Address to Die For (7 page)

The name sounded familiar, but I couldn't remember where I'd heard it. I stood on the driver's side of the car. I'd expected her to walk toward me and hold out her hand after introducing herself, but something about this whole scenario was off. She sounded friendly, but she hadn't moved. Should I approach her? Did she have personal-space issues?

“I'm Maggie McDonald,” I said. “My son Brian is in seventh grade and I've got a freshman at the high school.”

“Boy or girl?” asked Tess. “Umm . . . would you mind coming closer? I really need your help, but I don't want to shout it out to the whole neighborhood.”

“Boy. David.” I walked around the car and burst out laughing, then covered my mouth with my hand. I'd just met this woman and the first thing I did was laugh at her? She'd think I was a barbarian with no manners and she'd be right.

“It's not funny,” Tess said. “Oh hell, of course it is.” She started laughing too.

The fancy kick pleat of her skirt was stuck in the passenger door. I was guessing the car was locked. Her keys had fallen out of reach, along with her purse.

“Can you grab the keys and unlock me?” Tess said. “I'm not sure how this happened. If I'd caught the jacket in the door, I could have taken it off. I was about to try stripping off the skirt, but every time I reached for the zipper, a car went by. I'm so glad you showed up.”

I grabbed the keys and her purse and unlocked the door.

Tess smoothed her skirt and threw her arms around me. “Thank you
sooo
much. Today was not the day I wanted to get naked in my front yard. You
have
to come in and let me give you coffee, at least.”

I started to decline. “No, we've got to get back. I've got the movers coming and this one needs a walk and the groceries—”

“Stop right now,” Tess ordered. I obeyed. The dominatrix was back. “Stop. You must come in. I make the best coffee and I've got cookies. You need energy for moving. I should know. I'm a real-estate agent. I'll give you a snack to give your boys. Nothing says
home
like after-school cookies.”

Trying to disagree with Tess would be as useful as tackling a bulldozer. I didn't like confrontation and I wasn't going to fight a battle I wasn't sure I wanted to win. Coffee and cookies actually sounded wonderful.

“Look,” Tess continued, pointing at Belle. “Take your gorgeous girl around to the backyard. My Mozart is there. That's him barking. He's a German shepherd, but he's a marshmallow. They can play while we get to know each other. I'm so glad you came by when you did. My lucky day. Go on, now. I'll head into the house and let you in the back door.”

I wondered why she didn't invite me in through the front door. I shrugged. People are weird. She took great care with her appearance. Maybe she didn't think dogs belonged in the house.

I followed a path lined with African iris and lobelia around the side of the house, through a redwood gate, and into the backyard. A German shepherd bounded to greet us, tail wagging. I let Belle off her leash. The pair sniffed each other and then they were off, chasing one another like puppies.

Steps led to a redwood deck that extended across the back of the house and looked like a picture in an upscale garden catalog. Comfy-looking red cushions covered black wrought-iron armchairs and ottomans. The look had the welcoming feel I hoped we'd someday achieve in our new house.

I peered through the window, but it was dark inside the house and I couldn't see a thing. I tried the knob just as the back door opened. I stumbled into the room and was helped up by a woman who had to be Tess's twin sister.

She looked like Tess but without the edgy black and red power outfit. This woman's hair was pulled back in a scruffy ponytail. She wore a gray sweatshirt splotched with white paint and jeans that appeared to be a size or two too large. On her feet were a battered pair of Ugg boots on which I was sure I'd spotted a lump of dried cookie dough.

“Tess?”

“Shh.” She laughed and pulled me into a kitchen that smelled of the cookies. “This is the at-home Tess. I shed those killer heels and that silly power suit the minute I walk through the door.”

I must have looked skeptical, because she pulled me through the house and threw open the door to a room near the front door. The size of a small bedroom, it looked like a Hollywood dressing room with racks of classic black and red suits and snowy white blouses. A lighted counter held scads of cosmetics. A robe lay crumpled on the floor of the adjacent bathroom.

My astonishment showed and Tess laughed—a gentle, burbling laugh that was at odds with the woman I'd seen at the school.

“I keep my business stuff in here. It used to be the guest room. Mozart and the cats aren't allowed in here—it saves time not to have to swipe off dog and cat hair. I can get changed in a heartbeat if anyone needs me for work. For everyone except my friends I wear these dominatrix clothes. They help me get deals signed quickly.”

