The familiar Skype ringtone had Kat on edge. Gotta be Mom, she knew, unless it’s that bastard Mitchell Jarvis. Aren’t two unanswered phone calls enough? No, he wouldn’t have the balls to contact me now, probably just hopes never to see me again. Now I get to explain all that to Mom. Great.

But the call didn’t have the name Adrienne Le Fleur, but Jeanell Le Fleur Black. That sent waves of apprehension through her already stressed system. Is Mom okay? Is there some emergency? Did Ric finally manage to do the deed? All aboard the gloat boat!

Kat plopped herself down at her desk and clicked the mouse, her sister’s face appearing in the Skype window. She had Kat’s dark brown hair, but cut above the shoulders—a conservative look to match her few years of seniority.

“Leen, how are ‘ya?”

“Great, Jeanell, great,” Kat said—easier than explaining the truth. “What’s up?”

“I just thought I’d call to give you the good news…we did it!” Her face lit up with a wide smile, her eyes bending into wrinkled crescents.

“That’s so great, Jeanell, really terrific! I’m so happy for you, I know how…um, how hard you and Ric…worked for this.”

But Jeanell just waved her kid sister off with a roll of her eyes. “The way we went at it, the kid’s gonna be born six feet tall.”

Kat wasn’t sure how she was going to take the news, but she was genuinely glad to be genuinely glad. Her own smile was natural and beaming, making Kat feel even better. For all the kids she worked with every week, there would now be one with her blood, in her family.

In Tuscon.

“I-I couldn’t be happier, Jeanell, really. How far along?”

“Three months! I’ll start showing anytime.”

“Awww. I wish I could be there to see you get fat!” The sisters shared a laugh, but it ended with a skeptical glare from Jeanell on the other side of the computer monitor. “In a good way, I mean.”

“Uh-huh. Well, look, Leen, maybe this is a good time to think about coming home, moving back to Tucson.”

“Jeanell—”

“You’ve been out there almost ten years, Kathleen; you’ve had your fling, don’t you think? How are things with your writer guy?” Kat wasn’t fast enough, and even from that distance, her sister could read her expression. “Oh, hun, I’m so sorry. So…what’s keeping you there?”

More and more, she was wondering the same thing. “There are lots of nice guys here in Arizona. Take your pick. You’re a Tucson ten, but in New York? I dunno, a seven maybe?” Jeanell smiled. poking fun at her sister. The expression on Kat’s face said it all.

“Okay, I gotta go.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it, Kat. Please don’t be upset with me. Your little niece or nephew is going to want to know their Aunt Kathleen, that’s all I’m saying. And if you think you might be happier coming home, well—”

“There’s no shame in it?”

Jeanell nodded. “Exactly.”

* * *

Kat was spending some idle time at the apartment between gigs. More balloons, she thought to herself. Twist, fold, twist and fold again. Is that what my life’s going to be—just an endless series of twists and folds, amounting to nothing? These kids have fun, but they forget it just as quickly. No balloon animal can hope to survive four or five days, and it’s a saggy, withering demise.

But what if I do go back to Tucson? I’ll still have to make a living, and there’ll be a lot less opportunity out there as well. Still, if I let Ben keep up the business, just take the work out there, I could make it work. If I can make it here, as they used to sing… Still, twist and fold and twist and fold again.

There was a knock at the door, too forceful to be a woman’s. Kat crossed the little apartment to the front door, sliding the chain lock closed and picking up the baseball bat she and Jackie kept by the jab. “Who is it?”

“Kathleen, it’s me…Mitchell.”

“Mitchell! Get outta here, you son of a bitch!” She shouted with a bubbling rage that poured out of her like lava.

His voice was quick and muddled on the other side of the door. “Kat, please, give me a chance to explain.”

“Why should I? I never want to see you again.”

“That’s fine, Kat, but you won’t take my calls. I just want a few words, then I’ll go.” She stood on the other side of the door, clutching that baseball bat with both hands, extended in front of her.

“Go ahead and talk then,” she piped.

