Life is Sweet (29 page)

He smiled ruefully. “Or die trying?”

 

That evening, Becca tapped her pencil eraser against her chin and gave her Quicken window the evil eye. Where had all the money gone? And where was there room to economize? She never thought of herself as a penny-pincher, but there were no lavish expenditures for her to cut out to offset the growing Walt bill.

Except one. By far, her biggest personal expense was Harvey. His upkeep, even boarding him at the relatively no-frills Butternut Knoll, averaged her nearly five hundred dollars per month. That was huge. The outlay might go up as he aged, too, if he developed a chronic health problem. There was no question that her finances would make a lot more sense if she didn't have Harvey.

The only catch was, she would just as soon saw off her own arm as give him up.

“What you need is an accountant,” Erin said, circling behind her. “You should use my guy, Brad. He saves me oodles in taxes.”

“I'm guessing Brad charges oodles, too.”

“I've never paid much attention,” Erin said. “But he's worth his weight in gold.”

Becca shot her an amused glance, and wound up doing a double-take. Erin's black wool jersey dress fit her like a second skin. “Where are you going?”

“Noah's picking me up.”

“Noah, the detective?”

She nodded. “We're meeting with Marv, my lawyer.”

Becca frowned. “I thought Marv was Bob's lawyer.”

“He was, but he was mine before we married, so I'm declaring custody of him.” She stepped into a pair of four-inch pumps. “There's a lot to go over.”

Acute support-staff envy struck Becca. Erin always seemed to attract a fleet of men to ease her over life's bumps. Having a trust fund probably didn't hurt, but Erin was also the kind of person people wanted to help—like a fledgling that had fallen out of the nest. Some dowdy chicks flopped around on the ground and were left for the feral cats. But Erin was the sweet downy chick that made people line shoe boxes in cotton and call the Audubon Society.

“Noah and I are hoping that Marv will green-light my going back to the house.”

“I'm sure he will.”

Erin put a manicured hand on her shoulder. “But whether he does or doesn't, I'm going to pay you for my time here.”

“Shut up.”

“And I want to keep working at the cake shop,” Erin continued. “I really like it there.”

“Of course.” In a short time, Erin had become very popular with customers. Free Cake Day probably had something to do with that. She wasn't a bad baker, either. “I hope you do, but—”

The doorbell rang, and Erin clattered down the stairs to let Noah in.

Becca stood up and smoothed back her hair, ready to greet the gentleman caller. Before they came back up, however, her phone rang. It was Matthew.

“Thank God you picked up,” he said.

The urgency in his voice sent a chill through her. “What's wrong?”

“When I got home from work tonight, I found a note from Walt on the kitchen table.”

Her heart beat double-time. Erin reappeared and, seeing her on the phone and noting her worried expression, tiptoed to retrieve her coat and purse. A lanky young man with floppy brown hair and a beaky nose trailed after her, smiling shyly at Becca. At any other time, she would have thought he was adorable, but now it was all she could do to concentrate on what Matthew was telling her.

“The note says, ‘Thank you very much for letting me stay. Here's five dollars. Please return the saxophone to Rebecca. The Sonny Rollins CD is for her, too. She'll know why. Your friend, Walt Johnson.' I looked in his room. His plastic tub is gone.”

“Oh no.” She had to remind herself to breathe.

Erin flicked a concerned glance her way. Becca met her gaze, frozen.

“Have you seen him?” Matthew asked.

“Not since this afternoon. Hold on.” She snagged Noah's coat sleeve as he edged toward the door. “You're a detective, right?”

Noah's eyes went owl-wide, but he nodded.

“I have a job for you.”

It took some doing, but Noah untangled the mystery of Walt's whereabouts faster than her own frantic brain could have. Checking all the local bus stations, he discovered that Walt had bought a ticket that would connect him to the Greyhound line in Frederick, Maryland. Becca, with Matthew, jumped in the Subaru and drove hell-for-leather for Frederick. She couldn't believe Walt was just going to leave her, going to get on a bus and head out without so much as a good-bye.

“I hope we're not too late,” she said.

Matthew sent an anxious glance in the direction of the speedometer. “I'm hoping a cop doesn't get you in his radar.”

When she streaked into the bus station, she found Walt in the waiting room, sunk low in a chair, his legs pushed out straight in front of him and propped up on his plastic tub. He clutched his
Me Minus You
purple backpack and appeared asleep. She rushed toward him but stopped short of waking him. She was almost afraid to use her voice—unsure whether it would come out as a shriek or a wail.

