Call Me, Poppy

  “We don’t keep secrets from one another.”

  Balling her hands into fists, Lex pouted.

  “Spill it…”

  “Fine.” Lex’s porcelain face flushed. “Last month, when your parents had that dinner for the people from Washington, DC, I drank too much soda and had to pee. All the bathrooms were full. People were shoving stuff up their nose.”

  “So, Eddie does drugs.” Her father was a major coke-head. We’d figured that out last year.

  She pulled her hair up into a ponytail, tying it with a band she had around her wrist. Whatever she was going to say made her uncomfortable. The redness on Lex’s pretty face traveled down her neck showing large blotches.

  “I went to your parent’s bedroom to use their bathroom. I walked in and Countess Irma was naked with my mother.”

  Fast, hard, I slapped Lex across the cheek. “Don’t say that.”

  Stunned, Lex held her face. “I knew you’d be mad. That’s why I told you not to make me tell.”

  We stood in silence for a minute and collected ourselves. Lex dried her face on my pillow. I didn’t cry.

  “I’m sorry I smacked you.”

  “I’m sorry I saw them.” Her face became serious. “You believe me don’t you?”

  “Maybe,” I said, knowing Lex could be dramatic but she’d never lie about this. Usually Lex didn’t admit her parent’s shenanigans. “What exactly did you see?”

  “My mother and yours in bed together, with your father somewhere underneath them.”

  “Where was Eddie?”

  “On a chair in the corner of the room…watching.”

  “Gross!” We both made sick faces at each other and sat on the edge of my bed. I had a pink canopy back then.

  “Do you think we’ll grow up to be like them?” Lex asked.

  “You mean naked and in bed together?”

  Lex dipped her chin into a nod.

  “Never! Why can’t our parents just be normal like everyone else?”

  “I don’t think they know how.” She reached into the box for another gummy.

  There was a knock at the door.

  “Come in,” I said, looking up at Mom entering my room.

  The smell of gin came with her. Ugh. Hating that smell, I’d forgotten how bad it was. After lunch is when it seeped out of her pores.

  “Tabitha Adelaide, our jeweler Harry is downstairs. He’s brought some wonderful sparkly baubles that I want you to look at.”

  “Why?” Since when did I sparkle?

  Irma bounced her hand on her hip surveying the room. “For the party, this weekend.”

  “Baubles?” I asked.

  “Earrings and a necklace. Something small and dainty.”

  Glaring at me, Lex wasn’t having it. “Countess Irma, why are you making Tabitha toss her Candy Land game?”

  Mom stepped closer into the bedroom. In a swift motion, she extended her hand, open palmed. “For the same reason Birdie doesn’t want you eating that anymore, Alexandra. You’ll get fat and dumb.”

  “No.” Lex tried to hold onto the box but Mom was too fast.

  “If Tabitha Adelaide continues to play silly board games, she’ll become stupid.”

  “Mom!” My jaw hung open in shock. Hearing her words, I realized this was the gin talking.

  “I will not have a dumb child for a daughter.” Irma marched over to the trash bag, and threw Lex’s candy inside. The sound of the sugar pellets smacked the Candy Land box. “Now come downstairs and pick out your jewelry, Tabitha Adelaide.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said.

  “Alexandra, your mom is coming this weekend too. She says your father will be home from his tour. Let’s surprise them and get you a bracelet.” Without waiting for a reply, Mom strutted out into the hall.

  Lex and I stood in the doorway watching her march down the spiral stairs to the main floor. Her black, wavy hair bounced. So did her breasts.

  “How is your mother’s jewelry any different than my candy or your board game?” Lex asked. “Countess Irma is a nut.”

  “So is Birdie,” I snapped back.

  “Irma is insane, like mental institution mad.”

  “Leon!” A voice from another room, another place, shouted.

  Not wanting this conversation to end, I asked, “What do you mean mental institution?”

  Our childhood talk was over. I heard voices calling me again…

  In the sand, I sat up, feeling the warm cushiness of a cotton beach towel beneath me.

  Leon grabbed the one thrown at him.

