I shrugged. “I don’t know what I want to do.”
“You will. What about your social life? You haven’t been invited to any parties, asked out on any dates?”
I looked away. She had been tiptoeing around this ever since my return to school. My answers were always vague, with a show of indifference.
“What’s going on?” she asked. “None of that is important to you?”
“It’s important.”
“So?”
“The sort of invitations I’ve been getting are not what either of us would appreciate.”
“What do you mean? I’d like some answers, M,” she insisted when I didn’t respond.
“What do I mean?” I sat back. “Okay, here’s what I mean.” I rose, went into my bedroom, and returned with an envelope that I tossed onto the table.
She looked at me curiously, picked it up, and looked inside. Slowly, she took out the two ten-dollar bills and the note. She looked at me again. I sat back with my arms folded under my breasts and waited for her to read the note.
“What is this, a joke?”
“Yes, it’s a joke, or maybe it isn’t. Maybe that idiot thought I would respond.”
She read the note again and then read it aloud. “ ‘This is for the first ten minutes. There’s more if I can last longer’?”
I nodded.
“I don’t get it.”
It suddenly occurred to me that Roxy never knew what Chastity had done and what I had done with Chastity. I had backed myself into a corner and finally had to confess.
“It’s not your fault. It’s mine,” I said.
“Explain,” she demanded, and sat back with her arms folded, too.
I shook my head and leaned forward. “After Papa had seen you in the limousine waiting for one of his coworkers, I would hear them talk about you often. That was how I learned that you lived in this hotel and what you were doing.”
“So?”
“So I was curious about you, Roxy. I used to think I might walk into you on a New York street. I know Mama hoped for that.”
She relaxed, looking less angry. “If I wanted to get in touch with you and them, I would have.”
“I’m sure you wanted to,” I said.
She looked at me sharply. “Oh, you are, are you?”
“Yes, now that I’ve gotten to know you more, I’m sure. But you didn’t because you were . . .”
“What? Don’t tell me I was embarrassed and ashamed of myself.”
“No, I think you were just afraid.”
“Afraid? Of what?”
“Of how much you would realize you needed them, maybe not me as much but definitely them.”
For a moment, she just stared at me. “So what are you going to be, a psychiatrist?” she asked belligerently.
“Maybe. I have a good background for it now,” I fired back.
She continued to glare at me, and then she smiled. “Okay, but that still doesn’t explain this,” she said, holding up the envelope with the money and the note.
“I said I was interested in you. Neither Mama nor Papa talked about you with any of their friends, of course.”
“Of course.”
“And those who did know about you didn’t mention you in their presence. Papa wouldn’t have stood for it.”
Her eyes got smaller. “And?”
“And I didn’t talk about you in school, either, except with the girl who was my best friend at the time.”
“That fat girl at the funeral?”
“Yes, Chastity Morgan. I was always planning with her to see if we could see you. I told her where you were and what you were doing.”
“What did Papa say about your doing that sort of research?”
“He didn’t know about it. Neither did Mama. Finally, one day, we came up here after school and stood across from the hotel, waiting to catch a glimpse of you. I was afraid to ask for you, of course.”
“Of course. Papa would have disowned you, too, if he had found out.”
“We were about to give up when we saw you come out and followed you to a boutique. We watched you try on a dress, that black one you wore two nights ago, and then we followed you to where you met a woman for coffee. An older man joined you. I stayed far enough away, but Chastity overheard you speaking in French.”
“Mr. Bob,” she said, nodding.
“Who is he?”
“The man who saved my life, I suppose. He brought me to Mrs. Brittany. I still don’t get this,” she said, holding up the envelope.
“I got involved with someone at the school, Evan Styles.”
“Martin Styles’s son?”
“Yes. You keep up with politics?”
“I know who he is. So?”
“Chastity became annoyed because I was ignoring her and wouldn’t go back to spying on you. One day, she told someone about you at school, and it spread very quickly. Evan’s father was running for Congress, and when his parents found out, he broke up with me, not that we had gone together very long, but it wasn’t pleasant. More stories were spread, nasty things said, and stuff like that.”
“I see. And now it’s worse because they know you’re living here with me?”
“Yes.”
She looked at the envelope. “So that’s the joke? They think you’re—”
We heard the front door open and close. I knew there was only one other person with the key. We both froze in anticipation until Mrs. Brittany sauntered into the kitchen. She was wearing a dark brown pantsuit with a frilly collared blouse. Her hair was shaped and styled, and she looked made-up to attend an important event.
“Sisters having a bit of dinner?” she asked, disarmingly pleasant.
Roxy recognized something frightening in her voice and demeanor, however. “I had nothing on for tonight, Mrs. Brittany.”
“Oh, I know, although if we followed up on the requests for you, you’d have something every night.”
“What do you mean?” Roxy asked.
Mrs. Brittany looked at me, and her face hardened, her eyes turning to ice cubes, her lips tightening. “We’ve been inundated today with requests for Fleur du Coeur.”
“What? What do you mean? Who’s calling?”
“Obvious nuisance calls. Ridiculous and at times filthy statements. I had someone put a trace on them for us, someone with authority,” she added. She turned to me. “Do you know who Evan Styles is?”
