Bad to the Bone (20 page)

Kiley's heart hammered away. No. That couldn't be true. “Tom's in Russia shooting a movie,” she said carefully.

“Not anymore!” Serenity declared gleefully. “He's in your living room. Right this very minute. Can I watch you guys kiss?”

He wore jeans and a blue skater shirt, and he was sitting on the chintz-covered couch in Kiley's living room leafing through a
Hollywood Reporter
.

Kiley gaped at him. She was wearing the same clothes as last night, and she hadn't even washed her hair. It seemed to her that fate must have been cracking up, sending her cheating boyfriend back to her unannounced when she looked and felt like shit.

He stood and smiled. “Surprise,” he said softly.

Kiley let her backpack fall at her feet. “What are you doing here?” It wasn't the most gracious way to greet him; that she knew. But it was what flew out of her mouth.

“Remember I told you there was trouble with financing on the movie?” he began. “Well, they stopped paying the crew.
For the past three days they've been promising things would resolve, but they never did. So they pulled the plug.”

Kiley felt dizzy with confusion. “You're saying they already spent millions of dollars and then they just … canceled?”

“Happens more often than you'd think. I thought about texting, but then I decided to surprise you.” He moved over to her and smiled into her eyes. “Missed you,” he said softly, and hugged her.

Missed her. Ha. That was rich. Well, she'd at least give him a chance to tell her about Marym. She moved out of his embrace. He looked confused. She walked to the couch and plopped down; he sat next to her. “So, how was it while you were there?”

“Russia's amazing,” Tom said. “The history, the people, the food. But the film…” He shook his head. “They never should have started shooting.”

“What'd you do for fun?” Kiley asked.
Say it
, she thought.
Just say it out loud. I hooked up with Marym. At least tell me the truth
.

Tom shrugged. “Hung out. Played cards with the crew. Did a lot of sightseeing when I had free time.” His brows knit together. “Is something wrong?”

“I'm just tired.”

He reached up and ran his knuckles softly against her cheek. She shivered. His touch had always done that to her. Well, too bad. It probably did that to Marym, too.

“You sure that's all?” he pressed.

“Sure.”

“This isn't a good surprise? I thought you'd be glad to see me.”

“I am.” Her words sounded stiff and false, and she knew it. “It's just that I have to go do something for Serenity, and Sid needs help with his reading project, and Bruce needs to be picked up from his friend's house, and then I have all this homework….”

“Got ya. Sorry, I just didn't think.” He rose. She walked him to the door. “I'll call you later?”

Her eyes didn't meet his. “Okay.”

“Okay. Well…” He leaned down to kiss her; she gave him a quick peck.

She saw the hurt in his eyes. Or maybe that was just what she wanted to see. Well, let him hurt. Let him cry her a river. He was a cheater and a liar, and she was not going to let him break her heart.

She watched him walk down the gravel path—it felt as if she was watching him walk away forever. No matter how angry she was, or what resolution she'd made, she felt her heart breaking anyway.

Jimmy and Martina were practically jumping out of their skin with excitement. And even Kat, who talked to more famous people in a month than most of the world did in a lifetime, was giddy with anticipation. As for Lydia, she was thrilled that she was able to engineer this meet and greet. Her new best friend was coming over to meet her relatives. In fact, it had been Audrey who'd proposed the idea, and then followed through on it with a quick cell phone call to Lydia that morning.

“We're breaking between three and six,” Audrey had told her. The call had caught her between English and history classes. “I thought maybe I'd stop over and say hi to your aunt and cousins. You told me they were fans, right?”

“Fans” was an understatement. Now that Anya was out of the house, Jimmy and Martina's true characters were beginning to emerge. Anya had been such a taskmaster with
them, which did have some positives. Compared to the Ama kids in Amazonia, most American kids were soft to the max and utterly un-self-sufficient. On the other hand, Anya's to-do lists and every-minute-of-the-day-preprogrammed approach to life gave her cousins high anxiety. They were constantly looking over their shoulders, worried that the Merry Matron of Moscow might be ready to berate them for doing x and not doing y.