“Not through the door, Kat…for obvious reasons.” Tension swirled in the air while he waited for her to open the door, and when it was clear she wasn’t convinced, Mitchell went on, “Look, I don’t blame you for being mad at me, I really don’t. I just…I want to put things right, if I can, just a bit.”

She searched her heart and mind for something which Mitchell could still give her, and she came up empty. But she was ready to reclaim her sense of self—some kind of resolution over the matter. She’d been humiliated and exploited, and completely taken advantage of. This was a chance to throw a little humiliation back his way, to not feel so helpless, yet again.

Kat reached over and slid open the lock. “Step back into the hall,” she said before unlocking the bolt and clicking open the knob. She stepped back as the door was idle and ajar in front of her. It slowly slid open and Mitchell cautiously poked his head in. He saw the baseball bat and released a quick, amused huff, putting up his hands, flattened palms out, as he stepped into the room.

“You don’t have to worry, Kathleen. Why would you think I’d ever hurt you? That’s not the kind of person I am.”

“I have no idea what kind of person you really are,” she snapped back, fingers caning around that rubber handle. “Married? Really, Mitchell!”

“Okay, I know it…it wasn’t great.”

“How do you even get any fucking writing done? A team of ghostwriters, I would imagine.” She instantly recognized his mischievous but bashful half-smile. Her disgust quickly returned and she could only shake her head. “Unbelievable. You’re pure bullshit through and through.”

Mitchell took a step toward her, and she a matching step back, the aluminum bat still high and ready. But it would take a lucky blow if he advanced quickly, and both of them seemed to realize it.

“Like I said, I don’t blame you for being upset. I know I’ve hurt you, and I’m really, really sorry about it.”

“Uh-huh, is that it? Is that what you came all the way down here to say?”

“It’s really not that far; my wife and I have a place on the Upper West Side—”

“Then get the hell back there, you scumbag,” she said, her advance putting him two steps backward toward the door.

“I will, Kat, I will, but I just want to know that, well, that we’re parting as friends.”

“We’re not. Fuck off,” Kat exclaimed bluntly.

“Okay, not friends, I get that, but, y’know, at least we can both walk away and not, y’know, go on reliving it through a lot of small talk or newspaper interviews or anything like that.”

Kat could finally see the real reason for his visit—his true intent. “You want me to keep quiet about all this, your double life, our affair … God, just saying it makes me sick.”

“Exactly,” Mitchell said, leaning forward and shrugging to punctuate his point, “that’s what I’m saying. Let’s just get on with our lives, leave it behind us. Why keep drudging up the past?”

“Especially when it could hurt your career.”

“And my marriage.” After a calculated pause, Mitchell said, “And it wouldn’t do anything for you either.” She turned her head to better hear the truth behind what Mitchell was trying not to say. But he went on, “Professional child’s entertainer has torrid affair, with a man she met at a professional function?”

Kat had tried not to think about it: a lapse in professional judgement that she was always afraid would snap back and bite her on the ass. But there were other things at stake, including her pride, her self-respect, and her personal safety.

“That’s no worse than an author who doesn’t write his own books, and has a double life—”

“You can’t prove the first thing,” Mitchell said, his eyes locking on hers, “and you really won’t be able to prove the other.”

Driven by a need not to back down to Mitchell even a single further step, she felt compelled to asked, “Why not? We were together for six months.”

“Nothing that you can prove; you’ve got no pictures, no witnesses.”

“I told my friends, my family—” Kat retorted.

“The delusions of a crazed fan, like I told my wife. And that’ll really look bad: a deranged party clown who stalks her clients? You’ll be finished, Kathleen, you and everybody you work with.” Her lungs were robbed of breath and her mind vacant of any response. Mitchell seemed to know he’d won. “Let it go, Kathleen.” And there was more to that than simply practical advice.

It was a threat.

“Just get the hell out of my sight,” she said, repulsed by every fiber of his being, advancing and easing him backward out the still-opened front door.

“Goodbye, Kathleen Le Fleur,” he said as he faded into the hallway, “goodbye forever.” He turned, and Kat slammed the door closed behind him.