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‘Everything is fine.’ She headed toward her richly appointed bathroom and dressing area. She stopped. ‘Didn’t you have an audition last week at The Public?’
    â€˜I did. I wasn’t what they were looking for.’
    She stood at the door and looked back at him. He was very good-looking, mixed-race … striking. She’d cast him as her assistant, but could easily see him in a T-shirt and tool belt on one of Lenore Parks Productions DIY shows. ‘We should have you test,’ she said. ‘I think you’re a natural.’
    â€˜You’re kidding.’
    â€˜I’m not. You’ve been a good assistant, but we both know this isn’t your dream.’
    â€˜I like working for you,’ he said.
    She weighed his words, and drew two cartoon bubbles over his head. One contained the words he said, and the other held the raw ambition that lay beneath them. ‘Good.’ They were all so transparent, these pretty young things. She saw her single word answer create castles in his head as she closed the door behind her.
    â€˜Damn Rachel,’ she muttered as she tried to hang on to her yoga buzz. She turned on the shower, stripped off her workout gear and flung it into an open wicker hamper. She caught her reflection in the infinity mirrors that bounced off each other creating an illusion of endless Lenores, each one smaller than the one before. Mugging into the mirror with her trademark head bob and wink, she muttered ‘Lenore says, age is a number.’ She surveyed her toned body, her stomach still flat even after two natural child-births. She popped on a shower cap and, with a dozen jets blazing, stepped into the steaming spray. Her thoughts drifted to her daughter and her latest bout of drunken attention-seeking chaos. Sad thing was, the girl was too miserable to realize just how much she had … and was throwing away with both hands. A natural green-eyed blonde, Rachel had hit the genetic jackpot. Lenore’s choice of sperm donor, a carefully guarded secret, was none other than sometime beard and long-time friend John Gregory, action hero, all round hunk and deeply closeted actor. Just like Lenore, his career was dependent upon the fantasy. Do twelve-year-old boys really want to pay twenty bucks to see gay super heroes? An unanswered question and one John, their mutual agent Max Titelbam, his publicity machine and his risk-avoidant backers were unwilling to answer.
    But she’s not grateful , Lenore realized. And according to Rachel’s five-hundred-bucks-an-hour shrink, Dr Amos Ebert, she had Borderline Personality Disorder. Which, courtesy of Lenore Says and several episodes over the years on the topic, gave Lenore pause. You weren’t a horrible mother. To which Rachel would reply – ‘You were no mother at all.’
    Unlike her brother, Rachel had been a hard child from day one. In constant need of nurturing, not sleeping more than thirty or forty minutes at a stretch − thank God for the nannies. But even there, too many of them; one that took pictures of her children and sold them to the tabloids, a couple more who viewed the job as a stepping stone to careers in entertainment. There’d been no stability and Rachel had needed that. Lenore stepped out of the shower. No use crying over spilled milk. She chuckled … and third time’s a charm . She felt a little thrill of excitement, knowing that, unlike the Barrys of this world, she still had it. Her pregnancies and unorthodox strategies to make a family had shot her to the top of the ratings, and she was poised to shock the hell out of them again.
    She checked the misted dial on the clock over the vanity. In three minutes her hair and make-up people would knock. She stepped into her panties − no need for SPANX − and then into the underwire bra selected for the day’s outfit. A knock at the door. Two minutes early , she noted. ‘Come in.’
    Without