Nobody Does It Better

  “Don't tell,” her mom whispered excitedly to Aaron. Eleanor was wearing a bizarre Versace outfit that had bad sample-sale purchase written all over it. The outfit consisted of an orange-and-black vertically striped halter top attached to green-and-black horizontally striped pedal-pushers by way of a mess of gold chains and buttons. The pedal-pushers even sported gold fringe.

  Why is it that the mom population is always drawn to designers' biggest mistakes?

  Not only was Eleanor's outfit ugly, but in another fit of postpartum depression she'd done something dreadful to her hair. That morning it had been shoulder-length and blond. Now it was dyed dark red and cropped close to her head, like Sharon Osbourne's. Needless to say, it was sort of hard for Blair to look at her.

  Aaron pushed the last tack into the corner of the map and hopped down from the bed, his wannabe Rastafarian mini dreadlocks banging merrily against his hollow vegan cheeks. “I hate to break it to you, Ma, but this is going to require just a wee bit of clarification.” He shot Blair an apologetic look. “Sorry, sis, we wanted to surprise you.”

  Blair liked her stepbrother Aaron okay—much more than she liked his fat loser of a father, Cyrus Rose—but it totally infuriated her when he called Eleanor Ma or her sis. After all, his father and her mother had only been married since Thanksgiving, so Eleanor was very definitely not his mom and she was very definitely not his sister. Despite the existence of her little brother Tyler, who was a boy, and Yale, who was only a baby, Blair had always identified herself as an only child, except for those rare occasions when she and Serena were getting along so well it felt like they were sisters.

  Eleanor scooted off the bed, grabbed Blair's hand, and dragged her over to the sage-colored wall to look at the map. It was a detail of Australia and the Pacific Ocean, and there were four red circles drawn around four pinpricks in the sea between Vanuatu and Fiji. Underneath the circles, written in black ink in Eleanor's loopy cursive, were the names Yale, Tyler, Aaron, and Blair.

  Pardonnez-moi?

  Blair twisted her ruby ring around and around on her finger. “What the fuck, Mom?” she demanded impatiently.

  Eleanor was still holding Blair's hand and she squeezed her daughter's fingers tightly with manic delight. “I bought you an island, sweetie, and named it after you. Each of my four little darlings has their very own Pacific island! And next year, when they print the new maps, your names will appear right there next to Fiji! Isn't it fantastic?”

  Blair stared at the map. Fiji had always sounded sort of exotic to her, but the Island of Blair probably consisted of a scrappy shrub on top of a piece of reef riddled with spiny sea urchins and kelp.

  “Tyler's already planning our big South Pacific Christmas trip next year,” Eleanor rattled on. “He's researching which of our islands have the best surf.”

  “And your mom's buying each of us a board,” Aaron informed her. “Except for Yale.”

  Blair noticed that Aaron's toenails were painted black.

  “It's a band thing,” he explained, noticing her noticing. “We were bonding over the fact that, at the moment, none of us has a girlfriend.”

  Big surprise, Blair thought. If he wasn't careful, Aaron was going to become one of those pale, skinny, asexual, vegetarian old men like Morrissey, fading into the ether without anyone remembering that he'd ever been there. Aaron and Serena had hooked up and even been in love for a fleeting moment that winter, but Aaron wasn't exciting enough to hold Serena's attention for more than five minutes.

  Then again, who was?

  Blair really wasn't all that interested in what Aaron and his loser Bronxdale Prep bandmates did to amuse themselves, or in her mother's insane need to buy random, completely pointless things like islands and alpacas and surfboards, but she did want to know what Kitty Minky, her Russian Blue cat, was doing digging around in the sumptuous pile of silk-covered bolsters, pillows, and throws at the head of her bed.

  “Meow-meow?” Blair playfully addressed the cat in the made-up cat language she'd used with Kitty Minky since she was nine years old.

  All of a sudden Kitty Minky let loose a stream of disgusting-smelling cat pee.

  “No!” Blair shouted, hurling a putty-colored leather Manolo sandal at him. Kitty Minky leapt off the bed, but it was too late: Blair's rose-colored silk bedspread and throw pillows were soaked through.

  “Oh my!” Eleanor exclaimed, wringing her hands and looking like she was about to cry. “Oh dear me, what a mess,” she added despairingly, her mood shifting abruptly from high to low.

