Sara Benincasa - Great

“No, they won’t,” Jeff said. “Giovanni always puts rum in Delilah’s and Teddy’s Cokes, so they’re a little drunk. Your mom and Delilah’s mom are each on their third glass of wine, so they’re definitely drunk. No one is paying any attention to us. And besides, I know about the whole thing, anyway. Teddy’s my best friend. And everybody in town knows, anyway. If Delilah doesn’t know, she’s an idiot.”

“If he’s your best friend, then why are you talking to me about this?”

“Because it’s interesting. It’s an interesting turn of events, to have you drawn into it. This changes the game a little bit. It’ll require a slightly altered strategy on his part.”

“Do you always talk about people’s lives as if you’re talking about a round of golf?”

“Usually,” he replied.

“Great,” I said.

“Misti’s dating the bartender,” he said. “He’s twenty-one. She’s, like, nineteen. They’re from up-island. Babylon, I think. Italian, if you couldn’t tell. Their families own a bakery together. Immigrants. The American Dream.” He chuckled to himself. I purposely turned away from him and pretended I was interested in Mrs. Fairweather’s conversation.

“You know they love Delilah on the blogs,” she was saying to my mother.

“On all the blogs?” Teddy asked innocently.

“What’s that one that writes about you—the one that called you the next big modeling sensation, the return of the supermodel?” Mrs. Fairweather asked Delilah, ignoring Teddy.

“The Wanted,” Delilah said, and even looked a little proud.

“That’s it,” Mrs. Fairweather said. “The Wanted. All the kids are just in love with it. Of course, it’s all about them , so why wouldn’t they be?” She laughed lightly.

“I’ve never heard of it,” I said. “Is it like Perez Hilton, or something?”

“Sort of,” Delilah said. “It’s mostly a fashion and style blog, but it’s about people who go to independent schools in Manhattan.” It’s so funny how rich people have invented a less hoity-toity term for “private schools.” As if we normals don’t know it’s the same thing.

“But she does bigger stories, too,” Delilah continued. “She covers Fashion Week in New York, plus social events the rest of the year—parties and stuff like that. Sometimes she writes about models. I guess she thinks I’m good.” You could tell Delilah was underplaying it, because even she couldn’t hide that she was kind of excited by the attention.

“All the girls at Trumbo are obsessed with The Wanted,” Jeff said. “If they get mentioned on it, it’s like they won an Academy Award.”

“The girl who runs it will grab photos from Trumbo parties off Facebook and analyze what everyone’s wearing,” Teddy added. “It’s probably not even run by a chick. It’s probably some thirty-year-old dude in his mom’s basement.” He and Jeff snickered.

Delilah ignored them and looked at me. “It’s a really pretty site. And the girl who runs it goes by Jacinta, even though no one knows if that’s her real name. She takes a photo of what she’s wearing each day, but you only ever see her from the neck down. She could be anybody.”

“It’s me!” Teddy announced. “I’m Jacinta!”

“Oh, you are so not Jacinta,” Delilah said. “Jacinta has perfect taste.”

As if on cue, Misti showed up for the mothers and Teddy to sign their account cards. She murmured, “Thank you for dining at Baxley’s.” I saw her hand shake a little as she took away the cards. Our eyes met for a moment, and she flicked hers away.

“She’s going to have to be more subtle than that,” Jeff whispered.

In the car on the way home, Teddy drove faster than was absolutely necessary.

“Teddy!” Mrs. Fairweather said, giggling. “Slow down .”

But he didn’t, and we ended up at my mother’s house rather quickly. Her house is lovely and expensive, but it’s no mansion—“just” five bedrooms, and only three bathrooms (the shame of two bedrooms that aren’t en suite!), a finished basement with a game room and home theater, a living room, dining room, big kitchen, and a spacious back deck. It has a nice view of the narrow, northern end of Georgica Pond, which laps the edge of the property. It’s not the fancier, Steven Spielberg-y end of Georgica—it’s nearer the highway, and the public landing where clammers and fishermen are allowed to enter, but you can make out the back of the Fairweathers’ house across the water. The property is still considered desirable, though not as desirable as beachfront real estate—but, as Mom never tires of pointing out, some people even prefer the pond as more private and less touristy than the beach.

“Our humble abode,” my mother said wryly when Teddy screeched to a halt at the bluestone driveway.

Mrs. Fairweather said, “I have always thought your cottage is darling. I remember when the Timothy Stanford family owned it, and they always had the loveliest eggnog and caroling at Christmastime.”

“Well,” Mom said darkly, “I’d like to make some improvements, but I won’t have anything more done to it until I can find the perfect restoration experts to maintain the integrity of the original layout.” Mrs. Fairweather nodded approvingly.

“Weren’t you talking about putting in a pool with a waterslide in the spring?” I piped in. Jeff held in a snort.

“I most certainly was not talking about anything of the sort!” my mother snapped. “I did have an idea for a nice Zen garden with a reflecting pool, but it wouldn’t be for swimming. And of course it would be nothing like the one next door.” The house next door was something of an infamous legend among my mother’s friends. A three-story cedar-shingled castle, it fairly towered over Mom’s house. It even had a couple of turrets in the Queen Anne’s style. And while Mom had one very well-maintained acre of land, the house next door sat on over two acres. It even had a moat, sort of.

A winding pool designed to look like a river dominated the backyard. It snaked along the right side of the yard and then doubled back, curving along its original path and then snaking out along the left side of the yard before curling around and returning to meet the place where it started. I imagine from above it looked like a giant bubble letter U drawn with squiggly blue borders, with perfect green lawn filling in the space between. There were a few rustic-on-purpose footbridges scattered along the river pool’s path, and here and there, little waterfalls built from smooth stones. There were even a couple of story-high waterslides. It was actually really cool, and ever since I was eleven, I’d secretly longed for a chance to swim in it.

“Who lives in the Disney castle, anyway?” Teddy asked. “We’ve never been introduced.” You could tell by “we” he meant the entire great and powerful Barrington Oil clan. Super-rich people never really think of themselves as individuals—they’re forever blessed, or doomed, to be an extension of a glamorous genetic web.

“Neither have we,” said Mrs. Fairweather.

“God knows we haven’t, either,” my mother said with a touch of resentment. “Some Europeans who never actually visit. They rent it out to summer families and, I’m telling you, Merilee, they pick the people with the noisiest children. Last year it was a Saudi family who let their boys swim until three o’clock in the morning. Nine-year-old twins. Screaming little madmen. You can imagine how much we loved that.”

“They were just excited to have that pool,” I said, not sure why I was defending a pair of rich Saudi boys. “It wasn’t their fault their parents let them stay up.”