Skinnydipping (52 page)

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the pregnancy test. “I’ll trade you,” I said.

He stared at the little plastic stick in my hand for a moment, and then a look of recognition came over his face. Then, it was as if a great weight was lifted from his brow. He leapt to his feet and pulled me into his arms. “Oh my God,” he said, his face pressed against my neck. “I can’t believe it.”

Then he pulled back and looked at me. “Is it mine?”

“No, it’s the doorman’s. I was just coming to tell him.” The doorman was still watching us. “Hey, buddy, guess what?” I yelled to him. “I’m having your baby!”

The doorman ducked back inside the building. Harris laughed. “You’re crazy,” he said.

“And you already have too many crazy women in your life?”

“I think I could use one more.” He pulled me back against his chest. He felt so warm.

“I could do this alone,” I whispered in his ear, wrapping my arms around his neck. “But I’d rather do it with you.”

“We’re going to be a family,” he whispered back, pressing his cheek to mine. “Faith, Faith, I love you.”

I pulled back from him and looked him straight in the eye. I took a deep breath, and then I said it: “Harris, I love you, too.”

We heard about it first
on television. Harris was getting ready for work, and I was still lying in bed, trying to figure out what to do with my life next, when I flipped past the Entertainment News channel.

“Domestic Devil?” the host said. “Author, entrepreneur, and television personality Sybil Hunter just wrapped her
Domestic Goddess
reality show finale, but she may also have inadvertently wrapped her career.” The screen flashed an unflattering picture of Sybil with her mouth open. “This morning, anonymous sources leaked this recording of Hunter, talking about the contestants on her popular reality show.”

“Harris, get in here!” I yelled. He came out of the bathroom in his boxers with shaving cream on his face, to the sound of his mother’s voice. The words showed up on the screen, as she spoke:

“They’re all a disaster. Every one of them. I don’t want to hire any of them. They’re all ridiculous.”

A muffled voice responded, saying something like “Contractually, I think you have to hire one of them.”

Sybil answered: “I don’t care about a fucking piece of paper, I can do whatever I want to do. I’m Sybil Hunter.”

The barely audible voice said something about how she had handpicked the contestants.

Sybil answered: “Handpicked? I disown any responsibility for that. I don’t even know where they got these people. Faith should probably win. She’d be great on her own show, which is exactly why I’m not going to choose her. I can’t stand that girl, and I can’t wait until the day I never have to see her again. I suppose I’ll just choose that whiny, simpering, ass-kissing Shari to win, but I can guarantee that as soon
as she’s hired, she’s fired, so my business can go on operating at the standard I expect.”

The anchorwoman came back onscreen. “Sources at Ovation Network claim that Hunter may be fired, for violating her contract. No word on whether plans for Hunter’s new SHE network will be influenced by these events, or whether the winner of
Domestic Goddess
will actually receive the promised prize.”

Harris and I stared at each other. “No fucking way,” I said.

I slumped back into the pillows. She couldn’t stand me? She couldn’t wait until she never had to see me again? I laughed out loud. The woman was about to become my mother-in-law! And Shari … poor Shari. I almost felt sorry for her. What an awful thing to come out on national television—Sybil Hunter calling her a simpering ass-kisser.

But it all made sense now. She chose Shari because she never intended to give her a show at all. Had she chosen me, I wouldn’t have gone down without a fight, and she probably knew it. Especially if I was with her own son. And she couldn’t stand me! I smiled. In a way, it was a huge relief just to hear her say it.

I wondered who hated Sybil enough to secretly record her, then leak something like that to the press. I thought momentarily about Polly. Could it be? Or Alice? Whoever it was … well, I was impressed.

Harris ran back into the bathroom, wiped the shaving cream off of his face, then came back out and grabbed his phone. “I need to call her,” he said.

“I thought she wasn’t speaking to you,” I said.

“She’s not, but if she needs legal advice, I have to at least offer it. If she doesn’t want it, then that’s her call,” he said. “But she may really be in some serious trouble here.”

“Will her new network be in jeopardy?” I said.

“Maybe. Although who knows what will happen. She’s always been a fighter. Just like you,” he said.

“I always knew we had a lot in common,” I said. “Although that scares me.” And then the phone rang.

“Faith Brightstone?” the voice said.

“Yes?”

“This is Roxanne Howard.”

“Wow,” I said. “Hi, Roxanne.” I turned down the sound on the television.

“Look, Faith, I wouldn’t normally be calling you directly, but I called around and you don’t seem to have an agent.”

“No,” I said. An agent? Why would I need an agent?

“I’d like to talk to you about a little proposition. Can you come into the office?”

“Can you tell me what it’s about first?” I said.

“Sure, I suppose I can,” she said. “You may have heard about recent events involving Sybil Hunter.”

“I just heard, actually,” I said.

“Yes, well. It looks like great changes are afoot. We’ve canceled
Domestic Goddess.
There won’t be a second season. We’ve also canceled Sybil’s daytime show.”