Some sixth sense must have alerted him to her presence. His eyes opened, and he pushed himself up straighter. “Rebecca. You shouldn't have come all this way.”

“Were you just going to leave?” she asked, her voice shaking with the effort not to yell. “Just slink off in the middle of the night?”

He looked behind her, where Matthew stood. “I left a note. I didn't want to trouble you.”

That word. “Walt, you're nothing
but
trouble! We had to get a detective to help us find you. And what if we'd been thirty minutes later?”

“Bus doesn't leave for another hour,” he said.

She took deep breaths in and out to control her anger. At herself as well as at him. Had she not made herself clear this afternoon? “Where are you going?”

“Back to LA.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “It's what I know.”

“Do you have friends there? Anyone to take care of you?”

His chin dipped toward his chest. “I'll be okay.”

“No, you won't.” She kicked his tub in frustration. “You'll die, and you don't even care. You're just going to give up, without a thought about how it will affect me or anybody else.”

“You're wrong,” he said. “I might not be worth much, but selfish?” He shook his head. “Not so. I gave up Ronnie because I was no good. Because I knew she and you were better off without me. Was I wrong? I don't think so. Look at you—at what you became. You've got so much. I couldn't be prouder.”

“But I don't have any family.”

“You'll make your own.”

“But
you're
my family. Right now. You're all I have.”

“If you think that, you're not paying attention. Family is people who love you. You've got that in spades. My being here will only screw everything up.”

“You'll only screw it up if you leave now,” she argued. “What's gotten into you? I thought you'd changed, that you were going to try to make things right. Or else what was the point in finding me at all?”

“I
have
changed. And I'm glad I got this opportunity to see you. When I came to Virginia, it was sort of a last-ditch thing. I'd lost my job, and those LA doctors weren't giving me too long. So I figured, well, bucket-list time. What's the last thing you'd like to do here on earth?
Find Rebecca,
I thought. That's all I meant to do—find you. I didn't want to disrupt your life like this. I met you, which is more than I hoped for. And all I really wanted.”

“In that case, you could have left weeks ago.”

He drummed his fingers restlessly on the backpack. “I meant to. I was going to work at that gas station till I had enough to get back to LA. But then you took me in, and I fell sick, and it got harder and harder to leave.”

“But it's not hard to now?”

“Hardest thing I've done in a long time,” he said, and his voice sounded so ragged that she could believe him. “You're a good person. Caring. You make me think maybe my life hasn't all been a big waste. But I don't want to take anything more from you than you've already given. That wouldn't be right. Knowing you a little has been enough for me.”

She would not let him do this. “It's not enough for
me
. I'm not letting you on that bus. I don't care if I have to block the door with my body. You're not giving up.”

“I don't want to take a part of anyone's life,” he said. “I had my chance. I didn't do so hot, but I'm satisfied. Now that I've seen you, I am. If there are lives to save, let it be for the little kids and the young people with big futures. The people who haven't screwed up yet.”

“No.” Becca threw herself into the seat next to him. “A month ago you could have made that choice, but now it's too late. You found me. I have a father now, when I assumed I didn't have any blood relation left who I would ever know. I have questions about the past that only you can answer—about grandparents and great-grandparents and you. And Mom. Okay, you messed up your life. You ran out on us, for whatever reason, and you've been the crappiest father imaginable. But now that you're here, in my life, you've got one responsibility. Just one. To stay. I didn't ask you to come find me, but you did. And I'm not going to let you leave. Or give up. You might not be selfish, but I am. I won't let you go.”

“It would be for the best.”

“No, it wouldn't. Because I would live the rest of my life feeling I should have saved you.”

Walt's gaze met hers. “You might not be able to save me anyway.”

“Maybe not, but I'm going to do everything in my power. Everything.”

He thumbed the ridiculous knapsack, and she could feel his resistance fading. “What about money? I can't work steady. I'm a drain on you.”

“Don't worry about that. I have it all figured out.”

There weren't many options. Harvey flashed before her eyes—her beautiful horse, her dream, that last bit of her youth. How else could she either reduce expenses or make more money? Maybe Olivia would take him, or . . .

Her heart hurt.

Suddenly, she knew what she had to do.
Bite the bullet, Becca.

