Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. Again this was originally the second half of the last chapter but due to a voice-recognition software installation snafu I had to cut the chapter in half to get something out sooner. Thankfully after six attempts it's working perfectly fine.
Chapter 44: Things I Learned from My Mother
"Do I look OK?" Marc asked his boyfriend of nearly a year as he checked his suit one more time in his office mirror. He was nervous. He was 30 seconds from taking his asthma inhaler.
"You always look good." Cliff squeezed his hand in reassurance.
"Yes but Now I'm the EIC of a fashion magazine. I'm held to a different standard of fashionable." He had to look perfect because he was stepping into the now vacant heels of Wilhelmina Slater.
"It's temporary." Cliff rolled his eyes. "Don't freak out. Daniel will be back soon." Considering the email that he received from Daniel this morning, Marc does not expect to turn the reins over until the start of the New Year, despite Betty having to return for finals eventually. Not unless Faye allows Daniel to keep a playpen in his office, the separation anxiety is obvious.
"That makes it worse, especially because I literally got this job over Wilhelmina's cold dead body." He hates the thought of Wilhelmina being dead. He may not have liked her very much, but he still respected her as a professional. He also adored Nico. She was a great assistant and he was worried about her. He knows from personal experience that just because your mom is a bitch does not mean that you're going to hate her.
"Stop with the self-flagellation. You didn't arrange for your assistant to go off the deep end and execute Wilhelmina." Cliff knew him a little too well. Cliff knew that he was feeling guilty. He couldn't help but think that firing Carlo was the catalyst for everything that happened.
"The flagellation is necessary. If I was a better assistant to her, the trade would not have happened and she would never have hired Carlo in the first place. Of course in that universe I would probably still be her assistant right now but she would be alive. I think the trade-off would be worth it." Marc sighed as he pulled away from Cliff.
"I don't. What happened to Wilhelmina was no one's fault, except for the one who pulled the trigger. It wasn't part of some divine plan of God or the universe. Wilhelmina is dead because of Carlo Medea. You had no control over this."
"I know that, it's just..." I feel like it's my fault. Nico no longer has a mom.
However, before Marc could say that out loud Ruth walked in with a basket of Mr. Suarez's frittata muffins. He finds it slightly ironic that Faye asked her husband's restaurant to cater this repast considering Wilhelmina's overall stance on eating but he could use a mini frittata right now. Although he also finds it slightly disturbing Amanda's look alike cousin is the one dragging him to the conference room. Their similarities in appearance were even more apparent now that she's no longer dressing in Betty's pre Daniel/pre baby wardrobe.
"Marc everybody's waiting for you in the conference room. You want to get in there before they attack the buffet that Mr. Suarez set up." She said handing one of the muffins to Cliff.
"I didn't think you were going to still be here." Marc grabbed a muffin for himself. "Your investigation is done and I vaguely remember Amanda saying something about you helping her pick out caskets when she was telling me all about Kenny moving in." He is not surprise that it happened. Okay he would've been a year ago but Kenny really does bring out the best in his friend.
"I am permanently retired from police work. I don't think I have the stomach for it anymore. Besides you need an assistant and I need a job." The woman shrugged.
"You are very good at what you do." And your aunt is my boss and it's not like I can say no. "At least I'm sure you're less crazy than my last assistant."
"It wouldn't be hard." Cliff mumbled under breath and Ruth glared at him.
"After reading through Wilhelmina's 300+ page funeral guide we decided to at least ask Nico what she wanted before placing an order for 200 white doves and seeing if Beyoncé will play a funeral. Amanda is there now and they're bringing ice cream cake."
"At eight in the morning?" Cliff looked at his watch.
"I thought she wanted Mariah Carey?" Marc recalled from the funeral guide Wilhelmina showed him when he was her assistant. He really doesn't want to think very hard about the fact that Wilhelmina has had her funeral planned for decades.
"There was an incident last year involving extremely public remarks about Ms. Carey's sanity that Ms. Slater assumed were off the record." Ruth shrugged. "I don't want to talk about it. Amanda and Kenny will deal with it as I keep you on task and prevent all bedlam from breaking out in the conference room." She actually pushed him to the door.
"Which will happen soon if you don't allow people to break into the frittata muffins. These are really good." Cliff's mouth was half-full.
