By the time I got back to the office, Diane had already read the column in the Post. She was about to comment on it when I waved her off, mumbled, “I don’t want to talk about it,” and brushed past her, fleeing down the hall into my cocoon. Don’t ask me how, but I managed to see two clients that day without breaking down. It was only after they were gone that I buried my head in my hands and sobbed, all the while wondering who had been screwing around with my life—and why.
By late afternoon, I’d had it with crying and decided to find a more empowering solution to my problems.
I called the Post and asked to speak to the “Page Six” editor. I said that I was Lynn Wyman, that I’d read the piece in the paper, and that I wanted—demanded—to know who’d given them the information on which the column was based.
“You did,” said a man with a snide laugh. “I took the call myself, Dr. Wyman.”
“But I didn’t call you,” I maintained.
“Well, then it was someone who claimed to be you, someone who knew an awful lot about your life, someone who sounded exactly like you, someone who left your phone number in case we had to do any fact checking.”
Okay, I thought. So he’s convinced I have multiple personality disorder. So what. The main thing is, it was definitely a woman who had set me up. That narrowed the field by fifty percent.
Next, I reached into a filing cabinet in my office and pulled out the National Enquirer story about Kip and me that had run the year before. I called the Enquirer and asked to speak to the reporter whose byline accompanied the story—something I had never bothered to do when the story originally broke, because I’d been too stunned at the time and because I had assumed Kip had been responsible. When the reporter answered the phone, I explained who I was (naturally, he said, “Never heard of you”) and that it was imperative that he tell me how he’d gotten the dirt on me.
“Normally, I don’t divulge my sources,” he said, remembering who I was, finally, “but since that story ran so long ago and nobody but you gives a flip about it now, I can tell you that it was one of your own people who spilled their guts.”
“My own people?” Then it had been Kip?
“Someone in your camp. Your agent. Your manager. Your P.R. gal. I can’t remember her title at this point.”
No, not Kip after all. My P.R. gal, he’d said. Can’t remember her title. Whoever had contacted him was a woman, which suggested that one person must have committed both acts of sabotage. Still, I wasn’t taking his words at face value. “I don’t see how that’s possible,” I protested. “Your story presented me in a highly negative light. It put a huge dent in my professional life, as a matter of fact. Back in the days when I actually had people in my camp, they had a vested interest in building my career, not tearing it down. Why would any of them have ‘spilled their guts’ to you?”
“Hey, I don’t know why people do what they do,” he said. “What I do know is that this person hinted that you wanted your story out—anonymously—because you were pissed off at your husband for cheating on you and you wanted to dump him, without having it appear like you were dumping him. So we ran it. It’s all coming back to me now, Laura.”
“Lynn.”
“Whatever. Take care, huh?”
Click.
All right. So whoever had leaked the two stories to the media about me was a woman claiming to be in my camp, in my circle, close to me. Well, she’d have to be close to me because she knew everything about me, including my secrets. And, if the guy at the Post was telling the truth, she had my voice down pat too, was a good mimic.
A good mimic. Wasn’t that what I’d said about Diane while she was putting me through the Wyman Method? While she was playing my part, assuming the role of the linguistics coach, impersonating me?
No. It couldn’t be. Not Diane, my loyal, trustworthy Diane. Sure, she was “in my camp,” as the reporter had put it, but what motive could she possibly have to ruin my business, never mind my relationship with Brandon? It was ludicrous to even think that she might have—
And yet, she’d said it herself: “I’m more ambitious than I look.” She’d been the one to suggest that I promote her from a lowly assistant who booked appointments to a bona fide coach who interacted with clients. She’d been the one who’d expressed a desire to take on more responsibility. What if that desire was so strong that she actually wanted me to fail? What if she’d been plotting to make me look bad in order to be able to say to the world, “Dr. Wyman’s out of the picture but I can do whatever she did—and better!” She didn’t have a degree in linguistics, but she knew the Wyman Method cold. Perhaps she’d called the Enquirer, hoping that the article about Kip and me would be unflattering enough to bring me down, and when it didn’t put me completely out of business, she bided her time until she could try again—with the Post.
Or, what if this wasn’t about her ambition? What if it was about her resentment of me? Hadn’t she admitted to feeling talked down to by me? Hadn’t she described me as not being respectful of her needs, of not treating her as a human being, of not showing enough empathy over her broken nails? Maybe she was a disgruntled employee and I’d just never realized how disgruntled.
My God, I thought, the veins in my neck throbbing. It was Diane! How could she!
I hadn’t always been so impulsive in my thinking, so trigger-happy in my judgments, but the events of that morning had knocked me for a loop. I shot up from my desk and stormed out of my office, down the hall to the reception area. Diane was trimming her cuticles when I confronted her.
“Put down those nippers this instant!” I said, feeling even more tightly coiled than usual.
She glanced up casually. “Why? You need them? That’s cool. I’ve got another set in my drawer.”
“I do not want to use your nail paraphernalia,” I said, as she was about to hand me her back-up nippers. “What I want is the truth from you, Diane.”
“About?”
“About that rag on your desk.” I nodded at the Post, which was sitting there incriminatingly, opened to the loathsome “Page Six.”
“Oh, that,” she said. “You want to know what I think of it, is that it? Of how Mr. Brock came off sounding like a crazy person?”
