Chapter Six
In which we meet the most unlikeable mother. Unfortunately for Violet, she’s hers.
Violet…
"This is going to be a good day," I tell myself in the mirror.
After our agreement last night, Roman escorted me downstairs and had one of his men drive me home.
I stayed in the shower until the hot water ran out, questioning what kind of person I've become.
Because I'm fine with it. All of it.
I'm fine with the club and the insane, erotic carnival Roman had created there. I'm completely comfortable with him murdering my stepfather.
Does that make me any better than Jack, the man who I think deserves to die? I went to sleep, pondering that question and woke up feeling completely refreshed, so I guess that's my answer.
"This is going to be a good day!" I greet Rose and Iris, who are still sprawled out on my pullout couch.
"Uh-huh," Rose mumbles into her damp pillow.
Iris rolls over, opening one bleary eye. "If I Venmo you two hundred bucks could we turn on the air conditioner?" It's only June, but summer has arrived with a vengeance in Manhattan and they look as sweaty and limp as a flounder.
"You don't have to Venmo me anything." I hit the thermostat, wincing a bit as I turn it down. "You need to save your money for college, remember?"
"Yeah…" Rose sits up, wiping her sweaty face. "Because you know we're gonna have to sue Jack and Poppy to get a penny of our trust fund."
"I'll handle that when the time comes," I say.
Hurrying over to the kitchenette, I turn on the coffee maker and grind some beans, hoping the smell will distract them from my stifling apartment.
La Colombe beans, organic, and an eye-watering fifty dollars a pound, but there's some luxuries I'm unwilling to give up.
"Coffee? A little something to get you going?" I invitingly wiggle a mug.
"What's the plan for today?" Iris yawns, reaching her hand out. "Oh, thank god. Precious life-giving caffeine."
"I hear you," I say fervently. I may have slept the sleep of a conscienceless monster, but it was still only four hours or so and I've got to get my brain back online before I head to the shelter.
"What do you think about hanging around here today?" I try to sound casual, busying myself with pulling out the milk and cereal. They're silent, and I turn around to find both sitting at the counter, clutching their coffee mugs with identical expressions of suspicion.
"Why?" Iris asks, taking a sip.
"You don't want to go home and deal with Poppy and Jack, do you?" I evade.
"Yeah, but we're running out of clean underwear," Iris says.
"You do know where the laundry room is, in the basement?" I say dryly. "I've got some change in the jar on the counter and you're welcome to borrow anything of mine."
"Yeah, if we wanted to dress like we were still in Catholic school," Iris mumbles into her coffee cup.
"Oh, that's harsh," I point my finger at her.
"You don't remember what I looked like after I graduated from St. Mary's?
I wore nothing but crop tops to show off my belly button piercing for my first two years at Columbia, out of spite.
It's just for a couple of days." I slice a couple of oranges and arrange them on a plate.
"Let's keep you out of arm's reach for a few days until things settle down. "
Yeah, until Roman murders our stepfather, my conscience helpfully reminds me.
"Fine by us," Iris shrugs.
Checking my phone, I groan. "I've got to get out of here, make sure you lock up behind me, okay? If Jack or Poppy come by, do not answer the door."
"Yes, Mother." Iris rolls her eyes.
Turning back as I sling my messenger bag over my shoulder, I ask, "Can you keep yourself busy here today?"
They look at me. They look at each other with that unsettling, identical twin communication. Both offering hugely insincere grins, they chorus, "Absolutely."
This is in no way reassuring.
Despite my earlier promises to my bathroom mirror, it is in fact, not starting out to be such a good day. Larry meets me in the lobby. Today his T-shirt reads, I'm probably not listening to you. He also does not look like he thinks this is going to be a good day.
"You have a visitor," he says, folding his arms.
"Oh, god," I groan. "Who now? One of the city inspectors?"
"Worse," he says. "Your mother - excuse me - Poppy's here. She's bouncing around your office as we speak."
"You left her in there alone?" I shove my computer bag at him before whipping open the door to find my mother pinching leaves off my orchids with her sharp, manicured nails.
"These poor things are going to wither and die on this windowsill," she says, still focused on my poor, defenseless flowers. "Much like your career."
