Chapter 16
As the months passed by, Pippi got colder and wetter and quieter.
Lily and Nicola worked hard all autumn. By the time June had settled in and the sky was permanently clouded, the daytrippers, weekenders, and holidaymakers who loved Pippi in all its summertime glory promptly forgot about it.
The beach was deserted except for Lily and her family and a few other locals.
It felt like a completely different place.
With the cleaning jobs drying up over the winter, Lily took a casual job tutoring history for a few kids at her old high school.
Throwing herself back into the books was a comfort but also a reminder that her life was now untethered from school.
Would it be like this forever now? Filling in time with unsatisfying work and a vague feeling that she should be doing something else?
Nicola shared her frustration as she took double shifts at the bakery and came home with stories about her bitchy coworkers—and occasionally a few leftover iced buns, only slightly stale.
As their travel departure date drew nearer, Lily grew all the more excited to leave behind the miserable mood at Pippi for sunny, shiny LA.
Perhaps there she would find a key to her future, or at the very least be distracted from worrying about looking for it.
Preparing for the trip soon consumed her life.
Packing began and she and Nicola wrote lists of places to go and people to see.
“Theme parks, Hollywood tour buses, wax museums, give me it all, darling,” said Nicola.
“And matching ‘I Heart LA’ T-shirts?”
“Worn totally unironically.”
Lily was intent on seeing all of LA—not just hitting the famous hot spots—and she was glad she was going with someone like Nicola who could also enjoy LA’s superficial side.
Lydia, Rosie, and Nicola’s mum saw them off at the airport, and Lydia made a big show about her “baby” leaving her for a month.
“I’ll be fine, Mum, you know I will.”
“I know you’ll be fine, but what about me? I’m going to be childless!”
“What am I, a potted plant?” said Rosie indignantly.
“You might as well be, you’re never here,” said Lydia, not paying much attention.
“Potted plants are literally always there,” protested Rosie as Lydia talked over her.
“The most important thing, Lily,” Lydia went on, looking quite serious, “is to HAVE FUN. Without getting arrested.”
“And make sure you bring me back that eye shadow palette I asked you for,” added Rosie. “And a key chain from every single theme park you go to. And a bikini from Venice Beach.”
“Of course,” assured Lily from deep within a very tight hug.
Fourteen and a half hours in economy later—not helped at all by the leopard-print neck pillows Lydia made them buy at the airport—Lily and Nicola stepped out of Tom Bradley International Terminal with big smiles on their faces and even bigger cricks in their necks.
They jumped in a taxi and chatted excitedly about all that was ahead of them, jet lag completely forgotten.
“Omigosh, everything looks like a movie!” Nicola gushed as they exclaimed over everything from fast-food joints to street signs to enormous shiny black vehicles with tinted windows.
“We are totally in a reality TV show right now,” agreed Lily. “About to meet the only-slightly-famous host!”
“Who is just a bit creepy.”
“And way too effusive.”
“Wilson,” they said simultaneously and laughed.
“Do you think he’ll take us to meet Stacy Black?” asked Nicola. “Or to hang out in a gorgeous mansion filled with movie stars?”
Lily laughed. “I kind of feel like I already did that. It wasn’t that great.”
“Well, maybe the problem was you,” snorted Nicola.
“Probably. I’d better stay away from Stacy Black and her business.”
“See, that is a definite problem. Stacy Black is Hollywood, Hollywood is money, money is life. I’m going to sip champagne at a gorgeous mansion with movie stars and dazzle them all.”
“Good to set concrete goals.”
“And I’m not leaving this town until someone declares their love for me at sunset.”
The taxi pulled up in front of Wilson’s mother’s house in Beverly Hills.
“Oh. My. God,” said Nicola. “Forget everything I’ve ever said about Wilson—he’s my favorite person in the whole world.”
The house was beyond the scale of anything Nicola had ever seen.
Even Lily, whose aunts Jane and Elizabeth had comfortable homes in exclusive Sydney suburbs, was a little awestruck by the building’s vastness.
Everything was supersized, from the big trees to the big gate to the big front door, the portico, the terra-cotta roof, and the chimney three stories high and as wide as a car.
Lily and Nicola piled their luggage out onto the curb and took a moment to take it all in.
“Show’s starting,” Lily whispered to Nicola as Wilson rushed out of the gate to greet them, followed by a middle-aged woman with sensible hair, and no makeup and wearing a bathrobe: Wilson’s mother, Charlotte.
From her social media photos, Lily had imagined Charlotte only ever existed in a neutral-toned linen tunic and draped scarf, leaning on or near expensive-looking furniture.
“Oh my, look at you two! You poor things! We would have met you at the airport! Grab their bags, Wilson, honey,” she said as she enveloped Lily in a hug.
“Pilar!” Wilson bellowed back toward the house. “Can you get these bags?”
“You must be Lily,” Charlotte said, smiling. “You look just like your mum. And you must be Nicola!” She hugged her too. “Aren’t these neck pillows a scream? So comfy. I’d wear one everywhere if I could. Come on in. Don’t worry, Pilar, Wilson’s got them.”
“I can carry this,” asserted Lily to the obliging Pilar, who had materialized from a side door and looked somewhat confused about whose orders she should follow.
“Take the girls straight to the guesthouse, honey, I look a fright,” said Charlotte. She disappeared back into the house, whereupon Wilson handed the biggest two bags back to Pilar, led the way up the driveway, and launched into a monologue.
