Sarah knew them too well to expect them to express any pride in her success. She was not seeking approval. She simply wanted to face them with the fact that their dumb, disappointing daughter had broken into TV without really trying and would shortly become as real in their lives as Barbara Walters or Johnny Carson. All she wanted was to see them chew on that.
It came up in a casual way after coffee, when they were stacking the dishes. Her father already had a golf match going on the portable. “He’s going to buy me a dishwasher,” said her mother. “A Whirlpool.”
“Does he know yet?”
“He sees it on TV most nights. You must have seen it, too.”
“I don’t watch much, but you could be seeing me soon on the tube.”
Her mother put down the plates she was holding. “Sally, what do you mean?”
“Just what I said. I’m going on TV. Look out for a series called Never Fear starting on NBC three weeks from Saturday. I’m in it.”
“I don’t believe it. You?” Her mother eyed her as if she had just got back from Mars. Her lips moved as if she were talking to herself. She crossed the room to where her husband was watching Jack Nicklaus on the long fourteenth. “George, did you hear that? Sally has just told me she is going on television.”
It was like watching a silent film. Their reactions were so histrionic, as disbelief turned to mystified acceptance, that Sarah could hardly keep herself from laughing.
Her father turned down the volume and stared at her.
She described the details of Greg Laz’s program.
“Why should they pick you for a thing like this?” her father asked in a tone suggesting she must have done unspeakable things to be considered for it.
“It isn’t as if you’re anyone special,” said her mother, without malice.
“Maybe you’re not the best judge of that.”
“If Marty had lived, I would have expected to see him on TV.”
“Marty was going places,” said her father.
“I can’t understand how this could have happened,” said her mother, as if the house had caught fire.
They could not accept the fact that the daughter whose existence they had consistently ignored was recognized by the communications medium they revered.
“They’re full of promises, these smart guys who make these programs,” said her father. “When you get there, you’ll find they don’t need you.”
“The program is done. It’s in the can.”
“What did they have you do, for heaven’s sake?” asked her mother.
She told them she had been interviewed by one of New York’s top psychiatrists.
“Psychiatrist?” said her mother. “What do they think you are — some kind of loony? Is that why they put you on TV?”
“If they did, I’ll get it stopped,” said her father. “I’m not having one of my family displayed to America as a crazy.”
“I appreciate your concern,” Sarah said ironically, “but you’ve got it all wrong. This is a program about irrational fears. They talked to me because I don’t have any.”
“I don’t understand you,” said her mother.
“Did you ever really try?”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Skip it, Mother, and relax. There isn’t a single thing in the program to upset your fine relatives in Boston or anyone here in Cherry Hill. I keep my clothes on and my language is irreproachable. Okay?” She turned up the volume on the golf commentary. “It’s time I hit the road.”
Driving back, she felt revitalized.
At the therapy session on Monday, Frank, the man with the dog phobia, listened to Sarah’s account of the way she had mastered her childhood fear of spiders. It seemed to help him. His frequency count on the conductivity test showed a distinct improvement by the end of the session. Now he was gone, and the next patient had canceled, so there was time to tell Ed the news.
If he had heard about Havelock Sloane’s offer, he was tactful enough not to mention it. His face lit up as he listened. When Sarah had finished, he put his hand over hers and said, ‘Terrific! I’m so pleased for you. We must drink to it.”
He poured her a cognac.
She basked in his approval. He told her he was proud to have been the first to interview her on TV. There would be a lot of media interest in her from now on.
“I can’t think why,” she said, wanting to hear more. “It’s only a documentary — nothing glamorous, like a song spot on a talk show.”
“Little lady, you’re so wrong. Pretty girl and ugly spider — it has a polarity that can’t fail to attract. Don’t let anyone kid you that this is just another wildlife documentary. With Havelock Sloane involved, it’s going to be big. You’d better get yourself an agent, but soon.”
She laughed.
“I’m serious.”
“I’m not proposing a career in show business.”
“That’s immaterial. When this breaks, you’re going to be a celebrity, and the sharks will move in. You need protection. Have you told anyone else about this?”
“Only my parents. Jerry Berlin knows, of course.”
“Would you like me to find out about agents?”
She was unconvinced, but it was great that he cared. “If you really think it’s important.”
“It is.” He made a note on his pad. “Well, how did your parents take the news?”
She gave him an account of her visit home. She admitted getting satisfaction from their inability to come to terms with her success. “Deep inside, I’m not a nice person to know.”
“Were they ever nice to you? I don’t think you should feel guilty about this. Obviously it did you good. You needed to get things straight at home, assert yourself. I’d say it was a significant step in the maturing process.”
“Ed, you’d make it sound right if I blew their brains out with a shotgun!”
He smiled. “I could. They gave you justification.” His hand went to the cognac bottle, but she covered her glass. “Sarah, tell me some more about your brother.”
She weighed that. It was a shade too clinical for comfort. She knew what interested psychiatrists. She didn’t want to be analyzed. She wanted Ed to forget he was a shrink. On the other hand, how could she get near him if she didn’t confide in him? “Marty? I thought I told you everything. There was an accident. He came off his bike on Highway Seventy, twenty miles from home. No one could tell why it happened. I drove out to see the place myself. By then they’d removed the — But I found the marks on the road.”
“Why did you go?”
“Conscience, I guess. It didn’t seem real when they told me. I felt nothing. No, if I’m completely honest, I was secretly pleased that my parents’ hopes had crashed with him. I didn’t like myself for that, so going to look at the scene of the crash was a kind of penance.”
“Did it shock you?”
“It made it real.”
He nodded. “Retribution is a powerful force in your life, and this time you turned it inward. You’re a fascinating person, Sarah.”
She liked hearing him say that. She wanted to tell him it was mutual, but it was too soon. She had to disarm him by degrees.
“I’d better be off. I have some reading to catch up on. I’m going out to Lake Pinecliff Wednesday. I promised Don Rigden some lessons in hang-gliding.”
He took the bait. ‘That’s great! I thought you two didn’t get along too well.”
“He’s okay. He’s had some disappointments lately, but we’re working on it.”
She was practically certain his skin color deepened a shade. “Sure.”
When she got to the elevator, she turned as if she had just had a thought. “That agent — will there be a chance to discuss it with you first?”
“Why, of course! But we shouldn’t lose any time. I’ll make some inquiries. Maybe we could have lunch on Friday.”