One Fifth Avenue - Candace Bushnell [102]
“Mother, can we please change the station?” Lola said again.
“No,” Beetelle said.
“Why not?”
“Because I like it.”
“But it’s so awful, Mother,” Lola whined. “It’s so…out of touch.”
Beetelle took her eyes off the road for a second to regard her daughter, sitting impatiently in the front seat, her eyes narrowed in annoyance. An irrational anger overwhelmed her; all at once, she hated her daughter. “Lola,” she said. “Will you please shut up?”
Lola’s mouth opened like that of a little fish. She turned to her mother, unable to fathom what she’d just heard. Beetelle’s face was hard, set in an expression Lola saw rarely and only in brief flashes, as when the head of the school board had dismissed Beetelle’s suggestions to serve only organic lettuce. But her ire was never turned on Lola herself, and Lola was shocked.
“I mean it,” Beetelle said.
“All I said was…” Lola protested.
Beetelle shook her head. “Not now, Lola,” she said.
They were on the highway. Beetelle thought about the forty-minute drive in traffic and decided she couldn’t go on. Lola had to be told. Beetelle took the next exit. “Mother!” Lola screamed. “What is wrong with you? This isn’t our turn.”
Beetelle pulled in to a gas station and parked the car. She reminded herself that she was a courageous person, a person of honor, who could face the most devastating of circumstances and come out a winner.
“What’s going on?” Lola demanded. “It’s Daddy, isn’t it? He’s having an affair.”
“No,” Beetelle said. She looked at her daughter, wondering what Lola’s reaction would be to the news. She would likely scream and cry. Beetelle had screamed and cried when she’d first heard as well. But she’d gotten used to it—the way, she’d been told by the hospice patients she occasionally visited, one got used to constant physical pain.
“Lola,” Beetelle said gently. “We’re broke. We’ve lost all our money. There. I’ve said it, and now you know.”
Lola sat silently for a moment, then erupted into hysterical laughter. “Oh, Mother,” she said. “Don’t be so dramatic. How can we be broke? I don’t even know what that means.”
“It means we don’t have any money,” Beetelle said.
“How can that be? Of course we have money. Did Daddy lose his job?” Lola asked, beginning to panic.
“He quit,” Beetelle said.
“When?” Lola asked in alarm.
“Three months ago.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Lola said accusingly.
“We didn’t want to upset you,” Beetelle said. “We didn’t want to distract you from your work.”
Lola said nothing, allowing the irony of the situation to sink in. “Daddy can get another job,” she muttered.
“He might,” Beetelle said. “But it won’t solve our problems. Not for a long time.”
Lola was too frightened to ask her mother what that meant. Beetelle started up the car, and they rode the rest of the way in silence.
Windsor Pines was an idea more than an actual town—a continuation of the strip malls and fast-food restaurants that spoked out from Atlanta like the legs of a spider. But in Windsor Pines, the shops were upscale, and the downtown strip sported Mercedes, Porsche, and Rolls-Royce dealerships. There was a Four Seasons hotel and a new town hall built of white brick and set back from the road and fronted by a wide green lawn with a bandshell. The “town” of Windsor Pines, incorporated in 1983, had fifty thousand residents and twelve golf courses, the most golf courses per capita in Georgia.
The Fabrikant manse sat on the edge of one of these golf courses in a gated community. The house was an amalgamation of styles—mostly Tudor, because Beetelle loved all things “English countryside,” with a nod to the great plantation architecture in the form of tall white columns flanking the entrance. There was a three-car garage and, above it, an entertainment center that had a pool table, a giant flat-screen TV, a bar, and sectional leather couches. The large kitchen had marble countertops and opened