How to Teach Filthy Rich Girls (11 page)

How generous could one fairy gaymother possibly be? The walk-in was filled with rack upon rack upon rack of gorgeous designer clothes. He began pulling out possibilities.

―For the gallery with Will, I‘m thinking Bottega Veneta high-waisted black crepe trousers and the Fendi ivory chiffon blouse. Now let us find you more.‖

I tried to protest, but by the time he was done, he‘d filled one large suitcase and a king-size garment bag, saying that I‘d need these clothes for the future.

―My advice for what you‘re wearing, darling?‖ he offered. ―Burn it.‖

Next came hair and makeup. Marco didn‘t share Keith‘s genius for hair, but he did teach me to use a flatiron. Next was makeup, which he had more than perfected, and then I changed into the outfit he‘d suggested. It fit. I looked down at my black loafers and bit my lip in concern. Even I knew they were a
nonono
.

―Oh, dear.‖ Marco nibbled on a perfectly manicured fingernail.

I wore a women‘s eight. He wore a women‘s ten. Then he snapped his fingers. ―Stretch Chanel ballet slippers, darling. Just the thing.‖

I tried them—still too big, but they stayed on because of the elastic. He promised to call Keith and have him bring over some other options. I protested one more time, but Marco was hearing none of it.

―Dahling,‖ he drolled in a near-perfect Zsa Zsa Gabor accent as he coated my lashes with mascara, ―you look stunning. Which car will you take?‖

I hadn‘t given it a moment‘s thought, which was what I told Marco. In exactly fifty minutes, I was supposed to be downtown on Worth Avenue, where Will would give me the grand tour of his father‘s gallery and then take me to the Breakers for tea.

―Take the Ferrari,‖ Marco advised. ―The red Ferrari. It‘s the most fun to drive. You can handle a stick?‖ He smirked at the sexual innuendo.

―I sure can.‖ I laughed. My father‘s pickup truck had a manual transmission.

Marco smiled. ―My advice, my dear? When given the opportunity to handle a stick, handle it.‖

The Phillips Gallery was located at the north end of Worth Avenue, and it had but a single painting in its picture window: a stone bridge in the French countryside. An even more discreet sign announced PHILLIPS GALLERY: PALM BEACH. JEAN-BAPTISTE-CAMILLE COROT, WORKS. NOVEMBER 13 TO DECEMBER 23.

I left my car at the valet stand directly in front of the gallery and then stepped inside. So this was it. The gallery that Will‘s father wanted him to run. The front room was stark white with a polished wood floor. The air-conditioning offered relief from the sun and humidity.

I was greeted by a young woman in a very fitted black suit, with a de rigueur Palm Beach tan and blunt-cut shoulder-length blond hair. ―Welcome to the Phillips Gallery.

I‘m Giselle Keenan,‖ she said to me. Then she turned her head and regarded me again.

―I hope you don‘t mind my asking, but . . . who did your color? The streaks are
wonderful.”

―Um, Keith,‖ I told her, his last name escaping me for a moment.

―
The
Keith?‖ Giselle uttered the name with hushed reverence. ―I‘ve tried and tried to book him. How did you do it?‖

―I‘m staying at Les Anges—‖

―With the Baker twins? We were all on the Hearts and Hopes ball committee last season. Tell them Giselle said hi, okay? I loved their
Vanity Fair
thing.‖

―Sure,‖ I told her, filing away some mental notes. ―And I‘m actually here to see Will Phillips? He‘s expecting me. I‘m Megan.‖

―Right away.‖ She pushed a few buttons on her phone system. As she did, a well-dressed guy with shaggy hair and the ruddy complexion of someone who spent lots of time on boats, or golf courses, or both, entered the gallery. He smiled at me in the way that I had seen so many guys smile at my sister. My first instinct was to turn to see if he was smiling at some really hot girl standing behind me. Apparently, the Cinderella effect had lasted after the ball.

Just as my golfing sailor took a couple of steps in my direction, Will materialized.

―Megan? Welcome to the gallery.‖

He wore a blue sport coat, an open-collar light blue shirt, khaki pants, and maroon loafers with no socks. I would soon learn that variations on this outfit were Palm Beach‘s unofficial male uniform. My sailor offered me a little nod of recognition and a good-natured look of regret. Then he turned and walked out.

―Have you had a chance to look around yet?‖ Will asked.

―Not much. But this room is gorgeous.‖

―I grew up with it. I don‘t even see it anymore,‖ Will confessed.

