Chapter 8 #2
On Saturday, the last day of their vacation, the family spent their time together at their rented house and then had dinner at Daphne and Phillip’s.
This time no one mentioned Geoff and Gloria.
She hadn’t texted her mother when they arrived nor thanked her for the trip or the extra expense for the switched tickets in order to leave three days early.
Eugenia enjoyed the others for the last day, and they had a lovely dinner at Daphne’s house and then went back to their own.
They laughed and talked late into the evening and drank a lot of wine, and after Eugenia went to bed the others went for a midnight swim.
They all agreed that it had been a great vacation and they were sorry to see it end.
Their day on Patrick’s boat had been an added adventure, and they were curious to see what would happen between Patrick and their mother.
It looked like something was starting, but they were discreet enough that no one was sure if it was romantic or if they were just becoming friends, but they seemed to enjoy each other’s company.
“Maybe your mother will marry him and we can all go on vacation on his boat next year,” Liz suggested, and Stef gave her a look.
“Slow down, they haven’t been on a date yet. They met a week ago.” They didn’t know about the day Eugenia and Patrick had spent in seclusion on his boat.
“He’s a cool guy and I like his boat,” Liz said simply, and Stef shook his head.
Eloise was nervous about going back to Paris, perennially worried about her job, and they were all going back to work on Monday.
It was always hard to go back to real life after the vacations Eugenia provided them, where she took care of everything.
It was all planned to perfection and she spoiled them like the children they had been and no longer were.
Only Gloria was still trying to cash in on everything she could, like her wedding, with total disregard for the massive expense for her mother.
It annoyed Stef and Eloise, but Sofia assumed that their mother knew what she was doing and could afford the vacation if she did it every year.
It never occurred to her that the pandemic had impacted her mother’s business.
Sofia had no experience in business and financial affairs.
“I think that the investor’s money she accepted yesterday is a big deal for her,” Stefano said, sitting by the pool with his sisters at one in the morning. “She doesn’t say a lot about it, but I think she’s been really worried for the last six months. I hope that helps.” He was concerned about her.
“Your mother is a smart businesswoman, she knows what she’s doing,” Liz said with total confidence.
They hated to see the night end, and their vacation, always a bittersweet moment, but this time they knew they’d be together again soon, at the wedding. Eugenia had made a point of inviting Brad and had handed him an invitation, which touched both him and Sofia, and he had promised to be there.
They were all packed when they went to bed that night at two a.m. , and Eugenia’s bags were standing in the hall outside her suite.
She set her alarm and got up with each of them when they left. Eloise was the first to go. With a ten a.m. flight to Paris out of Newark, she had to leave the Hamptons at five in the morning, and Eugenia gave her a big hug.
“Try to relax and stop worrying,” she reminded her daughter.
She stood on the porch and waved as the car drove away.
Brad and Sofia were next, with a flight to Memphis at eleven.
They left at seven, and Eugenia had breakfast with Stef and Liz before they drove back to the city.
He said he thought it was one of their best vacations ever and Eugenia was pleased. She had worked hard to achieve it.
She checked the houses after they left, closed and locked everything up and left the keys where she’d found them, and drove to Daphne and Phillip’s house to say goodbye.
Daphne promised to call her if anything happened with the twins.
She and Phillip were driving back to the city that night.
They’d already stayed a week longer than the obstetrician wanted, just in case she went into labor and things moved quickly.
Eugenia doubted she’d make it till the wedding, it looked like she was going to pop any minute, and Phillip was eager to get her home.
Eugenia thanked them for the times they had entertained all of them, and they stood in the driveway and waved as Eugenia drove away.
—
It was strange getting back to her empty apartment.
It seemed so quiet and lonely now that the children were gone.
Eugenia was used to it, but their vacations always reminded her of how much she loved being with them, and how sweet it had been when they were all still at home.
It was an adjustment being on her own again with no one to talk to.
After she unpacked, she took out the folder with her drawings and Eloise’s, and did some more sketches for Cotton Candy. She smiled every time she looked at them. They were going to be so much fun to produce and she couldn’t wait to see how they’d sell, and to whom.
Patrick called her that night to make sure she got home safely. She asked him how his meeting had gone the day before.
“Pretty well,” he said, sounding pleased.
“I wanted to sell him two buildings but he might buy three or even four. That would give me what I need to make some major changes on the ones I have left. It’s all a chess game, with a little bit of poker thrown in.
I might come out ahead in the end. It’s not over yet,” he said.
“How about Tuesday for dinner? I have a lot going on tomorrow.”
“So do I.” She wanted to speak to the factory again about Cotton Candy, go to the wholesale market for the right fabrics, and rehire one of her patternmakers and two sewers to work on the new line.
This was a whole new world for her, and for a completely different client.
She was already set for her show during Fashion Week.
All she had to do was hire models and do fittings, starting in two weeks.
The runway samples were already made. She was showing a very reduced line to test the market for her daywear.
She was making big changes to salvage her business, and she was praying it would work.
And now she was going to have fun with Cotton Candy, put the clothes in a pop-up store she hadn’t chosen yet, and see what would happen.
“It’s crazy that we’re both rebuilding our businesses, isn’t it? ” she said to Patrick on the phone.
“That’s what life is all about, reinventing yourself when everything goes to shit.
And if it all fails, we sell everything.
I’ll keep the boat, and sail around the world.
” He made light of it. She loved his strength and his humor, his determination and optimism, and his perseverance.
He gave her the feeling that he wouldn’t let the ship go down.
He hadn’t yet, and neither had she. They had that in common, although her business was so much smaller than his, but it wasn’t negligible either, and he had given her valuable advice.
“Tuesday would be great for dinner,” she responded to his invitation.
When they hung up, she went back to her Cotton Candy sketches, and started making lists of everything she needed to do.
She still had her assistant in New York, Pamela Atkins, but Pamela had been on vacation for a month with nothing to do until the weeks right before Fashion Week.
Eugenia had reduced the staff dramatically in the last year as their business slowed down to a trickle, and finally dried up entirely.
She was hoping to hire many of them back when they got started again, but for the moment, she couldn’t afford them, and had no work to offer them.
Most of her employees had been on unemployment.
She tried to pick and choose among them, and decide who would be best suited to working on an inexpensive youthful line.
But she wanted to do it with quality too.
All the people in her atelier, which was dormant now, had been trained in Paris and were overqualified for what she had in mind.
She explained it all to Pamela on Monday morning.
Eugenia knew she was an early riser and went to the gym every day, so she called her at seven.
Pamela was thrilled to hear about the new project.
It had been incredibly sad, watching the business stall in the last eight months, and it had taken a toll on Eugenia’s spirits.
She’d been anxious and nervous for a long time, and there had been nothing Pam could do to help.
Their customers just weren’t buying, with everyone locked down.
They were going to put on a beautiful show for Fashion Week, but the new daywear was an experiment and by no means a sure thing.
It was expensive, made with the best high-quality fabrics available, although getting the fabrics and trimmings in from Europe wasn’t easy, and Pam wasn’t sure their clients would adjust to the change.
But Cotton Candy was a concept she could wrap her mind around.
She had a fourteen-year-old daughter herself, and it sounded right up her alley, at the right price point for even Pam to afford.
She was forty-four and a single mom. She had decided to have a baby on her own at thirty, and hadn’t regretted it, although she was finding the early teenage years harder than she’d expected.
She and her daughter, Isabelle, had been so close, and now Isabelle disapproved of everything her mother did, and was vocal about it.
But Pam knew she was going to love Eugenia’s new line.