  “Taddy. Leon. We’ve been looking everywhere,” Vive cried out. She was in her bathing suit.

  Fabian stood next to her for only a second then tackled Leon in a hug. They wrestled on the sand like two boys.

  “And here I thought you’d died.” Vive knelt beside me.

  “We think alike.” I hugged her, tight. She smelled of soap. I wanted to smell like soap. We cried for a while. I told her about the hunk of metal, the swim, the dolphins, pretty much everything except but the sex. That could wait till later.

  “Our flight landed not too far from here, on water. Everyone is safe and sound.”

  “How’s Blake?”

  “His hair is burned on one side. He’ll probably have a scar, but he’ll live.” Vive dried her eyes and said, “Lex is, of course, beside herself with worry.”

  Cinching the towel around me, I got to my feet. Then I saw them, kissing.

  Leon and Fabian.

  WTF.

  “Huh…” Confusion overcame me. I stared at Leon.

  Tongues touching, his hands massaged Fabian’s ass.

  I’m not talking about the French way men kiss one another on each cheek. Nope. They were Frenching. Like almost face-fucking one another.

  “Knock it off you two!” Vive eyed them. “It’s bad enough there’s a hot man shortage in this world, I don’t need you two rubbing my face in it.”

  “Eh? When? What? How did I not know?” My voice rose in surprise.

  “Fabian told us last night. We all had a little coming-to-Jesus moment when we got to our rooms. Naturally that was after the Eden police came and we filled out reports. The airline officials soon followed—”

  “What did Fabian tell you?” I didn’t want the details of their check-in. Vive would be telling this airplane crash story for many years to come. I needed to know more about Fabian. “What’s his relationship to Leon?”

  “That their lovers, of course.”

  Shock flying through me, I screamed. “No!” I couldn’t help it.

  “Why are you getting upset?” Vive asked, as Leon came over.

  “Taddy, we need to talk. I—”

  “Ha! I have nothing to say to you, Leon Lartique.” I poked my finger at his broad chest, the one I had licked earlier. “Thank you for the last twenty-four hours. I can handle it from here.” I turned so fast I thought I’d trip.

  “What the fug is up with you, girlie?” Vive stood between us, ruining my opportunity for a dramatic exit.

  “I need a shower. Can you please take me to your room?”

  Vive nodded and said in their direction, “Leon, I’ll catch you sexy boys, later. Oh and thank you for bringing Taddy back alive and in one piece.”

  Concern creased Leon’s forehead. I could care less how he felt. Regret soured in my empty stomach. Never mind that I’d given up my Lady V. I had unprotected sex in the Atlantic Ocean and under a tree with a dude who had a boyfriend.

  I wasn’t just fucked, I was screwed.

  So Screwed!

  “Whether you’re lusting or in love, crave boys or girls, desire monogamy or openness, sex for the first time can be a beautiful, scary, and an unforgettable experience. Why? Because it only happens once! For my VBF her Atlantic Ocean sexscapade wasn’t the beginning to an end. No, boo. Leon Lartigue had opened Taddy’s mind with fresh thoughts and desires. And if you know anything about Taddy, she’s a curious girl.” — Blake Morgan III, husband hunter, f
uture father, and undecided college major.

  TMI Moments

  Eden Island

  Unfrickin’ believable!

  Giving the boys my best catwalk possible, I strutted my twice-fucked, unfed, sunburned bum toward the resort.

  Too much for me to handle, I pressed my palm against my forehead.

  Nope. My head hadn’t exploded. Not yet. One might say I’d seen and experienced too much in my eighteen years. Well duh!

  I recapped the TMI moments of my life. In chronological order they are…

  #1. Living on the Upper West Side in an apartment building that everyone knew my name and who my parents had swung with. Looking back on it now, the Brillfords must’ve been the laughingstock of the entire block. No wonder I was sent away.

  #2. Having a mother that reeked booze, and I mean twenty-four-seven. At Avon Porter, kids would come back from the holidays with a bottle of their mother’s perfume. They told me that smelling the fragrance in their room, especially on their pillows, helped them to not get homesick. I sure as fudge wasn’t going to sniff a flask of bourbon. Yuk.