  “Don't worry, Blair. You can sleep with me and Tyler in our room until Esther cleans this place up,” Aaron offered.

  Tyler and Aaron's room smelled like beer and feet and tofu hot dogs and those foul herbal cigarettes Aaron was always smoking. Blair wrinkled her nose. “I'd rather sleep on the floor in Yale's room,” she responded miserably.

  Eleanor wrung her hands. “Oh, but baby Yale's in quarantine for the next few days. She picked up some sort of terrible face rash at the pediatrician's office when she was there for her checkup yesterday. Apparently it's very contagious.”

  Ew.

  Blair's small blue eyes narrowed. She adored her baby sister, but she wasn't about to risk getting a rash, especially not a face rash. Which left a particular question unanswered: Exactly where the fuck was she supposed to sleep?!

  The penthouse was clearly uninhabitable, and while the Archibalds' house had seemed like an obvious choice only an hour ago, it had since turned into an after-school program for sixteen-year-old Nate-worshipping stoners. Serena's door was always open, but Serena's parents were kind of old-fashioned, and they probably wouldn't like it if Blair had a boy in her room with the door closed or whatever.

  Like Serena never had a boy in her room with the door closed?!

  Besides, Blair had already tried living with Serena for a few days that spring and they'd fought the whole time. Of course that was when Blair had been trying to seduce Serena's brother Erik in order to lure Nate away from that drugged-up lumber heiress he'd met in rehab. Still, now that she and Serena were friends again, it was best not to risk it.

  As if they wouldn't find something else to fight over.

  Blair pulled opened the top drawer of the cruelty-free mahogany dresser. She had a credit card, and there were lots of nice hotels nearby. She grabbed a pair of clean white cotton Hanro underwear and a white tank top. The one benefit of wearing a uniform to school was packing light. And the benefit of packing light was that undoubtedly she would need something she didn't have and would therefore have to buy at one of the three Bs: Bendel's, Bergdorf's, or Barneys.

  “Want to come see what Tyler's found out about our islands?” Aaron offered. “He's downloading a whole bunch of stuff right now.”

  “The man I spoke to said the temperature on the islands is consistently between seventy-five and eighty-five degrees all year round,” Eleanor added gleefully. She glanced at her gold Cartier chain-link wristwatch. “Phooey. I'm five minutes late for my Red Door makeup appointment.” She giggled conspiratorially and clapped her hands together like a little girl. “Cyrus is taking me out to the Four Seasons tonight. I can't wait to surprise him with his present.”

  Blair didn't even want to guess what her mom could have dreamed up to buy Cyrus. A whole country?

  “I'll probably be back to pick up a few things,” she informed her mother. “And we definitely need a new mattress, pillows, and sheets for this room. But I'm not sure if I'll even be coming back, you know, to live.”

  Eleanor blinked dazedly at her daughter. After seventeen and a half years of being Blair's mother, she still didn't quite know what to make of her.

  “Just in case there's a civil war on your island or your new shipment of French underwear comes in, exactly where might you be reached?” Aaron demanded with an annoying wise-assed smirk.

  Blair smirked back. “The Plaza?”

  And preferably a suite.

  N Is Easily Led Out to Sea
r />   The roof terrace atop Nate's four-story town house wasn't high enough for a real view, but it was still nice to sit up there and suck hits out of Jeremy's giant green glass bong and reminisce about all the wild shit they'd gotten up to when they were young and carefree—before they had stuff to worry about like college and the future.

  As if they were genuinely worried.

  “Dude. Remember that time in Latin when you were so baked you thought you were in French?” Charlie Dern drawled, blowing smoke out of a tiny gap in the side of his wide, clownish mouth. “You were just babbling in French like a fucking lunatic and Mr. Herman the She-Man was like, ‘I beg your pardon, Mr. Archibald. Although all romance languages find their roots in Latin, I never did master French.’”

  Anthony Avuldsen and Jeremy Scott Tompkinson began to cackle as they remembered that legendary day.

  “I was speaking fucking perfect French, too,” Nate observed. “I think maybe for a moment there I thought I was French. Like a native speaker.”

  “Right,” Charlie agreed sarcastically. “Man, you could barely even talk.”

  Lexie floated by in her tie-dyed dress, barefoot and waving her hands in front of her face. She'd drawn flowers on her fingers and toes with a glow-in-the-dark pen she'd found on Nate's desk, and they glowed neon green in the deepening twilight. A ponytailed boy named Malcolm was playing the guitar and singing an ancient James Taylor song.

