Valerie had been present for the first few group photos, but had slipped away while we were talking to the photographer. She’d been oddly quiet throughout the event, letting the mayor and Beth handle all the talking.
Sana looked around, but nobody was near enough to overhear us. “I think Valerie’s upset that Beth has taken over as head Thompson. You saw how she was when she talked about her place in the family business. She probably thought this was her chance to make an impact on the company.”
She paused, fiddling with her recycled paper cup. “It hasn’t been made public yet, but I think Beth is the new head of the company. I can’t even imagine how Valerie feels, considering her relationship with Beth and that she isn’t even blood.”
“How do you know all this?” Elena had finished handing out samples and wandered over to where we stood.
Sana’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. “I do coaching work for the Thompson Family Company, remember? Not that Beth has ever bothered attending any of the sessions. She’s smart enough to not say anything too obvious since there hasn’t been a press release yet, but she’s not the most subtle person in the world. The life I’ve had, you really learn to look past the marketing copy to discern the true intent.”
It hadn’t occurred to me that with Rob gone, there would be a shift in leadership in the Thompson family business. Would Valerie have killed her brother for a shot at taking her rightful place in the family hierarchy? Or had Beth known she’d be the likely successor and wanted to speed up her rise to the top? Since Sana did coaching work for the company, would she have a better insight to the company’s power dynamics? Remembering Beth’s earlier remarks, the two seemed to have a rather contentious acquaintance, with Beth having little respect for Sana’s profession. I wondered what the story was there. Maybe something for the aunties to sniff out? The Calendar Crew must know something about all this.
“Did you make these muffins, Lila?”
Beth slipped into our circle so seamlessly, I let out a yelp, worried she’d overheard our little tsismis session.
“Uh, yeah?” I cleared my throat and attempted to speak with more confidence. “Yes, one of my partners,” here I gestured toward Elena, “requested that I make my own version of her favorite muffins. I replaced the usual lemon with calamansi, which is a small citrus fruit native to the Philippines.”
OK, so that came out more encyclopedic than confident, but at least it was an improvement from uptalking and that weird noise I’d made. Knowledge was power, right? OK, maybe that didn’t fit here, but Beth kept catching me off guard.
She smiled, ignoring my awkwardness. “Whatever it is, it’s delicious. Remind me to talk to you about publicity for your little shop. Maybe we can have you cater some of the Thompson business meetings as well. I think you might have something special.”
I didn’t know whether to bristle at her minimizing comment about the cafe or be thrilled that a woman with as much power and influence as Beth wanted to help me out, so I just changed the subject. “Is it time to go back yet?”
Beth glanced at her rose gold watch and grimaced. “Indeed it is. All right, ladies, let’s go interview the future leaders of Shady Palms.”
Chapter Ten
If these girls were the future of Shady Palms, maybe it was a good thing I’d moved back here.
We filed into one of the small classrooms housed in the community center, this one dedicated to arts and crafts, if the various paintings and collages lining the wall were any indication. Most of the surfaces were covered with a dusting of glitter, which would soon be coating us as well. Beth pulled a lint roller out of her purse and went over her outfit to try and remove every little sparkle, but I didn’t bother. Fighting glitter was a losing battle.
We took our seats at the long table at the front of the room, in front of which sat five chairs. The first Q&A was done group-interview style, and the contestants were not only being graded on their answers, but their posture, poise, confidence, and ability to lead a conversation as well. Each judge had the same list of twenty-five questions in front of them, and we would each ask a question off that list at random, so that no contestant group received the same three questions.
Beth, as head judge, went first, followed by Sana, then me. By the usual pageant rules, I should’ve ranked higher than Sana, but because I was technically a replacement judge, I was at the bottom. Not that it mattered, since our scores all carried the same weight, but pageantry sure loved enforcing hierarchy and so did Beth.
“OK, I’ve marked the questions I’m going to ask each girl, so cross-check your list now so you don’t get mixed up. Since this is in groups, it’s easy to get confused or off-topic, but we don’t have time for that.” Beth showed us her questionnaire, her bold handwriting listing a contestant next to each question.
“Wow, you’re very organized,” was all I could say. I figured I’d just wing it and choose my questions based on the vibe I got from the group.
Beth had a lovely smile, but there was always a touch of disdain in it. “We’re interviewing three dozen teenagers over the next couple of hours. The only way I’m not going to run screaming from this room after the millionth inane answer is if I stay organized and keep us on schedule.”
She ran her hands lovingly over her champagne-colored planner. “It’s no different from a job interview. Study the candidates ahead of time, prepare the questions accordingly, and shunt them out on time so you can move on to the next one.”
I nodded as if I understood, when in reality I’d never been on a real job interview, let alone run one. I’d worked at Tita Rosie’s Kitchen most of my life, and even the internship and odd restaurant jobs I’d had in college were because of my ex-fiancé, Sam. Over the past few months, I’d had to deal with people (mostly my family) pointing out how spoiled and privileged I was, but it wasn’t until that moment that I’d realized that maybe they were right.
This point was driven home when one of the contestants, a lovely Puerto Rican girl named Sara Colon, answered the question, “How do you plan on juggling the responsibilities of the crown with the demands of your current life?”
I thought it was a silly question because how busy could these girls be? At their age, I was pulling straight As, taking exam prep classes, working at Tita Rosie’s Kitchen, and still found plenty of time to hang out with Adeena, Terrence, and my then-boyfriend, Derek.