Trilemma (10 page)

I lie in the Jacuzzi, smoking and sipping Sauvignon Blanc, still feeling charged about being on TV.

Look at me now, Steve and Hilary; not such a sad little cuckoo after all, huh? Look at me now, Ralph, Mike, Ted, and Sean. I'm famous. Don't you wish you'd stuck with me?

But I can't tell the person I most wish to about my success. She wouldn't understand.

When Mom stopped replying to my e-mails, I assumed it was because Steve and his young wife, Mary, had just presented
her with twin grandchildren and she no longer had room for the little cuckoo she'd nurtured for so long. When my birthday passed and no present arrived, I thought she'd finally decided I was too old for gifts. When I telephoned and she didn't answer, I assumed she was away visiting Steve or maybe staying with Hilary in New York. I left a message, but she didn't call me back. To my shame, three months passed without hearing from her before I contacted Steve to ask if she was okay.

Nah, he'd said. She's lost it.

I flew over to see her in the home they'd put her in when she'd started wandering to the shops in her nightdress.

Dear Mom. I can still see her anxious face when I came into her room. She knew she was supposed to know me, but the memory of my name was gone. “It's Lin,” I said. “Your stepdaughter.”

“Lin!” she cried, and her eyes relaxed and she smiled happily. “Of course, it's you. How are you, dear? I like your shoes, are they new?”

“No, Mom, I bought them a while ago, but they are nice, aren't they?” I'd said, and gave her the Swiss chocolates I brought.

“Thank you, dear,” she said. “I like your shoes. Are they new?”

The next time I visited there was no light in her eyes at all. She didn't notice my shoes. She didn't notice anything at all. I seldom cry, but that day I wept all the way to the airport. Very little of Mom was still there. Her body now grown frail and her mind mostly departed, I felt I'd lost my only family.

Dear Mom. I took you too much for granted. I wish I'd told you how much I loved you before it was too late.

It was then I decided to find my sisters, so I wouldn't have to feel so alone in the world. Vivienne and Alison, did you see me tonight? Did you hear me stake my claim to our father?

I drag myself out only when my eyelids start to droop. Although I long for the embrace of the crisp white sheets of my bed, I stop at the table and check my e-mail.

In my in-box are notes from Marion and Ian and from several other members of the staff. Two suppliers obsequiously register their congratulations. A request for an interview from a journalist from a business magazine. Three salespeople wanting to sell me something.

And—an e-mail from Emmy. The last wisps of alcohol vanish from my brain. Little Emmy, half brat and half sweet kid. Growing up in leaps and bounds, faster than her father could bear. I couldn't help resenting the hold she had over him.
What's that hanging off Emmy's little finger?
I'd ask.
Oh, it's Ben,
I'd answer.

Although I admired his devotion to his daughter, I wished he had more for me.

I open the message.

Dear Lin, I just heard that you're down here in New Zealand! I hope you're going to come and visit. Dad didn't say what happened, just that you and he had broken up and he didn't know if we'd see you again.

Anyway, I just wanted to say hi, and that Dad misses you and I do too, so I hope you can visit us. Maybe you and Dad can sort it out?

Love, Emmy

Now, how was I to reply? Insult her with prevarication or hurt her with the truth?

In the room the men come and go, talking of ultrafast broadband.

For my first public event as Hera's CEO, I wear a dark-gray suit with a skirt that ends just below the knee and a pair of modest heels. No cleavage, no thigh, no toes, nothing see-through and nothing too tight. Definitely nothing that says “fuck me.” Women chief executives do not seek to be fucked.

There is a crowd around the chief executive of the country's incumbent Kiwicom. Although run by foreigners and owned by mainly foreign investors, they are still considered “the local” telco. As Tom and I pause at the entrance to the room, a short man with a thick moustache peels away from the group and approaches us. Tom introduces him as chairman of the Telecommunications Forum, but I am so busy basking in my new title I forget to listen to his name.

Another two men leave the group and join us. Their eyes quickly skim my figure before settling on my face. One is partner-manager for Kiwicom, and the younger of the two is a management consultant specializing in transformations, he tells me. He has a quick line of banter that breaks the ice.

I practice my executive smile. Although I know these men are not interested in Lin the person, only in Lin Mere, chief executive, it is hard not to enjoy the attention.

A young waitress holds out a tray and offers me a miniature hamburger, an inch in diameter, stuck on a toothpick flying a Kiwi flag.

“Pretty,” I say, and take one. I try not to eye the tray too eagerly. I missed lunch and I'm hungry.

“Yes, they're from Ruth Pretty Catering. Top up?” she gestures with the bottle. I shake my head. I will wet my lips, I will not drink.

A fair-haired man with a hawkish nose and a square jaw greets me. “Luke Holden,” he says and reaches out a well-manicured hand. “You must be Linnette Mere.” He holds my hand a second too long.

“Linnet,” I reply. “Are you in the telecommunications business too?”

He smiles ruefully. “Afraid so. Is your husband with you?”

“I don't have a husband.”

“Boyfriend?”

I shake my head. “Not even a cat. And you?”

Luke is signaling the waitress. “Let me get you a drink,” and he places a glass of red wine in my hand and smiles down at me. “Bit of a crush tonight. Do you know many people here?”

