Slim Chance (11 page)

I put on my biggest and brightest smile (
Marie Claire,
June: “Be a Bleach Bunny: Get those Pearly Whites their Whitest”) and discreetly made my way toward the staircase.

“Evelyn?” Mr. Fulbright’s voice froze me in my tracks.

“Yeah?”

“Have you seen Bruce?”

“No.”

“Well, see if you can find him—I want to introduce you to my cousin Freddy. He just came in from Seattle.”

“Sure thing, sir,” I said, and scrambled up the stairs.

“Bruce?” I whispered.

There were about twelve doors in the upstairs hallway, and each one was closed.

“Bruce!” I said loudly. “It’s me. Where are you?”

The door to Diana’s bedroom opened and Bruce popped his head out. “Over here,” he said sternly. The look on his face told me things were pretty serious.

Inside, Roderick was sitting cross-legged on Diana’s bed, his head hung over a little pink garbage pail. His fly was down.

“So sorry,” he mumbled. “So sorry. I thought she wanted to play with me.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. Suddenly, it all seemed pretty funny.

“Evie, this is fucking serious,” Bruce said, pacing the floor.

“I know,” I managed. “It’s not funny. It’s not funny.”

“She was wearing pigtails. She looked like a little runny babbit,” Roderick slurred, gripping his bucket.

“Watch it, man,” Bruce growled at him. “That’s my sister you’re talking about. She’s only eighteen.”

I didn’t know what to say. Roderick had never displayed this type of behavior before. As far as we knew, he wasn’t a pervert at all.

“What the hell happened?” I asked.

“I have no idea,” Bruce said, “but I can guess. This isn’t good, Evie. This isn’t good. My mother’s going to tear his heart out with a spoon. Where’s Diana?”

“Calm down. She’s in the kitchen with Rosita. Your mother has no idea—”

The door flew open and in walked a sobbing Diana, pulling her mother along by the arm. Bertie’s normally pale face turned deep purple as she assessed the scene.

“See?
See?
” Diana cried. She really did have a huge zit on her forehead. “He just came into my room without even knocking. And then he got on my bed and…and…oh…it’s just too awful…he…he….”

“Spit it out, Diana!” shrieked Bertie.

“He grabbed me!” she wailed, and ran into her bathroom and slammed the door. Yes, she has an ensuite bathroom.

“If I may say something in my own defense…” said Roderick, then heaved into the pail.

Bruce and his mother looked at me as if he were my responsibility. “What are we supposed to do with this disgusting animal?” Bertie spat.

“It’s not my fault! I barely know him,” I said.

“No one’s saying it is, Evie,” Bruce sighed. “Maybe we should get your mother and aunt up here to deal with him.”

“Noo,” I whined. “I don’t want this to ruin the party.”

“It’s a little late for that,” Bertie said curtly. “The guests are starting to leave anyway. I don’t think they know what happened, and that’s the important thing. So help me, if your father finds out, Bruce…”

Roderick hiccupped. “Don’t blame poor Eve,” he said. “’Snot her fault. The little rabbit wanted me to jump up and down with her on the bed.”

“If you know what’s good for you, you’ll shut up,” Bruce warned.

“Eve, you’re more of a moose than a rabbit,” Roderick said thoughtfully. “But you’re still a good girl. She’s a good girl, that girl Eve. Bastard that she is. Bastard.”

“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?” Bruce was really getting pissed off. I kind of liked it. In this day and age, a girl
can’t afford to take chivalry for granted, even in a terrible situation like this.

Roderick tried to put his finger up to his lips. “Ssshhh…issa secret. Her mommy never told her. Ssshhh…”

“Told me
what?
” I hissed.

“That she never married your daddy,” he sang.

Bertie and Bruce stared at me. Roderick’s eyes rolled back into his head and he fell forward, spilling the contents of his bucket all over Diana’s white lace bedspread and then landing in it facedown. Nobody said a word.

My face felt like it was on fire.

“Evie?” Bruce reached over and grabbed my hand. “Evie?”

I couldn’t say a word.

Bertie threw her hands up into the air and went into the bathroom after Diana.

“Maybe it’s not true,” Bruce said. “He obviously has no idea what he’s saying.”

Tears spilled down onto my cheeks.

“No… No…please don’t cry,” he said, and hugged me. “Don’t cry.”

