Living Lies (15 page)

CHAPTER 9

“Hello, Ms. Ward,” the pilot said. “We have your flight schedule and should be taking off in the next 15 minutes.”

“Thanks, James,” she walked onto the plane. “Am I alone today?”

“Just you and the crew.”

She buckled into one roomy leather seat and looked out the window as her phone rang.

“Hey, Mike.”

“What the hell is going on?”

“Ben is taking time off and you’re getting Parker as a replacement.”

“No!” His astonishment was mixed with a dash of disbelief.

“Yup, they offered domestic to me but I declined.”

“You declined? Melanie, Parker needs all the help he can get. Now you’ll have to work under him.”

“No, I won’t. I resigned. Right now I’m on a flight headed, headed … I’m not sure what I’m doing but I can’t stay and watch Parker get what I’ve worked for, I can’t.”

“What will you do? The espionage game is all you know.”

Melanie groaned.

“Sorry.”

“It’s all right.”

“Let me know if I can help with anything.”

“Thanks Mike. Just keep your eyes and ears open.”

“I’ll keep your phone intact for as long as I can, complete with all the gadgets.”

“Thanks, Mike. Hey, do me one more favor.”

“Anything.”

“Call me if we’re going to lose San Diego.”

“You’ve got it. I’m being paged for a meeting upstairs.”

“Bye, Mike.”

“Oh, and Melanie, thanks for the Hawaiian shirt.”

“No problem.”

The gifts she’d brought for Mike and Ben had still been packed when Melanie opened her luggage to leave the Agency for the last time. She had a first-year distribute them after she’d left.

The flight was smooth and quiet. Melanie sat thinking of nothing. She was numb, emotionless. The probability that she’d just walked away from her life didn’t seem real. Yet she knew exactly what she’d done – she’d thrown out her entire existence. Mike was right, she didn’t know anything but being a spy. Where or how could she begin? How would she face her friends and most importantly, her mom?

Melanie hid from more than the bright sun behind a pair of oversized sunglasses. She wasn’t ready for a new life, nor did she want one.

The taxi pulled up to her parents’ home and Melanie paid the driver. She stood at the curb, a duffle bag in each hand, carrying everything she owned. She faced her future and her past.

“Anyone home?” she called out from the front door and dropped her bags at the base of the stairs.

The old, green carpeting had been pulled up years ago, exposing the original hardwood flooring. Melanie let out a deep sigh and caught a whiff of her father’s rose bushes, her first welcome home.

“Melanie?”

The swinging door into the kitchen was propped open and Melanie followed the sound of her mother’s voice.

Rita’s hair was now a soft blonde, but still cut in her favorite style, something she always called an Italian boy. She’d worn it like that since she was a teenager. Her bifocals hung from a beaded chain around her neck. It had been over a year since Melanie had walked through these doors.

The mother and the disconnected daughter embraced without sentiment.

“You should have called, Dear, I’d have made something to eat,” Rita nervously flittered around the kitchen. “Let me look at you.”

Melanie smiled and took a step back.

“You’re so skinny and you look tired.”

“Well, you look great.”

Her mother shuffled her feet and struck a pose.

“I’ve been taking tap dancing lessons.”

Melanie laughed. “Hey, where’s Dad?”

“He’s out back tending to his roses, they came out especially beautiful this year. He is going to be so thrilled to see you.”

“Hi, Dad,” Melanie said as she pushed open the heavy glass door that separated the living room from the backyard.

“Annie! Hey, I didn’t know you were coming home.”

“It was a last-minute thing.”

He pushed himself off the ground where he’d been kneeling.

“How long are you staying?” he asked, embracing his daughter.

“I’m not really sure.” She closed her eyes as her dad put his arms around her, and sadness washed over her. “I’ve missed you, Pops.” She said, and for the first time realizing how much.

“I’ve missed you, too. Come on, let’s talk. How’ve you been?”

Rita brought out three glasses of iced tea and they sat on the patio, chatting about the weather, the roses, the neighbor’s new car.

“The flowers you sent were beautiful,” her mother said out of the blue.

“Flowers?”

“Mother’s Day. I had hoped for a call but I guess that was too much for your secretary.”

Melanie stared blankly. What could she say? She had been on the case in Hawaii and hadn’t even remembered it was Mother’s Day. “I’m sorry.”

“That’s not good enough.”

Melanie brushed a clump of hair off her forehead and out of her eyes. She tried to push it behind her ear but suddenly it was exactly too short and exactly too long and kept falling into her face. She was in dire need of a haircut but hadn’t even noticed before. “It’s all I’ve got.”

Mrs. Ward was hurt and the pain in her eyes bored into Melanie. She stood, appearing larger than her 5’2” frame, and stomped into the house.

“God, it was a bad idea to come home,” Melanie said, rubbing her brow.

“You’re going to have to make amends with her sometime, why not now?”

Words of wisdom from a man who’d spent the last two decades refereeing his two women.

Melanie smiled. “I’m afraid of her.”

Roger Ward laughed. “She loves you. Just make an effort and I guarantee that she’ll come around.”

“Okay, Dad,” she faced him, “you know I really am sorry for … everything.”

“You don’t have to worry about me, Honey.”

“Thanks, Dad. You have my back, don’t you?”

“Always have. Now go see your mother.”

All the drapes and windows were open, allowing the ocean breeze to sweep through the house and keeping the temperature always perfect.

“Bruce and Cheryl should be here soon. They can’t wait for you to meet the baby,” Rita Ward said from behind her open cookbook as she leaned against the new granite kitchen counter.