  #3. Not knowing the identity of my birth-father isn’t that big of a deal. But having a man I loved, correction—still love—as a father who wants nothing to do with me, is a living nightmare. I’ve called, written letters, and tried to visit. I’m always sent away. Blood relations and matching DNA shouldn’t define who one’s father is or is not, right? Joseph Graf Brillford will always be dad to me.

  #4. Dropped off at thirteen for boarding school and never picked back up. It’s criminal. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t wonder how my parents can sleep at night, throwing me away as if I were a dog. Hell, people in Manhattan treat their pets better.

  #5. Sick with mono, those two months were worse than the plane crash. The abdominal pain was torture. All I ever wanted was to have my mom give me a cold compress, and sit with me, even if only for an hour.

  #6. Juvi! Yup, six months wearing an orange jumper in a room with Lex and Vive would make anyone go cray-cray. (They’d kept Blake in another building.) I don’t regret standing up for Vive, I’d do again. The night her boyfriend Sanderloo started gay bashing Blake and she hit him with a shovel to try and get him to stop was the worst night of our lives. He’d died right there.

  My regret was burying him. We didn’t call the police.

  I should have never told my besties to act as though nothing had happened. I’m the one who suggested we all go on with our studies the next day. Utter selfishness got the worst of me. How? The courts would never approve of my separation hearing from my parents if they knew I was being tried for murder. Vive’s parents would’ve made her have an abortion when they found out she was pregnant. Blake would’ve been sent to the military academy down the street and tortured some more.

  #7. Alone on my graduation with no one but my friends and their families to acknowledge my good grades was beyond craperific. In my cap and gown, I was the class valedictorian who’d emancipated from my folks the year before. Would I be spending the rest of my adult life with no family to call my own?

  #8. Learning that the college fund I’d received as a settlement in my emancipation and lawsuit against my parents, that I’d banked on to set-up my life as an adult, was empty. Zilch! Not a penny to my name. Who knew my parents would take the trust given to me and transfer those funds into some offshore bank account.

  #9. Thinking my besties had died. My flight to hell and the plane crash that followed weren’t as bad as allowing myself to believe that my friends were gone. Heck, I thought about them non-stop, except for maybe those seven minutes that I was with Leon, which leads me on to my finale of number ten.

  #10. Giving in to temptation and having sex with a beautiful man. A man I’d wanted since the first day I met him. A man who might’ve only fucked me because he probably thought we’d die out there. I know I did. A man that loves other men!

  They turned me the freak on. That shook me to a core I hadn’t thought about since I’d learned my parents were swingers. No thank you!

  Shit. SHIT. SHIT!

  Vive glared at me. “What’s wrong? Are you cold?” Her worried voice snapped me out of my TMI thoughts.

  “No.” I folded my arms over my breasts. The towel kept me warm.

  “You’re shaking.” She pulled me close, wrapping her arms around me. “Maybe you got diphtheria from being in the water for so long.”

  She always made me laugh. I chuckled. I didn’t want to but I did. “No. My nerves are shot. I’m hungry too.”

  Squeezing Vive’s hand, I didn’t want to let her go.

  We walked from the beach toward the stone castle ahead. Gaelic and feudal in structure, the resort was about half a mile from the shore. Stiff and sore from kicking in the water, I wondered if my legs could manage even another step. “What is this place?”

  “Magical paradise,” Vive replied, all giddy and pointing to a bronze sign.

  “Welcome to Eden, where reality is whatever you want it to be…”

  My reality was that I’d been screwed. What I wanted was for this trip to be o-v-e-r. I’m done with modeling. “F” the French, and dagnabbit I wanted my bedazzled Swarovski crystal flip-flops back.

  Vive seemed happy though, which was a far cry from the suicidal face she had on the plane. I humored her and asked, “Like Club Med?”

  “Kinkier.” Vive selected a pink orchid off the ground and handed it to me.

  Succulent smells filled my nostrils, causing hunger pains to ache in my empty stomach. The aroma made me ravenous.

  “Meaning?”

