New York City, USA
February 2012

By no special friend

Sighing, I rub my hands over my face. "Walk me through it again?"

"Sure," agrees Dan, who's sitting across from me at his and Joy's dining table. "What do you want to know?"

I drop my hands to look at him. "Maybe if I understood what their sodding problem is, this would be, you know, a little less confusing."

Dan takes a long sip of water. "US immigration is concerned that you looking after Jake and Izzie constitutes a form of employment you're not allowed to undertake under your visa conditions."

"Yeah," I nod slowly. "I got that. I don't see why they'd think that though. You never employed me or anything."

"Officially, we didn't. But we supported you financially and what with you looking after our children, it could be constructed to count as a form of employment. Illegal employment, might I add," explains Dan.

There's many a reason for why I didn't become a lawyer, but this is definitely one of them. These legal quibbles make my head hurt.

"If it is ruled to count as employment, it would also mean Joy and I could get in trouble for tax evasion," adds Dan. "We never paid social security costs for you."

"Of course you didn't!" I protest. "I was never your employee. I looked after Jake and Izzie because I wanted to. And you gave me some money because me looking after them saved you the money you'd otherwise have spent on a nanny or babysitter."

"Which some people might argue means that you actually were our nanny," remarks Dan. He's outwardly calm, because Dan rarely is anything but calm, but I can see his left eyelid twitch slightly. It's a clear sign that he isn't feeling as calm as he pretends to be and it makes me nervous.

He takes another sip of water and I use the moment to mull over what he said. It takes me a second or two to realise what it was that heightened my uneasiness, but when I do, I sit up straighter. "You said 'ruled'. That it could be ruled to count as employment. What do you mean by that?" I ask, watching him closely from the other side of the table.

Dan sighs. "If we can't convince them there's nothing to it, we'd have to fight it through the courts," he explains. "We could probably drag this out long enough for you to be able to finish your studies in May, but you'd get barred from entering the US for several years."

With an impatient gesture, I wave this aside. I don't have any plans to stay here anyway. Or, to be honest, ever come back. This entire mess has quite put me off this country.

"Never mind me. What would happen to Joy and you?" I want to know, though part of me is more than a little anxious to hear his answer.

Dan takes a long moment to answer. A disconcertingly long moment. "Well… tax evasion and facilitating visa fraud… it could get us into quite a bit of trouble."

Sitting back in my chair, I let out a puff of air. "And what with you being lawyers…"

I don't finish the sentence, but Dan nods anyway. "Quite."

This is a mess alright.

"What are we going to do?" I almost don't dare ask, but then rationalise that not knowing would probably be worse.

"We're going to argue that Joy and I gave you the money as a gift, totally unrelated to you looking after the children and without expecting anything in return," relays Dan. "And that you spend time with them because they're your niece and nephew and you like spending time with them."

"Which is true," I point out.

Dan smiles tiredly. "It is. But it's going to take more than that to convince a bunch of officials out for blood."

Closing my eyes tightly, I press the balls of my hands against my temples. "It wasn't even that much money," I mutter sullenly. "Barely enough to cover groceries."

Only belatedly do I realise how petulant that makes me sound, but Dan doesn't comment on it. "I don't think that's going to make much of a difference to them," he remarks instead.

Yeah. Somehow, I didn't think so either.

Silence falls between us, stretching out and expanding for several long seconds.

"Do you know it was a fashion piece?" I finally ask absently, staring at the table top. "That got all this rolling, I mean."

Dan makes a questioning sound, inviting me to elaborate further.

"It was a piece on my fashion that had the first picture of the university club I work at. Of course, that story then got picked up by a bigger paper and that's where the border police got the idea that I work off-campus. And that's what alerted them to me in the first place and made them dig. Which is how they came up with the nonsense of you and Joy employing me," I explain, lightly drumming my fingers against the table.

Because I might have thought they were through with me when they let me re-enter the US last month, but apparently, I couldn't have been more mistaken. They only let me back in so they could sniff around my life some more. With copious assistance from the press of course, because what else is new?

"It's how it is," replies Dan with a sigh. "We should probably have foreseen it anyway. It was always a potentially questionable arrangement."

Still. It was the press that turned this into a problem, wasn't it?

I just want to point that out to Dan, when I hear a key being turned in the lock of the front door. Both Dan and I turn to look into the direction of the hall and moments later, Joy appears in the doorway to the dining room.

