Farewell, Dorothy Parker (14 page)

For all her playfulness, Mrs. Parker took her role as a theater critic seriously. So when the actress Billie Burke gave what Dorothy Parker considered a terrible performance in a play, she wrote a scathing review, despite the fact that the actress was married to Florenz Ziegfeld, a prominent producer and one of
Vanity Fair
’s biggest advertisers.

Dorothy Parker was promptly dismissed.

Violet was glad the world didn’t work that way anymore. Critics were encouraged to be honest. For most editors, it was a matter of principle. Though, of course, Violet wasn’t naive enough to believe there was no commercial interest behind it; negative reviews sold more magazines than positive ones.

Dorothy Parker went back to Andi. “After your
assistant
brings you coffee, you’ll dictate a list of tasks for her to accomplish. Make sure you give her tight deadlines, and be strict about it.”

“Tight deadlines,” Violet repeated, as she typed.

“And no insubordination,” Mrs. Parker said. “She’ll do everything you ask, and be pleasant and professional about it.”

“What else?”

“That will do for now, I think.”

Violet had a few other ideas, like making Andi pick up lunch for her and straighten her office shelves. She started adding them to the list.

“I could use another drink,” Mrs. Parker said.

“Just a minute,” Violet said, as she continued typing.

“Now, please. Don’t forget I’m at your mercy.”

“Hold
on,
” Violet said. She read through the list one last time and made a few corrections. When she looked up, Mrs. Parker was smiling.

“What is it?” Violet asked.

“One of these days you’ll tell me to go fuck myself, and then we’ll really be onto something.”

Violet laughed. There was that language again. She had read in several biographies that Dorothy Parker loved the shock value of the f-word, but she never understood how much impact it could have until hearing it in Mrs. Parker’s genteel accent.

And sometimes the famous wit needed only to allude to the word to get a rise out of people. There was an anecdote about Mrs. Parker arriving at a party where people were playing a new game involving
fruit in a bucket of water. When someone explained that the guests were
ducking for apples
, Dorothy Parker said,
That, with the exception of one consonant, is the story of my life.

“I guess I’m becoming inured to your desperation about drinking,” Violet said.

Mrs. Parker held up her empty glass. “If you were left with only one physical pleasure, you’d be desperate, too.”

Violet paused to take that in. She was becoming more and more attuned to the pain behind Dorothy Parker’s glib jokes.

“Do you miss the other physical pleasures?” she asked.

“You mean sex? Of course. Wouldn’t you?”

“I guess, but…it’s hard to say.” Violet put her computer back on the desk and turned to face her guest. “I’ve never been dead.”

“Exactly,” Mrs. Parker said. “Sex very nearly defines what it means to be alive.” She handed her empty glass to Violet. “I miss it like hell.”

Inspired, perhaps, by the end of her conversation with Mrs. Parker, Violet was in the midst of a lovely sex dream when the phone rang. She didn’t want to answer it. She wanted to go back into Michael’s arms. His touch was exquisite. The pull of desire, merciless. Nothing mattered but reaching the summit she was climbing toward. Please, she thought.
Please.

The phone rang again. Damn it. Violet looked at the clock. It was two-thirty in the morning.

“Hello?” She barely croaked it out.

“You sound so sexy.”

It was Carl, drunk.

“Do you know what time it is?” she asked.

“Did I wake you?”

“Of course you woke me,” she said. “What do you want?”

“I want
you,
baby.”

“I told you—it’s over. Don’t call here again.” It came out easily. She was still half asleep, and her filter was off.

“Don’t you miss me at all? Even a little bit?”

Violet sat up to get a firmer grip on consciousness. He was trying to manipulate her—use her sense of guilt to get her to say something she would later regret. She wasn’t going to do it.

“It’s time to move on, Carl.”

“I did. I did move on. I fucked another girl last night.”

She hated his stupid drunken confessions, even when they were benign. But this was intolerable.

“You’re sloshed, and it’s the middle of the night, and I’m going back to sleep. Good-bye.”

“I fucked another girl, but I pretended it was you.”

“That’s disgusting.”

“I know, baby. But it’s because I need you. I need you so bad. You take care of me. You make me a better man.”

“That’s not my job. You need to make yourself a better man.”

“You’re right. I don’t deserve you.”

That was her cue to argue with him and insist he was worthy, but she wasn’t going to bite. “Get yourself to AA or something. Get a life.”

“If I go to AA, will you take me back?”

“I’m hanging up now,” she said. “Don’t call here again.”

Violet shut off the phone and dug herself back under the covers, looking for the dream she had lost. It was gone. But had she found something else?

Violet adjusted her pillow and asked herself why she had been able to remain firm with Carl this time. Was it simply because she was too tired to be fearful, or was something else going on?

Finally, she drifted off, and dreamed she was watching small
stones dancing in a line. Or perhaps they were tiny bones, balancing on a wire. No, not a wire, but a cord—something organic that gave them strength. It fortified her.

When she awoke the next morning, Violet had to laugh at the obvious imagery of her subconscious. If the dream were a movie, the word
banal
would have found its way into her review. But trite or not, the message made her happy. Violet was growing a spine.

Chapter 15

“You okay?” Travis said, when Violet got on the elevator. “You look a little tense.”

“A
little
?” It was the day she would be meeting with Andi to lay down the law. And though she had discovered her inner alpha dog when she spoke to Carl, this was a different animal entirely. Andi wasn’t a drunk calling her in the middle of the night. She was a fierce little beast, intent on taking Violet down.

“What time’s your meeting?” Travis asked.

