To Slay A Christmas Monster

KEMI AMUSAN

TO SLAY A CHRISTMAS MONSTER

PROLOGUE

Date: December 19, 2002

Subject: RE: Crushing Hard—Seriously I am Sane

Dear Rick,

I must have made quite an impression with those nude pictures I sent you; what was I thinking? You are a tech giant for Christ’s sake. It would take more than the picture of a nude pregnant eighteen year old to make you fall in love

So anyway, I will halt the nudes for now, till I am back to my Kate Moss look at least; but would lay bare for you other details of my life, even the ugly ones. They are the only ones I remember, anyway. Writing them down will sure please my therapist

Your Not-So-Creepy Fan,

Diane

Date: December 20, 2002

Subject: Girl Power—A Visit from Armani

Dear Rick,

Yeah, about baring the details of my life in writing- It’s not easy you know. It’s almost like browsing through a room full of decaying dead bodies. Messy, at best.

Anyways, I am going to college.

Using Alexa speak, I decided to ‘woman up’. You know, when she showed up on our doorstep, clad in Armani and called my frumpy mom out on being a pest.

Oh you don’t know Alexa. She is Jack’s cougar boss cum lover, cum wifey. I’d get to the story later. Again, dead bodies! Messy. Oh shit! And… Jack is my dad. We are estranged

So, about going to college. I figured I am going to need an upgrade. I mean my history of drugs, pregnancies, abortions and teenage marriage might not be the kind of background you would want your wife to have

So, I am ready to do something about that.

Dreaming,

Diane

Date: August 14, 2015

Subject: RE: Crushing Hard—Not So Much!

Dear Rick,

So I pick up Business Times after two weeks of vacationing at the psychiatric ward, and what do I hear? Rick Gordon refuses to apologize for his ‘lean back’ commencement speech.

To think I went crazy, shattering a glass ceiling to impress you- going back to college, a divorced twenty year old single mom, the rigours of Law School and securing partnership at one of the most fuck -you law firm in the country.

I won’t pull a Stan on this one and give up living! I would lean in as much as I want and enjoy my partnership- even if it gets me a permanent room at the York Psychiatric Canter.

So over You,

Diane

Date: November 5, 2015

Subject: RE: Crushing Hard—a Warning, a Favor, Whatever…

Dear Rick,

So Ivy told me you will be a guest on her show. . .

Yeah, yeah, I know she is smart, a wonderful blend between Beyoncé and Jenifer Lawrence, and very well on her way to becoming the next Oprah, but do you mind not falling in love with her?

I mean it would be so weird -my celebrity soul sister and my billionaire crush. Ex-crush, sorry.

It is the least you can do for me.

A Warning,

Diane

Date: January 1, 2003

Subject: O Sweet Mother of Many Eras—In the Beginning Was Sophie Roberta Beirschmidt

Dear Rick,

I reckoned I’d start with my mother.

Born Sophia Beirschmidt in a little Iowa farm, mom arrived Chicago with a determination to marry into old money, and nobility. Her rural Iowa however kept getting in the way and finally found a place in her hair- in the form of a purple highlight that isn’t fading anytime soon.

It was the era of Sophie the Great; a woman of the world, one keen on embracing the varieties that is the human race.

Her two best friends were much like her. Aunt Tricia was an activist of black heritage that fought for the rights of all colors, and Aunt Ingrid, well Aunt Ingrid… she loved her stars.

Sometime before she met my father, a small time magazine publisher mistook mom’s weirdness for psychic abilities and gave her a job copying horoscopes from other magazines, but mom’s inventiveness got the better of her. She took her job one step further and started a Dear Sophie column, dishing out advice like a pro

It backfired when a reader put all her money in the lottery at mom’s suggestion and lost everything - she let mom know she has a stellium in Scorpio, and if mom understood what that meant, she would have let it end there. Instead, she brought her farm girl into the mix and went home with more than a black eye

Crazy Sophie’s daughter,

Diane

ONE

DIANE

…296, 297, 298, 299, 300. Wow. It’s been all of five minutes since Justin Nelson, son of retail mogul, Frank Nelson has had his eyes fixed on my chest, trying to see through my Armani suit, I take: 300 seconds without blinking. Yes, I have been counting.

Any moment now, he would ask if I ever wear my blonde hair long, or if I own a cut-off jean and a pink tank-top, or if I like girls.

351, 352, 353… maybe he just finds this whole lunch thing as boring as I do. Maybe he is also thinking of slugging his dad, as I am thinking of slugging my senior partners-Doug and Matthew, for dragging this lunch meeting this long. We are supposed to be on our way back to the office, for Christ’s sakes.

382, 383, 384… Justin looks up and smiles. He really is a handsome one. Harvard trained and all that. Too tepid for me though.

I return his smile. When things go wrong in our client-lawyer relationship, I’d like him to remember I didn’t take his leering against him.

You don’t seem to be having a nice time, he says to me. Are you okay?