"Wait until you try the bacon cheddar scones. They're so good." Ruth said singing Mr. Suarez's praises.
"It feels sacrilegious to hear you talk about scones like your 30 seconds from orgasming at what is essentially a wake for Wilhelmina. She never really liked eating." Marc said just as he dusted a few crumbs off of Cliff's tie before reluctantly letting Ruth force him to the conference room.
Even though black is the mainstay color of fashion he's pretty sure he didn't see this much black during the week surrounding Mr. Meade's death. Of course these people were mourning a murder victim not a guy who died of a heart attack or even their boss that most of them probably hated. Technically, Mr. Meade's was murder but it wasn't like they knew that at the time.
But this is a different type of morning, because Marc was well aware if Wilhelmina died under other circumstances there may have been actual cheering instead somber reflection or what passed as somber reflection at a fashion magazine. Every one of them knew something was wrong with Carlo and nobody did anything to change the outcome. The essence of guilt in the air was palpable.
The conference room was packed. He didn't think it was possible to get most of the staff in there but they were, somber faced. While most were somber, Megan had no problem whatsoever talking badly about Wilhelmina even in death. Marc hoped that she choked on a scone.
He gave Cliff one last squeeze at the hand as he moved to the front of the table to take Daniel's regular seat. He did not dare take Wilhelmina's. It stayed empty as a testament to the fact she was no longer with them.
"If everybody could take a seat I would like to get started." No one actually did, but at least they stopped gossiping amongst themselves.
"I know by now you are all aware of what happened to Wilhelmina. It was definitely a tragedy, but she died saving the lives of her daughter and baby Alex. For that, I'm sure many of us are grateful."
Actually most of you are aware that she was murdered by her former lover and your colleague who you all realize was unhinged because almost all of you were talking about it when I walked into the room.
"Daniel will be also taking some time off with his family to recover from what happened." To recover from having your youngest child kidnapped by a complete lunatic.
"Daniel will come back eventually." I hope. "However, in their absence we must continue on and Faye has decided that I will be the one in charge until Daniel returns." That's when Megan actually choked on her scone. Marc knew she would be angry and was still pissed about him getting the junior creative director job over her and then subsequently getting Wilhelmina's old job after Bradford's untimely passing.
"After we have our bacon scones we need to discuss the 'February is for Lovers' issue. However, let us take a few minutes to pay our respects to a true visionary of the fashion world." Who probably made most of the people in this room feel absolutely miserable. Please do not start calling her a bitch.
However nobody said anything. You could hear a pin being dropped in that room. Okay you can hear somebody still eating their scone. Okay Cliff was the one eating. He's a stress eater. Marc finds it cute. Sometimes.
"Even though Daniel is on family leave." Most likely screwing Betty into the nearest surface. "He did find time to e-mail me a few words about Wilhelmina."
Marc reached in his pocket for the copy of the speech he placed there only to find nothing. Great, he probably left the stupid thing on the printer because Cliff 'distracted' him. However, Ruth wordlessly passes him another copy of the speech which is probably the only reason he doesn't reach for his asthma inhaler right then and there.
"Why does everybody keep bringing me food?" Nico asked when Amanda and Kenny showed up to Monique's rooms with her daily supply of fresh clothes. "Also, ice cream cake is inappropriate for 8 AM in the morning."
"Because chocolate always makes me feel better in times of great sadness." Amanda said, looking at the cake like she wanted to eat the whole thing.
'That explains why you're wearing stuff from your chunky collection.' Nico thought to herself.
"Nothing says 'I'm sorry for your loss, like ice cream cake'. I was going to have them write 'I'm sorry your mom was murdered', but Kenny said that was in bad taste. So we went with the butterflies instead."
She looked over to the accountant and mouth the words, thank you. She's not sure she could eat the cake at all if it said something like that. It was moments like these Nico wondered how many drugs Faye took before she realized she was pregnant with Amanda.
"Considering I'm not entirely sure what they're feeding me is food I think that ice cream cake could still be more nutritious." Monique smirked from the bed. "Let's just have a slice and we will put the rest out for the nursing staff. They always like free food, and they deserve it for putting up with my mom."
"True. Most of your doctors are now afraid of her." Nico said thoughtfully.
"Where is mother Windom-West this morning?" Kenny asked politely.
"Probably yelling at Nico's grandfather." Monique supplied.
