Abby went with Kevin and AJ to their radio interview. Kevin was taking her to meet his publisher friend after the interview, so it made sense. There was nothing new or electrifying in the interview. Congratulations were sent to Nick, AJ was asked about his health, Kevin thanked the fans…standard stuff. Kevin and AJ hoped it was going as well in the other two locales.
It was at one of them. Brian talked about parenthood and accepted congratulations for Nick. His genuine joy at his friend’s happiness carried over the airwaves. They talked about music and he got to mention God again, when he said that he was honored that he was able to stand beside his brother while God blessed his marriage.
Nick and Howie didn’t fare quite as well. They were being interviewed by Ken Lane, a man in his mid-forties with a pleasant radio voice and the personality of a spoiled four-year-old. Ken had gone through a number of partners in his morning radio show. It’s Ken and Christine in the Morning! had become ‘Ken and Mickey’ and ‘Ken and Sabrina’ and finally just Ken. The hoped-for chemistry with an on-air sidekick never materialized. Ken didn’t like to share. He didn’t like to share the spotlight, the punchlines or the billing. His was the only morning show in the area that had a solo host. The other deejays all had Christine and Mickey and Sabrina.
This morning, Ken Lane, knew five things. One, he knew that there were three separate Backstreet interviews going on at the same time. Two, he knew that he had scored big, getting the new bridegroom on his show. Three, he knew that this interview would be up on the radio station’s website almost as soon as it was over. And four, he knew he was in danger of losing his drive-time spot. So he wanted something big. He wanted so many hits on that website that the big brass would lose count. He wanted enough downloads that their bandwidth would stretch to the breaking point. Five, he knew he wasn’t going to get his big scoop from Howie.
“I’m here with Backstreet Boys Nick Carter and Howie Dorough, who are in town to perform a sold-out show tonight at the Garden. Mornin’, guys! Thanks for stopping by.”
“Mornin’, Ken.” “Good to be here.”
“So Backstreet’s back, huh?” Ken raised his eyebrows at Nick. He knew that the best way to get Nick Carter to say something stupid was just to let him talk.
“Yeah, we’re back,” said Nick. “We…uh…got the new album out and we’re…you know…getting out there to see the fans. We love coming to New York.”
“The fans have been waiting a while for this one. Three years. Did you think you were in danger of losing them?”
Howie stepped in, even thought the deejay hadn’t been looking at him. “Maybe we lost some fans,” he said, “but maybe we got some new ones.”
“Or maybe we got the same ones,” said Nick, “only they’re older now.”
“Well, they’d have to be, wouldn’t they?” said Ken with a chuckle.
Shit! thought Nick. I said something dumb right from the get go. “What I mean is, we’ve grown up. Maybe they have too. It’s not all young girls in the audience any more, is it Howie?”
“No, we have a much broader fan base,” said Howie.
“Hey, what are you doing looking at the girls in the audience?” joked Ken, ignoring Howie. “You’re an old, married man now. Congratulations on that.”
“Thanks,” mumbled Nick.
“For those of you who were off the planet for the last couple of days, Nick got married in Atlanta the day before yesterday. Now, I heard that you were getting married in September. Where did that rumor come from?”
“It wasn’t a rumor,” said Nick. “That’s what we were planning, but then we decided that we couldn’t wait, so we just…” He shrugged.
“I gave the bride away,” said Howie. “Walked her up the aisle.”
“That’s nice,” said Ken. “So is she here with you?”
“She’s going along on the tour for a few days, just to kind of get an idea, you know, of what I do…you know…what a tour is like… Then she’s going to go back to her own life.”
“So she’s not in the business, then?”
“No, she’s…” Nick froze. What should he say here? Abby didn’t actually do anything. He didn’t know how to describe her without making her sound like some kind of flaky pastry like that tramp Paris Hilton. A spoiled little rich girl. “…she’s not,” he finished lamely. Then he brightened. “I’m the breadwinner in the family.”
Seeing that he wasn’t getting anything earthshaking here, Ken moved on to other topics. He asked about AJ and was assured that he was healthy and happy. He alluded to the solo efforts and said that they hadn’t been as successful as the group effort and hinted that maybe that was the reason they were all back together…because they weren’t cutting it on their own.
