Chapter 63

Daddy had his eyes closed and was conducting Beethoven's Fifth Symphony as I came up to the car. It was easy to tell because he was at the da da da daaaah part. He turned toward me as I opened the door. His face looked relaxed and he smiled at me silently, leaned forward, turned the key and started the engine. We eased out of the parking lot towards home.

He listened to the CD for a while, then lowered the volume. "How did it go?"

"Real good. I think Myra's going to come work for us. She's coming over for dinner tomorrow."

"Wait a minute. I thought you were taking care of Laurie tomorrow."

"We are. Myra's got a boy and a girl and I figured it would be nice for them all to play together."

"How old are her kids?"

"Her son is two and a half and her daughter's four."

"Are you nuts? You're going to let three kids that age run around your apartment together?"

"They'll be fine. There will be three of us to look after them. Don't forget Bozo."

"Yeah, right. Don't forget Posie. You have no idea what you're setting yourself up for."

"What did you take Laurie for if you can't handle kids her age?"

"I didn't take kids her age. I took Laurie. One Kid. They have places you go to if you want to put a bunch of them together. Places where rats serve lousy pizza and they have cages filled with balls that you can throw them in and wear them out."

"Oh, Daddy. You're just mad that you already made plans with Wanda and can't come over."

"Yeah, you just go right on believing that, little girl."

We got home and I could see the light coming out around the big garage door.

"Jack's got a shoot tonight. Gina, one of the girls from school. We bought a couple of murals so Jack would have something to shoot against. Would you like to see?"

"I don't want to disturb him while he's working."

"Oh, come on. It'll be fine."

We went up to the side door and I tapped on it. I heard footsteps and then Jack pulled it open...

"Can we come in and watch?"

"Sure. Just stay back there out of the way and be quiet."

I looked at Daddy and he shook his head. I reached out and grabbed his sleeve and pulled him inside. I shut the door, then pointed towards the garage door. We walked over there and I pulled out a couple of plastic milk cases that were against the wall. We both sat and watched.

The winter mountain scene was opened up with a snow covered slope in the middle of the picture. Jack had one of the standing construction lamps on the floor, pointing diagonally across the mural, about a foot past the end of it. The other was lying on the storage platform, aimed above the mural. It either had a burned out bulb or Jack hard turned off one of the lamps.

Gina was wearing a skin tight ski outfit. Tight white stretch pants, tight white sweater, a white stocking cap with a ball made out of yarn on top, a matching white muffler and gloves. She was holding white ski poles. The only non-white thing about her was her sunglasses. They covered half her face and were black. You couldn't tell if she had eyes, much less see them.

She didn't have skis; her feet were bare, in fact. Jack was moving around, in front of her, then off to the side, constantly changing the angle. I watched as the lights moved his shadow across her but somehow it was never there when I heard the camera. He called out to her, "bend down, feel the wind in your face, there's some guy behind you checking out your ass, quick — swerve to the right." The whole thing was phony but he was talking her through it and she really looked like she was taking the ride of her life, skiing down that mountain.

We watched for about ten minutes, then Jack said, "How you holding up, Gina? Ready to do the other mural?"

"Do we need to? You really wore me out, Jack."

"I don't know. I think I got some good shots, but I'm not the one paying for them. Why don't we take a break and go upstairs. You can have something to drink and maybe I can talk Jill into giving you something to eat while I upload these pictures to the computer so we can see them."

"OK. That sounds good."

Jack turned on the ceiling light fixture, turned off the lamp standing on the floor and unplugged the one on the platform.

Daddy said, "That was amazing. It looked like you were skiing."

"I know. There were a couple of times it felt like I was. I almost turned around when Jack told me that guy was checking out my butt."

Jack went over to Gina and put his hand on her elbow. "Come on, let's go."

Daddy said, "I'm going to go in a get Laurie. I'll talk to you later. You'd better get up there and see if you can find something for her to eat."

They'd just gone inside and I had to wait a few seconds for Bozo to come down the stairs. I gave him a quick pat and he took off for the back yard. When I got upstairs, Jack was sitting down at the computer and Gina was standing behind him, a glass of grape juice in her hand.