"Or the chief of police." Nico suggested instead. She knew that grandma Windom-West was furious they fell for Carlos' distraction. She personally blamed them for Monique's hospitalization and Wilhelmina's murder.
"I'm going with your grandfather. If I'm wrong, I won't force you to go help Alexis put MYW back together again." She knew that Monique wanted her to join the rest of the world again but Nico just wasn't ready for the world outside.
"If I'm wrong?" She asked reluctantly.
"You're getting escorted to the Meade building to at least meet with your tutor."
"You and Vivian said I didn't have to go back in until after the funeral."
"That was about work. This is about school." Monique said, much to Nico's annoyance.
"That might take a while. Wilhelmina's funeral binder is 3 inches thick and has a guest list of 900 people. There's three pages of catering instructions." I'm not sure we're going to be able to pull something off for Monday despite the amount of money your grandmother is willing to pay to speed things out."
900 people. Nico cannot be around 900 people right now. The three people in this room is about all she could take and at least these three liked her. She wasn't sure about the 900 people on her mother's guest list.
"I don't want to be surrounded by people who probably hated my mom and are happy that she's gone." Nico told them bitterly.
"That would cut the guest list dramatically to about No o…" Monique and Kenny covered Amanda's mouth simultaneously.
"Maybe we can limit the list to people who actually like you." Nico realized that would be considerably more people. She didn't realize how many real friends she had until this happen. Despite being in Puerto Rico Daniel has called multiple times. Justin has been here a lot and Cliff brought her homemade cookies. So did Mister Suarez. That's what she wants.
"She did have a backup plan in the case of dying under questionable circumstances." Kenny started to explain.
'Such as being murdered by your ex fuck toy' Nico thought to herself.
"That involves a small private funeral and no Beyoncé performance."
"But she does a really good Amazing Grace." Everyone stared at Amanda
"I think that's a better idea. Besides, if 900 of Wilhelmina's fake friends want to throw a party in her honor we can charge them $1000 a plate and turn it into some big charity event to…" Monique stops speaking abruptly when they started to hear her mother screaming in the hallway.
"Your daughter was just murdered and mine is still in the hospital and yet you're more concerned with losing the deposit at the Plaza if we don't do the wedding as scheduled? What the fuck is wrong with you?"
"Oh, boy!" Monique groaned.
"Definitely talking to my grandfather." Nico sighed.
"I don't really care how your PR person spins this. I have no trouble being made the bad guy, but I can't do this anymore. No matter how much I love you, I can't just keep going along. You don't love anybody but yourself. Not me, not Nico, and definitely not the daughter who we are going to have to put in the ground in mere days. You only care about your approval rating and I just can't be your prop."
Nico's stomach filled with dread. Like everyone else, she did not want Vivian to marry her grandfather, mostly because Vivian was too good for the man, but now Vivian would have no claim over her; best case scenario would be she would end up with her grandfather and she really doesn't like the senator right now.
"I won't let you turn Nico into a prop either. No Nico's staying with us." Vivian yelled much to Nico shock.
"First of all, because you don't have time to take care of a teenager." Thankfully, the 'One who was recently kidnapped and survived her mom being murdered' was left off of that sentence.
"Second of all, her job is in New York along with all her friends. There's no point in moving her out to DC right now, especially in the middle of the school year."
"I'd don't want to go to DC." Nico mumbled, turning to Monique.
"You won't. You're nearly 17, have a good paying job, and have a decent trust fund. You have a good case for emancipation if nothing else." Monique wrapped an arm around her.
"Your godmother also has scary lawyers on her side." Kenny added. But Nico was panicking too much on the inside to listen to logic.
"If you do not make a big deal about Nico continuing to live with me, I will pay for everything to make the wedding go away and you look like the wronged party. I will also keep quiet about covering up your daughter's ex-husbands violent streak."
Nico's mouth opened in shock. Vivian Windom-West was bribing her now ex-fiancé to keep Nico with her and from the sounds of it the senator was all for it.
"I knew you would see things my way. Have your PR person email my PR person and she will take care of it immediately." With that Vivian ended the call.
"So it's over?" Nico asked Vivian.
"Things have been falling apart for a while now and losing a child sped that process up. It's just one of those things." She put an arm around her.