Meet the baby?
Melanie thought, completely confused.
Had the baby been born?

“So, when…?” Melanie wondered how she was going to ask without looking like a complete ass. “Olivia, right?”

“Yes, that’s her name and, no, she hasn’t been born. Honestly, Melanie could you be more out of the picture?” Disgust dripped from every hurtful syllable. “The baby can recognize voices from inside the womb.”

“I didn’t know.” Melanie sat on a counter stool and rubbed her tired, red eyes.

Her mother continued. “I must say this new secretary of yours has great taste. She’s already sent the cutest things, you should see them.”

“I get it, Mom. I’m a terrible daughter, sister and now I guess I can add terrible aunt to that list.”

“Don’t get angry with me, this is all you. Believe me, it’s always all you.”

Melanie was cut by the words but had promised to make an effort, so after a pregnant pause she tried again.

“The remodel came out really nice,” she said of the distressed white cabinets and moss green countertops.

“It was finished over a year ago.”

“You’re right. I’m going to take a shower if you don’t mind.” Melanie was broken. “I did bring you something.” Melanie reached into her pocket and placed the small red satin purse with the Hawaiian pearl earrings on the open cookbook. “I hope you like them.”

She didn’t wait for a response.

Upstairs Melanie lay down on her old bed, crawled beneath her lavender print spread and fell fast asleep.

The light was different when she awoke, confused by the bright sunbeams streaming in her bedroom window. Timidly, she climbed down the stairs.

“Good morning, Sleeping Beauty.” It was her dad, sitting in the living room watching TV.

“What happened?” She plopped down on the old couch next to her father’s chair.

“Bruce and Cheryl came over to see you yesterday but you were out.”

“Yesterday?” Now it made sense. “I screwed up again.” Melanie leaned her head back. “I had no idea I was so tired. Where’s Mom?”

“She has a group of girlfriends at the church she meets with a few times a week. They’ll be updated on every move you made yesterday.” Her father winked.

Melanie groaned.

“It’s a good thing, I think.” He wondered to himself for a moment.

“What are we watching?” Melanie asked, kicking her feet up on the coffee table.

The first few days Melanie paced and when she wasn’t pacing she was checking for listening devices in the phones and cameras in the fire alarms. She memorized each license plate that parked within a block radius, checking for suspicious activity. Any sign of espionage would have satisfied her, but to her intense disappointment there was nothing out of the ordinary. Manually she did a second sweep of the house, stopping when her father said, “Annie, you’re like a caged animal,” during an afternoon of wearing out a pattern on the carpeting. Dispirited, she found her way to the old couch where she hunkered down to wait out her misery.

Curtains were drawn and the bright sunny days weren’t allowed into her cave as the TV’s constant flicker comforted her aching ego.

The news was frustrating, only tidbits of information were released and Melanie knew there was an iceberg beneath each headline. She’d sat with a notebook and attempted to unscramble the fiction from the truth. No easy task, though she did know what to look for.

By the end of the first week, she gave up, boycotting every channel.

No CNN, no MSNBC, no local news, no paper – nothing that would cause her to obsess on all she was missing.

She intended to ride out this hiatus on the couch, which was more comfortable than she had remembered. Surrounded by the familiar smells of childhood, when life had been easy and uncomplicated, she sulked. Melanie flipped through the channels, surviving mostly on TV Land because she hated the handy do-it-yourselfers on the home decorating and cooking networks.

The battles between her and her mother had ceased. Apparently her church friends advised her against conflict. Melanie, left to her own devices, chose to do nothing but root into the cushions of the big old couch, under Nana’s hand-knitted afghan. Moving on from TV Land’s old Westerns, she switched to sappy Lifetime movies.

During the second week of her dismal new existence, she claimed her spot on the couch and curled up with her pillow, blanket and remote control. She battled the big decision of the day: a
Twilight Zone
marathon or a movie about a woman whose husband had three wives?

“Melanie, Honey, we need to talk,” her mom said entirely too sweetly, causing the hairs on the back of her neck to prickle.

Rita entered the living room with Melanie’s father, her brother and Cheryl, Carla, Trish and Jenny trailing behind her.

Melanie sat upright.

“What’s up?” Melanie asked as her family and friends took their seats around the room.

They each looked at her mother. Melanie knew who the culprit was – and what the topic would be.

Cheryl opened the curtains to let in sunlight and Melanie squinted at the brightness of the day. Her mother turned off the TV and sat with her hands on Melanie’s knees.

“Melanie, you are such a beautiful girl. We think that maybe you should take a more active role in your life. We’re worried about you, Dear.”

Right, they’re worried about me, I’ve spoken to Jenny once in a year and only a few times more with Carla or Trish
. Melanie rolled her eyes and doubted very much that any of them were worried.

She let out a heavy sigh. Her friends couldn’t even look at her; they sat with hands in laps and heads down. But not her mother, the instigator, who had arranged this in the name of love. Melanie sighed and again waited for the barrage.

“You know what we’re talking about,” Rita said.

“Yeah, me taking a more active role. Right, I got it,” she repeated hotly.

“Mel, what
have
you got planned for your vacation, another
I Love Lucy
marathon?” Bruce asked.

She had not been able to say she’d quit her job. They believed she was taking time off like a normal person. Besides, she was waiting for the Board to figure out they couldn’t run the place without her.

“Actually, it was the
Twilight Zone
.”

“This is not a joke!” Rita’s voice was stern. “I have been angry with you, Melanie. But I’ve realized that I can’t expect you to take an interest in my life when you don’t even have an interest in yours.”