The Bette Davis Club Read Online Free PDF Page B

candy-apple red, absolutely gorgeous. Rakish and wonderful, its wire wheels and chrome work gleam in the sun.
    I haven’t seen that car since I was ten years old. I forget that I’m broke and three thousand miles from home, that my half sister is a cocaine addict and my niece some sort of fugitive bride. Instead, I remember how our father looked at the wheel of his favorite automobile—elegant, laughing, full of life.
    “Oh, Charlotte,” I say. “It’s beautiful. What fun it must be to own it.”
    “I wouldn’t know,” she says impatiently.
    I turn to her, but she avoids my gaze.
    “I mean,” she says, “I never drive it. Even though Mama’s been dead for years, the only reason I keep it is because she did. I have Juven take it in regularly for service.”
    She pulls at one of her diamond earrings. “You know, Margo, Daddy’s car doesn’t hold the same memories for me that it does for you. I see it, and I think, There’s the little toy my father drove away in on all those bright sunny mornings—when he went to cheat on my mother.”
    Well , I think, that’s your version . But this is no time to begin arguing again about our parents.
    I’m about to descend the stone steps, when Charlotte touches my arm. “There’s something else I want you to do. Georgia took things that belong to me. I want them back.”
    “You mean the wedding dress?” I say.
    “That too. But besides the dress there are other things. Tell her I want my possessions returned immediately.”
    “What are these items?” I say.
    “Doesn’t matter, she knows.” Charlotte’s voice is controlled, but insistent. “Make it clear I’m not kidding around about this.”
    I sigh. “Tell me something, please. Are you sending me to Palm Springs to retrieve your daughter or your property?”
    “The whole kid and caboodle. Ha-ha. I believe I mean kit and caboodle.” She frowns. “What I mean is, for fifty grand, I expect it all.” We start down the steps.

    We’re almost at the bottom of the stairs when a man—fortyish, pale, not terribly tall—comes hurrying round the side of the house. He’s wearing an Armani tux and clutching a pair of suitcases.
    Even in a tuxedo this fellow has the tweedy, self-absorbed look of the professional college student. The rumpled hair, eyeglasses, and befuddled gaze of an absentminded professor. He comes to an abrupt halt, apparently confused by . . . other people? Life? His own thoughts? His eyes dart round like a possum considering how best to cross the road.
    I laugh at the sight of him. “Who’s that?” I say.
    “The groom,” Charlotte says. “Tully Benedict. He’s going with you.”
    I knew it! I knew Charlotte would play dirty.
    “No!” I say. “I won’t. I absolutely won’t!”
    “Yes, you will. Number one, because if you don’t, I won’t pay you. Number two, because Tully is your driver. And number three, because you and I both know, Little Mar, that you don’t have a valid driver’s license in the state of California, the continent of North America, or anywhere else in this godforsaken world.”
    We go on like this a minute or two, though I know it’s pointless. Charlotte will have her way. When, at last, there’s a break in our bickering, I glance back at the MG and get a shock. Despite the fact that no wedding has occurred, a group of drunken wedding guests are spraying shaving cream all over my father’s car.
    “Stop!” I cry. “Please, stop!”
    Too late. Shaving cream hearts decorate the car’s hood, pink rose petals dot the tan leather seats, and a bouquet of red and white balloons floats from the spare tire mounted at the rear. Vinyl clings on the car doors proclaim “Just Married!” and “Love Machine!” The effect is oddly festive considering, when you think about it, that we’re in the midst of calamity.
    I decide not to think about it. Charlotte’s sense of urgency is contagious. So is the temptation to earn fifty thousand dollars for what, presumably,