“Right this way, mind your feet, Pablo’s late with the leaf blower.
How was your flight? Long way in coach. I just can’t do it, I mean at my height, six foot one—” (Lily and Nicola exchanged a glance: five ten at the most.) “You’re lucky you’re both so small.
There’s the pool, no one uses it, we’re all so busy, consider it yours.
There’s the hot tub, Pilar will show you how to turn it on, it’s a little tricky, it’s imported. And here’s where you’ll be staying …”
Wilson turned the lock on the door to the Spanish-style guesthouse.
It was two stories, with an open-plan kitchen, living, and dining downstairs, and two bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs.
The front windows in the living room faced the sparkling turquoise pool, which separated the guesthouse from the main house.
The furnishings were simple yet elegant and, as Wilson constantly pointed out, expensive.
He gave them a bragging tour of the whole place that would have been dull if it weren’t so funny.
And Nicola, who had never in her life considered the thread count of sheets or the provenance of floor tiles, made a good show of being both knowledgeable and impressed.
At the end of the tour, with perfect timing, Wilson received a text and quickly ushered them all back to the driveway as a sleek black SUV stopped outside the gate.
“Cannot do without me for two seconds!” Wilson complained proudly. “I’m so sorry, you’ll just have to get used to that.”
“Is that her? Stacy Black?” asked Nicola.
“It’s her driver. Come look at her car, it’s amazing.”
Lily assured him she’d make a much better impression on the car and whoever was in it after she’d showered. Nicola had no such reservation and with wide eyes scampered off down the drive after Wilson.
Lily laughed somewhat ruefully. Wilson’s performance of superiority was so annoying and now Nicola was lapping it up.
Lily had high hopes for her American holiday; the last thing she needed was for it to be tarnished by the hierarchical nonsense that had almost spoiled her summer.
The very name Stacy Black reminded her of Dorian Khan, and he was the last person she wanted to be thinking about.
Before Lily had time to even unpack anything, Nicola came charging back into the guesthouse at a run.
“How amazing was the car?” Lily asked in an exaggerated American accent.
“So amazing!” said Nicola.
“Really?”
“What? Yes. It’s electric. BUT. That’s not it: Stacy Black has invited us to dinner at the Sunset Room!” Nicola squealed.
“Sunset Room?”
“Oh my God, Lily, this is why you need me here. It’s a super fancy restaurant.”
“And you’re going?”
“Yes and so are you.”
“What if I said no?”
“Wilson already said yes, so you’d better just change your mind.”
“I hate doing that.”
“Oh, come on,” wheedled Nicola. “You didn’t come halfway around the world to say no to things!”
“I didn’t come here to be pushed around! By Wilson!”
“Yes you did!” Nicola gave her a friendly shove. “We’re his guests!”
Lily shoved her right back and laughed.
Nicola was right after all. Lily was here to experience something new—and she would take every opportunity that came her way, however strange or uncomfortable, and at the very least, she would always find something to laugh about.
Wilson disappeared back to work in the amazing car, leaving Charlotte, now showered and dressed in immaculate athleisure, to look after the guests.
Charlotte turned out to be the best kind of hostess.
Practical, friendly, generous, and the kind of person who would happily invite you in to sit and chat if you encountered her in the kitchen but sensitive enough to know that you might not want to.
“You just treat our place as you would your own,” she assured Lily and Nicola in her strange hybrid American-Australian accent.
“And let me know if you need anything; I’ll be around.
” As she rambled with them through a tour of the three living areas and the cavernous kitchen and the den and the vast array of bedrooms upstairs, Lily felt that it would be entirely possible to stow away somewhere in this house and never encounter another living soul.
“Wilson’s so excited about your visit, bless his heart, and he will do anything for you.
Anything,” she emphasized with a significant look.
“But he works so hard, he’s hardly ever home.
Have you got his cell? You just text him any little thing and he’ll make it happen for you.
That’s my husband, Javier.” She indicated a framed wedding photograph that was mostly of sand and ocean.
“You probably won’t see him. I never do. ”
Lily and Nicola recovered from the flight by the pool.
“Sun is the best thing for jet lag,” Nicola, sprawled on a deck chair, murmured from beneath her hat while Lily frolicked in the water and enjoyed the clear Californian light.
“Nicola, look! Squirrels!” she chirped.
“Where?” Nicola angled her hat to peek at the lawn without actually sitting up. “Oh, cute.”
And they had to agree that although the squirrels were physically less impressive than the wallabies that roamed around Pippi, they were much more romantic.
Just at the point when they were wondering if they were hungry or not, Charlotte called out that she had “thrown a platter together” and they were free to eat whenever they liked as she was headed out and Wilson should be home any minute.
Lily and Nicola showered and changed and ventured into the main house, where they found the biggest grazing plate ever seen in the history of the world, which they devoured despite their weird light-headedness.
They became rather giggly and silly, to the point that when Wilson finally appeared, they found him delightfully funny and took note of every suggestion he made for the following day.
He expanded under the light of their attention, like a flower unfurling in the sun, and Lily wondered if he was close to six feet after all.
Perhaps he was only so unpleasantly intense all the time because he was afraid of being minimized.
But she was too tired for serious reflection.
The thrilling rush of having arrived on the other side of the world caught up with the travelers and hit them in the face before it was dark outside, and that night they slept the deepest, heaviest, most dreamless sleep they had ever thought possible.