Hillary was on all fours in the bathroom, searching for a tiny garnet stud earring. If she didn’t find it soon, she’d be late for work, which did nothing for her usual cranky morning mood.
“Hillary, will you hurry up,” called her father. “Jesus, you’d think you were about to be interviewed on Good Morning America.”
“Oh, hold your friggin’ horses,” she shouted. He was such a baby. The stud had fallen off just as she was about to slip the back on. She simply had to wear these earrings this morning because she’d seen Joanna Kasimir wearing a pair very much like them yesterday at the airport. Of course, Joanna’s had been rubies.
Hillary’s dad banged on the door. “Open up or I’m going to break it down!”
“Go ahead,” she called back. “I’d like to see him try,” she muttered, moving closer to the toilet. “Probably give him a coronary.” That thought brought a smile to her lips. “There it is,” she cried.
“There what is?” came his muffled voice.
She grabbed the stud, which had lodged itself in a groove in the floor tile grout. She inserted the stud and clamped the back on, then took a long appraising look at her makeup to make sure it was as understated
as Joanna’s, sprayed herself with a knockoff of Jean Patou’s perfume Joy, and opened the door.
“Get out of my way,” said her father, barreling in before she could even leave the room. “God, it smells like a cheap whore in here.”
“You’d be the expert on that.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? Hillary, I’ve never gone to a whore in my entire life.”
Maybe he should have, thought Hillary as she slammed the front door behind her. She drove to work listening to Rufus Wainwright, her newest musical passion. She had no idea what kind of music Joanna listened to, but in her mind she decided that Joanna would like Rufus.
Entering the hospital, Hillary took the elevator to the basement level. She stowed her purse in her locker, put on her pink smock, and unlocked the door to the flower shop. After switching on the lights and opening up the cash register, she stuck a sign in the door that read BACK IN TEN MINUTES, locked the room back up, and walked down the long hall to the cafeteria, which was already buzzing with people.
Stepping up to the pastry counter, Hillary ordered a chocolate doughnut and black coffee. The woman behind the counter, Carolyn Hanson, a gray-haired old shrew who thought she knew everything and was better than everybody else, gave her a lopsided grin. “So, did you see Joanna Kasimir yesterday like you said you would?”
Hillary could tell that Carolyn thought it was a big fat lie. Pulling a couple of ones out of her smock pocket, she said—as nonchalantly as she could manage—“Not only did I see her, we had dinner together.”
“Right.” The woman gave a phlegmatic nod. “Look, it’s none of my business, Hill, but I don’t understand why you spread this kind of ridiculous story around. A couple of the other servers told me you fed them the same line. You think by making stuff up, people are gonna like you better? ’Cause, it doesn’t work like that. People just think you’re bragging. Either that or you’ve got a screw loose.”
“Believe what you want,” said Hillary with a shrug. “I’ll have pictures to show you in a few days. You can decide then if I’m telling the truth or not.”
The woman stopped pouring coffee. “You’re bullshitting me, right? Why would a famous person like Joanna Kasimir even be in Minnesota?”
“She’s from here, you know. Grew up in St. Paul.”
“I know that. Everybody knows that.”
“She’s in town to do a play at the Allen Grimby. It was announced in the paper ages ago.” Hillary took a sip from the Styrofoam cup Carolyn handed her. “She said she’d get me front-row seats for opening night.”
Carolyn looked at her skeptically.
“My doughnut?”
“Huh?”
“You didn’t give me my doughnut. And hey, Carolyn, if you play your cards right, maybe I can get you one of those front-row seats.”
Carolyn’s hand hesitated just inside the pastry counter. “What about my husband?”
“Yeah, I suppose he should go, too.” Hillary was loving this. Carolyn didn’t know what to believe. On the off chance that Hillary might be telling the truth, she knew she’d better act a little more respectfully, not give Hillary the worst-looking doughnut in the counter, like she usually did. “I’ll take the one way on the left.”
“Sure. Right.” She covered it with the waxed paper, then dropped it into a white paper sack. Reflecting on it another second, she reached for another doughnut, this time a raised glazed. “On the house,” she said, giving Hillary a conspiratorial wink.
