Chronicles of a Midlife Crisis (23 page)

“Tell her the truth,” he demands.

“I did!” I lie.

“You’re in the newspaper with your shirt undone, practically throwing yourself at that Cody kid.”

“What?” Sam shrieks.

“You’re such an asshole,” I hiss at Trent.

“She’s going to find out sooner or later.”

“Honey,” I say, turning to my daughter, “it’s not that bad. I’d spilled some juice on my shirt and so I had it undone to dry out.”

“Juice?” Trent snorts.

“Yes,” I glare at him, “juice.”

“Stop treating her like a baby,” Trent snipes. “She’s not going to buy that bullshit story.”

Unfortunately, he appears to be right. Sam turns on me. “First you flash your boob at him, and now this?” Her voice is cruel when she says, “You make me sick.”

As Sam storms across the parking lot toward Trent’s car, he says, “You flashed your boob at him?”

“No!” I snap. “It fell out—not that it’s any of your business.”

“What exactly is going on with you and this Cody kid?”

“Nothing! And he’s not a kid. Why are you even here, anyway?”

Sam is at the Lexus’s passenger door. “Dad, unlock your car!”

“Don’t,” I tell him. “She needs to come home with me so we can talk.”

“Sounds like it’s a bit late for that.”

“Trent …”my voice wobbles. “There’s nothing going on with me and Wynn. It was a mistake. Please … I can’t lose her.”

He is surprisingly kind. “You won’t,” he says, giving my shoulder a brief, reassuring squeeze. “Give her a little time to cool off. I’ll bring her home later.”

Trent

“
I WANT TO SEE IT,
” Sam says, flopping on the couch. Despite the fact that she’s only been to my apartment once, she seems remarkably at home. “If you don’t show it to me, someone at school will. And that will be even grosser and mess me up more.”

She has a point. At least if her initial viewing of the photograph is with me, I can be there to ease the pain. I grab the newspaper off the floor and hand it to her.

Sam stares at the photo, and for a few moments, says nothing. Other than a distasteful curl of her lips, she seems to have no reaction at all. Then finally, she throws the paper to the floor. “It’s disgusting!” she shrieks. “It’s even more disgusting than you bringing your girlfriend to my art show.”

“Uh … thanks.” I shift uncomfortably. “That was a big mistake and I’m not seeing her anymore.”

Sam picks up the paper, looks at it once more, then proceeds to rip it into pieces. “What is wrong with her? Cody’s like, practically my age.”

I clear my throat. “But Wynn Felker is actually twenty-seven, so it’s not … you know, against the law or anything.” It feels strange, defending Lucy’s liaison with Cody Summers. I’m sickened by the thought of it. And although I have no right, I feel jealous, possessive, and hurt. Seeing her breasts hanging out in the newspaper makes me livid. Those are my breasts! Why did she have to flaunt them in that kid’s face like that?

Sam brings me back to the room. “She’s sick,” my daughter is saying. “She invited him over to our house and she was all like, ‘Meet my poor sad daughter.’ And then she hits on him!”

“Well …” I’m not sure if I should say this in front of Sam, but the pieces are coming together in my mind. “Maybe Cody was really there to see your mom?”

“But he brought me flowers!” Now she stops, acknowledges the possibility. “Eww! Do you think Cody’s, like, her boyfriend?”

The words are like a punch in the stomach. “No,” I say quickly, “he’s not, like, her boyfriend. She said there’s nothing going on and I believe her.”

“Well, I don’t,” Sam huffs, going to the fridge. “Can I have a beer?”

“What?” I boom. “No!”

“God, you don’t need to spaz. It’s just one beer.”

“Forget it.” I hurry to the kitchen and shut the fridge door.

“That’s what’s wrong with this society,” Sam says, rummaging through the cupboards in search of something to eat, I suppose. “Parents are so uptight about everything. If this was France, you would already have offered me a glass of wine.”

“This isn’t France,” I mutter. “There’ll be no underage drinking.”

“Okay,” she says, removing an Ikea glass and filling it with water. “I’ll just deal with my mom banging the guy I’m in love with without alcohol.”

“They’re not banging!” I yell. “And don’t say
banging
, please.”

“Sorry!”

“And you’re not in love with him. He’s a TV character.”

She whirls on me. “He came to see me and brought me flowers!” She suddenly remembers the distinct possibility that the visit wasn’t hers. “I’m not going back there.”