“We aren’t in this for the money,” said Nick. “We’ve got money. We’re doing this because we love it.”
“Yeah,” said Howie, “we did the solo projects because we wanted to branch out, to grow as artists in our own right, as individuals…do some other things.”
“And now you’re back to the group thing,” said Ken, sounding unconvinced. “And we’re glad you are,” he finished, trying to sound upbeat. “That’s the Backstreet Boys on their Reunion Tour tonight at the Garden. It’s sold out, but you can win tickets here if you’re the ninth caller when you hear…” He flipped a switch and they heard ‘Backsteet’s back, all right!’ “Thanks for coming by, guys. And now with a look at the traffic, here’s Milt Weston.”
He pointed at the window and his technician flipped a switch. Howie and Nick shook hands with
him and said ‘thanks’ as the man in the next booth started his report on the morning rush hour. Ken watched them depart, not feeling very satisfied. He didn’t feel like he’d gotten anything new or different out of them. He didn’t realize that he had an ally in Chicago who was going to help him out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Ronni sat in front of the computer.
She had paced the house for an hour after talking to her mother-in-law. As she cleaned up the debris of the coffee cup, she thought things through and made calculations and she came to the conclusion that she had made two and two add up to a solid four.
Nick had gone to Rose Cottage at Brookhaven Lodge during the first week of June. He had told Ronni that he was taking her on a secret vacation in the first week of June. Therefore, he had planned on taking her to Rose Cottage. Why? Why would he choose that place? It wasn’t a Nick kind of place at all. He wouldn’t even have known about it if Ronni hadn’t shared her childhood stories and said how much she wanted to stay there. So…Nick was there for Ronni. Considering their living arrangements in California, It wasn’t too much of a leap to figure out that Nick had gone there to propose to Ronni, that he had set up this scenario to please her, to fulfill her childhood dreams and to ask her to marry him. That had to be it!
And she had phoned him from Las Vegas and told him that she had married James. That must have been devastating for him, thought Ronni. And he took his devastation and fell into the arms of…Ducky?
That didn’t make sense. That was the part that eluded her logic. She tried to picture it in her head. So here’s Nick in Rose Cottage. Ronni’s just told him she’s married someone else. He goes…where? For a walk? Up to the dining room? Along the shore? It doesn’t matter. He meets Abigail.
And why is Abigail there? She’s there because she’s just broken up with this Philip Randall character. Ronni needed more information on that, she decided. She got a pad of paper and a pen. She needed to make some notes.
So there’s Nick and there’s Abigail…both heartbroken. And they find each other. What? Like they were wearing a sign!? Ronni remembered Brookhaven as a huge place. Lots of people everywhere. She clicked open Explorer and did a search for Brookhaven. Interesting, she thought. It’s changed a lot. Corporate seminars. Golf getaways. Spa weekends. Yeah, maybe two losers in love would find each other, especially if they were there on their own.
Don’t sweat the details, she told herself. You know they met there. Now, move on.
Ronni didn’t stop to ask herself why this was all so important to her. She was too selfish for that. She never examined her own motives. If she had, she would have realized that it really had nothing to with Nick. It all had to do with Abigail.
Ronni had grown up, with two mantras being chanted at her. Her parents were well off, but not as wealthy as the people Miranda Howell wanted to associate with. She wanted her daughter to be part of that crowd and insisted on her having the latest in everything…fashions, stereo equipment, electronic gadgets. Ronni was the first kid in her class to have her own cell phone. The Howells paid the high tuition fees at the best schools, not because the education was better but because of whom she would meet there. Miranda told her daughter every day how beautiful she was and that she deserved the world.
But her father saw it differently. Donald thought Miranda was spoiling Ronni and he tried to keep her feet on the ground. He gave her all the things she wanted but added the tagline, “you don’t know how lucky you are”. Ronni didn’t think she was lucky. She thought she deserved all of this, and she hated it that her father tainted it with his sacrifice on her behalf.
And then she met Abigail Fremont.
Abigail Fremont was not beautiful. In fact, she was quite the opposite. She was downright homely…and awkward, kind of like a baby giraffe. But she had everything that Ronni did not. She didn’t have gadgets and gizmos and cell phones. She didn’t need them to parade her worth. Because her worth, in Ronni’s eyes, was astronomical. She had Rose Cottage.