"Would you like something to snack on, Gina?"

"Oh, don't go to any trouble for me."

"No trouble. I didn't really get dinner tonight so I'm going to see what we've got."

"All right, then."

"Jack? Are you hungry?"

"No thanks. I had a big dinner."

"OK."

I didn't find anything on a quick inspection of the refrigerator so I looked in the freezer. There was a package of cinnamon rolls. I took out five of them, put them on a plate and zapped them in the microwave.

You know how some restaurants bring you warm moist towels after you've had something sticky? Years ago I discovered something that does the job just as well and is a lot less hassle. Baby wipes. I figured if it was good enough to get all that shit off a baby's butt, it would work after you've been eating fried chicken. Now, I don't know anyone who doesn't like cinnamon rolls. But they do leave your hands pretty messy.

I got the baby wipes out of the cupboard just as the microwave dinged. I got the plate and took it out to the living room.

Jack and Gina were looking at the pictures. Gina had her hand on the back of his chair and was leaning over, almost resting her chin on his shoulder. She was still wearing the pants and the sweater but had taken off the gloves, hat, muffler and sunglasses. Her brown hair was spread out, coming almost halfway down her back.

I held the plate out and she jerked a little bit and said, "Oh," not really expecting it. "Uhhmm, these look good." She picked one up, took a bite and said, "Mmmm, thank you."

Jack could smell it and I held the plate out. "Sure you don't want some?"

"Well, maybe one."

"OK. There's plenty."

I grabbed one and took a bite, then put the plate down, picked up the baby wipes and held the box out to Gina. She took one.

"Ohmigod! What a good idea!"

They looked through the pictures. They were all excellent. All of them looked like she was really skiing in the mountains in the middle of winter.

Jack said, "Well, what do you think? You want to try the other backdrop?"

"I don't know. I don't think that's it, but there's something missing. I'm not sure what it is." She wasn't quite whining but there was definitely some dissatisfaction in her voice. Along with some frustration.

Jack pushed back and got up. He went behind her and grabbed both arms, just below the shoulders. He guided her into the bedroom. I didn't stare, but I could tell he was standing behind her, pointing her at my dresser.

"Take a look in the mirror. What do you see?"

"My hair."

"Good. What else?"

"My face."

"That's what's missing. There are plenty of great pictures of you skiing down the mountain but they could be anybody with a killer body and a tight outfit. We need one or two where somebody can tell that it's you, without a doubt."

"I agree."

They came into the living room.

"Cool. How do you feel? Are you up for it?"

"Yeah. I feel great."

"Good. Lets go back downstairs, get set up and take some pictures."

"Will I need the stuff I took off?"

"Yeah, bring it. I'm not sure how I'm going to do this but it won't hurt to have it all down there."

He looked at me. "Jill, I'd appreciate it if you'd find something to do up here. We won't be very long."

Bozo must have been waiting at the top of the stairs because he came in as soon as Jack opened the door. He came over to me and I sat on the couch and ruffled his fur. "You still love me, don't you Boy?"

He didn't answer but I could see adoration in the look he gave me.

I thought back on what had happened since I got home. Jack hadn't really had much to do with me. I know there was no kiss. Did he ever really talk to me? He let me and Daddy watch but he also told us to keep quiet when we went in the garage. He told Gina I might find her something to eat. Up here he said he had a good meal, then he said he'd have a roll. He made it very clear that I was not welcome downstairs while he was taking the rest of the pictures. Was that it? Was his telling us to keep quiet his way of letting me know we weren't welcome when he was working?

I wasn't going to dwell on it. Both of us had made ourselves crazy worrying about things when we didn't know where we stood. I knew one thing for sure. Jack and I were going to have a talk before we went to bed tonight. Whether it was a long one or a short one was up to him. But I was going to get some answers, even if I had to use all my female tricks to dig them out of him.

I pulled the business cards out of my pocket and found one of Liz's. She had a cellphone number on it.

It rang a few times and then a man answered. "Hello."

"Hi. Is this Liz's husband?"