“What?”

Sam charges back to the living room and sits on the sofa. “I’m not going back to Mom’s house.”

I’m really dying for a beer myself, but it would be like taunting her. Instead, I follow her to the front room. “You have to go back, honey. It’s your home.”

Shades of the vicious girl I’d seen after the art show emerge. “So you don’t want to spend time with me after all. Was that just your way of getting into Mom’s good books again?”

I keep my cool. “Of course I want to spend time with you, Sam. But you don’t have any clothes here. You’ve got school in the morning …”

“I’m not going to school.”

“Yes, you are.”

“How can I? Everyone at school will have seen that photo! They’ll think my mom is some child-molesting sex maniac!”

She has a point. “You have to go,” I say.

“Forget it. And I’m not going home either.”

I look at my daughter, her arms crossed fiercely across her chest. Her jaw, so like her mother’s, is set with grim determination. Suddenly I realize I’m completely out of my depth. Obviously, Sam can’t live with me in this apartment forever. And she can’t quit school. But what do I say? How am I supposed to handle this? I need Lucy.

“I’ll go to the house and pick you up some clothes and stuff,” I offer, already grabbing the car keys. “I’ll tell your mom that you’re going to be staying with me for a few days.”

“A few years!” Sam snipes.

“But you will be going to school tomorrow. Okay?”

To my surprise and relief, she shrugs. “Okay.”

“There are some frozen dinners in the freezer,” I say, slipping on my jacket. “I’ll be back soon.”

She reaches for the remote and flicks on the TV.

“And don’t touch those beers,” I caution. “I know how many are there.” But she doesn’t reply. She has already immersed herself in some reality show.

Lucy

“
FINALLY
,”
I MUTTER
as I hear Trent’s car pull into the driveway. Sam has every right to be upset, but running off to her dad’s place isn’t the way to deal with this. I need to make her understand that there’s nothing going on between Wynn and me. And even if there was, it’s really none of her business. I am a grown woman with emotional and physical needs. And Wynn is not the teenybopper with the overalls and can of yellow paint she thinks he is.

Yanking open the front door, I prepare to greet my angry daughter. “Oh my god,” I say as he lopes up to the door. “What are you doing here?”

“I need to talk to you,” Wynn says. “Can I come in?”

“No,” I snap. “Sam will be home soon and the last thing she needs is to find you here.”

Wynn looks over his shoulder. “We should talk in private. I don’t think I was followed, but …”

I suddenly have a vision of a swarm of paparazzi on motorbikes racing into my front yard. All I need is for Emily Sullivan next door to be alerted to my recent notoriety. “Come in.”

Alone in my foyer, Wynn reaches for me. “I’m so sorry about all this.”

I pull away. “Me too. I should never have agreed to come to your house.” What I really mean is, you should have just agreed to sleep with me instead of rejecting me like some idealistic moron.

“Don’t say that.” He moves closer to me. I’m disappointed that my anger has done nothing to diminish my attraction to him. “I’m still glad you came—no matter what this has done to my reputation.”

I take a step back. “Your reputation?”

Wynn looks sheepish. “Millions of teenage girls think I’m Cody Summers. It’s not good for ratings when they see me with someone who could be …” He trails off.

“Go ahead, say it,” I snap. “Someone who could be your mother.”

“Well … not
my
mother, but Cody’s mom.”

The whole thing suddenly seems overwhelmingly sordid. “You need to go. Sam knows about the photo in the paper and she’s justifiably disgusted. Trent should be bringing her back any minute.”

“Okay,” Wynn says. “But I came here to tell you that I’m going away for a while. The press is camped outside the studio and my house, and my managers said I should get away until this dies down.”

“Good idea.”

“I was thinking that maybe you’d want to come with me?”

“You’ve got to be kidding!” I splutter.

“My mom and my brother were supposed to come visit me here. But I’ve decided to go see them in New Mexico instead. I don’t know … it might be fun for you to meet them?”

I can think of very few things less fun than meeting Wynn’s family. “I can’t.”

He seems to have read my mind. “We could go somewhere else then … somewhere warm. Sam could stay with your ex for a few days. It would give her time to cool off.”

Looking at him, I’m surprised by his earnestness. Yes, there is chemistry between us, and yes, our make-out sessions have been very exciting. But that’s all we have—chemistry. It doesn’t mean we should go on a holiday together!