“First thing,” she said, her heart racing. She didn’t want to do this, but she had to. It was important in every possible way. She needed to save face in the office and show that she couldn’t be pushed around. But perhaps even more important, it was a chance to step up her game. If she could do this, maybe she really could get through the custody hearing without crumbling. It could make all the difference for Delaney…for both of them.

“Want me to be there?” Travis asked.

The elevator dinged, and the doors opened on their floor. “Thanks, but I need to do this on my own.”

On the way to her office, Violet passed Andi chatting with two other assistants. They stopped talking when they saw her. One of them elbowed Andi, who looked up.

Violet pointed to her watch, affecting what she hoped was a stern
expression. “Nine o’clock,” she said, reminding Andi of their meeting time.

“Might be closer to nine-thirty,” Andi said. “I’m pretty busy today.”

It was, Violet knew, the first test. If she let this pass, she was sunk. The three young women stared at her, waiting for a response.

“Nine o’clock,” Violet repeated. “If you’re a single minute late, you might as well pack your things.” It was a rehearsed line, and her voice sounded a little shaky when she said it, but she did it. And the impact was evident. Andi looked stricken.

Violet kept walking. “And bring something to write with.”

She didn’t look back but listened carefully. Silence. No laughter. No giggles. No snorts. Maybe she really
could
pull this off.

Sure enough, at five minutes to nine Andi poked her head into Violet’s office. “You ready for me?”

“Give me one minute,” Violet said.

It was pure posturing. Dorothy Parker had suggested it as an effective power ploy—a way to set the tone from the onset. She had said it was a trick she learned from the movie studio heads, who always kept her waiting.

Andi stood at the door as Violet stared at her computer screen. She opened and closed her e-mail a few times to make it look like she was busy, and then she clicked on the list of demands she had created with Dorothy Parker. She stared at it for several moments and then looked up.

“Okay, have a seat.”

Andi took the chair facing Violet’s desk. “Look,” she said, “I want to apologize. I know I can be an asshole sometimes. I shouldn’t have submitted that altered review. I’m really, really sorry.”

Sorry my ass, Violet thought. If the girl wasn’t worried about her job she would still be in the hallway, snickering with her friends.

Still, on an ordinary day, Violet would have accepted the apology. It was the way she had been self-programmed—make peace, move on. But not today. Today she was playing a role. She was the monster boss. Donald Trump meets Samuel Goldwyn meets
The Devil Wears Prada.

“From now on you’ll call me
Ms. Epps,
” she said.

“What?”

“Write it down.” Violet folded her arms to show that she wouldn’t move on until Andi did as she was told.

The young woman opened the notebook on her lap and started writing.

“It’s a six-month probation,” Violet said. “And I’m giving you the terms. This is very serious. A single violation is cause for immediate dismissal. Understand?”

Andi didn’t respond.

“Do you
understand
?” Violet repeated.

“Yes,” Andi said, with a slight edge to her voice. It was just enough to show she was holding on to her contempt.

“Yes, Ms. Epps,”
Violet corrected. As she heard herself say it, she wanted to cringe. Surely, she had gone too far. But when she looked at Andi’s face she saw a changed demeanor. The smartass attitude might not have vanished, but at least it was tamped down beneath a layer of discomfort and apprehension. Violet sat up a little straighter.

“So here’s how it’s going to work,” Violet said. “We’ll have a standing nine-o’clock meeting every time I’m in the office. You’ll come with a pad, pencil, and a cup of coffee for me.”

Andi looked horrified. “You…you want me to bring you
coffee
?”

“Milk, no sugar,” she said, handing her the
AMERICAN VIOLET
mug that everyone in the office knew so well.

“Seriously?”

Violet knew the coffee demand would be the tipping point. To someone like Andi, it wasn’t just demeaning, it was humiliating. She
would have to walk past all the other assistants, carrying Violet’s mug. More than anything else, this would put Andi in her place. Violet simply could not back down. She hid her trembling hands under the desk.

“Do you want to keep this job or not?”

“I do, but—”

“Write it down,” Violet said.

“Vi—I mean, Ms. Epps. Please. I’ll do anything else.”

Violet folded her arms again and shook her head, maintaining eye contact. This was the moment that would make all the difference, and they both knew it. Andi had a decision to make, and it was a big one. She could roll over and acquiesce. Or she could tell Violet she was being a bitch, and face the very real possibility that she would be immediately dismissed.

Violet sensed that Andi was calculating the risk, wondering if Violet would really follow through and get her fired.

I’ll do it,
Violet tried to transmit.
I’ll march right into Buck’s office and you’ll be unemployed in time to watch today’s edition of
The View.

Andi broke eye contact and looked down at her black-painted bitten nails. She let out a long breath, and her whole being seemed to deflate. She clicked her pen and wrote it down.

I did it, Violet thought. I won.

With that out of the way, she launched into phase two of her plan. The Incentive. It was Violet’s insurance, as her gut told her that without dangling a carrot, Andi’s resentment would quickly fester and things would get ugly fast. And if this probation ended quickly with Andi’s dismissal, neither of them would have learned very much. So Violet came up with a strategy and cleared it with Buck. She leaned across her desk.

“What do you want from this job?” she asked.

Andi shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Sure you do.”

“I guess…I want a chance to write for the magazine.”

“Movie reviews?”

“Um…”

“It’s okay,” Violet said. “It’s natural for you to want to move up.”

“I could write book reviews, television—”

Violet held up her hand as a stop signal. She got it. The girl was trying to assure Violet she wasn’t after her job. It was heartening to see that Andi was concerned with appeasing her new master, even if she didn’t mean it.

“Here’s the thing,” Violet said. “If you can show me that you can follow these new rules without complaint or insubordination, I might be able to give you a movie review assignment every now and then. And who knows? If it works out, Buck might just be able to find a place for you in books or television or some other department. How does that sound?”