“Don’t be sorry. Obviously it isn’t your fault. But where are you going?”
“Home.” I tried to keep my tone breezy so as not to alarm anyone else in the car. “Olivia wants to meet her father.” Olivia looked up at the sound of her name and smiled at me. I smiled back. Breezy. Everything was breezy.
“Her father?” Michael echoed. “Do you even know where your father is right now?”
“No, as a matter of fact I don’t. I’ve been trying to reach him all day, but he won’t pick up my calls or return my messages—”
“Of course not, cell phones are prohibited in the courthouse. Everyone knows that. Haven’t you ever served on jury duty?”
“No,” I said, a little defensively. “Remember? I wanted to but they waived my summons because they were afraid it would be too much of a media circus if I showed up—wait, he’s in court?”
“Yes, you didn’t know? I just saw a clip of him on New York One, headed up the courthouse steps with his lawyers. His case was finally called today. He wore his ceremonial dress uniform, including his sword. They confiscated it, of course.”
Obviously I didn’t know. No one ever tells me anything.
I signaled to Lilly to check her phone. She did so, casually keeping the screen from Olivia’s view. Olivia had informed us that her aunt Catherine said she isn’t “allowed to have a phone,” though her stepcousins, Justin and Sara, each have one, as well as a tablet and laptop.
(The list of items Olivia is not allowed, besides sugar, cell phones, and trips to New York City, is long and somewhat curious, and makes me question her aunt’s parenting skills somewhat, although I realize, not having children, I have no right to judge. The list includes:
No pierced ears.
No bedtime any later than 9:30 p.m., “even on weekends.”
No books above a sixth-grade reading level, which is problematic since Olivia “is reading at an eighth-grade level,” or so she proudly informed us.
No pets of any kind, as “Uncle Rick is allergic.”
No shoes inside the house.
No friends over, as “they might bother Uncle Rick.”
No going online, except for homework.
No video games—too violent.
No gluten—although neither Olivia nor anyone else in the O’Toole household has been diagnosed with celiac disease or a gluten intolerance.
No television shows that haven’t been rated okay for kids eleven or under.
No Boris P. “Too sexy.”)
Tina was so profoundly upset by this list (especially the part about no adult books and Boris being considered “too sexy”) that she handed Olivia her phone, which was encrusted with pink crystals, and of course loaded with Boris P. videos.
“Here,” Tina said. “You can have this until you get your own.”
Olivia was delightedly shocked, and cried, “Thank you, Aunt Tina!”
I was shocked, too, but probably not for the same reason as my sister.
“Tina,” I hissed. “You don’t have to give her your phone. We’ll get her one. Besides, what are you going to use?”
Tina pulled another phone from her enormous Tiffany-?blue tote. “Don’t worry about it. That’s my game and music phone. This is my real phone.” This one was Bedazzled in zebra-stripe crystals.
Lilly turned her own phone toward me. She’s trying hard not to swear in my little sister’s presence, so all she said was, “Zoinks.”
The main page to TMZ (now no longer one of the nation’s leading gossip sites, but its leading breaking-news site) had split its screen so that one half showed a photo of my dad outside the Manhattan courthouse, and the other a photo of me taken outside Cranbrook Middle School, surrounded by Olivia’s classmates.
“Prince Meets the Judge,” screamed my dad’s half.