I gave Harris a look. “What?” he mouthed to me. I shushed him.

“Faith, we’re in the process of considering replacements for those slots, and I have an idea for a show that I’d like you to consider. We want to call it
Have Faith.
It would be a completely new kind of reality show. We would follow you around in your normal life, and make a show out of
you.
”

“Make a show out of
me
?” I said. “Who would want to watch that?”

“I have no doubt it would be extremely popular. You were the fan favorite on
Domestic Goddess
, so you’ve already got a fan base. People want to know what happens next, with you, with your career, and with Harry. Are you two getting married?”

“I… I think so,” I said. I’d said yes, but I still couldn’t quite believe I would be able to go through with a wedding.

“Excellent, TV gold,” she said. “And don’t take this the wrong way, but I heard from Sybil that you’re pregnant. Is that true?”

“It is,” I said.

“Platinum!” she said. “There’s nothing more engaging on a show
for women than a pregnancy. If you can come down to the studio tomorrow, I can talk to you about all the details.” The sound of her voice gave me a creepy feeling. My baby was a profit opportunity?

“Look, Roxanne… I don’t know,” I said. “I think I’m kind of done with reality television.”

“Honey, you don’t want to miss this opportunity,” she said. “You’ve gotta strike while the iron is hot. It’s happening for you right now. Don’t lose your momentum.”

“Let me think about it,” I said.

“That’s all I ask,” she said. “Of course, Harry would have to agree to be part of the show. And that adorable little baby you’re going to have, too. It will be all about your family. Call me when you’re ready to schedule a meeting. And I’m quite confident that you’ll be calling.”

I hung up the phone. “Harris?” I said. He came back into the bedroom. He’d put his suit on and was tying his tie. He looked adorable. Roxanne’s words echoed in my ears:
Your family.
I had no doubt Harris would be extremely telegenic. The world would fall in love with him. But did I really want to put him through all that?

“Yes, my irresistible wife-to-be?” he said, kneeling on the bed and wrapping his arms around me.

epilogue

I
peeked out from behind the white curtains that separated my dressing area at the Waldorf Hotel from the rest of the ballroom. I was six months pregnant, it was a gorgeous June day, and I was in the most beautiful white wedding dress I’d ever seen.

I saw all my friends gathered there, in chairs facing the altar—Victoria, Jennifer, and Samantha, Bronwyn and her husband, Chaz and Monica, Mikki and Christophe, and my bakery assistant, Alanna. My old friends Perry and Jeannie had both flown in from L.A., and at the last minute, Larry Todd, my old boss, had decided to fly in, too. “It will be like going to my own daughter’s wedding,” he’d said over the phone.

Sybil Hunter was there, of course—she couldn’t miss her son’s wedding, even if he was marrying me. She sat in the front row, on the groom’s side. She was going to be my mother-in-law, for better or for worse, and we’d both have to get used to that prospect.

My own mother sat primly on the other side, trying not to stare at Sybil Hunter, looking like she had a bad taste in her mouth. And then I gasped—my father was there, standing uncomfortably against the back wall, with a bouncy and smiling Brooke on his arm.

Nobody saw me peeking through the curtains, but I saw them all,
and it was perfect, no matter what had happened in the past, no matter who had said or done what. They were all here, all come together to usher me into my happily ever after, and whatever happened after this moment would be up to me. I was done blaming other people for my unhappiness. I was done being unhappy. And if my life was not about to be perfect, it was about to change in ways I’d only dreamed.

After much discussion, Harris and I had turned down Roxanne Howard’s offer to do a reality show about our lives, but had made her a counteroffer: I would do a show more like the show Sybil Hunter had done—a talk show with guests and cooking and tips for making life easier and better, but for a younger generation of women. It would be funnier, lighter, more irreverent, like talking to your girlfriends. I might even throw in a mixology segment now and again. We agreed the show could still be called
Have Faith
, and Harris could come onto the show only when and if he wanted to. And as for our daughter—the sonogram had revealed last month that we were having a baby girl—well, we would keep her off screen, at least for now.

After Bacchus Global had turned down our deal for the Have Faith Pink Lemonade Mojito, one of the other companies I’d called, Summit Liquors, changed their minds after hearing I’d scored my own show. They made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. I was going to bottle my signature cocktail and sell it after all. And I had a million other ideas, all waiting to happen. My future was wide open. No limits. Just space—and love.

Then I saw Harris. He was at the front of the room, in his tuxedo, looking nervous and handsome and beautiful. He was waiting for me. He turned, feeling my gaze, and our eyes met. His face relaxed. He smiled.

Then the music started, and I stepped out from behind the curtain, on no one’s arm, on my own two feet, to begin my next great adventure.

acknowledgments

T
hank you to my fans. I would never be anywhere close to where I am without your support. You have accepted me, embraced my flaws, and taken such an incredible journey with me. This next stop on that journey is filled with so much passion and joy that I know you will love it as much as if not more than anywhere I have taken you before.