I wanted Will to be comfortable enough around me to be himself—what better poster boy for an article about Palm Beach could there be?—but it was hard to squelch my desire to kick him in the shins for being so spoiled.

―Want to take the two-cent tour and then a walk on the avenue?‖

―Sounds good,‖ I answered him.

Will mostly talked, and I mostly listened, as he showed me through the two expansive white rooms of the gallery. He had an encyclopedic knowledge of Corot‘s work and life, and he took me through the artist‘s three distinct periods, then turned to me. ―Let‘s go.‖

We walked out into the dazzling early-afternoon sunshine and turned right on the sidewalk, passing one designer shop after another. Ferragamo. Gucci. Hermès. Tiffany.

There was nary a Gap nor a Starbucks in sight. The pedestrian traffic was light, and the day was warm. The only real action was in front of a restaurant named Ta-boo, where a team of valets was efficiently parking a substantial lineup of Bentleys, Mercedeses, and Rolls-Royces.

I noticed a speed-limit sign that was posted with a minimum as well as a maximum.

Why would you possibly have a
minimum
speed requirement?

―What‘s up with those signs?‖ I asked.

―They don‘t have those in Philadelphia?‖ He looked puzzled. ―It‘s to keep the tourists from slowing down to gawk. People around here like their privacy.‖

―Who said I‘m from Philadelphia?‖

―Sage.‖

Well, okay. This could work to my advantage. For research purposes, it couldn‘t hurt for Will to also think I was the other Megan.

―So I‘ve never been to Philly,‖ Will said. ―Tell me about where you grew up.‖

Thanks to my Internet research that very morning, this wasn‘t hard. I told him where I liked to eat (Tre Scalini), where I liked to shop (the Smak Parlour), and where I liked to go on vacation (Gstaad, for the skiing, and Brussels, for the shopping). I was having so much fun inventing myself that I barely noticed we had done the full circle of Worth Avenue and were standing in front of the gallery again.

Will looked at his watch. ―I have to get back to work.‖

Wait, what about the Breakers? ―Thanks for the tour.‖ I touched his arm. ―Maybe we could get together another time.‖

This was my shameless way of saying:
Ask me out for cocktails, pretty boy
. Who knew what I could get out of him after two or three drinks?

―Yeah, maybe. Take care, Megan.‖ I couldn‘t help but think he looked a little confused as he stepped backward into the gallery.

Choose the best antonym (pair of words possessing an opposite meaning) for the following set of words:

DIVIDE and CONQUER

(a) invite and party

(b) separate and destroy

(c) highlight and blowout

(d) unify and submit

(e) mani and pedi

Iwas walking on the now-familiar white pebble path between the main mansion and the twins‘ manse, going over the bizarre end to Will‘s and my walk, when I heard shouts coming from the pool deck. The twins—I couldn‘t yet tell their voices apart—and someone else.

How intriguing.

The expletives were flying as I stepped off the path and hid behind a palm tree just west of the pool deck. From there, I could see across the deck to the cabanas, where the battle royal was taking place. The girls were still in their swimsuits, and the other woman was dressed in a beige pantsuit.

―I can‘t fucking believe you, Zenith!‖ Sage screeched. ―You call yourself a fucking manager? You
suck
!‖

Manager? As in the manager who was supposed to be getting the twins all that priceless film, TV, and modeling work?

Zenith took a deep breath, clearly attempting to maintain her composure. ―Look, this kind of thing happens all the time—deals fall through when it comes time for people to write checks.‖

―You said you were going to get us our own TV series. Our own movie. Our own chain of clubs,‖ Rose whined. ―You said we were going to make the world forget about Paris and Nicole!‖

―Look, there
is
an offer on the table. If you weren‘t such spoiled brats, you‘d be grabbing at it,‖ Zenith fumed.

―Golden Glow spray-on tan? And I‘m the fucking ‗before‘ picture? Sage Baker is
never
a ‗before‘ picture!‖

Sage Baker as a ―before‖ picture? Priceless.

―Are you finished?‖ Zenith asked quietly.

―Get the hell off our property,‖ Sage responded.

―Nothing would make me happier. Don‘t ever call me again.‖ Zenith started back across the pool deck, thankfully taking a path that wouldn‘t cause her to run into me.

―No, you don‘t ever call
us
again!‖ Sage took off one of her jewel-encrusted sandals and hurled it at her retreating manager. It plunged into the pool. ―And you look like shit in beige!‖ Sage turned back to her sister. ―Fuck her. We‘ll find another manager. Come on, Rose, let‘s go get plastered.‖

―No.‖ Rose looked like she was on the verge of tears.

