Astrid Magnussen (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
white_oleander) wrote2021-03-25 02:16 pm
white_oleander) wrote2021-03-25 02:16 pm
Outside of LA, California, 1994; Thursday Afternoon [03/25].
Behind the tinted windows of Susan's Jaguar, Astrid nestled into the smell of leather and money. It wrapped around her like fur. There was a jazz station on the radio, a free-form piece with a flute and an electric guitar. Gulls bobbed on the blue-green water. In the sealed world of the Jaguar, it was a perfect sixty-eight degrees. Such a pleasure to be in a rich woman’s car. Now a new song filled the rarified atmosphere, Astrid immediately recognized it. Oliver Nelson, “Stolen Moments.”
She closed her eyes and imagined a scene she'd clung onto quietly ever since it came up once, in a simulation, when she was about to teach Nina how to drive. In a convertable, at the wheel, with Mae at her side and not her mother's lawyer. Barely tall enough sitting there to even peek over at the Pacific Ocean passing them by, the wind ruffling the fur on her cat face that wasn't really there. That precious moment. All the more so for being unreal, gone in an instant, something to savor like perfume on the wind, piano played in a passing house in the afternoon. Astrid hung on to it as Susan parked on the far side of a lake, where we could see the blue-green water, dotted with white, the picturesque hillside beyond. She turned the music down, but she could still hear Nelson’s trumpet.
“I want you to ask yourself, what’s she guilty of?” Susan asked, turning toward Astrid from the driver’s seat. “I mean, in your mind. Really. Murder, or being a lousy mother? Of not being there for you when you needed her.”
Astrid looked at the little woman, her black curls maybe one shade too black, her eyes a little mascara-smudged from the heat. The weariness was an act, but also the truth. Like so many things, the words hopelessly imprecise. Astrid wished she had something to draw her with. She was in the process of becoming a caricature of herself. Not yet, now she was merely recognizable. But in five years, ten, she would only look like herself at a distance. Up close she would be drawn and frightened. “Honestly, aren’t you just trying to punish her for being a crappy parent, and not for the alleged murder?” She cracked her window with the electric button, snapped in the car’s lighter, and reached into her bag for her cigarettes. “That's why you pulled that whole emancipation stunt, wasn't it? What was Barry Kolker to you anyway, some boyfriend of your mother’s. She had a number of boyfriends. You couldn’t have been that attached.”
“He’s dead,” Astird said. “You’re accusing me of being cynical?”
She put a cigarette in her mouth and the lighter popped out. She lit it, filling the car with smoke. She exhaled up toward the slit in the window. “No, it’s not Kolker. You’re angry with her for abandoning you. Naturally. You’ve led some difficult years, and like a child, you point to the almighty mother. It’s her fault. The idea that she too is a victim would never occur to you.”
Like a child. She was a child.
Out the window, in the unairconditioned part of reality, a very red-faced jogger trotted, dragging a tired setter on a leash. “Is that what you’ll say if I tell the truth at her trial?”
They watched the runner plodding down the sidewalk, the dog trying to sniff at the plants as they went by. “Something like that,” she said, the first honest thing Astrid had heard her say since she’d shaken her small hand. She sighed and flicked ash out the window. Some blew back in. She brushed it off her suit.
“Astrid. She may not have been some TV mom, Barbara Billingsley with her apron and pearls, but she loves you. More than you can imagine. Right now she really needs your faith in her. You should hear her, talking about you, how she worries about you, how much she wants to be with you again.”
Astrid thought again about her imaginary trip, but with Ingrid, the sight of her, the magic of her speech. Now Astrid was not so sure, maybe it was true. She wanted to ask this woman what it was her mother had said about her. She wanted to hear her tell her what her mother thought about her, but she didn’t dare leave her that opening.
“She’d say anything to get out.”
“Talk to her. I can set it up. Just listen to what she has to say, Astrid,” Susan urged. “Four years is a long time. People do change.”
Astrid's moment’s uncertainty faded. She knew exactly how far Ingrid Magnussen had changed. She'd had her letters. She'd read them, most of them, page by page, swimming across the red tide. She knew all about her tenderness and motherly concern. Astrid and the white cat. But now there was something that had changed. What had changed was that for the first time in Astrid's life, her mother needed something from her, something she had the power to give or withhold, and not the other way around.
My mother needs me. It sank in, what that meant, how incredible it was. If Astrid went on the stand and said she did it, told about the trip to Tijuana, about the pounds of oleander and jimson weed and belladonna she’d boiled down in the kitchen, she’d never get out. And if Astrid lied, said Barry was superparanoid, he’d developed a complex about her, he was crazy, about how Ingrid had been so drugged when Astrid saw her at Sybil Brand she hadn’t even recognized her own daughter, she might win an appeal, get a new trial, she could be out walking around before Astrid was twenty-one.
Captain America would not have approved of the emotion that filled Astrid just then, its sweetness was irresistible. She had Ingrid's own knife to her throat. She could ask for something, she could make demands. What’s in it for me, that’s what she’d learned to ask, un-apologetically. What's my cut? She could put a price tag on her soul. Now she just had to figure out what she could see it for.
"Okay," Astrid said. "Set it up."
Susan took a last drag of her cigarette, threw it out the window, then raised the glass. Now she was all business. “Anything you want in the meantime, some spending money?”
Astrid hated this woman. What she'd been through the last four years meant nothing to her. Astrid was simply one more brick in the structure she was erecting, she had just slipped into place. She didn’t believe Ingrid was innocent. She only cared that there would be cameras on the courthouse steps. And her name, Susan D. Valeris, under her moving red lips. The publicity would be worth plenty.