"Hey Joy," I greet her tiredly.

"Hello darling," adds Dan.

But Joy doesn't answer. Still in coat and shoes, clutching her handbag to her, she lets herself fall on the chair closest to her. But she doesn't react to Dan or me. In fact I'm not sure she has noticed us at all. She looks… all strange. Her face is totally blank, her eyes staring ahead.

It makes me shiver involuntarily.

"Joy? Darling?" asks Dan cautiously, reaching out to cover one of her hands with his own.

That startles her into action. Turning her head abruptly, she stares as him, quite as if she has never seen him before.

For a second, no-one even breathes.

"They fired me." Her voice is utterly toneless, devoid of any feelings.

Dan looks stricken. The gasp, I belatedly realise, came from me.

"They… what?" I stutter.

"They fired me," repeats Joy, still in that creepy, emotionless voice.

I blink, trying to process this. "But… why? Why would they do that?"

Joy doesn't say anything, having apparently fallen back into her stupor. But Dan seems to be quicker on the uptake than I.

"Because of the accusations," he answers in her stead, sounding resigned. "Tax evasion, retaining illegal employees, facilitating visa fraud…"

But… but…

"But none of that is proven," I argue, feeling helpless. "You said yourself you'd fight it through the courts!"

I look from Joy to him, pleadingly, hoping he can reassure me that it's all just a stupid misunderstanding. But Dan slowly shakes his head. "It looks bad. Even if we all get proven innocent, the accusation will always hang above her. And a law firm such as that one… they're not going to risk even the slightest rumour of one of their lawyers being involved in something illegal."

Gaping at him, I search for words. But I have none. This is just too awful to process.

At the head of the table, Joy starts moving, extracting her left hand from under her husband's and placing both on the table top, fingers carefully splayed out. Both Dan and I immediately turn to look at her, but she keeps her gaze fixed on her hands.

"Darling?" asks Dan carefully. I don't dare speak, or maybe I just don't have anything to say.

Slowly, Joy raises her head, looks first at Dan, then over at me. Her face is blank and I can't tell what she's thinking, which scares me. I've never known Joy to be shy about showing her feelings.

"Can you leave, please?"

It takes me a moment to realise that Joy is speaking to me. And another moment to process that she actually asked me to leave.

I don't think Joy has ever asked me to leave.

Too dumbstruck to move, I remain sitting in my chair for a moment longer, my brain whirling out of control. Joy stares at me with that unnerving blank expression on her face.

Dan's quicker to react than I am. "Joy, darling…" his voice is almost pleading. "Shouldn't we talk about this?"

"I don't want to talk," comes her reply, terribly composed. "I need you to be quiet and her to be gone."

"This isn't her fault," Dan points out cautiously. "We should have seen this coming."

Very slowly, Joy turns her gaze on him. "But no-one would have been interested in us. No-one would have found out."

"The press…" begins Dan.

Joy cuts across him. "Is only interested in her because of who she's dating. Which was her choice."

I try to speak and find I have no air. My throat feels constricted, my chest heavy. This can't be happening.

"Joy…" I whisper.

She looks back at me, considers me for a long, long moment. "Please. Just leave."

The mask of blankness is starting to slip. But there's no fury or anger beneath it, just a bone-deep weariness, which is somehow worse. Shouting, I could take. It's this quietness that scares me.

Looking to Dan for help, I find him slowly shaking his head. There's pity in his eyes, though whether for Joy or me or both of us, I can't tell. "Maybe it's best if you do leave for the evening," he suggests gently. "You have to go to work anyway, don't you?"

(Joy's face contorts at his words and I can't bear to look.)

At my tentative nod, Dan slides his chair back. "So, go to work. We can talk tomorrow. I'll walk you to the door."

With nothing left to do and my sister's gaze resolutely directed the other way, I slowly get up as well and start walking towards the hall. As I pass Joy, I stretch out a hand to touch her shoulder, but she flinches away without even looking at me and I drop my hand again.

"Rilla?" asks Dan, holding the door for me.

I hesitate next to Joy for a moment longer, trying to think of something to say, but all my words must be inadequate, so I remain silent. Shuffling over to Dan, I slip past him into the hall and just see the door to Jake's bedroom close. So he heard. Just great.

Turning to look at Dan, I find him nodding slightly. "I'll talk to him," he promises quietly. "To her, too. I'm sure she doesn't mean it. She's just hurt. Give her a few days. It'll be alright."

