Rayne & Delilah's Midnite Matinee(69)

I wonder if I should be taking advantage of the time to talk about the show. I decide to let Divine take the lead tonight and try to play it cool. I’d meant to Google “how to get a TV deal” before our meeting, but it slipped my mind.

We arrive at a place called Linda’s Jim Steakhouse. There’s a valet stand at the entrance. Pimpy-looking old men in white suits and orange fake tans with their considerably younger wives/girlfriends/mistresses gather around the entrance while valets whisk away their midlife/endlife-crisis mobiles. Dread seeps through me. My budget does not allow for a place like this. But what did I expect? Some big Hollywood type to hold a dinner meeting at Arby’s? Using my phone camera as a mirror, I hurriedly wipe off some of my makeup, so I merely look eccentric and not professionally bizarre.

“Glad you’re here,” I whisper to Lawson, gripping his arm.

“Especially after you only recently went to your first restaurant,” he whispers back, squeezing my hand on his arm. It takes me a second to remember my own joke. I love that he remembers my jokes even better than I do.

We walk inside the restaurant. It’s all dark wood and leather and bottles of expensive-looking alcohol and signed headshots of old-timey famous people and Frank Sinatra playing while pissy-looking middle-aged waiters in white shirts and bow ties hustle around like snobby ants.

“Table for four, and do be as quick as you can,” Divine says in an imperious, dismissive tone.

The host eyes the four of us with a wary mix of consternation and contempt. “Let me see what we have available.” He gives Lawson the up-and-down. “Sir, I’m afraid our dress code does require a blazer for gentlemen. If you don’t have one, I can offer you one to wear while dining.”

This is going to be a fun, fun dinner. Did I mention fun?

“Sure,” Lawson says tersely. “Hope I don’t spill.”

With a sour smile, the host walks to a nearby rack, selects a blazer, and hands it to Lawson. “I have you at a thirty-eight chest.”

Lawson takes the navy-blue blazer with a little gold crest on the front pocket and puts it on. It fits perfectly.

“Now then,” the host says, studying his reservation book. “It will be a few moments before we can seat you.”

Divine sniffs. “A few moments? I give myself another hour before I turn to cannibalism.”

The host leans in and, in a hushed tone, motioning at the four of us with his index finger, says, “Sir, if this is some sort of situation where—”

“She is not a prostitute, sir, if that’s what you’re implying,” Divine says noisily and indignantly, drawing stares. “Well…at least I don’t know her to be one. In any event, that’s not the capacity in which she’s here with me.”

The host’s face goes vermilion. “Sir, you misunderstand me. I wasn’t—”

“I’m actually standing right here,” I murmur, blushing to match the host’s shade. No acknowledgment.

Divine draws himself up to his full five-foot-three like a cartoon rooster. “Do you know who I am, sir?”

“I’m afraid memory fails me, sir. Forgive me.”

“Well, sir, get on your smartphone or whatever it is you use to inform yourself about the world and look up the name Jack Divine. You’ll see I certainly don’t pay for sex. Don’t need to. And what sort of prostitute dresses like this?” He flicks his hand at me.

I want to dissolve and turn to vapor. Even though I am dressed as Rayne, I’m not too self-conscious, since the black Hot Topic Victorian-style dress I am wearing looks only a little costumey when you take away the makeup and accessories. Plus, it’s Florida, so come on. But now? “Right here,” I say. “I am standing right here.” Nothing.

“Sir,” the host says, as though speaking with a toddler, “what I was going to say is if this is some sort of double-date situation, we might be able to seat the two couples at separate tables sooner, if time is of great concern.”

Divine guffaws. “Yuri? Oh, heavens, I would aim higher than Yuri if I swung that way. He was bred for brawn, not beauty.”

“Am standing right here,” Yuri growls.

“Yes, yes, fine, forgive me, Yuri,” Divine says. “Obviously yours is more of an inner beauty.”

This is going to be a long night. Please, God, make it worthwhile. Let me deliver this for Delia. Let me save our show.

Lawson reaches down and squeezes my hand.

And let me save this.





For a while, I listen to music, loud enough to try to jar the thoughts from my head like pounding on the bottom of a ketchup bottle, but for some reason, I can’t stand it. So I try one of my favorite true-crime podcasts. Nope. It sits with me like petting a dog the wrong way.

So I listen to the hum of the tires. I think about Josie and Lawson with Jack Divine. I hope they’re doing well. I think about how this is the longest I’ve ever driven on my own. And I try to plan out what I’m going to say to my dad.

Hi. Maybe you recognize me. I’m the daughter you abandoned.

Hi. I’m Delia Wilkes. Remember me?

Hi, “Derek Armstrong.” Bet you never expected to see me again.

And every one of these greetings—each of which rings more tinged with bravado than the last in my mind—ends the same way: I came to find you because I need you to tell me to my face why you left. I need to know why I wasn’t good enough to stay your daughter. Why you couldn’t stay my dad.