A Beautiful Fate (2 page)

Never have I ever been accused of being a people person, warm and approachable. I have a rather large space bubble and feel uncomfortable when people hug me or try to hold my hand. I am private. I don’t speak about myself much. I have been accused of being a brat, born with a silver spoon in my mouth, and while I have been raised as a fortunate child, my mother made me work for everything I wanted. She and I spent our Saturday mornings helping at a soup kitchen and we worked closely with families at a woman’s crisis center back home in Chicago. Although I am uncomfortable around people, I still have a large and compassionate heart. I just prefer having a few close friends rather than having a lot of strangers I pretend to call friends.

Relentless nightmares haunt me and they help add to a feeling that I have had for my whole life, a feeling of being very different from most people. Okay, I know many people have self-image problems. But I have truly always felt as though I am being avoided, as if people can sense that there is something not good in me. My logic tells me this is not true, of course. I am quiet at times and I keep mostly to myself, but there is no evil in my heart, just sometimes a darkness.

I do not speak of my dreams to anyone, nor of the sense of waiting and anxiety that constantly assail me. My mind churns on and on. It never stops. I mull over the same thoughts again and again, like a dog working over a shank bone. The brain activity irritates and then angers me. I cannot remember having a peaceful brain.

Eventually the three-ring circus of thoughts fills my head and there is nowhere to store the overflow. I get irritated and then I get angry. My mom was a pediatrician and once took me to one of her therapist friends, who said (big surprise) that I am anxious. She suggested a medication to slow things down, but I said no, no pills for this girl, unless I am actually sick. Then she suggested I take up running. She said that she has another patient with anxiety who refuses to medicate but found that he could control his panic by running. Well hell, I can run. I can run fast. So now, I do, and for the most part, it works.

****

Margaux walked around the kitchen counter and faced me. She was wearing shiny red shoes and a black dress; she looked lovely, as always.

“I am going in to the office. I trust that you will be able to occupy your time in a respectable manner until I return. I have made reservations for this evening at eight for Providence. I will have my assistant pull back a dress from the new fall line for you to wear.”

“Sure,” was all I could manage to say to her. I stood up to head back to the guest bedroom and she gave me a cold, tight lipped smile. As I passed by Margaux, I noticed that she had a ghastly burn on the top of her hand. Her skin was broken, red and raw looking. I was alarmed by the injury but quickly shook the feeling off, not really caring what had happened to her. I silently hoped that it hurt.

Locking myself away in Margaux’s chic guest bedroom, I turned my favorite
Radiohead
album up loud and worked hard on pushing back the tears that threatened to spill out. I concentrated on the frilly, white lace that outlined the bedspread and the pale pink flowered wallpaper that lined the walls. I reminded myself to breath and worked hard on the task of letting oxygen fill my lungs and then allowing it to leave again.

The nightmares from my mother’s death have troubled my sleep seven times now. I pulled out an already worn piece of paper from my overnight bag and I added to it a seventh tally mark.

I sat there alone until Margaux returned from work. She rapped on the guest bedroom door. I got up and my joints were stiff and popped from sitting still for too long. Margaux handed me a
baio
dress that she had designed for her fall line and a pair of dangerously high and pointy shoes. I took the clothes and met her downstairs an hour later.

At Providence, Margaux was greeted by the staff with warm hellos and we were seated immediately at a private booth near the back of the restaurant. Our table was covered with a nice, white linen cloth and wine glasses for four. The host took the additional glasses away and wished us a nice evening. Our waiter approached moments later and before I could glance at my menu, Margaux ordered.

“My granddaughter and I will each be having the River King Salmon. I will take a glass of your finest Sauvignon Blanc and Ava will have a glass of water, please – no ice.”

Handing my menu off to the waiter, I huffed and stared down at my linen napkin. How could a woman who has spent so little personal time with me know so much about me? I don’t use ice. Typically, ice is made from tap water, which is unfiltered; eventually ice melts in my drink and causes impurities to mix with my filtered water. I realize that this statement makes me sound nuts and annoying and we can go back to the silver spoon concept, but I can’t really help it; I am obsessive.

