Young Wives. Olivia Goldsmith

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      “Have you heard?” Michelle’s voice asked.

      Jada wondered if Anne, not visible now, was still listening on some other extension. “Honey, everybody’s heard,” Jada said. “Where are you?”

      “I’m at home,” Michelle managed and then she gasped, making an awful sound that Jada didn’t like to hear and hoped that Anne wasn’t hearing. She lifted the phone base off her desk and pulled it as far as she could. Then, setting it on the floor next to the credenza, she stretched the handset as far as she could and just managed to get to the door and look out. Anne and several of the other women had their heads turned toward her but immediately telescoped around, avoiding her. None of them was on the phone.

      “Oh God, Jada this is terrible. This place … it’s …” Michelle began to cry. “I have to go. I have to go pick up the kids. They were fostered out last night. Can you imagine?” She started to choke up; Jada could barely understand what she was saying. Something about Frank and making a list and the mirror and something else.

      “Be cool, Michelle,” Jada said. “All the shit you’re looking at, all the broken stuff, isn’t important. The babies are important and they’re all right. You can come to my house tonight. We can clean up your place tomorrow.” The poor girl. Kneeling there in the wreckage, she probably did look like Cinderella but it wasn’t the time for Jada to make a “Cindy” joke.

      “Oh, Jada.” Michelle made another horrible noise and then said something else about Frank.

      “Is he home?” Jada said. She didn’t want to be too inquisitive. She’d known a lot of people who’d been in trouble and now wasn’t the time for twenty questions. “Is he there with you?” she asked.

      “No,” Michelle answered, sobbing. “They wouldn’t let me talk to him, but a lawyer came and said he would be home tonight or tomorrow. Jada,” Michelle whispered, “it’s a nightmare. Frank didn’t do anything. How could the police do this to us?” She lost it then, and tears rose in Jada’s own eyes.

      “Michelle? Michelle? You cry, but then wash your face and fix your hair and pull yourself together for Jenna and Frankie. You want me to come with you to pick them up? I know how Child Welfare can be.”

      “I can do it,” Michelle whispered, pulling herself together. “I can do it,” she repeated, as if she were giving herself a pep talk, which Jada figured she was doing.

      Jada used an old joke they’d run through together during the trials of raising suburban kids. “Are you calm?” she asked.

      “Yes.”

      “If you’re calm, I’m the Dalai Lama,” Jada said.

      “If you’re the Dalai Lama, I’m Richard Gere,” Michelle answered weakly.

      “If you’re Richard Gere, I’m outta here,” Jada finished. “I’ll leave work real soon, pick up some pizzas, and we’ll have a pizza party at my house. If you want to sleep over with the kids, that’s just fine.”

      “Sleep?” Michelle asked. “Oh God, Jada. I’m never going to be able to sleep again.”

      “Just as well,” Jada said. “It’s overrated. A big time-waster, generally. And you got a lot of cleaning to do. You okay?” she asked, just to be sure.

      “Under the circumstances, yeah,” Michelle said. “Under the circumstances. And Jada?”

      “Yes,” Jada said.

      “Thank you. I won’t forget this.”

      “I hope you do. I hope you forget the whole thing once it all gets straightened out. Meanwhile, tell me what’s really important. I forget if the kids eat sausage on their pizza or not.”

10

       During which Angela sleeps through a riot and is subsequently read the riot act twice

      “You’re going to have to do something, Angela,” Tony, her father, was saying from the doorway of the study. “It’s not healthy to just lie here. You don’t even look healthy.” He craned his neck forward. “You’re not taking an interest in anything. You didn’t even get up last night during that riot.”

      “What riot?” Angie asked dully.

      “You didn’t even hear the cop cars and the commotion down at the end of the street?” Angela just shook her head. She’d found the number of a pharmacy that delivered, and a combination of Nyquil and Tylenol PM had put her in something close to a coma. “Well, you saw the police tape around the house today, didn’t you?” her father was asking. “The bastids wrecked the joint.”

      Angie shook her head again. She didn’t have a clue about what he was talking about, and she didn’t care.

      “Angie, there was a huge drug bust round the corner, about ten houses down.” He looked at her appraisingly. “Hey, when’s the last time you went out?” he asked, suspicion in his deep voice.

      “I’m going out later,” Angie told him, avoiding the question. It had been a few days. She was still in the Rangers sweatshirt, still on the sofa.

      “Great! You gotta date?” He approached her and sat on the arm of the couch.

      “Yeah. With my mother,” Angie said grimly. He better not get too close. She hadn’t washed, brushed her teeth, or been out of her father’s house since she arrived, and even she was willing to admit she was getting a little strange.

      “Oh, she’s back?” her father asked. Angie couldn’t help but notice how he pretended to be totally casual, but she could sense his very real curiosity behind it. Desperation knew desperation. Angela was almost certain that her dad regretted the divorce. As far as she knew, her parents didn’t speak. Her father had simply disappeared from her mother’s conversation. But somehow Anthony Romazzano always knew Natalie Goldfarb’s whereabouts.

      “You’re not going to get involved working for those schnorers?” he asked. “I didn’t pay for law school so that you could help out a bunch of freeloaders.”

      “You didn’t pay for my law school,” Angie reminded him. Her father was very odd about money; he’d been poor and then he’d been very rich. He tried never to let the women in his family know where he’d stood. But they’d ignored him, and he’d always been disturbed that neither Natalie nor Angie seemed influenced by his money. Though he’d suffered a few business reverses recently, he was still well off.

      “Please, Angie. You could get a job with a Park Avenue firm in a minute. I could help you.”

      “I’m not interested in Park Avenue. And you’re helping me right now,” Angie said. “You’ve been great.” She kissed him on the cheek.

      Tony awkwardly shifted his weight, reached into his back pocket, and took out his wallet. He pulled a wad of bills from it and handed them to her, without getting too close. “Look, you’re a beautiful girl. Go out. Get your hair done. Get a manicure.”

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