I'm not so sure about that, to be honest, but, eager for reassurance, I allow his words to wash over me and accept the brief hug he gives me after we've reached the door.

"Take care," says Dan by way of a goodbye.

I nod. I still feel strangely numb. "You, too." Though I'm not sure what he's supposed to take care about. "And thanks." He's been nothing short of lovely, after all. "And sorry." This, most of all.

"It's alright," promises Dan, giving me a reassuring smile. Try as I might, I don't manage a one back.

Turning, I take a step towards the stairs, but then stop and look back at him. "They will re-hire her, won't they? Once this is all cleared up. Surely, they must take her back then. Right?"

There's a note of desperation in my voice that Dan can't miss. But for all his sympathy, he's not one to lie and he doesn't now. Instead, he just sadly shakes his head. "I don't think so, Rilla. I really don't think so."

"That's not fair," I choke out.

"No. No, it isn't," agrees Dan with a sigh, before turning to look back into the flat. "I need to get back to her. Goodbye, Rilla."

"Bye," I whisper and watch as he softly closes the door.

Unshed tears blurring my vision, I stumble down the chairs and out of the house. My mind is in upheaval and there's only one thought I can grasp. Joy was fired. Joy. Fired. Brilliant, clever, hard-working Joy. Fired from the job she worked so hard to excel at. And all that because of… because of…because of me. Because of my relationship.

It's too much to wrap my head around.

At least there are no reporters camping in front of the house, though I know they'll be waiting at the restaurant. Ever since I returned to work after my Christmas break, they've always seemed to be there when I'm scheduled to work. I don't know how they do it, really, but am too preoccupied to think about it anyway. For now, I am just glad not to have their cameras shoved in my face just yet, hoping that the walk through the brisk New York Winter might be enough to clear my head and cool my heated face.

No such luck, of course.

I'm still all worked up when I arrive at the restaurant. My eyes feel puffy and my nose is runny and it's not just because of the cold. And if I harboured any hope of being able to evade any reporters in my state, it is dashed the moment I round the street corner. They're out in full force again, which means that they know something is up, or at least that they think there is.

For a moment, I hesitate, hovering on the brink between privacy and detection, but before I can make up my mind to turn back and just leave, they have discovered me.

"Rilla!" shouts the first one, rushing towards me. His camera goes click, click, click.

"Is it true that you were charged with visa fraud?" cries another one.

"Will your sister be prosecuted for illegally employing you?" yells a third one.

The flashing of the cameras is always so much brighter in the dark of the evening and I flinch away by instinct. But whichever way I turn, there's flashes everywhere. Flash, flash, flash. Cameras on all sides of me. And ringing in my ears is their incessant clicking, only partly drowned out by the shouted questions.

Click, click, click.

Flash, flash, flash.

Raising my arms, I shield my face from the glare of attention, using one hand to blindly swat at anything in my way, trying to clear a path forward. In some distant part of my mind there's a reasonable voice, reminding me that I'm supposed to stay composed and pleasant and amiable, but I am so done with being good, so done with behaving. I just want them to leave.

"Hey, Rilla! Why the hiding?"

"Look who's suddenly pretending to be all shy!"

"Thought going to bed with a prince would give you preferential treatment, didn't you?"

"Got to face the music sometime, sweetheart."

There's something nasty about how they speak, something that is sneering and gloating and that makes my blood boil. Because if they had just stayed out of my life, Joy would never have lost her job and if she hadn't lost her job, she wouldn't have had a reason to look all pale and blank-faced and unsettling. If only…

"Leave me alone!" I snap, lowering my arms to glare at the journalists surrounding me. "Leave. Me. Alone!"

Click, click, click, go the cameras. Flash, flash, flash.

"This is none of your business. This is my life. My family. You don't get to do that to my family. You have no right –" But I can't finish the sentence.

Chocking on my words, on my anger, on my helplessness, I stare at the cameras that click and the reporters that shout and realise that it doesn't matter whether they have any right to do this. They're doing it anyway, no matter how many lives they ruin in the process. Because there's money to be had and as long as that's the case, they aren't going anywhere and they aren't going to leave us alone. Common decency be damned.

Reaching forward, I use my arms and elbows to shove and push at anyone or anything in my path, caring little who I might hit or what it might look like or how they might think of me. Because tomorrow's headline is already written and besides, what did playing nice ever bring me anyway?

Still, the cameras click and the cameras flash.