He arched a brow. “You're not thinking of doing anything crooked, are you?”

She smiled sadly. Actually, she almost wished she did have the nerve to rob a bank. It seemed more palatable than what she actually had in mind, which was going to be painful. Very painful.

She looked up at Matthew, who was still standing by. His eyes telegraphed his concern.

“Just leave it to me,” she said.

Rebecca, dressed in jeans and cable sweater, smiles at camera a little self-consciously
.

 

INTERVIEWER:

Why are you participating in
Celebrities in Peril!
?

 

REBECCA:

Why?

 

 

I'm doing this for my dad, actually. Growing up, I never knew my father. He and my mom split up before I was born, and then he went through some really tough times. He was addicted to drugs, did some bad things, and actually served time in prison.

 

QUICK CUT TO BLACK-AND-WHITE MUG SHOT OVER (BLURRED) PRISON RECORD. A BUREAUCRATIC STAMP HITS THE RECORD AND LEAVES THE WORDS
8 YEARS
IN RED BLOCK LETTERS.

 

REBECCA:

After he got out, he didn't feel he could look me up. He didn't want to come off as a dad mooching off his celebrity daughter, you know? Which is ridiculous, because that's so not who he is.

 

 

REBECCA:

A few years ago, I moved to Leesburg, Virginia, and opened my shop.

 

 

REBECCA:

That's when Walt finally found me. And then I discovered he has a terminal kidney disease and needs a transplant. Since my mom died, Walt is all the family I have. So we're praying we'll find a donor. In the meantime, I'm doing the show to raise funds to cover medical costs. Whatever happens, I'm so grateful I've got this chance to help my father get a second chance.

 

 

 

Celebrities in Peril!: Child Star Edition
Transcript of Contestant Interview
ABBY WOOTEN

 

 

INTERVIEWER:

Why are you participating in
Celebrities in Peril!
?

 

ABBY:

 

I'm in it to win it.

Chapter 24

 

“If anyone expects me to butcher a moose, they've got another think coming,” Abby said, stomping her feet. Her elaborate boots looked like something NASA might have fabricated for a voyage to an icy planet. Their shiny nylon-and-leather construction gave off more glare than the snow beneath them. “I warned them I was vegetarian in my very first interview.”

Becca, exhausted from the effort of pick axing through the ice to set their fishing line, couldn't bring herself to worry much about the next cabin challenge, as the tasks were called on the show. This one was tough enough. “Do you think we're trying to catch tofu out here?”

Abby's nose wrinkled—it was about the only part of her not covered by protective gear. “Okay, I'm a pescatarian or whatever. At least fish aren't cute, with sad little eyes. And it's not like they bleed disgustingly when you cut them open.” When Becca turned away, she added, “They don't, do they? I mean, not like a moose would, right?”

“Not quite like a moose.”

Abby looked relieved, and vindicated.

So far no one had breathed a word about killing moose, but Abby was particularly concerned about the possibility. Borrowing trouble was one of her favorite pastimes. Becca was happy just to arrive at the end of the day not dead of frostbite or as a wolf pack's dinner. The future? She would slaughter that moose when she came to it, so to speak.

Abby edged as close as she deemed safe to the edge of the ice hole and peered down. “Do you think we're going to catch anything?”

That
we
would have made Becca laugh if she hadn't been so tired. Becca had been the one to pitch their little shelter—a tent—on the ice, and hack their way through to the water. Abby had done a lot of directing, and worrying, and had frequently mugged adorably for the benefit of the videographer who wisely remained huddled just inside the tent flap.

“Because it looks like the other team is already beating us,” Abby said, pointing at the tent a hundred yards away, where two fish were hanging on a pole, taunting them.

“Damn.” The fish were clearly biting better for the
Cosby–Full House
duo.

They were the only two teams out today because the rest of the group had been assigned the task of coming up with a fix for the cabin chimney, which had been billowing smoke into their shelter since they had erected it at the beginning. Putting their prefab shelter together had been Cabin Challenge #1, and the endeavor had nearly resulted in a mass former child star extinction. The sprawling hut—with parts pre-painted to look like a weathered, rustic log cabin—had come with Ikea-like instructions and diagrams. Unfortunately, the resulting structure proved just as frustrating to assemble, and even less durable. The first night, an interior wall had collapsed on one bunk bed, and asphyxiation had been a constant worry.