“See ya around,” said Hillary, grabbing some napkins on her way to an empty booth. She was on top of the world today. She’d have to send Joanna a special thank-you note.
Hillary was midway through the second doughnut when she spied her boyfriend, Cody Felton. Cody was a psych assistant up on five west. She thought he was working an evening shift tonight, but apparently not. As far as looks went, Cody was a total conundrum. Sometimes Hillary thought he was good-looking enough to be a model. Not a GQ model. Something more funky. More edgy. Calvin Klein, maybe. Other times, he could look a lot like the dad on The Munsters. This morning, with his spiky brown hair standing straight up—for God knew what reason—he leaned more toward the Frankenstein look.
“Hey, babe,” he said, striding up to the table. Psych PAs didn’t have to wear uniforms, so he had on his usual khakis and a brown cotton sweater. “What’s up? I called you last night, but your dad said you were out.”
“I was.”
He slid into the booth seat across from her. “At a movie?”
“No. You’ll never guess.”
“I give.” He took a sip of her coffee.
“Remember I told you Joanna Kasimir was coming to town. Well, I met her at the airport. We ended up having dinner together.”
“Shit, Hill. Will you back off with that crap?”
“It’s not crap! I did see her.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I told her about you, what an incredible lover you are.”
“Oh, Christ.”
“No, it’s true. I showed her your picture, the one of you on your motorcycle. She said you had an arresting profile. Exact words. Asked if you’d ever taken any acting classes.”
He grunted, but she could tell it was an interested grunt. “Where’d you eat?”
“The Lyme House. It’s on Lake Harriet.”
“Cool, but kind of pricey.”
“She paid.”
“And … tell me again how you know her?”
“My mom was a distant cousin, but they kept in touch. I’ve known Joanna since I was a kid.”
“Huh. Just kind of blows my mind.”
“It shouldn’t. I’ll introduce you if you want.”
“When?”
“Well, she’s kind of busy at the moment. She’s starting rehearsals today for a play she’s doing at a theater in St. Paul. But she’ll make time for us. That is, if you really do want to meet her.”
“Hell, sure. She’s, like, one of the most beautiful women in the world. Although, she’s kind of old.”
“Forties isn’t so old.” She glanced up at the clock on the wall.
“Jeez, look at the time. I gotta get back to work.” Having said that, she made no move to go. Instead, she propped her head on one hand.
“How long’s your break?” asked Cody.
“I’m not actually on break. I opened up and then left.”
“God, Hill, I don’t know how you expect to keep that job.”
“Don’t be such a worrywart. My boss never comes in until after ten.”
“You should go. You’ve already had two warnings.”
“Oh, all right.” But she still didn’t move.
“You know, sometimes, Hill … I don’t know if you’re telling me the truth. It bothers me.”
“You think I’d lie to you?”
“You lie all the time.”
She sat up straight. “Like what? Tell me one important thing I’ve ever lied about.”
“For starters, your journalism degree.”
“What about it?”
“You don’t have one. You quit school your junior year.”
Now she was pissed. “Who told you that?”
“Your dad.”
“How the hell would he know?”
“Hillary, he was paying the bills. He knows when they stopped.”
“That’s crap, Cody. Don’t you believe it.” She stuffed the rest of the raised glazed in her mouth and chewed resentfully.
“You don’t have to lie, you know.”
“Like you never lie.”
He groaned. “And what do I lie about?”
She sat back, folded her ams over her chest. “All this lovey-dovey crap. You just do it to get me in bed.”
“Oh, Hillary.”
“Admit it.”
He reached across the table with an open hand. “Why do you have such a hard time believing I love you?”
“Because,” she said, launching out of the booth, “if you loved me, you’d believe me, no questions asked. Besides, nobody ever really loves anybody. It’s all self-interest.”
“Sometimes you scare me, Hill. You really do.”
“Yeah, well, live with it. Or dump me. It’s up to you.” She turned to go but remembered her coffee. Scooping it off the table, she stomped out.