Golden Girl(3)

Ten years had passed. Carson was no longer a little girl but she still had her challenging moments.

“This is my house,” Vivi said. “I pay the mortgage, the taxes, the insurance, the electric bill, the heating bill, the cable bill. I do the shopping and make the meals. While you’re sleeping under this roof, I don’t want you out all night drinking, smoking, and having sex with complete strangers. Do you know how that looks?” Vivi stopped just short of reminding Carson that she’d already had chlamydia once, the previous summer. “You’re setting a rotten example for your brother.”

“He doesn’t need me to set an example,” Carson said. “He has Willa. I’m the screwup. It’s my job to be a hideous disappointment.”

“No one said you were a hideous disappointment, sweetheart.”

“I’m twenty-one,” Carson said. “I can drink legally. I can smoke pot legally.”

“Since you’re so grown up,” Vivi said, “you can move out on your own.”

“That’s the plan,” Carson said. “I’m saving.”

You’re not saving, Vivi wanted to say. Carson made good tips at the Oystercatcher but she spent them—on drinks, on weed, on clothes from Erica Wilson, Milly and Grace, the Lovely. Carson had finally dropped out of UVM after struggling through five semesters—her cumulative GPA was a 1.6—and although Vivi was initially aghast (an education makes you good company for yourself!), she knew college wasn’t for everyone.

“I’m not giving you a curfew,” Vivi said. “But this behavior won’t be tolerated.”

“This behavior won’t be tolerated,” Carson mimicked. It was the response of a seven-year-old, and yet it brought the reaction Carson wanted. Vivi took a step toward her, arm tensed. “Are you going to spank me?” Carson asked.

“Of course not,” Vivi said, though she kind of wanted to. “But you have to clean up your act, babe, or I’ll ask you to leave.”

“Fine,” Carson said. “I’ll go to Dad’s.”

“I’m sure Amy would take very kindly to you coming home like this.”

“She’s not as bad as you think,” Carson said. “When you demonize her, you show how insecure you are.”

Vivi stared at her child, but before she could come up with a response, she smelled something. “Did you…cook?” Vivi asked.

Carson stepped into the bedroom and slammed the door behind her.

Vivi flew down the stairs to the kitchen, which was filling with black smoke. The leftover sausage and basil pasta from last night’s dinner was in Vivi’s brand-new All-Clad three-quart sauté pan on a lit burner. The inside of the pan was charred black. Vivi turned the burner off, grabbed a towel, carried the smoldering pan outside, and set it on the flagstone path. It was so hot, it would have scorched the deck or the lawn.

Brand-new pan, ruined.

The sausage and basil pasta in a luscious mustard cream sauce, which Vivi had been thinking of taking over to Willa’s as a peace offering, ruined.

And what if Vivi hadn’t gotten out of bed? What if the kitchen had caught fire; what if flames had engulfed Money Pit while Vivi—and Leo—were sleeping? They would all be dead!

Back in the kitchen, Vivi caught sight of her bottle of Casa Dragones tequila on the side counter next to a shot glass. She felt a formidable strain of fury brewing inside her. That tequila was hers; she wouldn’t even let her (almost-ex-) boyfriend, Dennis, make margaritas with it. Carson had come home, put the pasta on a burner, done two—or three?—shots of Vivi’s tequila, which Carson knew was not for public consumption, and then left the pasta to burn on the stove.

Vivi marched back up the stairs and pounded on Carson’s locked door.

“You left the pan on an open flame!” Vivi said. Leo would definitely be awake now, which Vivi felt bad about because it was Saturday morning, but oh, well. “What is wrong with you, Carson? Do you honestly not think about anyone but yourself? Do you not think, period?” There was no response. Vivi kicked the door.

“Please go away” came the response from inside. “I’m trying to sleep.”

“And you drank my tequila!” Vivi said. “Which you know is off-limits.”

“I didn’t drink the tequila,” Carson said. “I haven’t had a drink since I left the Chicken Box and that was hours ago.”

Vivi blinked. Carson sounded like she was telling the truth and she had seemed sober. “Who drank it, then?”

There was a pause before Carson said, “Well, who else lives here?”

Leo? Vivi thought. She looked at Leo’s bedroom door, which was shut tight. Leo had been going to high-school parties since he was a sophomore, but a run-in with J?germeister had propelled him away from the hard stuff. He drank Bud Light and the occasional White Claw.

Vivi turned back to Carson’s door. “You are scrubbing that pot, young lady,” she said. “Or buying me a new one.”



After Vivi poured herself some coffee, opened all the windows, turned both sailcloth ceiling fans to high, washed the shot glass, and hid what remained of the Casa Dragones in the laundry room (her kids would never find it there), she calmed down a bit. She was the mother of three very young adults and parenting very young adults required just as much patience as parenting very young children. No one ever talked about this; it felt like a dirty little secret. Vivi had always imagined that by the time her kids were twenty-four, twenty-one, and eighteen, they’d all be drinking wine together around the outdoor table by the pool, and the kids would be cooking, clearing, and giving Vivi sage investment advice. Ha.