Chapter Ten
Chapter Ten
On a Monday morning in June, I pull into the parking lot at work, the same job I’ve had at my father-in-law’s firm—McKinnon, Wood, and Bloom—for over fifteen years.
I recognize every car and every crack in the asphalt.
I count them on my way into the lobby, then drift through the air-conditioning all the way to my desk.
I scroll through my inbox, decide what’s most urgent then jump at a voice in my doorway. Allen.
“Diana. Glad I caught you. Follow me to my office?”
A question that is not a question.
I sit opposite his mahogany desk. The same deer I’ve avoided eye contact with for fifteen years stares from the wall behind Allen’s head.
He settles into his chair. “I’m not sure if you’ve been following the latest, but John Markham was photographed leaving a strip club on Friday. And again on Saturday.”
“I missed that.” I did see the headline, but I hadn’t bothered clicking. Senator Markham was one of my favorite of Allen’s clients, always making an effort to ask about my day and never asking me for a cup of coffee. A low-but-meaningful bar.
“Our firm, of course, can’t be associated with that kind of behavior.”
“Going to a strip club?” Three of our last five holiday parties have ended with an after-party at a strip club.
“It’s all so public. With John’s recent divorce from Melissa. Cheating allegations. No chance he’ll win another term. He’s losing his base.”
“And his money.”
“It was always her money, Diana. And one has to choose sides even when it hurts. It feels like the right time to part ways with John and shore things up with Melissa. You wouldn’t mind letting him know, would you? You two are friendly.”
“You want me to get rid of him as a client?”
“And take Melissa to lunch.”
I don’t care about Allen taking sides. Or following the money.
Or the wild hypocrisy of dropping a client for moral reasons.
Secretly I find it all entertaining. The same way that on the best of days, showing up at the office is entertaining.
Reliably, we arrive and perform—we follow the script about what we should care about and not care about.
And who’s in charge and who’s invited to a meeting.
Who holds the door and who speaks first and who takes notes.
Some days I imagine it like we’re dinner theater actors in some town starved for entertainment.
We perform the same play again and again and pretend there is no audience.
And some days showing up and knowing I didn’t have to learn any new lines gives me a sense of peace and calm.
I could do this show in my sleep. Until lately.
As Allen speaks, the houselights come up and the audience is there.
I can see them from the stage, tearing into their prime rib from the smorgasbord, looking up at me, expectantly.
“I don’t think I can.”
“Take her to lunch? You have something?”
“No.” I sit in the chair opposite him so I won’t chicken out and slip out the open door. “I was actually planning to find you today. Oliver has been earning solid money flipping houses—”
“Solid?”
“He’s very good at it.”
“And? What does this have to do with you?”
“I’m giving my notice, Allen.”
—
The next twenty minutes feel otherworldly and light.
I float back to my desk and type an official resignation letter.
Then I pack up my picture frames and put the money plant from my windowsill into a box and decide to take myself for an early lunch, where I will make a list of everything I need to wrap up and delegate so I won’t leave anything unfinished for Allen.
I weave through the maze of cubicles and think of the days spent here with Oliver—my immediate crush on him, our first kiss in the stairwell.
Coming back to work after Emmy was born; the broken lock on my office door and having to shove a chair up against it so I could pump milk for Emmy without anyone walking in.
I think of the nights just last year when I interviewed women in my office after-hours, praying no one would find out.
Thinking about Dirty Diana, my memories cascade into worry—what if the business isn’t enough to support us?
What if Oliver’s next house doesn’t sell?
What if we’re both out of work? By the time I reach my car, the cardboard box of my office bric-a-brac feels like it might crush me. I turn on the AC and catch my breath.
Then I dial Natalie Hutton’s number. An assistant answers, and to my surprise she puts me through.
“I have an idea.”
Natalie listens as I pitch her on a gallery show idea I’ve been dreaming up for months, only now I tweak it so that Natalie and her portrait are at the center of it all. When I stop talking, there’s a long pause and for a moment I worry she’s dropped off.
“I love it. Are you in L.A.?”
“No. But I can be.” I just quit my job.
“Let me make a few calls and get back to you?”