“No?”
Sage echoed, sounding incredulous. I was incredulous, too. I hadn‘t known that Rose was capable of saying that word to her sister.

―Everything‘s . . . ruined.‖ Rose dashed across the deck and down the stone steps to the beach, leaving Sage alone. For a brief moment, it seemed like Sage was going to go after her. But then she strode back toward their house, kicking her other sandal into the pool on the way.

Divide and conquer,
I told myself. The twins‘ house was already divided. All I had to do was conquer.

I took the back way to the beach and tried to look casual, like I merely happened to be going for an afternoon stroll. Almost immediately, I saw Rose taking baby steps along the surf line, dancing away from each oncoming wave and then daring the ocean to soak her feet.

―Out for a walk?‖ I asked as I approached. Her lower lip was trembling. ―Hey, are you okay?‖

She shook her head. The tide was on the way in, and a wave came dangerously close to soaking our feet. I jumped back, figuring Marco‘s ballet slippers were not waterproof.

―Where‘s my sister?‖ Rose asked, looking concerned.

I shrugged. ―Don‘t know.‖

Rose started up the beach and sat down against the stone seawall. I followed her there, realizing that if Sage looked out at the beach, she couldn‘t see us together. That was the point.

―We‘re totally fucked,‖ Rose finally muttered. ―Sage and me.‖

Well, then. ―Fucked how?‖

She kept her eyes on the water. ―You remember what Sage told you the night you arrived—about our manager out in Los Angeles? All the offers and how we were going to make our own money?‖

I nodded and waited for her explanation. And waited some more. Finally, she let it all spill out in a monologue that challenged every law of punctuation and syntax: ―Sage said doing
Vanity Fair
would make us famous, and we wouldn‘t be able to go anywhere after a while without television cameras following us, and I mean, that sounded like fun because that‘s how famous people are, like, all the time and everything . . . So Sage hired this manager in Los Angeles, and there were going to be all these offers, like for a movie, and our own reality TV show, and, like, makeup companies but not like cheap ones, you know?‖

I nodded again. It seemed like the thing to do.

―Well,‖ Rose went on, ―as it turns out, none of those deals worked out, but I don‘t know why and, like, there was only this spray-tan thingie? Oh, and maybe this other thing that wasn‘t for sure, but it was for a chain of stores in the South that carries, like, Jessica Simpson jeans, which she doesn‘t even wear.‖

―Wow.‖

My sympathy seemed to encourage Rose. She went on, ―Anyway, we wouldn‘t have made enough to live for, like, a year. But we already said fuck you to Grandma‘s money we never should have made you swim naked because now you hate us and you‘ll never want to be our tutor but even if you did what good would that even be?‖ She blinked twice. ―Does that make sense?‖

In an alternate grammatical universe, maybe. But I got the gist, because the gist seemed like the opening I‘d been hoping for. Sage had sold Rose on the notion that they wouldn‘t need their grandmother‘s money because they were going to make so much of their own. Ergo, they could blow me off. All wrong. Rose was confiding in me because she was scared shitless of being fundless.

There‘s nothing like being needed.

―So . . . can you help us?‖ she asked.

I could tutor her, which would buy me more time in paradise—a good thing. No. A great thing. But could I get her in to Duke? Even if I worked with her night and day for seven and a half weeks, I wasn‘t sure she had the IQ of a tennis ball. Plus,
both
twins had to be accepted, and being the Palm Beach version of Heidi Fleiss was likely Sage‘s preference over being tutored by me.

At least I was getting somewhere with
one
of the twins. Maybe her sister wouldn‘t be so far behind.

That night, like any good investigative journalist, I worked on my notes. Between Marco, Keith, Will, and the twins, I had more than enough dirt to bury the Palm Beach privileged.

From Suzanne de Grouchy, after one two many flirtinis at the Red and White ball: A society princess who stabbed her husband with a Wüsthof-Trident classic kitchen knife, after catching him with one of Suzanne‘s friends, had received two months of house arrest. The friend was shipped off to the South of France.

From Keith, during another makeup application: Last year a shelter called the Peace Place canceled their usual fund-raising ball for The Season and instead sent out invitations announcing that ―guests‖ could stay home in comfort and send a donation in their place. Peace Place normally received more than a million dollars in donations at their event. The year they canceled, they raised five thousand. ―Charity balls during The Season,‖ Keith decreed, ―are Palm Beach‘s contribution to society.‖