I shook my head and smiled. “Um . . . I have to admit that
dominatrix
is exactly the word I chose to describe you when you were sitting in front of me this morning.”

Tess laughed and tugged me back toward the kitchen. “Isn't that Miss Harrier awful? I swear she'll be the death of me. If a form isn't filled out exactly right she'll rip it up and send it home. The parents want to kill her. And now with the budget cuts . . .” Tess shook her head.

She pulled cobalt-blue mugs and plates from the cabinet and continued talking as she pointed me toward a chair at a round table covered with a red-checked tablecloth. “Swear-to-God, the only reason she's still alive is that kids are in middle school for such a short period. By the time parents are ready to throttle her, their kids have moved on to high school.”

Tess measured ground coffee into a paper filter and poured boiling water over it. I found the lack of a computerized coffee machine refreshing. Much as I thrived on fancy coffee, I was glad to know there were people in this town who didn't need the trendiest appliances.

Tess handed me a steaming cup and pushed a pitcher of cream toward me. I poured the cream until the coffee turned the color of a paper grocery bag, then lifted the mug to my lips. It smelled heavenly. I sipped and Tess passed me the plate of cookies. Oatmeal. Old-fashioned. Homey.

“Now, tell me where you're from and where you're living,” Tess said. “Is there anything you need? You said the movers were coming. What time? We'll watch the clock. You must be swamped. Are you working?”

I looked at the clock. It was five past ten. I still had plenty of time. I glanced out the window, watching the dogs tugging on opposite ends of a knotted rope, growling, but with their tails wagging. I sighed. A contented sigh. I was having fun watching them and getting to know both of Tess's personalities.

“Let me help you with the moving, Maggie. No one sells houses just after school starts, and I've got plenty of time right now. Is your electricity on? Do you need the laundry done? Do you need any help unpacking? Is your Internet up?”

I laughed. “I don't even know what I need yet. I mean ... I've got a list....” I pulled my notebook out of my purse, a small battered backpack that had once been blue and white, but was now more gray and faded denim. “I'm a professional organizer. Lists are my thing. Being prepared for anything and easing people through transitions is what I do.” I shook my head and laughed as I smoothed out the page. “I'm starting to think I need to hire my own organizer.”

My phone rang.

“Excuse me,” I said to Tess, as I rummaged in my backpack. “It might be the movers.

“Hello? This is Maggie.”

“Mrs. McDonald, this is Roberto, from Stockton Movers? I've got bad news.”

My heart sank. This reprieve in Tess's kitchen had lifted my spirits and made me forget that nothing about this move had gone as expected.

“We got the team together this morning and they were on schedule until they got to the windmills.”

“Okay,” I said, waiting for the bad news. I knew where he meant. Thousands of space-age windmills dotted the hills that separated the San Joaquin Valley from the San Francisco Bay Area. The windmills harvested power as gusts roared through the narrowed pass, but wind speeds at the top of the hill had been known to flip heavy big rigs. I imagined the worst—all our worldly belongings being run over by speeding motorists.

“The brakes locked up as they headed down the grade,” Roberto said. “The team pulled the truck over. The crew and your furniture are fine, but we're going to have to send a new cab out to pull the trailer. We just can't risk it with the bad brakes.”

“No, you're right,” I said. “I'm glad no one was hurt. But . . . um . . . Roberto? When will you deliver our furniture?”

“Not for another forty-eight hours, I'm afraid, ma'am. We sent all the other cabs out with teams this morning. We have to wait until one comes back with an empty trailer so we can swap it out for your load.”

I could have argued with him. Pleaded. I could have reminded him that everything we owned was on that trailer, that it was taking longer to get it from Stockton to Orchard View than it would have taken to move it across the country. But I knew he was doing his best. Arguing would waste time and make us both more miserable than we already were.

I sighed. “Roberto? Thanks for letting me know. Thursday will be fine. Should I expect you at noon? . . . That's right. Twenty-one eleven Briones Hill Road, off Monte Viejo.”

I hung up the phone, made a face, shrugged, and snatched a cookie from the plate.

“Tess?” I asked my new best friend. “Did you mean it when you offered to help with my laundry?”

Before Tess could answer, my phone rang a second time. I glanced at the number, but didn't recognize it.

“Mom? Can you come back to school?” Brian sniffed. “I'm in trouble and the principal wants to talk to you.” Brian's voice and his fear were broadcast loudly through the phone, shattering whatever peace remained in Tess's kitchen.

“I'll be right there, Brian. Hang tough. We'll sort it out.”

