I waited weeks before bringing up the phone call. My birthday was a month and a half away, but I, for several reasons, had been stalling. On the one hand, I was curious whether my mother had actually quit the booze, and if she and I could have some sort of relationship. But on the other, I was petrified of seeing her. What if she said or did something stupid that made me angry, or worse, made me cry? I couldn’t let her get to me that way. Also, I was scared of my father’s reaction. Just the mention of her name usually sent him into a tizzy. For two weeks, I’d hidden behind the convenience of our conflicting schedules. But then came a morning where our breakfasts overlapped, and I decided the time had come.

“I’m failing math.” I poured myself some orange juice and took a few pieces of bacon off the plate Concetta had laid out.

“What happened to that tutor you had?” Daddy asked from behind the paper.

“He was a schmuck. I told him not to come back.”

“Jackie, mind your language, pleeeese.” Anna winked and shook her fork at me. After four years in Beverly Hills, Anna had settled into speaking as if she were a dignitary; like the ambassador to Spain, her thick accent returning only when she was excited or upset.

“I don’t know why I have to learn geometry anyway. Am I going to be a carpenter when I grow up?”

I was vamping, working up the guts to start the real conversation.

“Hey, Dad, guess what. There’s a teacher at our school who everyone thinks is a lesbian. Her name is Agnes, isn’t that perfect?”

Anna tapped my father’s arm.

“Yes, okay, I’ll tell Grace to call the school for a new tutor.” Grace was my father’s secretary. I pushed around the eggs on my plate.

“Concetta!” Anna signaled the housekeeper to clear the dishes.

“Um, there’s a musical at school everyone is trying out for,” I said.

“A musical?” Anna asked. “Is it Bye Bye Birdie? I love that one.”

“I thought it was West Side Story you loved,” Daddy said.

“No,” I interrupted. “This musical is about Hawaii. Oh, Dad, that reminds me, speaking of Hawaii—”

My father was half out of his chair still reading the paper as he fished for his jacket.

“South Pacific?” Anna asked. “With that song ‘Bali Hai?’”

“Daddy! Wait! Wait!”

“What is it, Jackie?” he asked impatiently.

“Um, oh, just that… I need someone to sign a consent form for a field trip on Friday.”

“Fax it to your father’s office and Grace will fax the school,” Anna said, rising, her purse in hand.

It was now or never. My window of opportunity was closing, and I couldn’t afford to chicken out. “Oh, one more thing. Mom called.”