Becca had to hand it to Renee Jablonsky. The woman couldn't have thought up a scenario better suited to bring out tensions than trapping them all in a snowbound, smoky cabin. Even though they were one stand of trees away from modernly equipped trailers with emergency generators, where the director and his crew lived, the isolation and simulated hardships nevertheless played on all their emotions and insecurities. One inmate was soon discovered to have smuggled several quarts of vodka in her hiking pack. (
“How do you think they survive in Siberia?”
) Vodka Girl had also been the first person Renee, sporting a dramatic scarlet parka with a faux fur hood, had dismissed in their weekly bonfire ritual, which always ended with the banished person handing his or her torch back to Renee.

Lately, Becca had started to dream of being the chosen torch surrenderer. Money be damned. How could she screw up enough to earn a plane ride out of this wilderness? The trouble was, screwing up had consequences in terms of survival or at least comfort, so in the heat of the challenge it was hard to give up entirely.

Maybe this grudging survival instinct was what had caused Abby to glom on to her. Abby had talked tough in the beginning, but from the moment the plane had dropped them off in this forsaken place, she'd wandered around in near-nervous breakdown mode. She had claimed the bunk over Becca's, though, and basically stuck to her like glue, as if they'd never stopped being besties.

“
We?
” Becca asked her now.

Abby yanked off her snow goggles and blinked her watery blue-green eyes. The years had not altered the heart-shaped face, jutting chin, or the round eyes that had made her such a memorable screen presence. Given their history, Becca had assumed that Abby would be her adversary. Yet this morning, for instance, Abby had volunteered to ice-fish with Becca instead of working with the cabin-repair crew, even though it would mean stuffing herself into unflattering long underwear to keep from freezing her butt off.

“I think we should form an alliance,” Abby said in a low voice—as if no one could hear them. As if there wasn't a digital videographer two feet away.

They had been instructed to act as if no one was watching them. But telling a group of people who had been weaned on sound sets to ignore cameras was like ordering lions to ignore lame baby gazelles.

“Wrong show,” Becca said. Alliances wouldn't really get them anywhere, because the cabin mates didn't get to choose who stayed and who would be eliminated. The decision was all Renee's. She monitored the footage assembled by the directors and did her own calculations of who would attract ratings. So far, the people who had been axed were either dangerously substance-dependent or, worse, dull.

“But it would help,” Abby argued. “If we made ourselves an inseparable pair, maybe the audience wouldn't want to see us broken up. Who wants to see best friends torn apart?”

“We're not best friends,” Becca said. “We haven't even spoken for over a decade.”

“But we're old friends reunited. At least that's something.”

“Something what?”

Abby leaned in. “Some angle for the audience to pick up on, stupid. Let's face it.
Me Minus You
never had the ratings most of these other shows had. I mean,
Little House
! Come on, is that fair? She spent her whole childhood in the top ten, and in a goddamned cabin, too. No one's going to want to see
her
get the ax. Ditto the Partridge guy, even though he's old, crazy, and likely to get us all killed.”

That was the truth.

“You and me, Becca, we're sitting ducks. We have to be wily.”

It was all clear now. “I wondered why you were suddenly my best pal. I thought maybe you felt insecure and were gravitating toward the familiar. I knew it couldn't be because you liked me.”

Abby's eyes flew open dramatically. “Of course I like you. We grew up together.”

“Wrong. We went through adolescence together. Frankly, I'm beginning to wonder if you ever grew up at all. I certainly don't trust you any more than I did then.”

“How can you say that?”

“Because you dumped me when I no longer was getting work. You think I didn't realize that?”

“What could I do? I was busy, and I heard you were in some public school. I had my own problems.” She shot an almost-imperceptible sidewise glance toward the camera. “Most ordinary people don't understand how difficult growing up on television can be. So many trade-offs . . .”

Becca bit her lip. She needed to leave rising to the bait to the poor fish under the ice. All this discussion was doing was giving Abby what she wanted—conflict footage that would make them more dramatically interesting to viewers and less likely to be selected by the red parka of doom at the next bonfire.

Ignoring Abby, she checked the line. Still nothing.

Abby groaned in frustration and started stamping again. “Oh, who cares? We're going to freeze to death out here before this stupid show airs, anyway.”

“You should have worn more layers.” Becca was sporting multiple pairs of Polartec long underwear. They kept her warm, and she also hoped they would pose an extra challenge to any predator wanting to make a snack of her.

