Island Girl (39 page)

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Authors: Lynda Simmons

BOOK: Island Girl
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“Slowly but surely, my name became a joke. Clients refused to have me on their team, other associates refused to work with me. It got so bad that Mark told me to take a leave of absence. ‘Go have some fun,’ he said. ‘Think about something else,’ he said. So I took the leave, found a lot of fun at the Duck, and never went back.”
I picked up my clothes, grabbed a towel from the floor. I needed a shower. The time had come to close. “So Brenda, that is why I cannot help you. That is why you need a lawyer whose name will be respected. A name that is anything but mine.”
Again, they didn’t move, didn’t speak, for another full second. Then it was as though someone had fired a gun and they were off.
“That’s nonsense,” Brenda said, “This is the perfect opportunity to win their respect. Come back with a bang. Show them you’re still a shining star.”
“She is right,” Nadia said, popping the last of her jelly beans into her mouth. “Problem with sister’s case was that jury never decided. No one knows if you would have won or lost.” She dusted her hands and walked toward me. “This time you will find out. This time you will see if you win or you lose.”
I dropped the clothes on the bed, sat down beside them. “But there’s so much at stake.”
“Which is why I’m betting on you,” Brenda said. “I’m betting I’ll have a check in my hands three days after you walk out of Vandergroot’s office.” She thrust out a hand. “What do you say? Three days, twenty bucks.”
“I am thinking four,” Nadia said and held out a hand to her. “Four days, twenty bucks.”
“You’re on.” Brenda pumped her hand and grinned at me. “Come on, Donaldson. What do you bet? Three days? Four?”
In my head, I could see her with pom-poms and a little short skirt.
Gimme an
L
. Gimme an
I. The self-appointed captain of the Liz Donaldson cheerleading squad, laying a lot more than twenty bucks on the line. Willing to risk it all on me in spite of the mountain of evidence laid out before her.
I rose, humbled, terrified. Resigned. “I’m betting two,” I said softly.
“Two days!” she shouted, and high-fived with Nadia. “I am going to win me forty bucks.” She looked me up and down. “You do have something other than jeans?”
“In the closet,” I said. “Far right.”
We shook on the bet and Nadia went back to her room for a pen and paper to duly record the details of our bet while Brenda opened my closet door. Pushed everything to the left, revealing what was on the right. Hanger after hanger of crisp white shirts, cashmere sweaters, silk dresses, none of which had seen daylight in more than two years.
She stood on a chair to go through each item one by one. “Holy crap. You’ve got designer suits in here. Real leather jackets, suede skirts.” She glanced back at me. “You must have looked amazing in a courtroom.”
“I did.” I wandered over. Pulled out my favorite black suit. Short jacket, fitted skirt. Crumpled and a few years out of style but exquisitely tailored, superbly finished—the signature look of a star attorney.
“Put it on,” Brenda said. “Let me see how a brilliant lawyer dresses.”
I shook my head, handed her the hanger. “Probably doesn’t fit anymore.”
“Just try it on,” she insisted. “That way we’ll know if we need to go to the dry cleaners or if we need to go suit shopping.”
“I love suit shopping,” Nadia said. “But if jacket fits ...” She slid the jacket off the hanger and held it up, waiting for me to slide my arms into the sleeves. “What is worst that can happen? You find out you are too skinny and suit needs altering.”
“I’m not too skinny.” I shoved my arms into the sleeves, feeling the cool glide of the lining against my skin. The nip at the waist as I did up the buttons one by one. Nadia was right. I was too skinny now. I started to take it off.
“Wait,” Brenda said. “It needs shoes.” She got down on her knees and reached into my closet, under my suits. Came out with an electric-blue shoe box. Gave it a shake. “What’s in here?”
“Not shoes,” I said, taking the box from her. Pushing it up on the shelf above the clothes, out of her reach. “Shoes are to the left.”
Nadia glanced up at the box then turned to me. “Is vodka?”