Ronni had heard about the Fremonts for her entire childhood. Sharon Fremont was the society maven that Miranda aspired to be. “And what would Sharon Fremont think about that?” was a common phrase in the Howell household when a social faux pas was committed. Donald Howell made a good living, an excellent living and the family was in the second tier of the Chicago social hierarchy. Donald had some business with Fremont Corporation but the two families did not associate with each other on a social level.
Miranda knew that Sharon and her daughter spent some part of each summer at Brookhaven Lodge. She insisted that they spend the summer there as well. Donald couldn’t understand why it was so important to go there. They could have a much better vacation at a cheaper price at…and he produced brochures from other sources. No, insisted his wife, Veronica won’t meet the kind of people she needs to at those places, people like Abigail Fremont. It must be Brookhaven. Ronni looked over the brochures. It seemed like an okay place, she guessed. Rose Cottage caught her eye. Let’s stay here, she said.
Miranda Howell would never have admitted to her young daughter that they could not afford Rose Cottage. So she made the excuse that it was already booked. Someone had gotten there ahead of them.
A couple of summers at Brookhaven hadn’t done much to further Miranda’s social aspirations, but it had firmly cemented things in Veronica’s adolescent mind. Certain things had been embedded in her subconscious. That she was deserving of more than she had. That Rose Cottage was the pinnacle and that she could never reach it. Because Abigail Fremont had it.
The first summer they were there, the Fremonts had Rose Cottage, but they weren’t in it. They had gone back to Chicago because Charles Desmond, Sharon’s father, had passed away. Miranda was crushed that her plan had failed. She spent the two weeks moping and pouting, while her eleven year-old daughter explored the grounds and flirted with the boys.
Ronni swam and played volleyball and learned how to French kiss. She was the natural leader and organized the kids into activities…not the approved ones put on by the Lodge, but more adventurous ones. Everyone liked her and followed her around. She had a good time. But at some point every day, she went past Rose Cottage and stared at it longingly.
The next summer they went back. And this time, the Fremonts were there. Miranda spent the first afternoon unpacking and drilling it into her daughter that Abigail was a good person to know. Ronni couldn’t believe that her mother wanted her to cozy up to this loser, this mouse who seemed to be afraid of her own shadow. But if that’s what it took to get her inside Rose Cottage…
Ronni made friendly overtures to Abigail and invited her to play tennis. Maybe after that, they could have lunch together. Ronni was very well put together for a twelve-year old and she had a date for a ‘walk’ after that with one of the busboys who thought she was much older than she was.
Ronni got all the kids to come and watch the tennis match. She wanted them all talking to their parents and each other about the match, so that her mother would be satisfied that she had spent time with Abigail. They all talked about it, all right. They talked about how Abigail wiped the court with Ronni.
After the match, Ronni was in a foul mood. She didn’t like to lose. She was a pretty good tennis player, but nothing up to Abigail’s standards. When Abigail shyly suggested lunch, Ronni said that she thought they might go to Rose Cottage. Abigail apologized and said that she would like that, but that her mother was in bed with a migraine. The rejection along with the humiliation of the loss at tennis combined to make Ronni furious. And she turned it all onto Abigail. It was all her fault. She seethed all the way back to the Lodge. So Abigail thought she was too good for the likes of Ronni, did she? She wouldn’t invite her to have lunch in her stupid cottage? Or even try to lose a few points at tennis to make a friend look good? Well, then she wasn’t a friend.
And Ronni’s adolescent mind took Abigail from being ‘not a friend’ to being an enemy. She tortured her for the remainder of the two weeks, and thanks to her mother, found the ultimate weapon, the horrid nickname, Ducky. She made sure that Abigail found out about it and then she turned the younger ones loose, the ten and eleven years old that wanted to hang out with Ronni and the older kids. Abigail couldn’t go anywhere on the property without hearing little whispered quacking sounds. It wasn’t long before she retreated to Rose Cottage and stayed there for the duration of Ronni’s vacation.
Ronni clicked Explorer shut. Yes, she had taken Ducky’s vacation away from her and now she was going to take away her husband.