  “Clothing optional, BDSM dungeons, marijuana and LSD are legal here. We can drink too. Daddy should get Farnworth Firewater an account at this place.” Vive was a picture of debauchery.

  Oh brother! My eyes narrowed, noticing the acres of nature. Tropical trees, white sand, and green ferns were at our feet. It was breathtaking.

  “There are fitness and beauty services at the spa. All the food and juices are organic. Eden has something for everyone.” Vive talked faster, perhaps trying to cover up her wishful party aspirations, which she usually camouflaged as her family business.

  “Who owns this place?” I asked, looking over my shoulder.

  Leon and Fabian hadn’t followed us. They’d gone for a walk near the water. I wondered what they were talking about right now. I tried not to stare, but I couldn’t pull my eyes away, two brawny men, holding one another.

  “A gazillionaire named Theodosius Vardalos. They call him the Master. I’ve only seen him once. He checked in on Blake and gave him a jar of face cream for his injury. He promised it would heal him.”

  Vardalos…

  I took in a shallow breath, thinking about my GBF. Blake’s insecurities about his looks were ten times worse than all three of us girls put together. I hope his injury wasn’t going to leave any scars.

  “Take me to Blake.”

  “You can stay with him. He has two bedrooms and this insane marble tub. I’m already unpacked in Lex’s suite.”

  Thank heavens I wasn’t sleeping near Vive. She snores loud enough to make the wallpaper peel.

  “Why does Theodosius Vardalos sound familiar? Is he from Manhattan? Did he live on the Upper West Side?” I smoothed my hair back. Lordy, it was getting hot out here. I wanted to take off my towel and be naked again. There was something freeing about not wearing a bathing suit in the water.

  “No. Don’t you remember the article that came out on him last year in Vanity Fair touting him as the next Richard Branson?” Vive loved her gossip magazines. Lex and I refused to read them.

  “Ahhh…yes. You tried to get Avon Porter to book our senior trip here.”

  “Right! Eden wouldn’t allow minors. But now we’re adults. It’s fate.”

  “Fate?”

  She nodded with enthusiasm and said, “We need this trip, Taddy. Avon Porter, the court trials, juvie, Lex’s mom being a junkie, it’s all been a funky few years. I can’t imagine
college being any easier. The universe brought us here.”

  “To do what?”

  “Heal!”

  “I see,” I said, and licked my blistered lips. I didn’t want to argue with her. She hadn’t been excited about anything in a while.

  “The Master’s staff put us up for free. Joely is Eden’s pilot. She gave us seats on the next charter flight back to Miami.”

  “Tell her thank you, but no more flights. I’ll take a boat back to New York.”

  “I hear ya, girlie. Eden has ferry service. They say it’ll take about eight hours to get to Florida from here.”

  We glanced out at the water. The waves weren’t as intimidating as before, when I was in the middle of it all. Regardless, as nice as this place appeared, I didn’t want to stay.

  “What time is that boat?”

  “Not for two more days.”

  “What?” I panicked. That meant I’d have to spend the next 48 hours avoiding Leon and Fabian. I’ll just stay locked in Blake’s room. I don’t trust myself around them.

  “The ship is on its way back from England. Apparently Eden is all the rage with the Brits.”

  “I can see why…”

  “Joely is nice. She’s been working with the passengers, helping them overcome their anxieties about the crash. That’s how we met.”

  “No flights. Not now. I’m sure I’ll fly again, just not this soon.”

  Vive stopped walking and grabbed me by my shoulders. Her disappointment was obvious. “My VBF who just survived a plane crash doesn’t want to get sushi, book a facial, and tan at the beach?”

  “No fish. No sun. Maybe a spa treatment.” My cheeks hurt from being outside for so long. I shook my head and said, “I want cement and noise. Let’s go home to Manhattan.”

  “What about the photo shoot for their magazine?” Vive started walking again. I could tell by the spring in her step she wasn’t going to quit. Raised by a Swedish mother who advocated socialism, Vive’s mantra was all for one, one for all. Meaning we pretty much did everything together.

  “I can’t go through with another round of pictures. Not again. They can use what they’ve got.”