The Seeds Of A Daisy: The Lily Lockwood Series: Book One (Women's Fiction) (9 page)

She hands me a pen and gives me the clipboard that holds the consent form. She points to what I need to read and where I need to sign.

As I read, I can tell that the procedure is extremely dangerous. There is a laundry list of terrible things that can occur, including death.

I flash back to the first TV series contract I ever read. I must have been about fourteen or so. The contract was for an ABC show, which ended up being short-lived. When my agent called my mom to tell us that I had booked the show, I ran around the house screaming at the top of my lungs. My mother called me into her office.

“Lily, you have to go through this contract with me, line by line.”

“C’mon, Mom, that’s
so
boring.”

She continued as if she hadn’t heard my whining. “Lily, it is extremely important that you always know exactly what you are signing. If you don’t understand any of the language in the contract, you must ask me.

I rolled my eyes. All I wanted to do was run from the room and get on the phone to call my friends and tell them the good news.

“Lily, even if you have an attorney, you must know what’s in your contract, to protect yourself.” She was persistent; I had to give her that.

“Mommy dear, that’s why I have you! You’ll do it. Everyone knows you’re great at this stuff.” I gave her a kiss on the cheek.

She smiled, hugged me, and said, “Lily of the Valley, I won’t always be around to do this sort of thing. You must learn how to be self-sufficient.”

“Gimme a break, Mom. You’re going to be around forever. You’re Daisy Lockwood—one tough cookie.”

She grabbed me, sat me on her lap, and tickled me.

“Now listen, flattery will get you nowhere, young lady, when I’m trying to teach you something, even if you are absolutely right.” She smiled and we both laughed. Then she stood me up and patted me on the butt. “Now go get the law dictionary from the book shelf, please, so we can look up this phrase in the contract.”

“We have a
law
dictionary? When did that happen?”

I ran over to the bookshelf, figuring that the sooner we got through the boring contract, the faster I could be on the phone with my friends.

“I bought a law dictionary when I thought we might need one.”

“Okay,” I said, eager to get the show on the road. “Give me the phrase.”

“Force majeure,” she replied.

“Huh? Can you spell it?” I asked.

“Of course,” she said, looking through the contract to find the phrase again. “The first word is spelled f-o-r-c-e and the second word is spelled m-a-j-e-u-r-e.”

“Okay, here it is.” I read the meaning to her. “Force majeure is a common clause in contracts that essentially frees both parties from liability or obligation in the event of an extraordinary event or circumstance beyond the control of the parties, such as a war, strike, riot, crime, or situation described by the legal term ‘act of God’ (e.g., flooding, earthquake, volcano). The occurrence of such an event or circumstance excuses one or both parties from fulfilling their obligations under the contract.”

“Ah,” my mother said, “now it makes sense. Come over here, Lily, and let’s figure out how it pertains to you. Then we’ll go through the rest of the contract.”

“Miss Lockwood, your signature please,” Dr. Grippi says sternly, bringing me back to reality.

“Sorry for being spacy. I’m very tired.”

So here I am, not even reading the single most important document of my mother’s life. I’m ashamed to say that I can’t even force myself to look at the words. I sign and quickly hand the papers to Dr. Grippi. I can’t get rid of them fast enough.

“Thank you. Do you know if your mother has a living will?” she asks.

“A what?”

“A living will—instructions given by individuals specifying what actions should be taken for their health in the event that they are no longer able to make decisions due to illness or incapacity.”

“I have no clue. My mother and I never spoke about anything like that. I guess I can call her lawyer.”

“That’s a good idea,” she says. “And we need to find out who her health-care proxy is as well. You can have her lawyer fax all the information to us.” She takes out a small piece of paper and writes down the fax number.

“Okay,” I reply. “And Dr. Grippi, I hope you understand—I really am way too tired to talk to the Public Affairs guy right now. I’m going to my mother’s room for a bit. I’m going to order a car service to take me to her house for an hour or two, so that I can shower and clean up.”

“Well, Martinez says the press is out in full force. He is adamant about wanting to meet with you.” Dr. Grippi seems nervous, as if she doesn’t want to cross this Martinez guy. I don’t answer her.

“Well, I suppose I can tell him that you’ll speak to him later.” She looks miffed. “Also, please leave me your cell-phone number. I can put it on the chart and call to let you know when your mother is stable enough for the angiography.”

I give her the number and thank her.

“You know, Dr. Nipatu is a wonderful surgeon. You’re lucky he was on call last night.” She walks out of the room.

Lucky
?
Are you freakin’ kidding me—did she really say “lucky?”

I go back into my mother’s room. Gilda is there, changing the IV. My mother is in the same position—nothing has changed.

“Did you speak to Dr. Niptau?” Gilda asks.

I’m sure she knows the answer.

“Yes, he told me about the bleeding in her brain and the surgery. It sounded pretty scary.”

She walks over to me and says, “Look, this is a serious situation, that’s certainly true, but I’ve seen people pull through in cases like this and worse. You can never underestimate the power of the Spirit. In my job, I’ve surely seen miracles.”

“Thanks, Gilda, that gives me hope.”

She smiles. “Lily, there’s a chapel on the main floor, if you feel the need.”

“Thanks. Right now, I want to head over to my mother’s house. Can you have someone arrange a car for me? And can you also ask someone to take me out of the hospital through a back door? I hear there are tons of reporters swarming around the lobby and outside.”

“Sure. I’ll ask Linda at the front desk to call the car service and to alert security. I’ll keep a good eye on your mother, don’t you worry. I’ll also say a prayer for her.” She smiles.

Her kindness touches me and I start crying again. Gilda gives me a mama-bear hug and pats me on the back. I pull myself together and she leaves the room. I stand next to the bed and gently stroke my mother’s hand.