Abby clucked. “I don't want to be photographed with Michelin Man ass, thank you very much.”

Becca glared at her.

“What?”
Abby asked, all innocence. “What's the matter with you? Christ, in the old days you at least had a sense of humor.”

“You mean I didn't mind when you insulted me?”

“Is this about the heifer thing? Honestly, how was I supposed to know that would catch on?”

Despite the cold, heat suffused Becca's face. “
You
said that?”

Abby shrugged. “You chunked out. It was funny.”

Becca bit her lip.
Don't push her head under the icy water while the camera is rolling
.

“Oh, look at the frowny face,” Abby sneered. “God, you were always so sensitive. No wonder you couldn't hack it and had to go hide yourself away in some Podunk town.”

“That Podunk town is a very nice place.”

Abby laughed. “I'm sure it is, if you can't make the grade anywhere else.”

Anywhere else? “You're saying that there's your little patch of Southern California, and then everywhere else.”

“You know what I mean,” Abby said. “You felt like a failure, so you decided to go be a big fish in a miniscule pond.”

Becca sputtered. “Abby, I run a cupcake store. That's not a big fish activity. My customers are bigger fish than I'll ever be. They work interesting jobs that solve other people's problems. They actually help people—some even rescue or heal people. What we're doing here is ridiculous. It doesn't make either of us better or more worthy. Or bigger.”

Abby shook her head. “Then why are you here? Why are you grandstanding in front of Mr. and Mrs. John Q. Public? You're just trying to make me look bad, I'll bet.”

Becca released a frustrated huff and stood up. She couldn't take it anymore. Maybe she could beg Renee to release her from her contract. Or she could do some crazy thing—would killing Abby be crazy enough?—and hand in her torch. She'd even weep for the cameras, if that's what was required. She looked over at the videographer, hoping he would get a good angle of her holding Abby's head under the icy water till the bubbles stopped.

To her astonishment, the camera guy wasn't even shooting them. Maybe he hadn't been for a few minutes. While she and Abby had been sniping at each other, he had directed his camera up the hill, where the cabin was. Smoke billowed out of the chimney—unfortunately, it was also pouring out the front door and the windows. Becca could see flames, too, and former child stars running in circles, tossing snow at their burning cabin.

The videographer shook his head and muttered, “I wonder how that happened.”

Becca and Abby, momentarily forgetting their spat, exchanged knowing looks and blurted out the most obvious answer, almost in unison.

“Danny.”

 

 

PAULA (host):

 

The Morning Show
has received dramatic footage of the conflagration on a reality star show set that resulted in the hospitalization of several former child stars and crew members who were on the scene. One star, still unidentified, remains in the hospital this morning for observation. The entire cast of
Celebrities in Peril!: Child Star Edition
was evacuated to Anchorage for a short hiatus. We're lucky to be joined by two of those cast members, whom some of you may remember from the nineties sitcom
Me Minus You.
Rebecca Hudson and Abby Wooten have joined us via satellite from our affiliate in Anchorage, where it is very early. Good morning, ladies!

 

REBECCA:

Hello.

 

ABBY:

Good morning, Paula! (
waves
) Hi, America!

 

PAULA:

First—how great to see the two of you together again. A lot of us remember your rivalry on
Me Minus You,
so it's great to see you reunited. And yet, what a traumatizing experience for you both. Can you speak to us about all the emotions you must have felt as you were watching that cabin go up in flames?

 

ABBY:

It
was
traumatizing, Paula. I feel fortunate to have survived the ordeal, and I'm so grateful to the brave crew and all the emergency workers who helped us survive it.

 

REBECCA:

Abby and I were ice-fishing when it happened. Not really close, actually.

 

ABBY:

But naturally, we rushed to help the moment we saw the smoke. Fortunately, everyone was out by the time we arrived on the scene. Then we did everything in our power to save the structure itself.

 

REBECCA:

But they wouldn't let us near the fire, because of liability issues.

 

PAULA:

Of course! Well, I'm certain you're both glad for a little break.

 

ABBY:

We are, and I personally am so grateful to C.I.P. for providing trauma counselors. The producers of the show have been wonderful, especially Renee Jablonsky, whom I like to call our fearless leader. She's absolutely amazing!

 

REBECCA:

Yes. And you wouldn't believe how luxurious it feels to have a hotel room to myself now.