Tess grabbed her keys. “Leave Belle here with Mozart. I'll drive you.”

The organized person will save time by getting to know the most influential and important people in any organization: the front office staff, the custodian, and any security personnel.

 

 

 

 

I
ran from Tess's BMW toward the school. The woman I'd seen in the office earlier met me outside the front door.

“Mrs. McDonald?” Now that she was out from behind the front counter, I could see that she was, indeed, covered head to toe in canary yellow. Her feet sported yellow high-tops. A yellow bow secured her ponytail. Shorter than five feet tall, she looked like a diminutive Big Bird.

“It's Maggie,” I said. “Is Brian okay?”

“Brian is just inside. He's fine, Maggie. I'm April Chen, the assistant principal. I wanted to fill you in before you see Brian or Miss Harrier.”

“What happened?”

“I talked to Brian. You requested that he be put in either eighth-grade math or in the seventh-grade algebra class? And in band?”

“That's right.”

“Brian went to his first-period class this morning. He figured someone made a mistake with his schedule because band wasn't on it. He asked the other kids what to do and they told him they'd show him to the band room.”

April held up her hand to keep me from going inside. “You have to hear this, Maggie. Before you see Brian and Miss Harrier, you have to know he didn't do anything wrong.”

“But, he said—”

“Five minutes with Horrible Harrier, and any kid would confess to having started the Civil War, but don't tell anyone I said that. If I ran the zoo, things would be different around here.”

I swallowed hard and nodded. April looked over her shoulder toward Miss Harrier's office and continued: “The music teacher didn't have Brian on her class list, so she called the office to correct Brian's schedule, asking to have him placed in her band class instead of theater. She told me that he wanted to move into advanced seventh-grade math in place of basic math skills.”

“Basic math skills? What's that?”

“What it sounds like,” April said.

“That can't be right.”

“That's what Brian said.”

“Did he have an attitude or something?”

April laughed. “I asked him that. He said that this was his first day and way too early in the year to be showing attitude. I like your kid, Maggie. He's a good one. I wanted you to hear that before—”

Miss Harrier flung the office door open so hard it banged against the front of the building. Her face was scrunched up, as if she'd swallowed a lemon. She stood with the posture of a drill sergeant and the tension of a volcano about to erupt.

“April, thank you. I'll take it from here. Follow me please, Mrs. McDonald.” Harrier stomped back into the school office and nodded to Brian, who looked miserable and small, slumped in the chair outside her personal domain. “Brian, join us if you please,
now
.”

I clenched my teeth and my fists to keep my thoughts from turning into words, or worse, actions. I normally steered clear of conflict, but where my kids were concerned, all bets were off. There was really no need for Harrier's stern “now.” Brian was right outside her office, for heaven's sake. If he'd dawdled—and he was a world-class dawdler, like most twelve-year-old boys—it would have taken him two seconds instead of one to reach her desk.

Miss Harrier invited us to sit in the scratchy upholstered chairs in front of her desk. She plucked two business cards from a wooden file on her desk and put one in front of each of us. Neither Brian nor I picked them up.

Harrier shuffled papers on her desk and turned on her iPad.

“Looking at our school roster over the weekend,” she said, peering at me over the top of her black-framed reading glasses, “I realized that we had limited room in some of our classes and I had to make adjustments to a few of the students' schedules. Apparently, Brian thinks he can dictate his own schedule.”

“Are you saying you can't accommodate him in band?”

“There are seventy-five students in that class, Mrs. McDonald. It is oversubscribed.”

It was a concert band class. What difference would it make if the enrollment was seventy-six students instead of seventy-five? And why, if students needed to be cut from the class, did Brian need to be one of them? There were always students who were taking band only because their parents were making them. Those kids would almost certainly volunteer to be dropped from the class
.
I turned to Brian.

“Did you introduce yourself to the teacher?” I said. “Did you ask if she had room in her class for you?” My kids had grown up on a university campus. Their grandparents and dad were professors. The unwritten etiquette of academia was in their blood.

Brian looked at his hands and nodded. “She was happy to hear I play French horn.” He looked up at me. “Mom, I have to take band.”

Miss Harrier
tsk
ed. “You see, Mrs. McDonald, this is the attitude with which I have a problem. Orchard View Middle School students do
not
dictate to their parents, teachers, and administrators. At this age we expect them to understand that they cannot have everything their own way.”