Did you get that insight from my breasts? I can’t resist asking. Obviously, my mouth didn’t get the memo to not take Justin’s leering against him, from my brain

I ignore the look of shock from my bosses and continue. Fifteen minutes ago,’’ I say. Lunch was over, but here we still are seated, and swapping Christmas tales. I have things I need to get back to in the office.’’

For a moment, Doug looks like he is about to have a stroke, but when I don’t repeat history and strip dance on the table, he relaxes.

"Diane is also a holiday baby. She was born on Christmas day.’’ He says, and Frank, Justin and Matthew reward the information, with variations of ‘wow, isn’t that lovely,’ like a December 25th birthday makes me a good person.

Doug, Matthew and Frank return to their Christmas stories and Justin, with eyes on my boobs asks, So, what do you need to get back to that is more important than this?

More important than being eye fucked by you? I ask quietly and he nods. He has to be kidding. There is no way I am going to tell anyone, least of all him, that I feel getting to the office in time for the Ivy Jordan Show will stop Rick and Ivy from falling in love. I mean I will be watching from a screen in Chicago, completely powerless if sparks start to fly between the two all the way in LA. So I reply, Just some life and death matter.

Justin nods again. He must find me highly profound. Talk about crushing. So what will you be doing this Christmas?

Cracking Santa’s balls. I answer. Once again, Doug gives me a brain-cells rearranging glare. I respond with a fake yawn and he gives Matthew who is seated beside me a meaningful look.

Ever eager to help drive Doug’s point home, Matthew places his left shoe on mine. The Nelsons are devout Catholics so cut it out. He whispers.

I might, if you get your flea market reject off my Manolos this minute, I hiss. Not like Matthew is one to take offence at being labelled cheap. He has transformed his love for the poor into an art, and resents me for my history of indifference to the homeless.

We are more alike than he thinks, though. We both do what we need to do to stay rich. Otherwise he wouldn’t be here sucking up to Frank Nelson who in a few months’ time, aims to convert the warehouse that has been serving as makeshift homeless shelter into a strip mall

As I watch him pour himself another drink, laughing to Frank Nelson’s tales of finding himself and his daughter –in- law under a mistletoe, an idea strikes me, one that will get us back to the office sooner.

I already envision myself getting so animated, that I spread my hands wide, then raise them up, then down like a desperate politician till I knock off Matthew’s wine glass and empty the content on his shirt.

I wash away practical matters like job security, with another glass of wine, then look across the table at Doug. I smile. Warily, he smiles back. You know, Doug,’’ I say, You will be more understanding of my fondness for cracking Santa’s balls, if you walked in on him raping one of your daughters."

Everyone is quiet. Except for the older Nelson. He actually winks at me. He is obviously enjoying this lunch. It has a freak show. Either that or he is concluding my no-holds-barred approach is why I am brilliant in the courtroom. I must brave this through.

I cross my legs and unintentionally tilt the table causing Matthew’s glass to empty on his pant.

I should be glad, Matthew looks discomfited. He might soon start foaming at the mouth if we don’t end this lunch, like right now. He hates to be caught in a mess

I on the other hand, feel a bit reluctant to leave. After all these years of repressing my own story out of respect for polite conversation, it is itching to be told. And I won’t let Matthew stand in the way of that.

Besides, Rick and Ivy have probably fallen in love and decided on a wedding date.

Have I upset you? I ask the table

Just a little, Justin stammers. Is Harvard blushing or am I just really drunk? I try to see the picture of Santa raping a little girl through his eyes and I get it. Over-pampered Daddy’s boy is traumatized already. Guys who get behind Santa suits usually have noble intentions, it’s unfair to suggest they could do something so outrageous. He glances up at his dad for support.

I see a seven-year-old in a 34-year-old’s body. Not my problem.

His willingness to discuss this at all, earns him my respect. How many Ivy Leaguers discuss rape at a formal lunch? Case in point, Doug, my apoplectic Princeton schooled senior partner.

I ignore him and return my attention to Justin, It did happen to me. I say, and Justin knocks off his glass, splashing wine on his father’s shirt.

Len and Tal lawyers may be sleazy enough to lunch in wine stained shirts, but Frank Nelson is of a different breed; and just when I thought I had my audience.

Date: December 24, 2002

Subject: Loss of Innocence- Once upon a Christmas Eve

Dear Rick,

Yes! The monsters in red suits are back, and lurking in broad day light, just like they were that afternoon when mom, suspicious of dad’s delay in arriving from Houston for the holidays, left me to investigate. We were in the middle of putting up the Christmas decorations.

Aunt Tricia was to take me in with her and Ivy, but she wasn’t due back from town till evening. So, I kept busy putting out the rest of the Christmas decorations. Dad always told me I had a knack for it, and when I was done, I knew he was right. Except of course for the gaping hole in the living room where the Christmas tree was supposed to be.

Cutting the pine tree from our backyard was dad’s call, but I wasn’t going to wait around for him to come home. Any grown up should be able to help. However, no one seemed to be home. Not even Mr. James Harley my English teacher who lived in the street next to mine. I left a message on his answering machine all the same. He had always told me to call on him if I was ever stranded at home.

