree and embark on a fabulous career and marry a terrific guy and have a kid or two? In that order?
“Are you all right, miss?” It’s the woman who keeps an eye on the patrons in the fitness center to make sure none of us has a heart attack on Royal Hibiscus property.
“I’m fine,” I tell her. Lie, lie, lie.
My cell rings again. I flip it open. “Rachel—”
“It’s not Rachel, it’s your mother. What’s wrong?”
“Oh, I don’t know, I just had, not really a fight, but kind of a fight with Rachel on the phone.”
“Did Jason say something to her?”
“No, mom! That’s not it. Stop blaming Jason for everything.”
“Stay put. I’m coming over.”
I’ve barely gotten back to my room when my mother arrives, in high dudgeon. “What the hell did he say to her? He told me he didn’t say anything but I didn’t believe him.”
“Let’s go sit on the balcony.” It’s outfitted with two chaise longues and a drop-dead view of the pool area. I pop open a soda water and hand my mom an orange juice. We’re alone because Shanelle’s souvenir shopping. She’s convinced the cops will arrest Misty Delgado today and we’ll all be forced off Oahu in short order. My mother and I make ourselves comfortable for a good, long grousing session. “Jason didn’t say anything to her so get that out of your head. The bottom line is that she told me she may not want to go to college next year.”
“Oh God.” My mother’s hand flies to her throat. “Why the hell not?”
“She wants to help people.” I relay the rest of the sad tale.
My mother frowns as she listens. “Could it be some new boyfriend making her think like this?”
“I don’t think so.”
“You’re sure she’s not
—
” My mother arches her brows.
“God, no!” I say it automatically, and with force. Then I have to wonder how I can be so sure Rachel isn’t pregnant. I can’t, really, even though there’s been no evidence of a serious boyfriend. True, there was the loser she took to the junior prom …
I must have screwed up my face remembering him. My mother pipes up. “You’re thinking of that Ryan kid. I never liked him.”
My mother and I agree on that. “I don’t think it’s Ryan, or anybody else. I think she wants adventure, something new. I don’t know. All I know is that I want her to stay in school.”
I feel my mother’s eyes on me. This territory has got to feel so familiar to her. After the way my mom pushed me into pageant after pageant, I swore I’d never push Rachel into anything. Now here I am, breaking my own vow. And why? For the same reason my mother did what she did: for Rachel. For her own good, or at least my idea of what her own good is. How ironic.
Eventually my mother looks away. “I don’t like it. What kind of boys will she meet in Guadalajara?”
“Guatemala.”
“Same difference.” She waves her hand dismissively.
I’m feeling like the bumpkin Misty Delgado accused me of being, because the truth is that’s how I feel, too. I don’t want my daughter traipsing off to some foreign country I don’t know the first thing about, where she could catch some awful disease or get murdered in the dark and have her body thrown in a ravine or, as my mother clearly fears, fall in love with an exotic native who keeps her away from Ohio for the rest of her natural life.
For me it’s just so simple. I want her to stay in school, here in America.
I feel tears rising. I hang my head but they keep barreling forth just the same. A second later my mom’s hand is on my spandexed leg.
“It’s all right, Happy.” Her voice sounds totally strong. She does tend to come through in the clutch. I choke out a sob. “She’ll come around. And if she doesn’t, you’ll just have to cope. If you have to, you will.”
Just like my mom did when I turned up pregnant at 17 and bullied her into giving me permission to marry someone she’s never stopped resenting.
Increased sobbing ensues. I grab my mother’s hand and hold on tight. I guess my winning the Ms. America crown isn’t the only miracle to occur here on lovely Oahu.