“I don’t hide my vodka. Although maybe I should so no one will put water in it.”
She shrugged. “Okay. Not vodka.” She jerked her chin at Brenda. “Find shoes.”
Brenda shifted to the left, reached in, and came back with a pair of black heels that had once made a judge forget to breathe while I was walking into his chambers. She set them on the floor in front of me. I slid my feet into them one by one, not certain if I’d be Cinderella or one of the stepsisters after two years in running shoes and flip-flops. The fit was still remarkably good—I guess feet don’t lose weight—but it was going to take me a while to remember how to walk.
“One more thing,” Brenda said, dragging the chair around behind me. She climbed up again, gathered my hair into a ponytail and piled it up on top of my head.
“Now look in mirror.” Nadia pushed back my closet door, revealing the full-length mirror on the other side. “What do you see?”
I saw a woman in a crumpled black jacket, fabulous high heels, and blue jeans, with a midget in bicycle shorts holding her hair up.
“I tell you what I see.” Nadia stood beside me. In my heels I was almost as tall, but not quite. “I see brilliant lawyer back on track again.”
“I see
my
brilliant lawyer back on track again,” Brenda said.
“Now look again.” Nadia raised my chin. “What do you see?”
I looked again. Saw the crumpled jacket, the jeans, the fabulous shoes, and the beaming faces of my friends. Two odd women who saw more in me than I had in a very long time. Who believed in me more than I deserved.
I heard the wagon coming around the corner. Heard the driver tell the horse to slow up, to wait.
“Well?” Brenda said. “What do you see?”
“I see a lawyer who is going to be forty dollars richer two days after that petition is delivered.”
Brenda whooped and let my hair fall down around my face. Nadia grinned and clapped me on the back. “Is good decision. Good decision.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Brenda said, taking the skirt from the hanger and looping it over her arm. “Who sent you the gorgeous flowers?”
I slipped off the jacket, looked over at the happy faces of the Gerbera daisies. “Just a man I met.”
Brenda smiled. “Is he cute?”
“Very. Just not my type.”
“Too bad.” She took the jacket and headed for the door. “We should get these to the cleaners. I’ll grab my purse.”
“Get mine too,” Nadia said, and then leaned close, whispering, “And just for today ...”
“I don’t drink,” I told her. “Tomorrow maybe. But not today.”
I kicked off the heels and climbed up into the wagon. Nodded to the driver and took my place in the back, knowing I’d have to earn a seat in the front this time.
GRACE
 
Jocelyn and I were sitting in her kitchen on Algonquin, ready to go to the nude beach for the usual Thursday picnic—and to look for the cuckoo along the way—but waiting to hear from Liz first.
It was already ten and I’d started sending
RU coming?
text messages at eight, but she still hadn’t answered back. I finally called her phone and left the same message three times. But when it got to be ten thirty and she
still
hadn’t called, I said to Jocelyn, “Maybe we should pack a lunch, just in case.”
Jocelyn shrugged and said, “Whatever,” and we went back to my house. Her phone started going off the second we were through the gate, and she sat outside tapping keys while I went inside and took a look through the fridge, making note of what we had and what kind of sandwiches I could make, just in case. All the while knowing Liz wasn’t coming, but not saying it out loud. Just waiting and checking the clock and sending the same text message over and over again
Whr RU? Whr RU?
Until it got to be eleven thirty and I finally went outside with two boxes of cookies and said to Jocelyn, “Do you want chocolate chip or vanilla cream with your lunch?”
She stopped tapping her keys. “I don’t care. But do you still want to go?”
“Well, it’s Thursday, and I always go to the nude beach on Thursday.”
“But do you want to?”
I hadn’t thought about it, but now that Jocelyn had asked, I realized the answer was no. Even though it was Thursday, I didn’t want to go to Hanlan’s Point. I wanted to be home when the peroxide arrived and when my mom got back from wherever she went because I wanted to talk to her. Wanted to ask her what was going on and hope she’d explain what
winding things down
meant. Most of all, I wanted to be there in case the lady mockingbird flew.