Much as I try to ignore them, I can also hear the questions still being shouted, gleeful now at having gotten a reaction out of me, and mocking, to try and provoke me into reacting again. That I don't give them the satisfaction has less to do with self-control and much more to do with the fact that I can't seem to speak around the lump in my throat.

"Get lost," I just about manage, more of an angry hiss than anything else. That they caught it anyhow, I know because the clicking immediately intensifies.

Blinking furiously against the flashing light and the coloured spots dancing in front of my eyes, I finally spy the back entry to the restaurant behind a vaguely familiar looking reporter. My eyes fixed on the door, I make a finally push, ducking beneath a camera hovering too near my head, and get my fingertips on the handle. In there, I know I will be safe, because apparently, it's alright to harass me and alright to bother my family, but trespassing on NYU property is a step too far even for this mob.

There's a collective groan of disappointment as I slip through the door and another question shouted after me, asking whether I expect to be doing jail time. (It is in this moment that I realise with painful clarity that Dan never specified quite what anyone awaits us if our version isn't accepted as fact, and it makes my blood run cold.)

Slamming the door shut behind me, I let myself fall backwards against the wall, head thrown back and eyes closed, trying to catch my breath.

I can't

"Rilla?" It's Carolina's familiar voice speaking, sounding both kind and worried, and though that's like balm to me, it still takes me far too long to open my eyes and look at her.

"Quite the commotion today," she adds with a sympathetic smile when she notices me looking at her.

"Yeah," I nod, feeling weary. "Quite."

Of course, nothing of this is new to my co-workers, just as it has become a regular occurrence to my fellow students and most especially my neighbours. Mrs Weisz shouting them down didn't keep the reporters away from my apartment house for longer than thirty seconds and while no-one has complained to me directly, I've noticed a lot more disapproving glances when I pass my other neighbours on the staircase.

"I'm sorry to bother you with this when you just got in, but there are people asking for you in the main room," remarks Carolina and at least she does truly look sorry about it.

This, too, is pretty routine by now. I don't know quite why it gives people a kick to be served by me – or rather, by the prince's girlfriend, because to them, I as a person couldn't matter less – but it definitely does. Maureen is secretly rather pleased at the increase in customers, but it makes my skin crawl in the most uncomfortable way. In their own way, these people are as creepy as the reporters out there (and most of the time they don't even tip well).

"I'll just go change," I sigh.

Carolina nods. "I'll tell them you'll just be a minute."

"At least have the decency to hurry," snaps Bridget, rushing past us on her way to the kitchen and glaring at me. "You're already late and having them ask for you constantly is such a bore."

Yeah, I bet it is.

With a forced half-smile for Carolina and a dirty look at Bridget's back, I push off the wall and shuffle into the direction of the staff room. Expecting to find it empty, I am instead greeted by the sight of Tracy tying her shoelaces and while there's little that could actually raise my mood right now, seeing her definitely doesn't make me feel worse either.

"Hey Trace," I greet as I walk over to my locker.

Tracy straightens and smiles at me. "Hello Rilla." Then, peering closer at me, "Are you ok?"

"Bridget hissed at me for being late, which I was only because I got accosted by a mob of photographers trying to provoke me into screaming at them. So…" I shrug, trying to appear more unconcerned than I feel. "Just another day at the office, right?"

"I'm sorry to hear that," replies Tracy, her eyes full of sympathy.

Turning towards my locker, I reach for the combination lock. "The reporters always seem to know when I'm scheduled for a shift here," I add as I move the discs into the right sequence. "I don't know how they do it, but no matter when I arrive, they're already waiting. In the beginning, I thought they just have a few of them camp out here on the off-chance that I show up, but it's the same guys also waiting outside my apartment every morning, which means they move here on purpose when they know I have a shift that day."

I pull the locker door open and toss my bag inside. "And at risk of sounding paranoid, I sometimes can't help wondering whether it's that they know about my shifts because someone tells them or gives them my schedule or something. Someone from the staff, I mean. From the inside. I know it sounds crazy, but someone also gave them that picture of my locker, right?"

The picture of my locker, printed in the article that kicked off this entire mess in the first place. The article that got the people at border control to be all suspicious, which led to US immigration sniffing around, which led to Joy's firing.

The door of the locker gently swings shut of its own accord, hitting my elbow as it does. It doesn't hurt much, but when I fling the door open again, I do so with much more force than necessary.