Twenty minutes after, I was still staring out the window, willing someone, anyone to show up and help with the Pine tree.

And like a dream, Santa showed up. The Santa of 96. I always knew there was something special about him, like we were connected on some level. And not just because his Scottish accent had tickled me in the mall.

I remember him sawing the tree and hoisting it on his shoulder as I showed him into our living room; but when Aunt Tricia showed up in the house an hour later, I was lying unconscious under the pine tree, with blood trickling down my legs.

I had been raped by The Santa of 96

Broken,

Diane

TWO

DIANE

‘Tricia would have been so proud," Mother Sophie had said again and again of Aunt Tricia, Ivy’s mother, when Michelle Obama made an appearance on the Ivy Jordan show.

Rick Gordon, however belongs to a different sect. He is awfully rich, but not as mainstream as the political figures, Hollywood Actors and Sports Superstars that frequent Ivy’s lavender sofa.

It still doesn’t cast any shadow on Ivy’s success though. She has come a long way, and I am proud of her. I just wish it is I who will be sitting across from Rick in a short while.

The ‘What if…,’ thought lingers in my head again; what if Ivy likes Rick, and Rick likes Ivy back. I mean, what’s not to like? Ivy is an angel.

I don’t get to dwell on it though, because Rick struts in, looking majestic in a faded jean and an ocean blue shirt. The feminist cells in me which had been angered by his misogynist commencement speech start to shrink.

I blame it on those eyes of his; talk about smouldering; he is just so much joy to behold. Every part of me agrees. I unzip my pant and a finger is about to go down there when the door opens revealing Matthew’s black face and my secretary, Anita’s harassed white one. They make quite a picture!

I leave my finger defiantly hidden and dismiss Anita, before turning the full force of my wrath on Matthew. If he doesn’t get through why he is here quickly enough, he will just have to be my audience.

I brought you the roster for the ‘adopt a shelter’ scheme, He says, looking past me.

I am too eager to get back to my show that I decide not to dwell on my name appearing in a roaster for associates when I am a partner, so I reach out to take the paper from him, but Matthew isn’t letting go.

His knuckles are white. For all his bravado, he is shaken about catching me in the act.

In New York, I had walked into a senior partner’s office and found him stark naked. And he isn’t a pretty man. Yet, we conducted business as usual.

To save Matthew his distress, I pull my finger out slowly and smear his grip with the cream of my wetness. He follows the act for a while, then releases the paper like it’s a grenade and runs out of my office.

I like to think he will be upping his sessions at his therapist’s starting today. We all see shrinks at Len and Tal.

I lock the door before settling down to watch Rick talk about his childhood. He manages to be open and evasive at the same time; one thing is clear though, he is still torn by his mother walking out on him when he was seven. Something about focusing on her career. She never came back, never looked back. She abandoned him and his father to pursue a career.

This, he says, informed his commencement speech remark, but as the CEO of TECKIE, he claims to be taking it a step further by providing the right environment for mothers who wish to spend more time with their children.

I guess this is all the apology, those offended by your ‘lean back’ comment can hope to get? Ivy asks, as if reading my mind

I guess so, Rick replies, like he could care less. He is being so stubborn, cute stubborn if you will (God, I am sick), but that won’t be good for his stocks. There is already talks of women boycotting his company if he offers anything short of an apology on the show today

But seriously ladies, his mother walked out on him and he is gorgeous. And didn’t he just say TECKIE provides the environment to lean in or lean back as much as mothers want? Please let’s unclench already

Ivy has gone on to the subject of pass time and Rick is saying he is a great artist.

Con? Ivy teases

Aren’t all CEOs? he shoots back. The audience laughs, as do I. "I also draw, play the piano, but I really suck at writing, except programming of course. It’s terrible really, composing emails or reading them suck the life out of me.’’

When Ivy remarks that his success in other areas more than makes up for it, he shrugs. So annoying. Has he ever bothered to think that someone’s joy and happiness could be hinged on getting an email from him? Come on, a simple emoji would go a long way

My phone rings, it’s Amelia. I am so not in a mommy mood right now. Not that I ever am. I let the machine pick.

Mommy Dearest, she says. Not that you care, but Tiffany gets to play Mary; I can’t even be the lead in a play I wrote. I know Aunt Ivy already told me it is the way the world works but I know it is because I am not blonde. Should I call dad? Maybe he can pull his Hollywood weight…

Should I call Dad? Ah. Is that a threat? I want to ask her, but Ivy has just presented some models on a screen so Rick can choose his type. I take exception to Ivy objectifying women like this. Good TV though, and Rick is a good sport as the audience cheer in anticipation.

He makes a show of deliberating on it, then says, I like curvy women, so if you are in a room with all these ladies, I think I would choose you.

"Clever! Clever!!’’ Ivy laughs as the audience hoots.

Meanwhile, I am wondering where this ‘liking curvy women’ business leaves me of the stick thin variety.

To make matters stickier than it is already getting, curvy