  You just call out my naaame

  And you know where ever I aaam

  I'll come runnin' to see you again.

  “I wish we were at the beach.” Jeremy sighed and traced his index finger along the rim of the bong. “Everything would be perfect if we were at the beach.”

  Nate nodded his golden brown head in agreement. “We will be soon. My parents' Hamptons booze cruise is in a couple weeks. Boat's already docked down in Battery Park. You're coming, right?”

  The junior boys on the roof terrace looked up, wondering hopefully if Nate was addressing them.

  Fat chance.

  “Everyone's coming,” Anthony Avuldsen responded, making the juniors feel like even worse dweebs. “It's like the kick-off to the whole freaking summer.”

  “Blair's class is doing their senior cut day the next day,” Nate mused. He realized vaguely that Blair had never made an appearance on the roof terrace. Maybe she was still in the shower, or maybe she'd kissed him good-bye and gone home? He honestly couldn't remember. If she was in the shower, he might steal downstairs and surprise her. The thought of her wet and naked made him smile deliciously.

  Charlie pulled a marijuana-stuffed Ziploc from out of his khaki pants pocket and began loading up the bong. “You said the boat's in the harbor?”

  Before Nate had a chance to respond, his cell phone rang. BLAIR flashed up on the phone's little screen.

  Speak of the she-devil.

  Nate pressed answer and put the phone to his ear without actually saying anything.

  “Guess where I am?” Blair gushed happily. “The Plaza. So get your ass over here right now. I have a suite.”

  The Plaza was only about twenty blocks away. Nate gazed in the general direction of downtown. It seemed very far away, but it would be nice to lie on a big white hotel bed and watch lots of movies and order room service. He was pretty hungry.

  Not exactly what Blair had in mind.

  “Just bring your toothbrush. I've got everything else covered,” she added coyly.

  Meaning the three Cs: champagne, caviar, and condoms.

  “Sounds good,” Nate responded gamely. “See you in a minute.” He clicked off and Jeremy shoved the bong at him.

  “So what I'm thinking is,” he told Nate with the intense face of a seriously stoned person. He'd picked the green alligator away from his black Lacoste shirt, and it dangled from his chest like a partially removed scab. “We all head down to your parents' boat. It's stocked with booze, and the crew's probably doing the tourist thing in town and won't even notice if we take it out for a spin, right? You sail like a master. Why not go on a little pre-Hamptons excursion to, say—”

  “Bermuda!” Charlie piped up.

  “Fuck, yeah,” Anthony agreed.

  The three boys looked at Nate. They knew they were asking to do something completely outrageous, but they could tell by the interested glimmer in Nate's eye that he was sort of into it.

  Nate's mind was racing in a blurry, zig-zaggedy, stoned way. Sail the boat to Bermuda? Sure, why not? They were seniors—they could do whatever they wanted. Blair could come too, and they could drink mimosas and make love on the beach under the warm sun. She was always talking about going away together.

  Lexie came over and sat down in Nate's lap. She smelled like amber incense and goose-liver paté. The tip of her jet-black ponytail just grazed the sun, moon, and stars tattoo on her shoulder blade. “Alors, what's next?” she yawned, taking the bong from Nate.

  Nate waited until she was done with the hit before pushing her out of his lap and hoisting himself to his feet. He clapped his hands together like a stoned camp counselor. “Come on, everybody, we're going on an adventure.”

  The junior boys began to murmur excitedly. Not only had they gotten to party at Nate Archibald's town house, he was taking them somewhere—probably somewhere cooler than they had ever been before.

  “Anyone who pukes on boats should probably stay behind!” Jeremy warned.

  “No fucking way,” whispered a St. Jude's junior whose name happened to be Nate Lyons, and who mimicked his namesake down to the color of his navy blue Brooks Brothers socks. There was a mass rush for the exit. Nate Archibald, the coolest senior boy on the Upper East Side, was taking them out on his boat. It was their big fucking day!

  Nate followed the rest of the boys downstairs with good-natured amusement, completely forgetting what he'd been about to do before the topic of a sail to Bermuda even came up. Behind him, his cell phone lay forgotten on the roof terrace, its little screen flashing the name BLAIR as it rang every two minutes for the next half hour.