“I’ll take a couple hundred,” Astrid said.
[[ continued from here! Taken and modified slightly from Chapter 29 of "White Oleander" by Janet Fitch. NFB for distance, but can be open if anyone wants to get in touch ]]
She closed her eyes and imagined a scene she'd clung onto quietly ever since it came up once, in a simulation, when she was about to teach Nina how to drive. In a convertable, at the wheel, with Mae at her side and not her mother's lawyer. Barely tall enough sitting there to even peek over at the Pacific Ocean passing them by, the wind ruffling the fur on her cat face that wasn't really there. That precious moment. All the more so for being unreal, gone in an instant, something to savor like perfume on the wind, piano played in a passing house in the afternoon. Astrid hung on to it as Susan parked on the far side of a lake, where we could see the blue-green water, dotted with white, the picturesque hillside beyond. She turned the music down, but she could still hear Nelson’s trumpet.
“I want you to ask yourself, what’s she guilty of?” Susan asked, turning toward Astrid from the driver’s seat. “I mean, in your mind. Really. Murder, or being a lousy mother? Of not being there for you when you needed her.”
Astrid looked at the little woman, her black curls maybe one shade too black, her eyes a little mascara-smudged from the heat. The weariness was an act, but also the truth. Like so many things, the words hopelessly imprecise. Astrid wished she had something to draw her with. She was in the process of becoming a caricature of herself. Not yet, now she was merely recognizable. But in five years, ten, she would only look like herself at a distance. Up close she would be drawn and frightened. “Honestly, aren’t you just trying to punish her for being a crappy parent, and not for the alleged murder?” She cracked her window with the electric button, snapped in the car’s lighter, and reached into her bag for her cigarettes. “That's why you pulled that whole emancipation stunt, wasn't it? What was Barry Kolker to you anyway, some boyfriend of your mother’s. She had a number of boyfriends. You couldn’t have been that attached.”
“He’s dead,” Astird said. “You’re accusing me of being cynical?”
She put a cigarette in her mouth and the lighter popped out. She lit it, filling the car with smoke. She exhaled up toward the slit in the window. “No, it’s not Kolker. You’re angry with her for abandoning you. Naturally. You’ve led some difficult years, and like a child, you point to the almighty mother. It’s her fault. The idea that she too is a victim would never occur to you.”
Like a child. She was a child.
Out the window, in the unairconditioned part of reality, a very red-faced jogger trotted, dragging a tired setter on a leash. “Is that what you’ll say if I tell the truth at her trial?”
They watched the runner plodding down the sidewalk, the dog trying to sniff at the plants as they went by. “Something like that,” she said, the first honest thing Astrid had heard her say since she’d shaken her small hand. She sighed and flicked ash out the window. Some blew back in. She brushed it off her suit.
“Astrid. She may not have been some TV mom, Barbara Billingsley with her apron and pearls, but she loves you. More than you can imagine. Right now she really needs your faith in her. You should hear her, talking about you, how she worries about you, how much she wants to be with you again.”
Astrid thought again about her imaginary trip, but with Ingrid, the sight of her, the magic of her speech. Now Astrid was not so sure, maybe it was true. She wanted to ask this woman what it was her mother had said about her. She wanted to hear her tell her what her mother thought about her, but she didn’t dare leave her that opening.
“She’d say anything to get out.”
“Talk to her. I can set it up. Just listen to what she has to say, Astrid,” Susan urged. “Four years is a long time. People do change.”
Astrid's moment’s uncertainty faded. She knew exactly how far Ingrid Magnussen had changed. She'd had her letters. She'd read them, most of them, page by page, swimming across the red tide. She knew all about her tenderness and motherly concern. Astrid and the white cat. But now there was something that had changed. What had changed was that for the first time in Astrid's life, her mother needed something from her, something she had the power to give or withhold, and not the other way around.
My mother needs me. It sank in, what that meant, how incredible it was. If Astrid went on the stand and said she did it, told about the trip to Tijuana, about the pounds of oleander and jimson weed and belladonna she’d boiled down in the kitchen, she’d never get out. And if Astrid lied, said Barry was superparanoid, he’d developed a complex about her, he was crazy, about how Ingrid had been so drugged when Astrid saw her at Sybil Brand she hadn’t even recognized her own daughter, she might win an appeal, get a new trial, she could be out walking around before Astrid was twenty-one.
Captain America would not have approved of the emotion that filled Astrid just then, its sweetness was irresistible. She had Ingrid's own knife to her throat. She could ask for something, she could make demands. What’s in it for me, that’s what she’d learned to ask, un-apologetically. What's my cut? She could put a price tag on her soul. Now she just had to figure out what she could see it for.
"Okay," Astrid said. "Set it up."
Susan took a last drag of her cigarette, threw it out the window, then raised the glass. Now she was all business. “Anything you want in the meantime, some spending money?”
Astrid hated this woman. What she'd been through the last four years meant nothing to her. Astrid was simply one more brick in the structure she was erecting, she had just slipped into place. She didn’t believe Ingrid was innocent. She only cared that there would be cameras on the courthouse steps. And her name, Susan D. Valeris, under her moving red lips. The publicity would be worth plenty.
“I’ll take a couple hundred,” Astrid said.
[[ continued from here! Taken and modified slightly from Chapter 29 of "White Oleander" by Janet Fitch. NFB for distance, but can be open if anyone wants to get in touch ]]