But I just cried harder.

“I hate you!” I screamed at Roderick, who could have been dead for all I knew, and pulled away from Bruce. I ran into one of the guest rooms and flopped down onto the bed. Bruce came in and sat beside me. I guess I cried until I fell asleep.

When I woke up, Lucy was stroking my hair.

“Are you okay, hon?”

I turned away from her.

“I’m so sorry, Evie. You shouldn’t have found out like this.”

“So it’s true, then,” I said quietly.

“Yes, it’s true, but it doesn’t really matter.”

“Easy for you to say. You’re married.”

“Believe me,” Lucy sighed, “right now, I wish I wasn’t.”

“Why weren’t they married?”

“It doesn’t mean your dad loved your mom any less. Andrew adored her, and wanted to marry her very much. She was the one who was waiting.”

“He never even knew I existed.”

“He knows now, hon. He’s always watching over you. I know you can feel it. And he would have loved you more than anything or anyone in the entire world. Don’t doubt that for a second. He was a wonderful, kind, gentle man. A lot like Bruce,” she said, wiping away a tear. “Oh, Evie, he would have been so happy for you, so proud of you.”

“How come nobody told me?”

“When you were younger, your mom thought it was best not to, and then I guess she just never figured out the right way to tell you. Please don’t be mad at her, Evie. She didn’t want to hurt you.”

“Yeah right.”

“She wants to talk to you. Can I send her in?”

“No. Tell her to go home.”

“You can tell her that yourself,” Lucy said.

“Only if you stay, too.”

“Sure thing.”

I had so many questions, but I was too angry to ask her any of them. At least if she saw how miserable I was, she’d feel bad. And that would make me feel a bit better.

She came in and sat down on the bed, but I pretended to be asleep.

“Evelyn, I’m sorry.”

I don’t think she’d ever apologized to me before. Not seriously, anyway.

“You can stay mad at me for as long as you like, since you were probably going to be mad at me for one reason or another, anyway.”

“Thanks. I will, then.”

“I knew right away there was something wrong with Roderick,” she said. “I could see it in his eyes.”

“This isn’t his fault, Mom, it’s yours.”

“He’s not supposed to drink,” Lucy explained. “He’s on antidepressants.”

“Where’s Bruce? I want to go home.”

“I’m here, Evie,” he said from the doorway.

“Please can we go home?”

“Sure we can,” he said.

It was almost three in the morning by the time we left. I was definitely mad at Claire, too, and didn’t want her to drive us, so Bruce borrowed Diana’s car. At home, I peeled off my tear-stained ocelot dress and crawled into bed. Bruce knew better than to try and comfort me. I was utterly inconsolable, and expected to remain so for quite some time.

I
didn’t talk to Mom for one month.

Claire called me almost every day to try and get me to see her side, as if she actually had a side. To be honest, I was almost as mad at her as I was at Mom.

“It’s not about sides, Evie,” Bruce huffed late one evening as we trekked to the corner store for some milk. Snow swirled up around our faces. It was already the third storm in as many weeks, and February was barely half over.

“Yes it is. It
is
about sides. Claire’s always been the one to defend me to Mom. She’s always seen things
my
way. Of everyone in the whole world, she was the only one who ever told it to me straight.”

“What about me? You don’t think I’m honest with you?” Bruce shook his head and stopped walking. “Well here’s some honesty for you. You don’t always want to hear it straight, Evie. You hear what you want to hear, or else you choose not to listen.”

“Exactly. Which is why I thought I could count on her. And if you’re going to be a jerk about it, then let’s just drop it.”

“Do you hear what you’re saying? You’re proving my point!” He was working himself up into a real state.

“Stop yelling. I can hear you. I understand what you’re saying, but look at it like this—it’s about hypocrisy. That’s why I’m so pissed. Claire’s always going on about the importance of being honest, and how people today can be such phonies. How she’d rather hurt someone’s feelings than humor them. And I agree with her one hundred percent. It’s far better to tell a person a truth that may be painful to hear in the hopes that it will do some good than it is to enable someone’s self-serving fantasies for fear of bursting their bubble. I can respect that philosophy, and I respected Claire for it. But she’s the real phony, lying to my face. I expect it from Mom, but not from her.”