Wynn takes my pause as consideration and continues. “By the time we get back, the press will have lost interest. Everything will go back to normal.”

“No,” I say, but my tone is less adamant than I intended.

Suddenly, Wynn grabs me by the belt and pulls me close to him. Our bodies collide and the attraction is undeniable. “Come on, Lucy. My contract’s up after next season. When I’m not Cody anymore, no one will care about the age difference.”

Maybe he’s right? Wynn’s next role has got to be more age appropriate. He could be twenty-nine-year-old Detective Robbie Madison, or thirty-two-year-old cardio-thoracic surgeon Dr. Larry Shoenfeld. And there’s nothing wrong with dating a thirty-two-year-old cardio-thoracic surgeon, is there?

“They’ve been talking about doing a spin-off,
Cody’s Way at Berkeley
, but I’m not committing.”

That’s when I hear a car pull into the drive. “Oh my god!” I shriek. “Sam’s here! You’ve got to go!”

Grabbing his wrist, I try to drag him to the back door, but he resists. “We can’t hide from her.”

“Yes we can!”

“My car’s out front.”

“Shit!” I slap his chest. It’s ineffectual, but somehow satisfying. I do it three more times for good measure before I spy the coat closet. “Get in there,” I say, shoving him toward it.

But Wynn won’t be shoved. “We need to talk to her. We can make her understand.”

“Understand?” I cry. “Obviously you know nothing about teenagers!” Of course, I could be wrong. Given that Wynn’s entire career is built on appealing to the teen demographic, he may have some useful insights. But he doesn’t know
my
teenager.

There’s a knock at the door.

“Please,” I plead, my eyes welling with tears. “It’ll be too much, finding you here.”

Wynn looks about to comply when we hear a key in the lock. Before we can react, the door swings open and Trent walks into the room.

“Where’s Sam?” I blurt, instantaneously discerning that she’s not with him.

“At my apartment,” he says. “What’s
he
doing here?”

“He was just leaving.”

But Wynn is proving less compliant than one would expect from someone his age. He steps forward. “I’m a friend of Lucy’s. We work together at—”

Trent cuts him off. “I know who you are. You’re the reason my daughter is humiliated and threatening to drop out of school.”

“Oh god,” I say, fighting back the tears. “She wants to drop out of school now?”

Trent moves toward Wynn. “You’re supposed to be a teen heartthrob. What the hell are you doing running around with someone old enough to be your mother?”

I gasp, outraged. What is with all this mother stuff? Technically, I guess I could have given birth to Wynn when I was thirteen, but it’s not like I was sexually active then. Before I can speak, Wynn comes to my aid. “Yeah, Lucy’s a few years older than me. What’s the big deal?”

“What’s the big deal?” Trent booms. He looks at me, his face a mask of anger and jealousy. I should be enjoying this, I think, but I’m too worried about Sam.

“This is not Wynn’s fault,” I snap at my husband. “If anyone’s to blame for Sam’s problems, it’s you.”

“At least I had the decency to keep my fling private,” he growls.

“Private?” I snort. “Like bringing that cow to the Crofton House art show was keeping it private?”

“This is not a fling,” Wynn says, stepping up and putting his arm around me. “Lucy has made a huge difference in my life. We’re friends … good friends. And I think we could be more.”

Under different circumstances, this moment would be extremely romantic. Under these circumstances, it’s a little creepy.

“Get your hands off my wife,” Trent growls.

“Look pal …” Wynn starts, but is unable to finish as Trent’s fist has found its way into his face. There’s a sickening crunch as my husband’s knuckles connect with Wynn’s chiseled cheekbone.

“Stop!” I scream, jumping in between them. Then to Trent: “What the hell are you doing?”

“Tell him to butt out!” Trent hollers. “He is not a part of this family!”

“Jesus Christ,” Wynn says, rubbing at his cheek. “My face is my livelihood, you psycho.”

Trent takes a threatening step toward him and Wynn retreats behind me—not very manly or sexy, but I’m still on his side. “You need to get out of my house,” I growl at my husband.

“
Our
house,” he says, pushing past us and heading for the staircase.

“Not our house!” I scream after him as he jogs up the stairs. I leave Wynn massaging his bruised face and scurry behind Trent. “You gave up the right to call this your home when you ran off with that fat slut!”

I find him in Samantha’s room, extracting handfuls of underwear and socks from her drawer and tossing them onto the bed. “What are you doing?” I demand.