Driving home, Gina tried to make her mind tackle practical matters. She still had four more days of shows to tape. With Scott. The memory of his face, twisted with anger, was still too fresh. No matter. She was a professional. She would get through this.
But then what? A new job. Where? Her old job at the Constitution had been filled long ago, and anyway, her heart wasn’t in newspapers anymore, even if there were any job openings. Television? What was it that Scott had called her? A wannabe foodie? Home-ec lady?
She pulled into the parking space in front of her town house, but left the Honda’s motor running. She found herself smiling at the thought of her home. She thought about the paint colors she’d agonized over, the window treatments her mother had sewn for the bedrooms, the thrift-store sideboard she’d stripped and refinished for the dining area. She couldn’t bear to think of those rooms, stripped, her furniture and belongings loaded in a moving van. A SOLD sign tucked in the front window.
Speaking of that window…the living room lights were on. She groaned. Lisa. With all the trauma of the past day, she’d forgotten about her little sister. She did not have the strength to deal with telling her about the day’s events. Not tonight.
Gina turned the key in the lock of her front door and with her last ounce of strength pushed it open with her hip and staggered inside. Dropping her pocketbook and laptop on the floor, she flopped down on the oversize down-filled sofa and kicked the shoes from her swollen feet.
“I want my mama,” she said, groaning.
The skinny blonde sprawled on the carpet in front of the television with a headset and Xbox controls looked away from the screen, where she’d just aced another killer in her seventeenth game of Halo that evening.
“What?” she asked, removing the headset and scooting over to where her big sister appeared to be in a near coma state. “What’d you say?”
“Mama,” Gina repeated. “I wish Mama were here. She’d rub my feet and fix me some supper and bring it to me on a tray in bed, and brush my hair till I fell asleep.”
“I thought that’s why you were sleeping with Scott Zaleski,” Lisa quipped.
“Lisa!” Gina said, horrified. “Who says I’m sleeping with my producer?”
“Not you,” Lisa said. “You never let anything slip about your sex life. But you are, aren’t you?”
“No comment,” Gina said.
“But you totally are screwing him,” Lisa persisted. “I know you’re on the patch. I see the box in your medicine cabinet. How is he, anyway? He seems kind of distant when he’s around me. My guess is, he’s an animal in bed. My friend Amber says those Nordic types are usually hung like a horse.”
“Scott and I are over,” Gina said dully. “Anyway, we are not talking about this.”
“Over? Did you two have a fight?” Lisa said eagerly.
“I refuse to discuss my private life with you,” Gina said wearily.
“Oh, give up the prissy-sissy act,” Lisa said. “We both know you’re no virgin. And neither am I. All these late hours you keep when you’re supposedly working? My ass! I bet the two of you were screwing like bunnies. So let’s stop this two-maiden-sisters charade.”
“No,” Gina said, sitting up with an effort. “Mama made me promise to keep an eye on you while you’re in Atlanta. You’re only nineteen. When I was your age—”
“You and Mike Newton went all the way at the Wayfarer Motel on Jekyll Island after you split a bottle of Southern Comfort. It was spring break, and you told Mama and Daddy you were going to the beach with your sorority sisters.”
Gina’s eyes goggled. “How did you know that? I never—”
“I found your old diary in a shoebox in the bottom of your closet,” Lisa said, swigging from the bottle of Natty Lite she’d left on the coffee table. “Everybody at home thinks you were a model citizen. Miss Teen Vidalia Onion. Only I know the real truth. You were a bad little girl, Regina Foxton,” she said, wagging the beer bottle at her.
“Give me that,” Gina said, taking a swipe at the beer bottle and missing when Lisa jerked it out of her range.
“First off, I was only runner-up Miss Vidalia Onion. Ashley Johnson won the pageant that year, because her daddy sent her to Jacksonville for a nose job her junior year of high school. And if you ever tell a single soul in Atlanta that I was once entered in beauty pageants, I will personally snatch you bald. After I kick you out of this condo and slap your tiny hiney on a Trailways bus all the way home to Odum.”
“You wouldn’t,” Lisa said confidently. “You don’t want me ending up like Mama. Forty pounds overweight, sitting on the sofa all day watching Dr. Phil and calling up her Sunday school friends on the prayer chain.”
“Watch your mouth,” Gina said severely. “I’m not kidding now, Lisa. Mama and Daddy have made a lot of sacrifices for both of us. It’s not easy for her being home now, with both of us grown and living on our own in Atlanta. Her blood pressure’s way too high, and she can’t teach anymore—”
“Yada, yada, yada,” Lisa said mockingly. “I’m just messin’ with you, Gina. I love Mama. I really do. You know that.”
“You don’t show it,” Gina said. “When was the last time you called her? Or went home for a weekend?”
“I’ve got class,” Lisa replied. “And work.”
“Speaking of which,” Gina said, “what are you doing home tonight? I thought you have a computer lab on Monday nights.”
“It’s after ten,” Lisa said, yawning theatrically. “Lab got out an hour ago.”
“You cut class,” Gina said. “Didn’t you? I tried to call earlier and the line was busy for an hour straight. You weren’t at computer lab, Lisa. You were sitting right here playing that idiotic video game.”
Lisa shrugged, not bothering to deny it. “The teacher’s assistant who runs the lab is the world’s biggest doofus. I gave my password to one of my friends, and he logs me on to the computer. This guy will never notice I’m not there.”
“Lisa!” Gina said. “You have got to quit cutting. You’re only carrying two classes as it is. If you flunk this class, your grade point average drops below three-point-oh, and you lose the Hope Scholarship. With Mama taking early retirement, they can’t afford to pay tuition and housing and everything else.”