“Mom,” I say softly. “I love you so much. Please, please don’t leave me.” It’s the first time in my life that I’ve cried in front of my mother and that she hasn’t rushed over to console me.

I whisper, “Mom, please remember you’re Daisy Lockwood. You’re a strong woman. If you can hear me, Mom, you have to fight to wake up. You have to do this. We have the Emmys to attend. We still have so many great things to do together. Please fight, Mom.”

I kiss her hand and leave the room.

T
hirty minutes later, I’m in a town car heading east on the Long Island Expressway to the North Fork of the island. I lie down in the back seat to get some rest.

Mom had just finished making repairs to the farmhouse and I wonder how they turned out. I’m curious to know if I’ll feel strange being there alone, without my grandparents or my mother.

Our home is a waterfront farmhouse on the beautiful Long Island Sound, a 110-mile-long estuary of the Atlantic Ocean. Only twenty-one miles of its waters separate Long Island on the south and Connecticut to the north. The farmhouse was built in 1897 in the boxy American Foursquare style. My grandparents, Samuel and Rose Edwards, took great pride in knowing everything about the home and its history. My grandpa taught me all about this type of home, and said you can find similar ones across the United States. The house is pale yellow, with forest-green trim, and stands two-and-a-half stories high, with a large wraparound porch.

When I was little, we would sit on the porch in our rocking chairs, look out on the water, and watch the boats go by. Grams tried to teach me how to knit and crochet and Grandpa spent hours telling me about the history of Long Island, the North Fork, and Southold. I learned all about the Corchaug Indians who had inhabited the area, and the English settlers who arrived in the 17th century. Grandpa had founded the East End Historical Society back in the late 1950s, so that generations to come would be able to enjoy the rich history of the area. He adored talking about Southold and the surrounding towns, like Greenport, which in the mid-1800s was a bustling whaling town.

But what truly transformed the town of Southold was the coming of the railroad. The Foursquare home was common in neighborhoods near rail lines
because—and Grandpa loved this part of his story; his eyes lit up every time he told it—you could order these houses from the Sears catalogue. They came in boxcars with a book of directions and all the parts pre-cut and numbered for self-assembly.

“Lily Rose, imagine that! You could look through a catalogue, pick out a suit, a dress, some shoes and, oh yes—your house!” He slapped his knee and laughed each time he told this story.

My grandfather was discharged from the service in 1947 and married my Grams two years later. She had grown up not far from Southold in a town called Cutchogue, where her parents owned a potato farm. At that time, most of the many miles of farmland in the area were either potato farms or duck farms. In 1950, with the help of the GI Bill and a small loan from Gram’s father, my grandparents bought the farm, which then consisted of the farmhouse, a barn, and thirty acres of land. Little by little, over the years, Grandpa sold off all the acreage to land developers—except for three acres of beautiful waterfront property. Even though most of the original farmland no longer belongs to the family, everyone calls the house “the farm.”

Years later, many of the surrounding farms were turned into successful vineyards, and the North Fork really began to prosper. It gets extremely busy with tourists three seasons a year: spring, summer, and fall.

There are still thriving farms left. In the summer, tourists are drawn to the miles of scenic, unspoiled beaches, and to the vineyards. On Sundays, in the late afternoon, people line up at the farm stands to buy fresh fruits, vegetables, and home-baked goods to take back to the city. Mom told me that when she was growing up, she worked at her family’s farm stand in the summers.

In autumn, the foliage blazes with bright oranges, reds, and rich shades of gold. Carloads of families come out to the North Fork to pick pumpkins, ride hay wagons, and get lost in the many corn mazes. The apple orchards thrive, and everyone gives the area one last hurrah before the desolation of winter sets in.

Mom loves the farmhouse now, but when she was young she couldn’t wait to leave home. She never talked much about her younger years, but I do know that she left home three days after graduating from high school. She took off for Manhattan to become a journalist, leaving the folks on the farm in her rearview mirror.

She was always happy that I had a good, solid relationship with her parents. She was their only child and I was their only grandchild.

After a day of visiting with her parents, she would sometimes have the strangest expression on her face and would say, “The grandpa you love is different from the father I grew up with.”

I would ask her what she meant by that and she would blow it off. “Oh, nothing, really. People just get mellower as they get older.” Then she would move on to a different subject.

When I think of home, I think of Southold. I spent the beginning of my life in New York City, but I always went out to my grandparents’ farm for weekends and holidays. When I got older, my mother and I spent a lot of time in LA, but we kept the city apartment and visited the farm whenever we could.

We love LA, and over the years we’ve lived in different condos and houses in Santa Monica and Malibu. But Mom and I come back to get our New York City “fix” four times a year, at least. We hit all the museums, art galleries, and restaurants. We make believe we are tourists and take all the walking tours, bus tours, and even the Circle Line boat tour. We snap photos and sometimes take our game a little too far and speak in thick French accents.

We got busted once on a boat trip to Ellis Island when a family from Paris heard our accents and spoke to us in French, as if we were long-lost cousins. I don’t think either of us had laughed so hard in our lives. Mom makes life a constant adventure, a never-ending party.

Whenever we went back to New York, we visited Grams and Grandpa and spent lazy days lying out on the beach or helping Grams with her flower or vegetable gardens. Grandpa died three years ago, leaving Grams alone on the farm. I was on
St. Joe’s
by then, and Mom and I were living in the Malibu house. I wasn’t a baby—I was 25 at the time—but Mom and I had never been separated, so she felt conflicted about leaving me to go back East to take care of Grams. But Grams was in poor health and needed her there full time, so she went.

Within a couple of months, I met Jamie and he moved in with me. Oh boy, that was a rough time between Mom and me. We had many, many loud long-distance phone marathons around
that
issue. But eventually it was resolved.