“No, Diane. I want the truth about how Brandon and I made it into the paper in the first place. I want you to admit that you planted the story, just like you planted the story about me in the Enquirer last year.”
She dropped her jaw (and her nippers). “Now you’re sounding like a crazy person.”
“Am I? Who else has been working side by side with me? Who else has had access to every detail about my career? Who else has had designs on my Wyman Method, on taking over my business? What do you have to say for yourself, Diane?”
She stared at me, her expression a combination of disbelief and amusement. If she laughs, I’ll kill her, I thought.
“You’re kidding right?” she said. “I mean, you’re practicing a script or something. You’re not serious. You can’t be serious.”
“I’m quite serious. Someone planted the stories in the Post and the Enquirer and I have a hunch that the ‘someone’ was you. So why don’t you tell me why you did it. Then I’ll call Brandon and tell him why you did it, and he and I can pick up where we left off.”
Diane was angry now. She rose from her chair and got nose to nose with me. The shiny gold ring that was wrapped around her right nostril nearly blinded me.
“Look, Dr. Wyman,” she said, jabbing a finger at me. “You’re way out of line accusing me of doing something so awful. But I’m going to defend myself, just to put you in your place. Are you ready?”
“Sure, let’s hear it,” I said skeptically, hands on hips.
“Number one. I couldn’t have planted the story about you and your ex in the Enquirer last year because I didn’t even know the two of you were having marital trouble back then. You weren’t sharing your personal life with me in those days. You weren’t sharing anything with me in those days. I was totally in the dark about your situation, because you were the ice queen, remember?”
All right, scratch that theory. So I hadn’t confided in her about Kip and me. I’d forgotten about that.
“Number two,” she continued. “Why would I plant a story in the Post that would make Mr. Brock come off sounding like a lunatic? He’s a good guy. I helped the two of you get together, or has that slipped your mind?”
“Ah, I’m glad you brought that up. You went behind my back and told him I how I felt about him. Maybe you’re in the habit of going behind my back. Maybe that sort of behavior comes naturally to you, Diane.”
“Listen here, missy.” Boy, she was getting really huffy. “If I hadn’t gone behind your back and told him you were interested in him, you and he would never have gotten together,” she countered. “If I were you, I’d be kissing my ass instead of chewing me out.”
I flinched at her vulgarity but conceded that she had, indeed, played a pivotal role in bringing Brandon and me together. Was I way off base by making her the villain? Probably, but I was on automatic pilot and couldn’t stop myself. “How do I know you didn’t bring us together just so I’d get caught up in romance and lose my focus on my business?” I said. “Wouldn’t that open the door for you to waltz in and snatch the Wyman Method right out from under me?”
She sighed. “You’re a smart woman, Dr. Wyman, but that’s a stupid idea.”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah. If you went out of business, where would that leave me?”
“Free to start your own business—as the new practitioner of the famous Wyman Method.”
“I have a bulletin for you: The Wyman Method isn’t famous anymore.”
“Well, not as famous, I grant you.”
“Not only that, I have no interest in starting my own business. I was happy working for you—until today, that is. I’m not the type to have my own business. And I’m not the type to do the lowdown, underhanded things you’re so convinced I did.”
Maybe Diane had a point there too. She had never struck me as being the devious type. Different, but not devious.
“Number three,” she went on. “The Post said Mr. Brock was secretly paying you to put him through the Wyman Method. Well, that was news to me, because you never told me it was a secret that he was your client. You never said a single word about him, except that he was a successful businessman who traveled a lot. So his showing up every Tuesday at noon was no big deal to me, no hush-hush type of thing. What I’m saying is that if you’re trying to pin stuff on me, you’re wasting your time, Dr. Wyman. What’s more, I’m so mad, I quit.”
“Quit?”
Good grief. I couldn’t let her quit. Not after she had defended herself so articulately. Not after she had communicated with me so expertly. What could I have been thinking to come bursting out of my office and blasting her? Clearly, I’d been thrown by the ordeal with Brandon that morning, but to blame Diane for my problems was unconscionable. I didn’t believe she was behind the stories any more than I believed she was out to take over my practice. I was just grasping for answers, any answers.
“Yeah, I quit,” she said. “Why should I stay?”
“Because I was wrong to accuse you and I’m sorry,” I said, hanging my head in embarrassment. “I had no business jumping to conclusions.” The way Brandon had jumped to conclusions about me. “It’s just that when something like this happens to you, it makes you paranoid, Diane. You start to think you can’t trust anybody. Even those closest to you. Especially those closest to you.”
She simmered down a little. “I can see why you’d be upset,” she said, “but to attack me, of all people—”
“I know,” I said. “I’m ashamed of myself. You’ve been a loyal, devoted assistant—and a supportive friend too. I couldn’t have kept the practice going without you. And I certainly couldn’t have gotten together with Brandon without you, as you mentioned. He and I may be apart now, but what we had was wonderful while it lasted. I’ll always be grateful to you for that, Diane.”
“How grateful?” she said, taking me by surprise. I hadn’t expected her to digest my speech and accept my apology so quickly.
“Very grateful,” I said. “Honestly.”
“Okay,” she said, nodding her head. “Then I’m thinking that this might be the perfect time to ask you for more money. How does a twenty-percent raise sound?”