I put the cookies on the railing. “No. I don’t want to go anywhere.”
“Good, because I don’t want to go anywhere either.” Her phone went off again. She growled and started hitting keys and I went back inside and put away the cold meats and the cookies. I was about to pick up the phone to find out if the beauty supplier had shipped my order, when the door opened and Jocelyn stuck her head into the kitchen. “Get out here right away! I think the lady mockingbird is going to fly.”
We ran down the stairs but slowed down as we rounded the corner so we wouldn’t startle the bird. Sure enough, she was sitting on top of the cage, bobbing up and down, up and down, looking for all the world like she was going to fly.
The male must have thought this was the day too because he had stopped working on the nest and was sitting on top of the lilac, singing like a cricket.
Mary Anne appeared at the break in the hedge, a wide-brimmed straw hat on her head and a pair of gardening shears in her hand. “How’s she doing?”
“I think this is it,” Jocelyn said, waving her over.
“Is she going to fly?” a voice called from the sidewalk.
We turned to see Kylie and Brianne and four other girls standing with their bikes at the gate, all craning their necks to see what was going on. Jocelyn smiled and waved them in too. “Hurry up. Or you’ll miss it. But you have to be quiet so we don’t scare her.”
The bikes dropped and they all tiptoed through the gate and over to the cage. They ranged in age from ten to thirteen and I knew each of them by name. They all whispered, “Hi Grace, Hi Mary Anne,” and then Kylie said, “Everybody, this is Jocelyn.” She grinned at Jocelyn. “And Jocelyn, this is everybody.”
The other kids introduced themselves and Jocelyn nodded to each one. “You all live on the Island?” she asked.
They all nodded and the youngest one whispered. “How long you here for?”
“The summer,” Jocelyn said.
“How are you liking it?” another girl asked.
“It’s good,” Jocelyn said, her smile bright, genuine. “Really good.”
“Jocelyn’s the one who brought all the power tools for the sale,” Brianne said.
“We are going to make soooooo much money with those,” Kylie added.
“You should totally come to Wonderland with us on Sunday,” another girl said.
“If you’d like to,” Kylie said, and Jocelyn grinned and whispered, “I’d love to,” and Kylie grinned back and said, “Great!” And while Kylie gave her all the details, Mary Anne and I arranged the girls in a group about ten feet back from the cage—putting the shortest ones in the front and the taller ones in the back while the bird bobbed up and down, and danced to the left and then to the right, her eyes on the honeysuckle bush across from her.
It wasn’t far. Maybe six feet. I crossed my fingers. Tried not to hold my breath.
“Look!” Kylie said. “She’s going to go!”
The lady mockingbird bobbed once, bobbed again, and flew! Fluttered was more like it, landing on the ground in front of the table. But it was enough to get all of us up on our toes and leaning forward, whispering, “Come on, come on. You can do it.”
Suddenly she took off again, reaching a branch about a foot off the ground. From there, she flew back to the top of the cage and tried again. This time, she made it to the honeysuckle bush. From there, she made it to the birdbath where she paused to freshen up for her mate, and we all looked at each other and said, “What the heck?” and then she took off again, flying all the way to the top of the lilac!
“She did it!” Jocelyn shouted and the whole group of girls squealed and jumped up and down while Mary Anne and I laughed and hugged and dabbed tears from our eyes and said we’d known all along she could do it.
Above us, the male performed his dance of love, swooping and diving while he barked like a dog, rang like my mother’s alarm clock, and finally sang his own sweet song, all for the lady mockingbird who had made it to the top of the lilac. She seemed to like his show and they flew up and around and down together, calling hew, hew, hew to each other until finally he led her to the nest he had built and the two disappeared into the leaves.
“Proving once again that love conquers all,” Mary Anne said and leaned in close. “I’m so glad your mom wasn’t here to spoil it.”

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