I am whisked around the room to meet more guests. Tom catches up with us and takes my arm.

“I must take Lin to meet—” he says and starts to move away.

“So you'll join me at the ballet?” Luke asks, his eyes creasing into a smile just for me.

“I would like that.”

I smile back with a real smile as Tom pulls me away.

“Henry, meet Lin Mere. Lin, Dr. Grey chairs the technology committee.”

A thin man holds out a limp hand and gives mine a perfunctory shake.

“American,” he says, accusingly.

“Nice to meet you,” I reply.

Dr. Grey grunts. “Tom, give me a call next week,” and he moves away.

Luke appears beside me and puts his hand on my arm. “Do you want to meet Wilson?” he asks.

“Does he still have any power?”

“Not much,” says Tom, glaring at Luke.

“But his opinion influences others,” Luke says.

So we thread our way through the gaggle to where an older gentleman with a lined face, hairy brows, and a tired brown suit, is accepting homage by the window. He does not look out onto the city that sparkles beneath us. Instead, he looks down at his hands, busy demonstrating the latest technological masterpiece given him by some sycophant.

The old guy looks at Luke and nods in recognition but does not relinquish his new toy. Luke introduces us and Wilson studies me briefly.

“Do you know Larry Ellison?” he asks.

“No,” I reply.

“Bill?”

Which one? Although it doesn't matter because I don't know either Clinton or Gates. I shake my head. “No.”

Wilson grunts and turns back to his toy.

“Sorry,” says Luke with a quick smile as we move away and leave the aging politico to the admiration of his cronies. “He's a bit of a fame groupie these days.”

Tom takes my arm, swinging me away from Luke's genial presence and leads me to a tall woman with a calm face and dark hair pulled back in a small bun that rests on the back of her neck.

“Georgette Meyer,” Tom says. “This is Lin Mere, our new chief executive. Georgette is the associate minister for the broadband initiative.”

Georgette gives me a large hand to shake.

“Congratulations on the new job. We're looking forward to Hera's involvement,” she says. “We need more international investment.”

“But as a junior partner,” I say.

Georgette nods. “As a junior partner. No selling off the crown jewels to foreigners. How are you enjoying New Zealand?” she asks.

“I spend most of my time in Wellington,” I reply. “But what I've seen is very beautiful.”

“You have to get out into the countryside,” she says. “That's where the real New Zealand lies.”

I nod and give her my polite smile. “I'm hoping to find the time to do a hike.”

“Tramp,” says Tom.

“Pardon me?”

“We call it tramping, not hiking.”

“I'd like to do a—whatever.”

We move away and into the path of a platter of small fritters. “Whitebait,” says the waitress. Eight hands reach in, octopuslike, to secure a fritter. They are white and soft. So are the fritters.

“Where are the rest of the women, Tom? I thought New Zealand was full of senior-level women?”

“They're still running half the Government departments, but since Tania left Kiwicom there are fewer senior women running the tech companies. Jane Kelly from VNL is over by the bar, the blond woman talking with Scott. She's keen to meet you.”

I gaze across the room at our lead consultant and his companion. So he's in bed with VNL, just what I should have expected.

“Your new friend will, of course, try to persuade you to go with LCNS.”

“Luke? He's with LCNS?”

“Director of sales.”

Huh. Conflict of interest. Damn.

The laughter has grown loud as the guests avail themselves of the free wine. The men start talking about rugby, and then about the property market. I smile politely and nod in the right
places. Eventually, the room empties out of the senior people, only the juniors and the freeloaders remain, settling in to drink the free booze as long as possible.

Tom checks his cell phone and tells me he needs to be home in time to watch the fireworks display, so shall we go?

I am barely inside the apartment when my telephone rings.

“Hello? This is Lin Mere.”

“I want to eat your pussy.”

“What?”

“I want to eat your pussy!” the female voice repeats.

I slam down the handset.

Well, that was a first. A dirty phone call from a woman.

Typical. If a woman is single and in a position of power, there's always the assumption that she must be like a man and therefore a lesbian.

As I gaze at the telephone handset, I wonder who she was and why she thought she could just ring a stranger and speak like that. My guise of being Caesar's wife is still in place. Why would anyone think I was interested in sex?

The telephone rings again.

“Hello?” I say, tentatively. “This is Lin.”

“It's me.”

The skies explode and I drop the phone. Outside, fireworks commemorating Guy Fawkes have started with three balls of gold that splatter into myriad fragments before my eyes.

I retrieve the phone. “Ben.”

“Emmy showed me your e-mail. How are you?”

The skies now fill with multiple silver flares.

“Fine.”

Multiple skyrockets bursting into stars of many colors.

Ben is silent. The shreds of light fall down into the sea.

“I hadn't heard from you,” he says. “As far as I knew, we were finished.”

More balls of golden fire, exploding into red hearts that evaporate, just like they do in real life.

“You didn't make any contact, Ben. You made no effort at all.”

“I think it was up to you, Lin, to make an effort. It was you who slept with whatshisname.”

Green lights, yellow lights, red lights.

“I did make the effort! I came all the way to New Zealand!”

“No doubt you came down here at whatshisname's call, Lin, for your brilliant new job!”