I felt the air rush out of my chest and the rock tumble into my stomach.
Roxy turned to me. “You told them my telephone signature name, too?”
“I didn’t. Chastity did,” I moaned.
“What is this, Roxy?” Mrs. Brittany asked. “What is she talking about?”
“Sometime before my sister came here, she and her girlfriend spied on me. They found out I was known as Fleur du Coeur, and the girlfriend told her friends. She was just revealing that to me when you came, Mrs. Brittany.”
“I’ve taken action to put a stop to it. I think Martin Styles will see that it’s done,” she added, “but this is not very good for us, Roxy.”
“I know. I’m sorry. We’ll deal with it.”
“I don’t like my business threatened,” Mrs. Brittany said, mostly for my benefit.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“If you were so intrigued with what your sister does, perhaps you should think about it for yourself,” Mrs. Brittany told me.
“No,” Roxy said, a little more sharply than she had intended, I’m sure. Mrs. Brittany turned to her angrily. “I mean, she has other opportunities. Please, Mrs. Brittany, let me handle things.”
“This is already more of a problem than I had expected,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to see anything else, any more surprises. Who knows what else she has done? Maybe sweet sisters bunking together isn’t as innocuous as we hoped.”
“It will be. I’ll handle it. I promise,” Roxy repeated, sounding more like someone pleading.
“I have an important charity event at
the mayor’s mansion,” she said. “We’ll talk about this later.”
She turned and started out. Roxy looked at me and then leaped up to follow her and speak to her again at the door. I put my elbows on the table and lowered my head to my hands. I should have told her everything much sooner, I thought. It takes so long for two people to build real trust between them, even two sisters. Maybe it’s even harder for two sisters.
Roxy returned, looking quite subdued.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Stop saying that. After a while, it has no meaning. I learned that from Papa a long time ago.” She sat.
“What’s going to happen?”
“Nothing. Yet. But you had better be extra careful about what you say and to whom you say it, especially in school,” she warned.
“I hate being there.”
She thought a moment. “Maybe it would be easier if you started in a new school. Let me look into it. In the meantime, you have a spring vacation coming up soon, don’t you?”
“Two weeks.”
“Maybe we’ll go to France,” she said.
“Really? I’d like that.”
She nodded, and we returned to our dinner.
I knew my life at school wasn’t going to get any better, especially now that Evan had gotten into trouble. The looks of lust and the dirty humor directed my way turned into angry and hateful glances when he had told his friends. Exaggerated stories circulated about me. Every morning, I felt as if I was entering a nest of vipers, the girls in my class hissing at me, the boys smirking, and even my teachers looking at me suspiciously. By now, they all knew I was living with Roxy, and I was sure they knew who Roxy was and what she did.
It got so I felt self-conscious when I put on makeup. I eventually stopped wearing even lipstick, and I would spend far too much time agonizing over what blouse or skirt to put on. While other girls were actively trying to be prettier and sexier, I was trying to look more like a girl from some extremist group who thought sex was the path to fatal sin. I was hoping that the plainer I looked, the less attractive I made myself, and the more uninteresting I became, the closer I would be to invisible. Not only would they not see me, but they would stop talking about me. I felt so shut up inside myself, so tightly wrapped, that when the school day ended and I stepped out of the building, I was like a prisoner who had been released from solitary confinement. The moment I was back on the street, I let my hair down, unbuttoned the top buttons of my blouse, and felt my whole body defrost.
As soon as I arrived at the apartment, I practically ripped off the clothes I had come to despise. It felt so liberating to be naked. When I looked at myself, at how my figure had developed, I grew even angrier. Once I had wondered if I would ever be pretty, attractive, and exciting to boys. Now I knew that I was head and shoulders above most of the girls in my class, and yet I had to hide it. Even Richard, the shyest, sweetest boy I knew at school, avoided me. How ironic all this was.
I lived with my sister, who had to be beautiful and sexy, who had to be someone men were proud to have beside them, men who wore her like some expensive piece of jewelry, the trophy girl who made them the target of other men’s envy. And then there was me.
I had to be the exact opposite, hidden in my room, gagged and tied and shut behind doors. I couldn’t have sexual feelings, fantasize about any boy, or dream about a wonderful love affair. I couldn’t look at any boy with interest or smile or flirt. Alarms would sound. Fingers would begin pointing. What everyone expected would occur. I would show that I was the sister of Fleur du Coeur, a budding second flower drawing the innocent to peer between her blossoms and then, like a Venus flytrap, close around them and steal away their reputations, corrupting them forever.
When Roxy first said I would live with her, I had felt a surge of excitement come into my body. I was going to be permitted to enter her exotic and glamorous world. I was going to learn about real life and be freer than ever, living in an expensive hotel, going to the finest restaurants, wearing the most exciting clothes. Merely walking with her on the street would make me feel special.
But instead, I had put myself in a different kind of prison. I was more restricted than I had been under Papa’s stern supervision. I had to laugh to myself thinking about his reaction now. He forbade my knowing Roxy. He was always afraid that I would turn out to be too much like her, but here I was, because of her, being almost the exact opposite. I’d probably have more of a normal teenage girl’s life if I had gone to live with Uncle Orman and Aunt Lucy.