I took a deep breath and thought before I spoke. Brian needed to play music the same way he needed to breathe and I knew that band was a great way for him to meet friends. He was going to take band. But I'd hear the rest of the story from Miss Harrier, first.

Silence and tension built within the room that was so quiet and stuffy that we were all startled when the air-conditioning fan kicked on and the metal vent made the annoying buzzing rattle that is universal to all public schools. All it would take to prevent that sound would be to tighten the screws on the cover to the ventilation shaft, I thought. But Miss Harrier seemed more interested in putting the screws to my son.

“What's happening with his math class?” I said, jerking my attention back to the matter at hand. In February, when Max and I had met with Miss Harrier, she'd agreed that Brian's test scores would place him in an upper-level class. It seemed like a straightforward decision. Could Miss Harrier be one of those people who was still, in the twenty-first century, quick to agree with a man and argue with a woman? I didn't see how the principal of a public school could operate that way.

“Mrs. McDonald, all our math classes are fast-paced and instruction is individualized. I'm sure—”

Her use of educational jargon triggered new levels of anger in me—I'd been exposed to too much of it at the university and had found it often signaled that the speaker was feeling more pompous than they had a right to feel.

“Miss Harrier, Brian grew up on a university campus and we've had trouble keeping up with his hunger for math. If we'd known that your classes could not accommodate him, we would have suggested he take math at the high school or the junior college.”

Miss Harrier shook her head. “I assure you, Mrs. McDonald, we are used to ambitious parents pushing their children, thinking they can dictate . . .” She sighed. “We are one of the top schools in California, but we are also a public school with limited funding.”

In the back of my mind, I half-wondered if this was a shakedown for a donation. It was a ridiculous, paranoid thought, but once again, Miss Harrier was talking about funding. I wanted to ask about the foundation, and why the missing money created such a huge problem. Surely the school could manage on state funding? But I was here for Brian, not to solve California's financial crisis. Maybe Miss Harrier was in shock over budget cuts and overreacting? Maybe she was having a bad day dealing with angry parents and frustrated teachers and was taking it out on us?

April tapped on the door, opened it, and handed Miss Harrier pink message slips. “Excuse me,” April said, showing great deference. “I did some checking. I have a solution that I think will work for everyone. With your approval, of course, Miss Harrier.” April raised her eyebrows, apparently requesting permission from the principal to continue. Miss Harrier nodded. April outlined her plan.

“The band teacher and the advanced-math teacher say they have room in their classes. If we change Brian's PE class, both those classes will fit his schedule. I'll be happy to make changes in the computer as soon as you've decided how you want to move forward.”

April backed out of the room and closed the door.

Brian and I looked at Miss Harrier. April had left the ball firmly in her court, but there was only one logical play. The muscles in Miss Harrier's face tightened. She put her hand on her iPad and clicked her pen.

“I see,” she said. “Brian, it appears that things have worked out well for you today.” She smiled, but it looked more like a grimace. “I hope you will thank the teachers who have been so flexible. Please return to the band room. You can pick up your new schedule from April after the bell rings.”

Brian stood and moved his chair so that it was precisely parallel to the front of the desk. “Thank you, Miss Harrier,” he said. He squeezed my shoulder. “See you after school, Mom. Thanks for coming.” He left the room and closed the door behind him.

I watched him go and turned to Miss Harrier. “Thank you,” I said. “I'm glad it worked out.” I shook her hand and left before she could change her mind.

Brian and I had achieved what we'd needed to and I'd leave it at that. But I had an odd feeling that I was missing something important, or that there'd been a subtext to the meeting that I was supposed to have picked up on, but hadn't.

Outside the office, Brian ran toward me. “I'm sorry I had to call you on the first day of school, Mom. I'm sorry I got into trouble.”

“You did absolutely the best thing by calling me. I'm happy to come. Any time.” I put my hand on his shoulder. “Grown-ups need to know when to ask for help, Brian. They need friends who are on their side. They need to know what they want, be persistent, and be gracious when they succeed. They need to learn that some things are worth fighting for. You did every one of those things.” I rumpled his hair—something he had told me he didn't like, but that I still did from time to time, though I was trying to stop. “Ready to go back to class?”

Brian nodded and bounced off to the band room without glancing back.

I met Tess at her car. While we'd won this round with Miss Harrier, I was quite sure we'd not heard the last from her. She was angry and frustrated and I hoped she wouldn't take that out on Brian.

“It's going to be a long year at the middle school, Tess. It's going to be a very long year.”