"However, just because I am ending things with your grandfather does not mean I am ending our relationship. I would still like to be your grandmother, if you will let me."
"Mom has a grand tradition of dumping husbands and picking up children." Monique smirked at her
"It's not a bad system. It's how I got you." Vivian kissed Monique's forehead. "Although if you know anybody who would like an all-expenses-paid dream wedding, Let me now. This happened to fall apart Three days after the catering deposit became nonrefundable." Her grandmother lamented. Nico liked the sound of that word. She deserved a good grandmother.
"Don't look at me. One, I've been dating Gio for barely a month. Two, it is in very poor taste to marry the second husband on the anniversary of the death of the first husband."
"You could reclaim the day." Kenny suggested.
"Not happening. Maybe we could turn it into a charity raffle of some sort or retool it as a giant party."
"We could take it." Amanda suggested causing Kenny to spit out the coffee he was drinking.
"You guys are engaged?" Amanda nodded her head yes at Nico's question, but Kenny nodded his head no.
"You said you wanted to marry me yesterday and we are moving in together as soon as we can decide whose apartment is nicer. You know daddy Suarez would be more okay with it if I have a ring on my finger."
"You should go with Amanda's apartment because Bradford secretly bought the building to guarantee that his grandchild would be raised in a nice place but I'm not sure who got it after he died. Maybe Daniel? I don't know." Monique explained.
"I do want to marry you eventually, but like in June. I would rather try living together for a little while, first. Besides I think Mr. Suarez will get over it eventually, especially because he lived with your mom for a few months before the wedding, the giant hypocrite. Also, I think your mom might actually own your building. I'm going to have to look into that." Kenny said thoughtfully.
"All expense paid wedding at the Plaza with Nico as your pseudo wedding planner." Vivian suggested.
"I did not agree to that." Nico protested.
"It will give you something to do. And trust me you're going to want something to do." Her grandmother told her sadly.
"I have a job."
"Where you worked with Wilhelmina and the asshole that killed her." Everyone glared at Amanda. "Sorry. Was I not supposed to say that? I don't know what I am not supposed to say to somebody in morning."
"No you need to say it. My mom was murdered and acting like that didn't happen isn't going to help. I am so fucking tired of everybody tiptoeing around me." Nico almost screamed on the verge of tears.
"If you want us to stop tiptoeing around you, then you need to get out of my hospital room." Monique told her gently.
"You don't want me here?" Nico asked worriedly.
"Of course I want you here. But I don't want you moping around and only eating what other people bring you. Trust me, I would love for you to avoid the meltdown I had after I lost my Jordan. If you want things to be normal again then you have to act like they're normal, until you no longer want to cry every 10 seconds. Go to work or leave the hospital room. Just do something so the guilt and depression don't eat you up from the inside." Monique spoke as somebody who understood what she was going through. In a way she did. Monique did not bury her mom, but she did lose her child and husband within months of each other. Monique Osborne understood loss.
"That may not be..."Amanda started to speak but stopped abruptly at Kenny's glare.
"No more treating me like a child. I want to know what's going on."
"Before work starts, there is going to be a remembrance of your mother. Daddy Suarez is making frittata muffins and my mom made Daniel write a statement."
"And you bring me ice cream cake?" Nico asked incredulously. Frittata muffins would've been nice.
"If you want a frittata muffin you can just go there. Besides it's your office, you should be there." Vivian told her.
"I did bring you a suit because wearing T-shirts all the time is just not good for anyone. If we leave in 10 minutes we can probably get their before all the frittata muffins are gone." Amanda suggested.
Nico had no choice but to go along with it. Okay, her new grandmother gave her no choice. Guilt is a dangerous weapon. Surprisingly, they were able to sneak out the back without the paparazzi following.
Nico made it to getting off the elevator for Mode before she felt like throwing up. At the hospital she could almost pretend that things were like they used to be but not here. The metaphorical ghost of Wilhelmina Slater permeated every corner of the space.
Her very first memory was being three years old and playing dress-up with her mother in the closet. She remembers being nine years old and doing homework in her mother's office. She remembers hiding in the closet of that office after her mother told her she would be going to boarding school. It's only now that she remembers the faint bruises on her mother's arms. It wasn't until that moment she realized that Wilhelmina didn't send her away because she didn't love her, but to protect her from her father.