He just stared at me, confused. “Where do you get this stuff from? I’ve never heard her say anything remotely like that. Come to think of it, though, that sounds an awful lot like something your mother would say, if she were ever able to articulate the motivation behind her mean-spiritedness. But Claire would never willingly hurt someone’s feelings.”

“Well she has. Maybe it was before your time,” I grumbled. He’d just insulted my mother, I think. At least that was something.

“Look. Claire deferred to your mother’s judgment on this one. And frankly, I can understand why. It was her decision, not Claire’s. How can you be mad at her for that? And why do you think they never told you, Evie? To be mean to you? To hurt you? To deliberately deceive you? Grow up, already. They weren’t conspiring against you. God! I am so damn sick of this conversation. It’s all we ever talk about.”

I immediately burst into tears. “I’m a bastard! A
bastard!
And all you care about is how bored you are of listening to my problems. So much for romance, you jerk! Tomorrow’s Valentine’s Day and this is how you treat me? Thanks a lot!” I spun around on my heels and began trudging for home.

Typical.
It was so like Bruce to twist everything around so that it was all about him. Really—pretending to act supportive
when he was really just being manipulative. And at a time like this, yet. He was so whacked out lately, I had to wonder if he even knew he was doing it (
O,
February: “Toxic Relationships: Are You Getting Sucked In?”).

“Evie!” Bruce yelled. “Evie!”

I wouldn’t answer. In fact, I resolved never to answer him again. Not until he learned a few more things about love and respect for his partner.

“Evie!”

I felt a snowball pelt me in the back. Still, I refused to turn.

“I’m still getting the milk!” he bellowed. “And it’s not going to be skim! You hear me? No skim! I like WHOLE milk and that’s what I’m going to buy! Maybe I’ll even get some cream! Put
that
in your coffee!”

By the time I got home, I was more sad than mad. What was happening to me, to us? Bruce was driving me nuts, and I knew it wasn’t really his fault, but I could barely control myself anymore. Even the slightest bit of criticism was setting me off, and it wasn’t just because I was hungry half the time. But shouldn’t Bruce see that I’m on the verge of losing it and cut me some slack? For some reason, what should have been the best year of my life was turning into the most miserable one ever—especially now that the one thing I always had faith in, everything I once believed to be true, had turned out to be a lie.

If it hadn’t been for Jade and the gym, I don’t know how I would have made it through those weeks. Even Morgan seemed to be unavailable to listen to me bitch and moan, though I couldn’t hold it against her. She’d finally been promoted to Vice President of Something or Other, which meant she’d be putting in sixteen-hour days for much of the foreseeable future.

She e-mailed me the good news the Tuesday after our party.

Morgan had always planned for a career instead of babies, so this was all shaping up quite nicely for her, and ahead of schedule, too.

I wrote back,

I had to hand it to her. She really knew how to get the most out of every situation.

Of course, Morgan was much smarter than that. She knew how to keep her eye on the prize.

Of course, I’d been too humiliated to call and tell Morgan, or anyone for that matter, what had happened on Saturday. I think Bertie just told everyone I had a headache and was lying down. Thankfully, I later decided to impress anyone who eventually discovered my shameful secret with my cool and laid-back attitude toward the whole catastrophe. My ability to brush off even the most horrific of family tragedies would be legendary; publicly at least, I would soldier on, breaking through my checkered past to emerge triumphant on the other side. There was a lot of room for sympathy here, after all. For not only was I posthumously produced, but I was, technically speaking, a love child as well.

It took her a few minutes to respond.

“Wow, Evie!” someone whispered incredulously from behind me.

I spun around in my chair. Andrea, that hag, was standing over my shoulder, her mouth agape.

“How
dare
you spy on my own private affairs?” I hissed as quietly as possible.

“Interesting choice of words. Seems you’re not the only one with private affairs!” she giggled.

From somewhere within the dark recesses of my mind, Bruce’s sensible voice called out,
You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

“Andrea,” I started. “Please…”

She put her hand on my shoulder. “Oh, don’t worry. I won’t breathe a word. We all have our crosses to bear, though for some of us those crosses are larger and more humiliating than others,” she said simply, and skipped off.

Shit, shit, shit. Now she had something on me, and I knew she’d never let me forget it. I could hear Bruce’s voice speaking to me once again,
only this time he was saying, What goes around comes around.
I guess I deserved it—Andrea had apparently caught a blast of crap from her boss about personal phone time the day I had her calls rerouted.