"Good morning to you too, Poppy." I close the door, leaning against it. "To what do I owe this visit?"
Abandoning my brutalized flowers, she finally looks at me, gaze sweeping over my tank top and white summery skirt. Verdict: Unimpressed.
She's elegant in a patterned silk dress that I suspect cost more than my rent. "Your sisters aren't answering their phones," she says, dusting off one of my chairs before seating herself. "I thought before I filed a missing person's report with the police that I should check in with you."
"They're eighteen," I point out. "They deserve a break after graduating with honors."
"Are they staying with you?" Poppy says sharply. There's something about her eyes, shrewd and assessing, that I've never seen before and I realize I haven't seen her smile at me for… years, maybe.
I used to get so excited when she'd smile and clap her hands when I would bring home a perfect report card, or how she'd bring flowers to one of my cello recitals, waving and grinning from the front row.
When was the last time that she had seemed proud of anything I'd done?
She attended my college graduation, but not with any real satisfaction, stating that social work was, "a sucker's degree. "
Poppy angrily clears her throat and I realize I've just been staring at her. "No," I lie. "They're staying with some friends, I think. I spoke with them yesterday, and they were doing fine."
"So, you don't know where they are?" She leans forward, her hands digging into her purse. "Is that what you're telling me? That you don't know where my eighteen-year-old daughters are?"
Gee, Poppy. Shouldn't I be asking you that? I think.
"I spoke with them, Poppy." My mother enjoys having us call her by her first name because she said it made her feel 'more like a sister than a mother.
' "I'm telling you that they're safe," I say sharply.
"But let's not pretend, here. You're not worried about their welfare.
You're worried that they haven't come home so you can push them around and pressure them into whatever Jack's little game is, am I right? "
She leans back, crossing her legs so that I can see her expensive red-soled shoes. The gloves are off. "You're not their mother, I am. I want what's best for my daughters. That includes you."
"And you think inflicting The Chads upon us is in our best interest?" I ask, my sandaled foot is jiggling madly under the desk. "Iris and Rose are teenagers, for hell's sake!"
"Don't swear!" she snaps. "Apparently, the nuns weren't strict enough with you at St. Mary's."
"Oh, I can show you the scars on my knees from hours of doing rosary as penance," I retort. "Believe me, they were very fond of old-school punishment. But I'm not a child and neither are Iris and Rose."
Poppy's eyes narrow thoughtfully and I know she's pivoting into a new approach. "I know we haven't been as close since we lost your father," she says, a practiced note of softness slipping into her tone.
"You mean, when I walked in on you and Jack in bed at the Newport Beach house?" I retort sweetly. The memory pops up with unfriendly clarity, curdling my stomach
"I'm sorry you had to see that," she says with not the slightest bit of remorse. "But Jack sees me, in the way your father never did. While I'm heartbroken that you have lost a father, Jack is here and ready to step up."
The sheer scope of her arrogance and heartlessness is breathtaking, and it takes me a moment to reply. "I miss my mother," I offer in a rare moment of vulnerability. "I miss who you used to be."
I should know better.
Spreading her ringed fingers out wide, she says, "This is who I've always wanted to be.
Your father was the one who loved to see me in those little sundresses and acting like a hippie, like my parents.
" Poppy leans forward, dramatically pounding on her bony chest. "Jack knows who I really am; intelligent, and driven.
Someone to be respected." Her hair is shellacked into a perfect bob, her bangs ruler straight across her forehead over her painted-on brows, her lips are considerably fuller since I've seen her last. She's had some work done.
"Then it makes me question," I say, the words choking my throat, "if I ever knew you at all."
With an irritable sigh, she rises from the chair, slinging her Prada purse over her shoulder. "I don't have time for your dramatics." She heads for the door. "Just send Iris and Rose home before I have to go looking for them." The sharp clack of her heel’s echoes down the linoleum hallway.
There's one picture left of my mother in my apartment.
It was from a trip she and I took together when I was ten or so, when I could still call her Mom and not Poppy.
She had long, flowing curls like mine, and she was holding my hand, swinging our arms as we walked barefoot on the beach, laughing and singing "Message in a Bottle" from The Police.
As I stand here in my tiny office, the memory is fading away, along with the sound of her heels and I realize I can't quite picture who she used to be at all.