I spend the entire afternoon emailing back and forth with Alicia, the two of us creating a pitch document for a Dirty Diana gallery evening with Natalie as the main draw.
Oliver comes by to drop off Emmy and I invite him to stay for dinner. Before I can tell him about quitting, he smiles and lets me know his mom already called. He opens a bottle of champagne and pours us each a glass.
While I’m cooking, I glance at my phone and see a string of texts from Petra:
Call me.
Seriously. Call me.
Diana. Call me back.
She picks up right away. “You will not believe this.”
“Is everything okay?”
“I spent the entire evening on the phone with Natalie’s agent, then her manager, then a team of film execs, including her producing partner, Allison Kidd, who wants you to come to Los Angeles and meet with her.”
“Me? Why?”
“Because they want to produce Dirty Diana. To buy the IP and turn it all into a movie about your life journey.”
“That wasn’t the pitch.”
“What do you mean that wasn’t the pitch?”
“I called Natalie and pitched her the gallery idea. A very different idea.”
“Finally! Thank god. You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for this moment.”
“What moment?”
“For you to fucking hustle!”
“Petra.” I can’t help laughing. “Is my life—even with the Footloose version of my childhood—interesting enough for a movie?”
“As your friend, I’d say, ‘maybe?’ But as your publicist, I’d say you’re pitchable. Let’s just get you in the room.”
—
In the backyard, Oliver is watching Emmy practice her cartwheels. When I recount the strange call, he looks as confused as I feel. “A movie?”
“They say the actual making of the movie hardly ever happens. They just like to buy stuff up and then never make any of it.”
“But it’s about your life? Would I be in it?”
“Maybe a character based on you. What do you think?”
“I think it’s exciting.” He watches as Emmy runs off to find her sidewalk chalk. “And what about Jasper?”
I feel my ears go pink. “I don’t know. I don’t know how much would be real or fictional or what they would even find interesting about it. It’s all way too soon to think about. No one has offered anything.”
For a long while, we sit and watch Emmy draw a sweet, smiling bunny in pink chalk. And then something with fangs chasing the bunny. Oliver and I share a familiar look that says she’s adorable and weird and better than either of us and did we do okay have we done enough, so far?
“I don’t want any of this drama at school to affect Emmy,” I say quietly.
“The parent Mafia? It won’t.” Oliver drapes his arm around me and pulls me close. He’s warm, his body solid and comforting. “It’ll blow over before summer’s done and Lorraine will be on to a new crusade. She’ll have fired a teacher and three janitors by fall and be totally sated.”
—
Oliver cleans up the kitchen while I run Emmy a bath, trying to keep Oliver’s reassuring voice in my head.
Once she’s asleep, I pull up the calendar on my phone and ask him, “School’s out next week, so what if we picked up after that and went to California?
I could take my meeting and we can vacation as well. ”
“The three of us?”
“It might be fun? Unless you can’t get the time away?”
Oliver skims the calendar, reading over my shoulder. “It’s actually perfect. The permit for the pool is being held up for at least a month, so things are at a temporary standstill at the house. What about Emmy’s camp?”
“She’d have the beach. Disneyland? Lack of humidity and mosquitos? And don’t forget, your parents will be in Santa Barbara for most of July. Maybe they could even take Emmy for a few days while we lie on a beach somewhere.”
Oliver pulls me into his lap. “Yes.” He’s thinking what I am: It means we’d be living together again. Not saying goodbye at the end of a date. Spending all day and night together. “We need a reset. What better place than Hollywood?”
I’ve lived a full life. That’s what you say, right?
But it’s true. A wonderful life that unfolded in order.
When my husband proposed, we looked forward to the wedding.
Then our first home. Then the first child, of course.
A lovely daughter, with a gap-toothed smile.
We had more children than we planned just to have that feeling of something big interrupting our lives.
And now, the kids are all married and scattered across the country.
We take trips, of course. We visit the kids.
They send us on cruises because they think that’s what we want.
But we’re still looking for that next big thing.
In my fantasy, we start having sex in public places.
At the park. On a bench at the museum. In the movie theater.
Why not? We even make a pact: We will not die until we’ve had sex on the sundeck of a cruise ship.