I couldn’t help being bitter about it. What would I become? Where would I eventually go? What kind of romantic life would I ever experience? Would transferring to a new school, even a public school, really make a difference? What would happen if someone there also discovered whom I was living with? How fast would the stories spread? How quickly would boys, maybe one I fancied, start to look at me as no one to have a relationship with but only someone with whom to have a one-night stand?
Once Roxy was my forbidden sister.
Now I was the forbidden girl.
One night a few weeks later, I put on my robe and sat on my bed feeling sorry for myself, mumbling like some bag lady on the street. It was a school night. I had plenty of homework to keep me busy and help me avoid thinking about all of this, but I was in a foul mood. Defiance washed over me. I rose and went out to Roxy’s bar and poured myself half a glass of straight vodka. It was the one hard liquor I had drunk and, in smaller amounts, enjoyed, especially with some fruit juice. Tonight I wanted the buzz faster and longer. I sat at the bar and sipped it, and then I put on some music.
I hadn’t spoken to Roxy since the night before. She had overslept, and I had left for school without seeing her in the morning. She hadn’t left me any notes when I came home, telling me about where she was or what she was doing. Usually, she was very concerned that I knew her schedule well in advance, especially if it would involve me sleeping in the hotel room instead of in the apartment. I thought she had a lot on her mind since the confrontation with Mrs. Brittany, however. She seemed more distracted with her own thoughts, even a little more secretive at times.
I was half through with my drink when I heard our door buzzer. It was too early for any dinner delivery, I thought. Perhaps something had been sent to the hotel for Roxy or me, maybe something from Uncle Alain in France. I tightened my robe and went to the door.
A man only an inch or so taller than me, dressed in what, thanks to Roxy’s tutoring, I knew to be a Giorgio Armani two-button gray pinstripe suit, stood there with an ever-widening smile, showing small teeth and large nostrils. He had dark brown hair and one of those perfect tanning-salon complexions. On his left pinkie finger, he wore what I thought was an overly big diamond ring. He also had a jeweled Rolex.
Roxy taught me always to look at a man’s shoes closely. If they were polished and/or Italian leather, you knew that he was closer to the real thing, the real thing meaning wealthy.
“Those who fake it most often overlook their shoes,” she said.
Walking with her, watching people moving on the sidewalk in front of a café window, or scrutinizing men and women when they came into restaurants was how she taught me about clothes and people.
“When you’ve lived the way I have, you have to rely on good instincts, but you need to read people faster and more accurately. Often, there’s no time for corrections.”
“Corrections?” I asked.
“Defensive moves,” she added. She didn’t go into what they might be or why they would be necessary.
“Yes?” I asked the man at the door.
“Yes? I’d say yes,” he replied. He looked at his watch. “I don’t think I’m too early.”
“Oh.”
My mind reeled with the possibilities. Did Roxy mess up an appointment? Had she forgotten? Was it this man’s fault? Did he make a mistake?
“Oh? Don’t panic. I can come in and wait,” he said.
“No. I mean, you’re here to see Fleur
du Coeur?”
“That’s the plan,” he replied, still holding on to that wide smile. It looked as if he had a walnut in each cheek.
I considered what to do. I couldn’t just turn him away. I had to call Roxy on her cell phone to tell her he was there and see where she was and what was happening.
“Yes, come in,” I said, stepping back.
“Nice place,” he commented immediately. He looked at me as I closed the door. “So what’s the story? You need help getting dressed? That part of the night’s activities?”
“No, no,” I said, pinching the sides of my robe closer. “I’m not Fleur du Coeur. I’m . . . someone else.”
“What do you mean?” He looked into the apartment. “There’s someone prettier than you here?”
“Yes, but . . . she’s late. I’ll call her. Why don’t you fix yourself a drink?” I added, nodding at the bar. “Everything’s there.”
“Late? How late?”
“I’ll call her right now,” I said, hurrying into the kitchen.
Roxy answered on the first ring. “What’s up?”
“There’s a man here to see you.”
“A man? What man?”
“A client, Roxy.”
“I have no appointment tonight,” she said. “Where is he?”
“I had to let him in. I told him to make a drink for himself while I called you.”
“What’s his name?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“It’s a mistake,” she said, but she didn’t sound confident of that.
“Where are you?”
“I’m only ten or so minutes away.”
“What should I tell him?”
“Tell him . . . I’m on my way,” she said. “M.”
“What?”
“Don’t tell him anything about us. I mean, don’t tell him anything true.”
“I understand.”
“It’s important,” she said.
“Okay.”
She hung up. I stood there for a while. My heart was thumping. I had no idea what I would say or do if he asked any questions. He was sitting at the bar and turned quickly when I entered the living room.
“What’s going on?”
“She’s on her way,” I said.
“Yeah, well, I don’t understand why she wasn’t here waiting. Time’s money,” he added. He downed what looked like a glass of straight whiskey. Then he looked at me. “So who are you? How do you fit into this? You another flower girl or something? I didn’t know about you. I like younger women, especially pretty younger women.”