Farewell, Dorothy Parker (25 page)

“Don’t leave it in the car?” he said.

“Please,” Violet said.

He seemed to think about that for a second, and Violet held her breath. Finally he agreed, and so she kissed her niece on the top of the head and said good-bye.

She watched them walk toward Malcolm’s RAV4.

“Notice that I’m getting in without a fight!” Delaney shouted to her aunt as she opened the car door.

“Great!” Violet said. “I’ll keep my part of the bargain, I promise!”

Violet felt a strange lump in her throat as Malcolm placed the box in the backseat of his car. For some reason, she felt like she was saying good-bye to a very dear friend she might never see again.

As if reading her mind, Malcolm shouted, “Don’t worry! I’ll take good care of your antique!”

Violet wiped her nose on her sleeve. I hope so, she thought.

Chapter 29

“Over a hundred comments in the first hour,” Buck said, “and almost all of them furious. Then another three hundred posts before eleven a.m.”

Violet sat across from her boss in his office. She couldn’t believe she was actually getting chewed out.

“You know how these things are,” she said. “People get crazy. It’s the
Internet.
”

Her review of
A Foundling’s Story,
posted on the magazine’s Web site that morning, had struck a chord. People were passionate about the movie. Sure, there were a few who hated it, but most of the commenters were rabid fans who thought Violet deserved disemboweling for the negative stance she took. There was nothing particularly unusual about this—people were always using the site to vent. But the numbers were impressive. To Violet, it merely meant that the film had scores of devoted fans. The same thing had happened to Travis when he had dared question the lasting resonance of the
Twilight
franchise.

The irony, of course, was that these angry hordes wanted to string her up for panning the film, while she thought she had been pretty soft on it.

“Not
this
crazy,” her boss said. “And not that many of them.”

Buck had a philosophy about these things. A lot of attention was good, but if too much of it was angry, he got nervous. He kept glancing
at his phone, which Violet surmised was a bad thing. He was probably waiting for the publisher to call and give him hell.

He loosened his collar. Though it was a pretty casual office, Buck always wore a suit, usually with a striped tie. He was old-school preppy. Literally.

“Tell me the truth,” he said. “Are you letting your personal life affect your work?”

“What?” Violet was stunned. How could he think such a thing?

“I know you have a lot going on. And if it’s affecting your reviews—”

“It’s not! I swear, Buck. I’m a professional, you know that.”

“Because if you need some time off—”

“Wait, are you saying my job is in jeopardy?”

He sighed and sat back in his chair. “These days, whose isn’t?” He shook his head and leaned forward. “Look, just keep it in perspective. Travis is our crotchety old critic. You’re supposed to be the young, fresh voice here.”

“But this isn’t even a young person’s movie. I don’t understand.”

“It’s about…relevance. We need you to be relevant.”

Relevant? That didn’t even sound like Buck. What was really going on here? Violet folded her arms and looked hard at her boss. “Did Sylvie say something to you?” she asked, referring to Sylvia Merrill, publisher and president of
Enjoy.

He sighed. “Sylvie’s not happy.”

“With me?”

“She insists this is just the kind of thing that scares away advertisers,” he said, pointing to his computer screen, which was open to the web page with her review.

That was a bomb. A massive, too-close-for-comfort bomb. “So my job
is
in jeopardy? Are you kidding?”

“You know I’ll fight tooth and nail for you, Violet, but just…tread
carefully these next few weeks. Things are tight here, and everyone’s looking for a scapegoat.”

“Me? A scapegoat?”

“Unfortunately, between this review and the one you passed off to Andi, you’ve made yourself an easy target.”

“I’m in trouble for that, too?”

“Sylvie questioned whether the kid was ready. And frankly, I did, too.”

“No one’s ready when they first start out,” Violet said. “You know that as well as I do.”

“I’m just saying you need to be careful. Don’t court controversy.”

“But you don’t want me to compromise my reviews—”

“Of course not.”

“I just don’t understand what I could do differently,” she said. “I was being fair, Buck. I stand behind that review.”

“Do you?”

“Of course.”

“Good. That’s what I needed to hear. Then just keep that up and…I can take care of Sylvie.”

“You promise?”

“I’ll do my best.”

Damn Sylvia Merrill. Violet didn’t need this added stress in her life—not now, when so much was at stake. Her custody case was hanging on by a thread. Hell, probably less than a thread. And if she lost her job, well, she didn’t even want to think about it.

But she did. And it kept her up almost all night. So when the phone rang at a quarter to six—right after she had finally fallen asleep—Violet felt like crying. Why? Why today? All she wanted was a few more hours of sleep.

She picked up the phone, hoping it was a wrong number.

“Ms. Epps? This is Jacqueline Connor from
Good Morning America
?”

Violet shook herself awake and sat up, wondering why she was on the phone with one of those young women who ended every statement with a question mark.

“Who?” Violet said.

“
Good Morning America
? Jacqueline Connor? I just wanted to tell you that your car service will be there in thirty minutes?”

“Car service?” Violet had no idea what this woman was talking about.

“We confirmed it with your office yesterday?”

“I don’t understand. Why are you sending a car for me?”

“We have you scheduled for the seven-thirty segment, and you had requested car service?”

“I did?”

“I’m looking at your e-mail right now?”

“Are we talking about an appearance on
Good Morning America
?” Violet said. It couldn’t be, she thought. It just couldn’t.

“We are,” said Jacqueline Connor.

A statement. This was serious. “Today?”

“You wrote a very gracious e-mail?”

“E-mail?” Violet said, and then went ice-cold as it became clear.

Andi.