With Anya gone, it was fascinating to see the kids come into their own. They'd started by decorating their rooms, which pre-split had all the charm of prison cells in a Siberian gulag. Jimmy, who was in seventh grade, had opted for a video games theme, with posters from RuneScape, Gears of War, Halo, and GTA. Martina, two years younger than her brother, revealed a secret rock and roll identity that Lydia hadn't known existed. There were posters for Green Day, the Beatles, Bowling for Soup, and the Disturbed. And best of all, there was something of a shrine to Audrey Birnbaum, including even more posters, plus photographs that Martina had printed off the Internet. It turned out that Jimmy was also an Audrey fan. Lydia learned this by hearing him singing Audrey's hit “Jump-start My Heart” in the shower the morning they came back from their trip to San Francisco.

Lydia couldn't not take advantage of an opportunity to score some points with Jimmy and Martina and make their day. When she told Audrey that her young cousins were big fans, Audrey insisted on coming over to meet them. She'd bring a whole bunch of gear, she said, that she'd be happy to sign personally. Lydia marveled at it. How cool was Audrey? First she bought Lydia the mad hot evening gown for Saturday
night. Then she'd somehow managed to get rid of every trace of the wild party at Aunt Kat's. And now … now this. Truly amazing.

X had picked the kids up at school and hustled them home, and Audrey had called to say that her limo was on the way. Kat had the chef put together an after-school snack of cookies, milk, and a bowl of fruit. Martina and Jimmy were waiting at the kitchen table. Martina had on an Audrey concert T-shirt (a baggy T-shirt; despite her weight loss and increased self-confidence, she still hated having breasts—and in her case, large breasts—way before the other girls in her class) and jeans, while Jimmy wore a sleeveless Everlast gym shirt and long ghetto-style shorts. He was in his dressing-like-a-rap-star phase, and ended nearly every sentence with “you know what I'm sayin'?” like his favorite rap stars. Kat wore tennis clothes. She was going to hit in the afternoon with the Williams sisters.

At the sound of the front-gate buzzer indicating that Audrey's limo was here, both kids practically ran to the front door, which made Kat laugh.

“If they ever greeted me that enthusiastically, I'd know something was wrong,” she cracked.

“I'll bring Audrey in to meet you,” Lydia promised.

Her aunt winked. “Only if she brought me a signed T-shirt.”

Lydia decided to hang back and give her cousins the thrill of opening the door to the rock star. She heard the doorbell ring and watched as the kids looked at each other, undecided as to who should do the honors. Finally, Jimmy swung the door open. There stood Audrey, a guitar case in each
hand, wearing skinny black jeans and a black tank top that revealed her tattooed arms. Lydia watched, amused and touched.

“Hello there. I'm looking for Jimmy and Martina Chandler,” Audrey told them.

“That's us,” Martina managed. “I'm Martina.”

“Duh,” Jimmy muttered. “She could probably figure that out, you know what I'm sayin'? I'm Jimmy.”

“Fantastic!” Audrey exclaimed. “I'm Audrey.”

“We know,” Martina whispered, wide-eyed. “Are you really our cousin Lydia's friend?”

“We're fab mates for sure,” Audrey assured. “Now, are you going to invite me in, or are we going to hang out here at the door? Either works for me. I'm easy.”

Lydia decided it was time for her to make her presence known. “Audrey? You made it!”

“Lydia! Give us a hug, ducks!” Audrey put down the guitars and threw her arms wide; Lydia enjoyed the moment—and the gaping jaws of her cousins—as she hugged Audrey warmly and at length.

“Thanks for saving my ass,” Lydia whispered in Audrey's ear. “The party…”

“All's well that ends well,” Audrey said cheerfully, and gave Lydia another squeeze before releasing her.

“We've got some snacks inside,” Martina said helpfully.

“Well then. Let's go in and see what you've got,” Audrey responded.

Audrey retrieved her guitars and led the way to the kitchen, where Kat rose to greet her warmly, the ease honed by years of
television interviewing and commentating apparent. Then Kat turned to Lydia.

“Lydia, there's something I wanted to show you upstairs,” she said.

