Into the Garden (Wildflowers 5)

We went to clean up and I put on something nicer than a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt to wear to Star's house. Then I packed a small bag for my overnight stay. I couldn't help feeling anxious about it. I had never before stayed overnight in anyone's home but my own.

Jade called for her limousine and ordered the driver to take us to Star's after he had dropped off Misty and her, but I couldn't help trembling a little as I locked the front door and left. Jade sensed it the most, I thought.

"It will get easier and easier each time," she whispered. "Before long, you won't even give her a passing thought." She squeezed my hand and we all got into the limousine.

I clutched my overnight bag on my lap like I would a parachute and stared ahead.

"I hope you're both going to follow OWP rules and not eat too much fattening food," Jade told Star.

"When you have her over at your house, you'll be in charge of the menu. Your buffet wasn't exactly a Jenny Craig spread. Anyway, I'll thank you not to tell me and my granny what to have for supper," Star retorted. She shook her head at me.

"I'm just trying to--"

"Run everybody's life?" Star sang.

"Oh, what's the use? You can help only those who want to be helped," she told Misty, who raised her eyebrows. "You know that you didn't wash off all the paint. You've got a black streak on your left temple. How did you get paint there?"

Misty shrugged.

"If my mother asks, I'll tell her I helped paint a doghouse or something. Stop worrying about everything."

"From the way it looks," Jade said, "I'll be the only one who worries about anything. What time will you be back tomorrow?" she asked Star.

"Let's see," Star said slowly, "after Cat and I get our toenails done and we have our skin treatment, we'll do lunch at the Polo Club and then--"

"All right, you idiot, just tell me when you want me to be over," Jade moaned.

Star glanced at me, shrugged and said, "About noon, I suppose."

Jade made arrangements to pick up Misty and then they were both dropped off. Now that Star and I were alone in the limousine and heading for her home, I really grew nervous.

"Will your granny ask me lots of questions?" I wanted to know.

"Probably," Star said. "Don't try to lie. She's got some kind of built-in lie detector."

"Great. What will I do if she asks about Geraldine?"

"Tell her everything but her fortunate departure and subsequent burial," she instructed. "Don't worry. She's not nosey. She's just concerned. Thank goodness for that," she added, and gazed out the window. "Without her, I wouldn't know what to do. Rodney would probably end up in some orphanage and I'd become a lady of the street."

"You wouldn't really, would you?"

"Cat, when all you have is what you have, you don't have any other choice sometimes. But forget it. We have it all now. We have each other," she added.

"Yes," I said. "We have each other."

Star's granny had an apartment on the first floor of a building in Venice Beach. Because of the apartment's location in the building, it had a rear entrance to a small patch of land covered with an anemic lawn, spotty and, according to Star, often cluttered with garbage of one sort or another.

"My granny takes it on herself to keep it as cleaned up as possible. A few times I caught her carrying away old tires. I don't know where she gets the strength and it doesn't do any good to bawl her out for it either. She just shakes her head and says 'What has to be done, has to be done.' That's Granny," Star explained as the limousine pulled to the curb.

Star's neighborhood looked seedy and worn, some of the small homes in desperate need of whitewashing, their sidewalks cracked and chipped, their gates and walls broken, some with doors dangling on rusted hinges. Every once in a while, there was a house that was well kept; at least Star's granny wasn't the only one trying to maintain the grounds and the building.

"Granny says we're too close to the ocean here. The sea air eats away at everything."

What a contrast to Jade's estate, I thought. Star was right. We were all from different planets.

We got out and entered the building. Someone had scribbled graffiti on the wall with a thick marker.

"Uh-oh," Star said. "That's new. Tomorrow morning, Granny will be out here scrubbing. Don't say anything about it," she warned me, and she rang the buzzer. "I for- got my key," she explained.