She would turn around and run out the front door if Amanda and Kenny were not by her side as she made her way to the crowd of people. Thankfully they were too busy trying to find something nice to say about her mom. No one could.
Before being trapped with her mother in that house, she would've been with them, but now she knows better. Now she sees the truth and it only took losing Wilhelmina to get to that point. Of course, her eyes were starting to become watery again.
Before she finds somewhere to cry in private, Marc begins to read a statement from Daniel. She wants to at least hear what her friend has to say about the woman who hated him so much that she kept his son from him. But also saved that son's life.
"Betty and I want to take a moment to thank everyone who offered us kind words and prayers for Alex, Nico and Wilhelmina. Your kind words, thoughts, and your willingness to help assisted us during those dark days. So thank you for everything you did from the three of us, baby Alex included. Also a special thank you to whoever made the cranberry chocolate chip cookies. Betty was sure they were her father's." Nico almost smiled at that.
"We also want to thank everybody who helped with the search to return Nico and Alex safely to us." And then she frowned.
"At the same time we must acknowledge that not everybody came home. I'm not going to make Marc read a fluffy statement where I talk about how good of a person Wilhelmina was because she wasn't always a good person." 'Understatement of the millennium Daniel'. Nico fought bitterly.
"Sometime she was but in our industry goodness is something that is often punished. We rarely got to see anything but the tough façade required of a fashion queen. In her defense, I am starting to realize that Wilhelmina was more than who I thought she was in life." A single tear ran down Nico's cheek.
"I now know that Wilhelmina loved her daughter. She didn't always show it in the best way." Like sending me off to boarding school instead of letting me know that my biological father was an abusive bastard. That was an unfortunate secret that Nico only learned about in the last few days.
"I think at this point in my life I'm well aware that a lot of parents have trouble expressing their love in words." Like Bradford. "But actions speak louder than words." 'Such as letting Carlo rape you in front of me just so I wouldn't become his victim too.' She didn't tell Officer Olivia that, she wasn't ready to yet. It didn't really matter because Carlo was equally dead.
"Do a few good actions cancel out a lifetime of bad ones? I don't think I'm in a place to make that call. Maybe at a time like this, it is more important to focus on the good instead of the negative. I've decided to remember Wilhelmina Slater as the woman who saved my sons life and for that I'm willing to let go of everything else." At that point, Mark puts the piece of paper down on the table and Kenny is kind enough to hand her a tissue because her makeup is completely ruined.
"Now I wish I agreed to the wedding instead of saying that we would think about it, just so Vivian would not have forced us to bring Nico here." Kenny mumbled under breath.
"That is a horrible reason to agree to get married." Nico mumbled.
"Maybe I should have waited until the end of the meeting to read that statement." Marc said from upfront. Nico wondered if he noticed her yet.
"Probably." Amanda mumbled under breath.
"You guys I'm fine." She said a little too loudly causing at least a few people to realize she was there.
"I'm well aware I am not Wilhelmina Slater. I don't even have as much management experience as Daniel. But I'm here now to keep this magazine as functional as possible until Daniel is ready to come back. I think Wilhelmina would've wanted us to keep going on."
However, at that point Christina was hugging her and Nina from features was crying on her shoulder.
"No one is paying attention to me anymore because Nico is back." Marc stopped speaking and ran to her. Christina let go just in time for Marc to take her place.
"I thought you were going to take a little while to yourself." He whispered in perfect French.
"I just want things to get back to normal." What the hell is normal right now?
"Everybody just give Nico a little space." Kenny ordered.
"I guess I should thank everyone who helped with looking for me." I just wish somebody found us before Carlo murdered my mom.
"Maybe at some point, I'll be ready to talk about what happened but not right now." or possibly ever. "Right now, I just want to do my job. I'm sure you're all aware of stories of my mother coming in to Mode during the middle of a blizzard to get the February 2004 issue to press." Everyone nodded their head. "That was just the type of person she is—was. Maybe she instilled some of that spirit in me because I'm here and I'm ready to take on the world of fashion. Honestly, I think the best way we can pay homage to my mother is to make the next issue the best ever."
"I agree with Nico. Let's get to work." Marc handed her frittata muffin as he gently lead her to his office. It was time to move forward, even if she wanted to cry into her muffin. But that's life sometimes.
Her mother taught her that lesson.
To be continued.