"It was probably Bridget," I announce, glaring at the locker for good measure. "I really wouldn't put it past her. She's just so… unpleasant all the time."

Turning my head, I look at Tracy over my shoulder, though whether I want her to back me up on my suspicions about Bridget or tell me that I'm imagining conspiracies where there are none, I can't really say. Either way, Tracy just stands there, biting her lip, her arms hanging loosely at her sides. She isn't looking at me. In fact, she seems to make very, very sure not to look at me.

Which is odd. Her entire stance is odd. So is her expression. I can't quite put my finger on it, but –

But.

Narrowing my eyes, I turn to face her fully. "Tracy?" I ask slowly.

Surely I can't be…?

"Tracy?"

With an abrupt movement, she raises her hands to hide her face. When she speaks, her voice is muffled, but it still hits me like a lightning bolt. "It was Shawn's idea. We've wanted to go on a vacation for so long, but we could get never the money together and he thought… he knew that you and I worked together and one day, he brought this reporter home. Such a polite man and he just counted the money out right there on kitchen table. Didn't ask for much either. Just some pictures from inside the restaurant and your work schedule for the next few weeks. It seemed so harmless and Shawn was so excited to finally be able to take me on holiday…"

Face still hidden, she is overcome by sobs, unable to speak further.

I stand very still, just looking at her, trying to organise my thoughts into something resembling order.

Tracy.

It was Tracy.

Tracy, who betrayed me to the paparazzi.

Not Bridget with her general nastiness, or Maureen, who is so quietly pleased that my notoriety is bringing in the customers, or one of the ever-changing kitchen helps looking for a quick buck.

Tracy.

"You sold me out," I finally manage. (In a corner of my mind, I can't help noticing that I sound exactly like Joy did. All toneless and weird.) "You and your lowlife husband sold me out."

"He's not a – not a – lowlife," protests Tracy through her tears, her voice shaking and wavering.

"Yes he is and the sooner you finally realise that the better," I snap. The weird calm is gone as fast as it came. Instead, I feel all the anger within me boiling to the surface.

Lowering her hands, Tracy looks like she wants to say something, but I cut right across her. "In fact, lowlife is far too good an expression for him. You're the only one who can't see it and God knows I feel sorry for you, but –" I take a deep breath, but it does little to calm me. "You're my friend, Tracy. I trusted you. And you have nothing better to do than to go and betray me just to please him?"

I wait for her to speak, to say something – anything, really – but she just stands there, looking at me, tears running down her face. There's something so utterly defeated about her that I can't even be truly mad. Instead, I suddenly feel very, very tired.

"My sister lost her job over this," I tell her, rubbing my hands over my face. "Over something that started with you wanting to make some quick and 'harmless' money."

At least that gets a reaction out of her. "I didn't know –" she chokes. "I didn't want –"

"Didn't want this to happen? Yeah, yeah." I wave her remark aside. "But it happened anyway."

Not waiting for another reply, I turn back to my locker and yank my bag out of it, before slamming the door shut. The combination lock closes with a single click.

"What are you doing?" asks Tracy in what is little over a whisper.

"Leaving," I tell her grimly without turning around. "I'm leaving. And if Bridget or Maureen or any of those vultures over in the dining room have anything to say about that, you can tell them I don't give a damn what they think."

Because if it's between Tracy and the mob of reporters out there, the reporters suddenly seem like the preferable option. At least I expect them to only want my worst.

Moving past Tracy, who watches me through wide and watery eyes, I stomp over to the door. It is only at the last moment, my hand already on the handle, that I hesitate. Turning my head sideways a little, so I can just see her out of the corner of my eye, I ask, "Just tell me… did you go on that vacation?"

Tracy swallows visibly. "We… we wanted to, but then Shawn went out with a few of his friends and naturally, he invited them for a beer and…"

And then they drank all the money away. Of course.

"Yes," I reply quietly. "That's what I thought."

I don't know whether to laugh or cry at the absurdity of it. In the end, I laugh simply so as not to cry.


The title of this chapter is taken from the song 'Restless Farewell' (written by Bob Dylan, released by him in 1964).


To Guest:
Hello and thank you for being in touch! I'm glad you agree with their decision. There's still a bit of time until they can turn it into reality, but I promise we're getting there. And yes, a bonnet is a car hood. I think one is the British term, the other American? Not being a native speaker, I sometimes struggle to stick with one variant of English. I apologise if it was confusing :).