“Listen to me, you creep!” her mother snapped with more emotion than Lavida had ever heard from her mother. “You played with my heart, you used me, you dropped me like a hot stove. I’ve been silent for so long, but now I’m ready to fight. You have one week to think about it. One million bucks, or we go all legal about this. Three times you have had me treated like a trespasser and had me thrown out. Oh, so you hung up on me...” She hung up too. “Talking of fifty thousand. Does he think I’m stupid?”
She turned and saw Lavida, and jumped to her feet. “Lavida, honey, how long have you been there?”
Her mother seemed terrified. She now shook a finger at Lavida. “Listen; you have no business creeping up on people to listen to their conversations! It’s a mean trick. I thought you were outside. Don’t ever let me catch you spying on my conversations again!”
Lavida was annoyed. “Spying? Is that what you think I was doing? I was merely coming downstairs and coincidentally you were on the phone, and apparently you didn’t want me to hear about your love issues and million dollar deals!”
“That’s it!” her Mom made a movement of finality with her hand. “Go back to your room, now! You’ll be having dinner in your room. I don’t want to see you till morning.”
“Mom, I’m twenty-two! You have to stop treating me like a high school kid! Don’t I have the right to know about this? I mean, we were hard-pressed for money since you lost your job and were merely surviving on your savings until I won that reality show, Mom.”
“And spent half the money on cheating boyfriends and stupid clothes and silly jewellry! How do you spend six thousand on a ring?”
“How is it you are discussing a million dollars on the phone?”
“It’s none of your business. But if I get it, I will think of my daughter before I think of boyfriends.”
“I was stupid, Mom, and Trevor and I broke up. After I already gave him fifteen thousand business capital that I will probably never get back.”
“Go to your room, Lavida,” her mother’s voice softened. “Trust me, it’s better this way. You shouldn’t know what this is all about.”
Lavida gaped. “Are you involved in crime?”
“Crime?” her mother laughed. “You have a wild imagination. I’m going after this creep who owes us.”
“Owes us a million dollars?” Lavida still seemed dumbfounded.
“Lavida, go to your room!” her mother snapped, grabbed the remote and turned up the TV volume. Lavida shrugged and walked back to her room.
*
Lavida’s mother was watching the TV screen but her mind had drifted back to a particular episode twenty-two years ago. This is what had happened twenty-two years earlier:
Tanya Hudson parked her Honda Fit and banged the door shut, ignoring the smiling parking attendant who had stretched out his hand, one big smile on his face. She was singing the song that had been playing on the car radio: Boyz II Men’s Water Runs Dry. She stopped singing as she dialled a number and began to speak on the phone, loud enough to be heard thirty yards away.
“Listen to me, Kim, you had better bring me my money by ten A.M. or you’ll be taken off my friends’ list, bitch. I’ll give you some allowance: make it ten past ten.” She hung up with a sneering expression and walked on towards the Fine Italian Cuisine restaurant where she worked. She cut off an incoming call and entered the restaurant with one big smile.
“Tanya, you are late,” spoke Luigi the bulky Italian who owned the place.
“Sorry Luigi,” Tanya said without pausing. Another incoming call. She decided to receive it before Luigi started grumbling and the whole thing would erupt into a shouting match.
“Tanya, honey, how are you?”
“I’m busy, mom,” she said, walking towards the dressing room next to the kitchen. “I will call you later in the week.”
“You always say that,” her mother said sadly. “Can’t you drive over one weekend? I’ve been unwell for weeks. Your sister came to the hospital every day. You never showed up.”
“Oh, and once again Toria wins, kudos to her. I sent some money to you, don’t you forget that. Gotta go, mama. Take care. I promise I’ll visit one of these days.” She hung up, took her apron and walked towards her small office near the counter. Though she was supposed to be the manager, Luigi seemed to do all the managing, yelling from behind the counter at the waitresses, yelling at her, and at anyone who was not a customer. Beverly, a tall slim white girl and Olivia, a cute Mexican girl, were the two waitresses and seemed to spend the whole day in a dazed rush, propelled by Luigi’s tireless voice.
Her phone rang again as she sat at her desk, half hidden from Luigi by slightly tinted glass but not from his voice. She pressed the receive button and snapped: “Listen to me dear caller, I told you this is a wrong number. In spite of that, you have continued to call me tirelessly because you are classically stupid. Now I want you to hang up and next time don’t use a private number to hide your identity and better still, don’t call because nobody wants to get calls from one unidentified idiot and if you are that lonely, why don’t you watch a movie and pretend you are part of the cast?”
“You are cheating on Chris,” a voice spoke before she could hang up. She was an expert at hanging up the phone, but this voice had beaten her to it.