“Evelyn!” Pruscilla shrieked from her office. “Come in here immediately.”

I sighed and shut off the screen. What the hell did she want now?

Her face was purple with anger. “You call this a report? All you had to do was proof it and check the numbers. It’s
full
of mistakes.”

“I must have given you the wrong version,” I mumbled. “Sorry about that.” There was no satisfying this woman. I once thought her bitterness was a byproduct of her unfortunate physique. But now I could see that her still formidable (albeit shrinking) girth had absolutely nothing to do with her sour disposition. She was mean as a snake from the inside out.

“Do you have any idea how much heck I would have caught if it went out like this? Thanks heavens I had the sense to look it over. What an embarrassment. This is it, Evelyn. It’s going to take more than just showing up on time. One more goof-up…” Her eyes glowed red.

Anger and courage swelled up uncontrollably from someplace deep within me. “Well, I certainly would hate for you to catch any
heck
on my account,” I snapped. “You were obviously right not to trust me. I told you, it was a MISTAKE! We all make them.”

She shook a chubby, fuschia-tipped finger at me. “Just so long as you understand that it was the second-to-last mistake you’re ever going to make here, if you catch my drift. And I’ll choose to ignore your tone because it’s obvious you’re not thinking clearly right now. Just have the right report on my desk within the hour.”

My stomach churned. That
was
the right report. I had to get out of this place.

Working out was my salvation. One month after the party, I’d lost another eight pounds, for a grand total of twenty-one pounds gone forever. The only thing that sucked was that I was scared to tell Bruce—I knew he’d think I was losing too much, too fast. He was probably right, but I hadn’t weighed under 150 pounds since high school, and seeing that thingy on the scale slide to the left instead of the right every week was undeniably intoxicating. It was easy, for the most part, since I was going to the gym almost every day. As a concession to Bruce and our financial situation, I did agree not to exceed three times a week with Jade.

But being the great guy he is, Jade always made sure to offer his support pro bono whenever I was there. When I broke the twenty-pound mark, I think he was almost as happy as I was.

“Amazing,” he said as he marked my weight on my chart. “You should be our poster child. Maybe we’ll put you in the brochure next year…like a ‘before and after’ shot, you know?”

“Well, you make me look forward to stepping on the scale, which is something I never thought I’d be able to say.”

He smiled and I could swear I saw his cheeks turn pink. I instantly realized that I love a man who blushes.

“Well, you did it all by yourself. I can only take credit for opening your eyes to the joys of physical fitness. Actually coming here every day is up to you.”

“And not eating like a pig, too,” I reminded him.

He laughed. “And not eating like a pig. Just promise me you’re not starving yourself.”

“I’m not, I’m not.”

The handful of Cheerios I’d had for lunch—sitting like a brick in my tummy—reminded me of that. So what if my stomach grumbled in protest on occasion? It would just be for a little while, until I could fit into The Dress. That would make it all worth it. Of course, Jade was so encouraging that it made me want to keep going, but if it weren’t for the thought of that dress, wrapped in plastic in the back of Mom’s closet, I’m not
sure I’d have the will to go on. It was sick, actually, but I couldn’t help it. Imagining myself fitting into that dress was more addictive than any drug could ever be, and far more enticing.

Jade was turning out to be the upside of my dark little obsession, and I admit that the short-term boost of seeing him was enough to get me back in there, day after day. Spending so many hours with a person in such an intimate way really lets you get to know them quickly, and I don’t think it was a stretch to say that Jade and I were becoming quite close. We had plenty in common, so why not? I knew we could probably even be really good friends outside the gym, too, although Morgan thought that was absolutely ridiculous and that I really just had a whopping crush on him.

“You’re getting married in six months, you’re not talking to your mother, your job sucks and your trainer is gorgeous,” she’d said. “Hmm…do you think it’s true love?”

“I’m not that much of an imbecile,” I reminded her. “And it’s not love, because it’s not even like. It’s just that we seem to have a lot to talk about. And he thinks I’m funny.”

“Sure he does,” she said. “And it doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that he makes a living off boosting the egos of chubby rich girls. I’m not saying he doesn’t genuinely like you. Maybe he does. It’s just that even if he didn’t, he’d make sure you thought he did. Remind me, what did you say he did again? I mean, when he’s not working you out?”