She must have written to them accepting the invitation, after Violet had specifically told her to turn it down. That bitch. That conniving, lying, two-faced little shit. Just when Violet was starting to trust her! This was a living nightmare.

“I’m sorry,” Violet said. “There’s been a misunderstanding. I…I can’t possibly do your show today.”

“But we
confirmed.
”

Not just a statement, but an emphatic one. Violet looked out the
window, where she could see the sun rising behind the house across the street. The world was changing from dark to light, and all she wanted was to go back to sleep before the transformation was complete.

“I understand that,” she said, “but—”

“It’s live television, Ms. Epps. We ran a promo for your segment. And your publisher is already here in the studio.”

“My publisher?”

“Sylvia Merrill? She’s very excited about the segment.”

Until that moment, Violet had never really understood the term
cold sweat.
But now she got it, as a chill swept her flesh, raising goose bumps in ugly, angry peaks and triggering a drenching, full-body sweat that almost made her drop the handset.

With all her heart and soul she did not want to do this television appearance. She could picture the cameras, the ice-cold studio, the pressure. Millions of people would be watching, judging. Some of them were already readers who would tune in to see what the snarky critic was really like. It was all too much.

“Ms. Epps? Are you still there?” Jacqueline Connor asked.

Violet had to hold on to the phone with both hands. “What should I wear?” she said.

Violet sat in a sage-green padded chair on set and held still as a stagehand wearing headphones clipped a small microphone to the lapel of her olive suit.

“Didn’t they tell you not to wear green?” he said.

Violet cleared her throat and then coughed into her hand, as she felt like her larynx had been coated in a thick, voice-proof mucus.

“It was all I had,” she croaked.

“I hope you don’t disappear,” he said.

If only, she thought.

He adjusted her mike. “This is very sensitive, okay? You don’t have to bend your head to talk into it. Just speak normally.”

Violet coughed again. Her throat was not cooperating. “I understand,” she said.

“Can someone get the guest a glass of water, please?” he said into his mouthpiece, and then patted her shoulder. “You’ll be great,” he said. “Don’t worry. Wendy’s a pro.”

At that, a striking African American woman walked onto the set. She was all poise and confidence—the kind of person who couldn’t wait for the cameras to get rolling so that she could glimmer and glow for all the world to see.

“Wendy Whitney,” she said, extending her hand.

Violet, of course, already knew who she was. “Violet Epps,” she said, and cleared her throat again. “Nice to meet you.”

“So glad you agreed to come.”

Violet glanced over to the left, where she saw her boss’s boss, Sylvia Merrill, chatting with the show’s executive producer. They were both uncommonly tall. Sylvie was dressed in her combat uniform—a bright red blazer and straight skirt in a black-and-white houndstooth print. The producer, John Dower, was in a dark pin-stripe suit with the kind of print shirt-and-tie combination you saw only on Englishmen and formidably prosperous WASP businessmen. Individually, they were intimidating. Together, they looked like a gorgeous middle-aged power couple conspiring to take over the world.

Violet swallowed hard. Talk about pressure. She wasn’t just appearing on live television before millions of people. She was auditioning for a woman who was one pen stroke away from firing her.

She took a deep breath to the count of four, held it for a count of four, and released it for a count of four. It was a calming technique she had learned in kung fu class.

You can do this,
she told herself.
You know these films.

Since it was a segment on romantic comedies, Violet had made notes in the car on the way to the studio, preparing herself for any questions that might come up. She had even scribbled down a few pretty good sound bites. If she could remember to say them, she might actually come off okay. She pulled an index card out of her pocket and read over what she had written.

“Two minutes, Wendy,” said a young woman crouching in front of the camera.

The newswoman took her seat and turned to Violet. “I’ll be on camera first, doing the segment intro. Then we’ll go to camera two and I’ll introduce you.”

“Great,” Violet said. “Are you showing any clips from the movies?” She was hoping for at least a quick heads-up on what films they would be discussing. The producer had declined to tell her, saying the segments worked best when they were spontaneous.

“Movie,” Wendy said. “Not movies.”

“I…I thought we were discussing romantic comedies.”

“Not anymore.”

“Not anymore”?
What did that mean? Violet’s blouse went damp under her jacket.

The crouching woman held up her hand and counted down with her fingers. “And live in five, four, three…” She trailed off, signaling the last two seconds in silence, and pointed at Wendy.

The woman came alive like a lit fuse. She stared into the camera, intense and focused. “Once in a while, a movie comes along that takes everyone by surprise, touching the hearts of both the tender and the strong.
A Foundling’s Story
isn’t a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster. There are no car chases, no violence, no sex, no modern cynicism. And yet moviegoers are drawn to it in droves, and leaving in tears.

“The critics, by and large, have had an entirely different reaction,
calling the movie maudlin, manipulative, sappy. Why the disconnect? I’m here today with
Enjoy
film critic Violet Epps to see if we can get some answers.

“Violet, welcome. Let’s start with a simple question. Why did you hate this movie?”

This wasn’t really happening, was it? Surely it was a nightmare she would awake from at any second. Violet stared straight ahead at the massive camera in front of her. It was, she knew, capturing her image. The sweat forming on her upper lip was being viewed from kitchens and living rooms, from hospital beds and office chairs. She was being watched by housewives in Idaho, teachers in New Jersey, scientists in Colorado, carpenters in Tennessee, politicians in Washington, construction workers in Maine, magazine publishers in New York. Violet glanced to her left, where she had seen Sylvia Merrill, but the lights reduced everything behind the cameras to darkness.

She held tight to the arms of her chair to prevent an out-of-body experience. Violet needed to stay put, to answer the question. Everything depended on it.