54
The weekend was quiet. Well, relatively speaking. Michael had four engagements, but I bowed out—both because I wanted to spend time with the kids and also because I felt it was best we weren’t seen together publicly until after my letter ran.
Unfortunately, after running into three women who snubbed me at the grocery store Saturday morning, I realized I couldn’t be seen alone publicly until the letter ran either.
Fran and Nancy were the only ones who checked in. And I warned Nancy that between this and my impending divorce, being seen with me was likely to become social suicide.
“I couldn’t care less,” she said over the phone, the noise of her children practically drowning her out. “If you need to go to another store, you just call me. I’d like to see them try that with me there.”
I grinned. Although knowing Nancy, she would be likely to throw a can of green beans at someone’s head for not saying hello, and then I really couldn’t be seen at the grocery store.
So I took the kids to visit my father, who surprisingly didn’t think the news story would significantly hurt Michael’s odds.
“Really?” I asked as we sat outside, the kids trying to climb the cherry blossom tree in the backyard.
“Really,” he said. “Men are pretty willing to overlook an indiscretion. And you’re both of age.”
“Papa, nothing actually happened.”
“Even better. But good luck convincing anyone else of that.”
I told him about the letter, which he didn’t think would make much of a difference. “In court, maybe,” he said. “But this isn’t like six years ago. He didn’t get a teenager in trouble.”
“That didn’t happen either though.”
He looked at me. “Like I said, good luck convincing anyone otherwise. But as salacious rumors go, this isn’t terrible.”
“Mama said I was ruining your legacy.”
My father laughed. A deep belly laugh, which I hadn’t heard since Mama left him. “And here I thought my legacy was civil rights. Apparently it was just a daughter who takes after her mother.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He chuckled. “She still hasn’t told you why her parents sent her away for a summer, has she?”
“You know about that?”
“Beverly, we’ve been married thirty years. There’s not much I don’t know.”
“Okay, then tell me.”
“Absolutely not,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. “While that would get her to come home, disposing of a body is a lot of work and you know she’d make you do all the digging. There’s no way she’d risk getting her hands dirty.”
“You two deserve each other,” I said, exasperated.
“I know you didn’t mean that as a compliment,” he said. “But I’m going to choose to take it as one anyway.” He looked out at the kids. “Speaking of which, I think I figured out a plan to win her back.”
“Which is?”
He shook his head. “I’ll surprise the both of you.”
“Papa, I really think—”
He put a hand on my knee. “I know you like taking care of me,” he said. “But I convinced her to fall in love with me once. This old dog still has a few tricks in him yet.”
“Okay,” I said, not believing whatever it was would work, but choosing to give him the benefit of the doubt because I just didn’t have the room to worry about one more thing right then.
Monday morning, Linda answered a call and said it was for me. Moving to my desk, I picked up the receiver. “Beverly Diamond speaking.”
“Mrs. Diamond,” a woman’s voice said in the clipped tones of finishing school. “My name is Mary Dubois. I am the editor of the For and About Women section of the Washington Post .”
I read the section daily but was a little confused about why she was calling me. “How can I help you, Mrs. Dubois?”
“Miss,” she corrected curtly. “I’m calling today in regards to your letter to the editor.”
“Wonderful,” I said. “Do you know when it will run so we can plan accordingly?”
“It will not be running,” she said. “As I understand it, there is an article in the works right now, and the editorial staff does not want your letter running before that.”
“Oh,” I said, my shoulders sinking. “I see.”
“A secretary brought it to me,” she continued. “And I disagree with the editorial department. While the format does not work as a letter for our section, I would like to run it as a column.”
“You—what?”
“I believe you heard me,” she said mildly. “And I do not suffer fools. Are you a fool, Mrs. Diamond?”
I hadn’t been spoken to like that since I was in elementary school. “No, Miss Dubois, I am not a fool.”
“Good,” she said. “Then we’ll get along famously. Expect to see it in print tomorrow. Good day, Mrs. Diamond.”
She hung up before I could reply.
“Everything okay?” Stuart asked me.
“I—I think so,” I said.
Michael walked out, three ties in hand. “Which one?” he asked.
“The blue,” Linda and I said in unison.
“Good choice,” he said, and he wrapped it around his neck, laying the other two over the back of a chair. Then he looked over at me. “What’s going on?”
“They’re not running my letter—”
Stuart let out a string of profanity that caused Linda’s eyes to widen. “I knew Michael should have addressed it himself—”
“Would you let me finish?” I asked. He stopped talking. “That was the editor of the Post ’s women’s section. She’s going to run it tomorrow.”
“The women’s section,” Stuart scoffed. “What good does it do there?”
I thought about what my father had said. “Maybe more than in the news section,” I said.
“Explain.”
“My father said men aren’t going to care about an indiscretion. He—he didn’t think it would hurt our chances, but he was talking about with male voters. Women are the ones who aren’t going to like this.”
“How widely read is that section?” Michael asked.
“Everyone I know reads it,” I said.
“We don’t get the Post at home, but I used to swipe Larry’s women’s section at work,” Linda said.
I looked over at her. “He got a second paper delivered to the office?” She nodded as I thought about how many times I had to read his leftovers stained with coffee rings. “That jerk.” I shook my head. “Either way, I think this might be a blessing in disguise,” I said.
Michael shrugged. “It’s what we’ve got right now. So let’s hope for the best.”