Rich and Pretty(40)
Lauren played coy and eventually Sarah showed her other pictures beyond that one—Christopher, polo shirt, gap in his teeth; later, safety pin through his septum, unwashed hair. Christopher was, she learned, political, only his way of doing things involved throwing vials of pig’s blood at the feet of the closeted mayor. He was young, but he was a savant. The apple fell near that tree, but on the far side of it. Ironic.
Lauren understood, later, that Lulu was a young mother, and she inferred that Huck was probably an absentee father; surely this explained something. Christopher had existed, there were photographs, but he was out of focus, he was off the page, he was ahead of his time, out of time as well. AIDS, which they blamed on drug addiction, but Lauren had studied those photographs, and divined in those eyes some sparkle, in that body, some softness. She had her doubts.
Sarah had been sent off to a psychiatrist that year, smart enough to understand that what was ostensibly a playdate was in fact an evaluation. She passed with flying colors, as was her wont. If they were stung, Huck and Lulu, by the fact that their friend in the Oval Office couldn’t do anything to spare their son, by the fact that the newspapers carried no mention of his brief tenure on earth, by the fact of a funeral for a child, of all the unthinkable things, they were at least saved by Sarah.
Two-thirds of their lives they’ve known each other, and Sarah’s told her so little of that brother. If Lauren complains about her brothers, Sarah reacts like Lauren is relaying something alien, something wholly unique. She had only been seven. Lauren remembers nothing of being seven: the sticky green vinyl of the bus seats on the backs of her knees, the fleshy gap in her teeth, the powdery smell of her second-grade teacher. Sarah’s recollections, if she has them, must be as vague, as fleeting, as sensory. They’ve never discussed it but Sarah works, now, for AIDS patients. It’s deliberate, but quiet, as she is. As a girl, Lauren almost begrudged Sarah her dead brother; hard to admit, as she was thirteen and old enough to know better. Like a cashmere scarf, a Tiffany key ring, a dead sibling was but another thing Sarah possessed that she did not.
Lauren sits up in the chair. Outdoor chaises aren’t actually all that comfortable, or she’s never sat in one that is, anyway. In the end, what you want is a bed. She’s got a funny knot in her lower back, testament to the fact that she’s just drifted away into sleep, this despite the chatter Fiona and Amina keep up. They’re each flipping through a magazine, stopping every so often to jab at the thin, glossy pages with an accusing, greasy finger. Their talk is of the clothes, their cut, their color, their appropriateness for the occasion being pictured, the connotations and associations of the celebrity caught sporting said clothes by some intrepid shutterbug with a telephoto lens. Lauren’s not opposed to such discussions; she knows quite well the pleasure of sitting, feet immersed in a hot, whirling bath while a penitent Korean woman trims her cuticles, and thinking about whether a certain personage has attained sufficient fame to wear a specific garment, or whether that garment’s appearance on the frame of a reality star hasn’t forever, in her estimation anyway, cheapened their good, Italian name. It’s just she wants to sleep is all. She wants to let her mind drift up into the sky like a kite, bob and dip on the eddying air, go where it will.
Maybe she’s being unfairly uncharitable toward Amina and Fiona. It’s easy to be that. Fiona, in her unexpectedly straightforward bathing suit, reclines like Delacroix’s odalisque on the fringed pink towel, a souvenir from a trip to Kenya. Amina, all those luxurious curves, that expanse of beautiful skin. Their every movement looks choreographed, something Lauren never knows how to do. She’s sure everyone can see it, the strain on her face as she walks through a room, that awareness of being watched. Other people have it so easy.
At least Meredith has a headache. She threw up after breakfast, then disappeared into the confines of the former plantation in search of central air. Meredith can’t hold her liquor, which is a problem as these celebratory rites naturally involve a fair amount of it, on top of which the poor dear is drinking to forget, though in her drunkenness she keeps bringing the conversation back to remembering. It’s Sunday, a day that feels like departure, but they’re not leaving until tomorrow afternoon, which gives the day a still more decadent feeling, if it’s possible, after the lobster at breakfast, to amp up the decadence. The Sun King himself would probably have taken it easy on the champagne. But never mind: Someone else is paying, and they’re all celebrating. That’s the thing with the way we celebrate in this culture, Lauren’s realized this weekend: Even if you don’t believe it, at first, and don’t mean it, eventually you get so drunk you feel celebratory. Then maudlin, but that can come later. They’ve agreed to take Sunday night off from one another, room service and pay-per-view, though she can imagine that Fiona and Amina might hit the town for dinner together. They seem to have much left to say to each other. A chat about their favorite mascara.
They are at the pool, where the breeze is less intense, because of the thoughtfully placed fence. Lauren stands, yawns, and slips into the water, which can be done in an instant, it’s that warm. She does it with the same thought she puts into everything: reaching for grace, or to be like Esther Williams—is that her name?—and not a portly sea lion easing its way into the surf. Her bathing suit seems wanting, somehow, though the shade, something like pink grapefruit, had seemed appealing in the pages of the catalog. She slips under the water, eyes closed, and feels her hair drift behind her like an idea, like a trail of perfume. She stands. The tile underfoot is reassuring. The water comes to just below her breasts, which if not quite as shapely as Fiona’s have always stood her in good stead. Gabe had liked them, anyway. They’ve been with her through a lot, these breasts. She’d wanted them, so badly, and then they came on, pretty quickly. She remembers standing before the mirror, shirtless, in profile, studying how they sprouted from her body, and they had, too, sprouted. No wonder we use fruit metaphors, Lauren thought; breasts nurture, yes, but they ripen on our bodies, too.