As we waited for our meal, several people came up to the table to say hello to Margaux and she politely introduced me to each of them as her “favorite granddaughter,” which made me want to gag – I am Margaux’s only granddaughter.

I paid very little attention to her admirers until a man approached us and Margaux seemed genuinely happy to see him.

“Margaux!” he beamed.

“Ah, Jason.” She smiled back. “It’s been too long.”

“Indeed it has.” The man clasped Margaux’s hand in his. They spoke briefly and then he looked over to me, squinted his eyes and cocked his head to the side in thought.

Margaux was pleased to see this man until he said, “this must be Adrian Moirai’s daughter.” Margaux’s face turned beet red and a big vein throbbed at the temple of her forehead.

“This,” my grandmother said sweetly, “is my granddaughter, Ava Zae Baio.” She put a little too much emphasis on the Baio and I knew immediately that this Adrian Moirai person was my father. I had never known the name of my father. In fact, when my mother died, I had been directed to her bank so that her assets could be signed into my name. As it turns out, my father had left a sizeable amount of money to me as well as my mother and even then, the documents had been whited out where ever his name appeared.

I tried to play off that I hadn’t been listening to Margaux’s conversation, but in the back of my head I said the name over and over again...this was a name I wanted not to forget, ever.

Our waiter arrived soon after with our meal and Margaux’s friend made his way back to his table on the other side of the restaurant.

Margaux and I ate in an uncomfortable silence and after dinner, she turned to me.

“Ava, I have taken the liberty of purchasing a car for you to use while you stay here in California. That way you won’t have to ask me to arrange transportation for you. I have also set you up with a spending account. You will have a weekly allowance of three hundred dollars for gas, food and whatever it is that you do; if that amount doesn’t work for you, please contact my assistant so we can adjust it accordingly.”

“I’m pretty sure I will okay with that,” I said as diplomatically as I could, knowing that I would just be donating the money to charity anyway. “And, um, thanks, for the car. That was very nice of you.”

“The car is more of a convenience to me, Ava. I am busy; I don’t have time to raise a seventeen year old girl. Let’s get through this year and then we will be free to go our ways.” She continued down her list. “You will need to check in with the Dana Point Institute tomorrow. The drive from here is about an hour, so I suggest you leave fairly early in the morning. You’ll check in at admissions. Your belongings have already arrived to your dorm room. I expect you to catch up on classwork quickly, you’ve only missed a week of the school year so it shouldn’t be a problem for you. I will be checking on your progress with the dean; if you get anything less than an A on any form of schoolwork, Ava, then there will be hell to pay.”

I looked down at my knotted fingers.

“Well?” She snapped.

“Yes. I understand.” My voice was small. I felt pathetic.

Margaux waved for the check, passed the waiter a black credit card and once he returned, we left. We rode together in the back of her car while her driver moved smoothly though the heavy L.A. traffic. I wondered idly if she ever drove herself anywhere - not likely.

When we got back to Margaux’s, I noticed her magnificent baby grand in the entryway. I pointed at it, “May I?” She took a seat and allowed me to play. I have played the piano since I was small child. Back in Chicago, I used to give lessons on week nights for my spending money. I know all of Margaux’s favorites. I played them until I eventually cleared my head enough that I could sleep.

Chapter 2

Nightmares came to me. I relived my mother’s death again, just as I had every night since she had died. I heard my own screams and cries. I saw her leave our house and I knew then that I would never see her alive again. No matter how much I begged her not to leave, she did anyway.

Waking in the morning after a restless sleep, I dressed quickly and found my way downstairs. I joined Margaux on the veranda for a cup of coffee and a look at some of her discarded
LA Times
. After a moment, she stood up to leave and turned to me.

“Good luck. I’m sure you won’t need it.”

I smiled at her.