  Winter, spring, summer, or fa-waall

  All you have to do is ca-waall

  And I'll beee there!

  Yeah. Right.

  Another Wasted Pair of La Perla Underwear

  “Nate's on his way over,” Blair announced to Serena smugly over the phone. She'd called Serena just to brag about being at the Plaza, feeling guilty as she dialed but getting over the guilt by the time the phone began to ring. She leaned toward the massive gilt-framed bathroom mirror and applied another coat of Chanel Vamp lipstick. It was dark red and she usually only wore it in winter, but when you were locked in a sumptuous hotel suite with your boyfriend having constant sex, who cared what season it was?

  “Don't be mad,” Blair pleaded with her best friend. “We can hang out in my suite tomorrow afternoon or something, okay?” She flashed her reflection a sexy, knowing grin. “After Nate and I wake up.”

  “You two are ridiculous,” Serena scoffed without the slightest note of jealousy. Blair had confessed to finally losing her virginity to Nate the morning after it happened, but she'd resisted going into too much detail and Serena had resisted asking too many questions. After all, Serena and Nate had lost their virginities together, so sex with Nate was kind of an awkward subject.

  “I have to go to this new Yale students' party,” Serena responded. “Not that I'm going to Yale,” she hurriedly corrected herself. Her acceptance to Yale was an even worse subject. “My parents signed us up though, so I have to go.”

  “Oh.” Blair pouted her lips and turned around to examine her butt in her new black silk La Perla underwear set. Of course she wasn't exactly into Yale yet, but she was on the fucking wait list—they still could have invited her.

  “I was hoping you'd come with me,” Serena added. “Since you're totally more likely to go to Yale than I am.”

  Blair readjusted her bra straps. Nate was into Yale too, but he hadn't mentioned any Yale party. And if he wasn't going, she certainly cou
ldn't go. They might be … otherwise engaged.

  Uh-huh.

  “It's not until seven,” Serena prompted. “You guys should be ready to venture outside by then.”

  “Can I call you about it tomorrow?” Blair asked dubiously.

  “Whatever.” Serena didn't mind going to parties by herself, since she was never by herself for very long. Boys buzzed and hovered around her like flies at a picnic. Have fun tonight. “Bye, sweetie.”

  Blair hung up just as the bellboy arrived with the bottle of Dom Perignon and the plate of caviar and toast points she'd ordered from room service. She slipped into one of the Plaza's thick white terrycloth robes and answered the door.

  “Over by the bed,” she commanded, loving how Joan Crawfordishly jaded she sounded. She tipped the guy and waited until he'd closed the door. Then she slipped out of her robe, flopped down on her side on the massive California king bed, and reached for the remote. Within seconds she'd found AMC—American Movie Classics, the channel that regularly played all her favorites like Breakfast at Tiffany's, starring Audrey Hepburn, and My Fair Lady, also starring Audrey Hepburn.

  To her disappointment, Dirty Dancing was playing. Since when was anything made after 1980 a true classic? Blair wondered. All of a sudden she felt old. But then, that seemed sort of appropriate, considering the fact that she was about to have a hot-and-heavy liaison with her lover in a sumptuous hotel suite. Where was Nate anyway? A cab from his house to the Plaza would only take about seven minutes. If she were Nate, she'd have made it in five. She dialed his cell without even looking at the buttons on her phone, but there was no answer. Maybe he was showering and putting on his sexy black Calvin Klein boxers in preparation for their rendezvous, she mused.

  Or maybe not.

  Blair stood up, removed her robe, and dimmed the lights. Then she spread a little caviar on one of the toast points and stood watching herself in the oversized gilt-framed dressing mirror as she ate it. On the TV screen behind her, “Baby” was trying to look innocent after spending all night having big sweaty sex with Patrick Swayze, the dance instructor at the summer resort where her family was vacationing. Baby's dad was so seriously pissed off at her, Blair wondered fleetingly how her own dad would feel if he knew she'd moved into a hotel suite just so she could have a little privacy with Nate. Not that her gay, French-chateau-living, pastel-argyle-socks-and-baby-blue-Gucci-sunglasses-wearing dad and Baby's responsible doctor dad in Dirty Dancing had anything in common. She dialed Nate once again and when he didn't answer, she made herself another caviar toast point sandwich and called her dad's number in southern France, where he'd been living since he and Eleanor split up over his gayness almost two years ago.