For a moment, Lydia didn't understand what was so urgent. Then she got it. Kat was engineering a way for Audrey to spend some alone time with her kids. Lydia was impressed, because Audrey did have a reputation for being a party girl. “Got it,” Lydia responded, and turned to her cousins. “You guys okay if we leave you for a while?”

“Yup,” Jimmy answered for both of them.

“Thank you so much for arranging for them to meet their idol,” Kat said on the way out.

“My pleasure,” Lydia replied sweetly. “It's the least I could do, after y'all have been so wonderful to me.”

“So how's school, Lydia? Getting used to Bel Air High?”

“I'm not real big on spending my whole day inside a building, to tell you the truth,” Lydia admitted.

Kat smiled and ushered Lydia into her bedroom so that they could continue talking. “No vines to swing from, huh?” Kat sat on the green love seat under a picture window that overlooked the tennis court. She patted the space next to her for Lydia to sit too.

“I just want to tell you how proud I am of you,” Kat began. “Leaving you here while I took the kids to San Francisco. You had a huge house and a driver at your disposal. You could have abused the privilege. But clearly you didn't. And you're doing such a great job with your cousins. That's why I'm giving you a raise.”

“Really?”

“Really. An extra hundred dollars a week. You've earned it.”

Lydia thanked her aunt profusely. She knew she should feel guilty since she had, in fact, violated her aunt's trust. But all she felt was relieved that she hadn't gotten caught. She wasn't sure that said anything great about her character. But really, who had been hurt by her antics with Audrey? No one.

She studied her aunt's tanned, unlined face, her bright blue eyes shining. “You really are okay without Anya,” Lydia realized.

“I am,” Kat agreed. “She'll always be the other mother of our kids, so she'll always be in my life. But beyond that, I'm ready to move on.”

“Good,” Lydia said. “You deserve all the happiness in the world, Aunt Kat.” She gave her aunt a quick hug, then went back downstairs to see how her cousins were doing with the superstar.

She heard guitar strumming and singing coming from the kitchen. Not just one voice, either. Three voices: Audrey's, Martina's, and Jimmy's. Lydia moved forward as stealthily as a hungry Ama stalking a wild boar. Finally, she saw Audrey with her acoustic guitar, leading the kids in “Jump-start My Heart.” In fact, she was letting them sing the melody while she sang a gentle harmony in the background.

Lydia waited for the song to end, so as not to embarrass her cousins. “How's it going?” she asked as she stepped into the kitchen.

“It's going fantastic,” Audrey exulted. “We've got a couple of junior rock and rollers here.”

Jimmy and Martina beamed at the compliment.

“Alas, I can't stay longer. I've got to get back to rehearsal. Lydia's going to ride with me. You'll watch the awards on TV on Saturday night?”

“Definitely” Martina promised.

“For sure,” Jimmy agreed.

“Well then, that's great. And it's been wonderful meeting you. I'm off like a dirty nappy.” Audrey stood and hugged first Martina, then Jimmy. Then she headed for the door. “Come on, Lydia.”

“Wait!” Martina exclaimed.

Audrey turned. “What?”

“You forgot your guitars!”

Audrey grinned. “I didn't forget them. And they're not mine. They're now yours. I'm giving them to you.”

“But—but—but—” Martina sounded like a low-power outboard motor, while Jimmy just sat there, astonished.

“Crap. There's one thing I forgot.” Audrey bounded over to the kids and whipped a Sharpie out of her pocket. Then, she signed each of the guitars with a flourish. “As a rule, I don't sign guitars. But if you look at me and my life, I'm proof that rules are meant to be broken. See you guys.”

“I … uh … thanks, um, Audrey,” Jimmy told her, wide-eyed. “You know what I'm sayin'?”

“Yeah. Thanks!” Martina gushed.

Yeah. Super-duper thanks
, Lydia added silently.
You just made two kids' day. No, their week. No, their year. Audrey? You are awesome
.

Audrey's limo was as well equipped as a hotel room. In fact, it was nicer than some hotel rooms, and far quieter. There
was a plasma television that was tuned to MTV2, a laptop, two white leather couches that Audrey said folded out to become beds, and a sound system, plus a refrigerator full of food, beer, and the ubiquitous Taittinger champagne that Audrey loved so much.