“I’m not gonna flunk,” Lisa said, tossing her long blond hair over her shoulder.
“You flunked out of Georgia Southern last year,” Gina reminded her. “A whole year’s tuition down the tubes. Do you have any idea how upset Daddy was?”
Lisa bit her lip. “I said I was sorry. I got a job waitressing at Hi-Beams and paid back every dime, didn’t I? And I’m here, going to Georgia State, living right here under your thumb to save money, aren’t I?”
“Do not mention Hi-Beams to me,” Gina snapped. “If anybody in Odum ever saw you skipping around that juke joint in those booty shorts and that hot-pink tube-top uniform, our parents would never be able to show their faces in town again. You looked like a ho in that getup.”
“I made eighty bucks a night in tips,” Lisa said defiantly. “A hundred sixty a night during football season. Paid off the note on my car, and bought Mama a Kitchen-Aid mixer for her birthday. It was the best damn job I’ve ever had. And I’d still be doing it if you hadn’t stuck your nose in where it doesn’t belong.”
“Enough!” Gina said, sinking wearily back into the sofa cushions. “I’ve had the worst day of my life. All I want tonight is a glass of wine and a hot bath.”
“About the wine…”
“Oh, Lisa,” Gina said, shaking her head. “Is there any more of that nasty Natty Lite of yours?”
“One,” Lisa said. “I’ll get it. Are you hungry? How ’bout a Hot Pocket?”
“I’d rather be hungry,” Gina said. “Is there any yogurt?”
In answer, Lisa handed her a carton of plain nonfat yogurt, a clean teaspoon, and a freshly opened bottle of Natty Lite beer.
“Thanks,” Gina said, taking a sip of beer. She scooped up a spoonful of yogurt and ate it, quickly finishing off the whole carton in eight neat bites.
“I don’t get it,” Lisa said, sitting down in the club chair opposite her big sister. “You’re around food all day. Why don’t you just eat on the set?”
“No time today,” Gina said, not wanting to elaborate. “We shot two shows back to back. I was gonna have a piece of apple pie from the second show, but the crew kids devoured the pies as soon as we’d shot that segment. Just as well. They were loaded with sugar. I don’t need the extra calories.”
“Ha!” Lisa guffawed. “You are the skinniest now that you’ve ever been in your whole life. I never see you eating anything except yogurt, or maybe an occasional piece of fruit. Hey. You don’t have an eating disorder, do you?”
“No. I have a perfectly normal appetite,” Gina said primly. “I just have to really watch everything I put in my mouth. I’ve got the Sewell women’s curse—small bones, big butt. And you know the camera adds twenty pounds.”
“I bet you don’t even wear a size eight,” Lisa said. “I tried on your Juicy Couture tracksuit, and it looked like it had been spray-painted on me.”
“Good. Stay away from my velour tracksuit,” her sister ordered. “You have a bad habit of staining and tearing other people’s clothes.”
“Bitch.” Lisa mouthed it—but slowly, so her sister could tell just what she was not saying. “You’re home later than usual tonight,” she said, changing the subject. “What’s up with that?”
Gina felt her right eye twitch. “It’s the last week of taping for the season,” she said finally. “We’re running out of money and time. Trying to cram two weeks’ worth of work into one. I’m going to bed now. Turn out the lights and lock up, okay?”
But Lisa had the headset on again, locked and loaded for her next video battle.
Gina trudged into her bedroom and shut the door behind her. In the bathroom, she dropped her clothes on the floor and stood under a scalding shower so long she looked like a boiled lobster when she finally emerged from the water. She knew she should slather eye cream on her face to combat the dark circles that were already emerging. She should blow her hair dry and lay out her wardrobe for the next day’s shoot. But she was too tired. And anyway, what did it matter?
She pulled back the coverlet on her bed and folded it neatly at the foot, as she always did. Got under the sheets and reached out a hand to turn off the lamp. Sitting in the middle of her bedside table, she saw her answering-machine light blinking. Call waiting.
Let it be Scott, she thought. Let him be calling to apologize. To tell her it was all a horrible practical joke. Let everything go back to the way it was before today. Her hand hesitated, but finally, she punched the play button.
“Hello? This is Mrs. Birdelle Foxton calling for Regina…” Her mother’s voice, sweet, slow, and southern as sorghum syrup, dripped concern. “Honey, your daddy’s cousin Flossie called here today, because she’d picked up your cookbook at a yard sale over in Bessemer. Flossie said she’d used your applesauce cake recipe, but it didn’t come out too good. I had her read me the recipe, and sure enough, it only called for two eggs. Gina, you know I always use three eggs and an extra stick of oleo, and my cake never comes out too dry. I think you should call up those publisher folks and have them change that…”
Not tonight, Mama, Regina thought wearily, punching the machine’s stop button. She cut off the light and lay back on the pillows, willing herself to sleep. Her stomach growled loudly.
No! she thought. Absolutely not. She rolled onto her stomach. Five minutes later, it growled again. She turned on her right side, and then her left. She tried to clear her mind, tried to meditate. It was no good. Her brain wouldn’t shut up.
Growwwl. There it was again.
With a sigh, she got out of bed and padded over to the dresser. She opened the top drawer and rooted around among the neatly folded garments until her fingertips felt the crackle of cellophane. She snatched the bag from its hiding place, avoiding looking at herself in the mirror.
Tucked back under the covers, she ripped open the cellophane bag and shoved a handful of fried pork rinds into her mouth. She closed her eyes and let the pure piggy pleasure, the sandy, salty crunch, work its magic.
There, she told her rumbling tummy. There now. Shut the heck up.