“Oh, and Ava, I already have plans for the holidays, so you will have to be on your own. The school allows students to stay in the dorms over breaks, so being on your own shouldn’t be a problem.”

My smile slid off my face. I felt defeated and lonely and the thought crossed my mind that the best thing to do was to fly home to my best friend, Mia. She and her mom would take me in with open arms.

Leaving my still hot coffee sitting on the patio table, I grabbed my bags and made my way out to the front drive of Margaux’s home. There I found a brand new, shiny, black Mercedes G Class SUV. I choked on my own breath at the site of my new car. I was expecting a clunker, some sort of metal death trap, considering the car was a gift from Margaux after all. A Mercedes, I’ll admit, is over the top and ostentatious. I should have protested and requested a vehicle more eco-friendly and less expensive but I would lost the battle anyway, Margaux would have yelled at me about being ungrateful and churlish if I had argued with her over this car. I threw my bags in the back with a ridiculously giddy smile and climbed in. I had no idea what made Margaux think I needed this much car, but I wasn’t going to argue. It was fantastic! It had leather seats, satellite radio, GPS, and a great speaker system. My new vehicle beat the hell out of stinky cabs and riding next to creeps on the “L” train in Chicago.

My music was blaring from the speakers and after a comfortable drive, I arrived at The Dana Point Institute’s campus about an hour later. The city of Dana Point is stunning and the Dana Point Institute is tucked away in the hills with a distant ocean view to soften them. I found the main building and walked into an unexpectedly luxurious space – The admissions building was more like a high-end hotel lobby than the foyer of a school. The countertops were marble and they had fragrant blue and white hydrangeas arranged in glass vases for centerpieces. Framed photographs of students in lab coats and on the soccer field dotted the walls. A blue and white banner hung from behind the desk. It read
Dana Point Institute, Education for the Unrivaled
. A small, very tan woman with frizzy hair was sitting at a front desk.

“Hello,” I said startling her a bit. “My name is Ava Baio. I am new here...”

“Yes, Ava,” she broke in, “Welcome! I am Mrs. Cali, Dean Petropoulos’s assistant. We have been expecting you. Your items arrived yesterday; they are waiting for you in your dorm room.” She handed me a stack of papers.

“Here is your class schedule, dining accommodations, insurance forms and a map of the grounds. You are in Socrates, a coed dorm, and your suite is on the twelfth floor.” She took the map out and marked Socrates with an X, then used a red marker to trace the way to it. I nodded and thanked her for the help as I turned around to leave.

I drove up the road to the parking lot closest to the building labeled Socrates and walked a short path to the dorm. I took the elevator to the twelfth floor and when the doors opened, I was pleasantly surprised.

The floor was bisected by a wide hall that served as a commons area. It was quite large and outfitted with comfy-looking couches and chairs. There was a flat screen TV mounted on one of the long walls. In the center, there was room for a pool table and an old upright piano. A door at the far end of the hall opened to a kitchen that had two of everything.

There were six doors on one side of the hall and six on the other. All but two of the dorm doors were decorated with pictures, dry erase boards with different quotes, and posters. The two blank doors, one right next to the other, were labeled AVA RM 1202 and ARI RM 1203. On Ari’s door, the paper had clearly been attached for quite a while – it had yellowed over time and there was a rip in the corner. Evidently, he was not the ‘decorate your door’ type. Good. I’m not either.

I opened the door to my new home. It was not as bad as I thought it would be. Actually, the room was really nice... small, but in a cozy way, with dormer windows overlooking a quad. The floors were clean and covered in a soft carpet. The walls were painted a light blue with a white trim. A bed pushed against one wall was flanked by a desk on one side and an overstuffed chair with an ottoman at the foot of the bed. There were a few white shelves above the desk and one over the bed. The closet was an all right size; I thought I could probably squeeze my clothes in there if I tried hard enough. The best part was that the windows actually could be opened, with the quad down below and, beyond, acres of treetops rolling out to the shining sea.