Chapter 28 #2
“You’ve learned a lot from being Etta’s girlfriend this long,” Adele admitted toward the end of their lesson.
Jamie sat primly, with her ankles crossed and set to the side, while her back remained straight and her hands poised in her lap.
Her hair even fell perfectly, bouncing on her shoulders and caressing the sides of her breasts.
Adele had stood up more than once to perfect Jamie’s posture with nimble, crafty hands.
“There is also a lot that she can’t teach you because she’s never known those rules.
New money people will give you a lot of leeway, no matter how long they’ve been in this world.
The old money types? Even the nicest, most well-meaning ones will look askance at you if you create a social faux pas.
That’s because the ‘right’ way is the only way they’ve ever known.
Their mothers and nannies have drilled it into their thick skulls since they were old enough to remember the difference between their mother and nannies.
They took classes in proper upper-echelon etiquette at their boarding and private schools.
If you and Etta have kids, you bet your new money asses you’ll be sending your children to at least Winston Academy. Guess who it was named after?”
Jamie gulped. “Hyacinth Winston?”
“Her husband’s grandfather, yes.” Adele fidgeted and kept touching her mouth as if she desperately wanted a cigarette.
How much does she smoke? Jamie never smelled it on her but had seen Adele taking cigarette breaks.
“They’re the ‘public’ school – although still very private and exclusive, of course – of the elite around here.
The biggest school, with state-champion sports teams. The boarding schools are also very prestigious but attract a more international student base.
Mostly European, but I’m seeing more Southeast Asian and Northern African students come by our office on field trips now.
They’re competing with the European boarding schools, is what I’m saying. ”
Jamie shook her head. “I don’t know if Etta told you, but I had a cancer… scare… a couple of months ago. It’s got me thinking about kids one day. And I don’t know anything about the schools…”
Adele clicked a pen in her hand. Better than chewing on her lip in need of a nicotine fix, Jamie supposed. “She told me.”
“Oh…” Jamie hadn’t actually expected that.
“After the fact, of course. She said it was a reason she decided to propose to you.”
“Yeah…”
“Anyway.” Adele cleared her throat. “I only said all that to make it clear where these people are coming from. Most had never experienced a messy no-napkin barbecue until their backyard frat parties in college. The messiest a well-to-do girl ever gets in her teenage years is her boyfriend missing the mark while they fool around.” Adele laughed. “The stories I’ve heard…”
Jamie’s brain was going in five different directions at once.
Not just where she would send her supposed children…
but those children growing up in this privileged universe where they were taught perfect manners and never knew what it meant to get barbecue sauce all over their faces until they already knew what it meant to lose their virginity in the back of an Aston Martin.
Better than I did. Got fingered beneath the bleachers at a volleyball game.
“I know I’ve been hard on you today, but I’m only trying to get you caught up. I had to teach myself all of this. It’s sink or swim when you’ve got our backgrounds, and I want you to swim better than Michael Phelps.”
“Thanks.” Jamie relaxed her shoulders, placing her folded hands on the table. “I mean it. I’m tired of embarrassing myself.”
Adele shifted in her seat. “I embarrass myself sometimes still,” she said.
“I’ll forget to lower the volume of my laugh.
I’ll wear the wrong kind of gloves to a party.
My hat will resemble the same one a high-profile wife wore a year ago.
I’m to the point now where most of this can be brushed off as I amass more of my own power, but…
I’m a businesswoman. I’m playing by different rules from you. ”
“Yeah. I’m just a queer wife.” Soon, anyway.
“There’s no just about it! Shake off all those images you have of the housewives you knew growing up.
They worked their asses off, yes, but not in the ways you’re about to.
Everything you do from the moment you say ‘I do’ with Etta will reflect on her.
You could destroy her career… or help her build it up to more monumental levels.
She could make her next billion because of the connections you make behind the scenes.
Impressing women with money – or whose families have money – will go a long way.
You don’t have to befriend them if you don’t want to.
You do have to show that you’re a competent wife for a competent businesswoman.
I’m not saying it’s fair, but it’s the way it is, and things are slow to change. ”
Jamie’s phone vibrated with a text. “I should check this,” she said. “It might be Etta.”
“Go ahead.” Adele took out her phone as well. “Although, I highly recommend you not do that unless it’s the biggest emergency of your life when in certain company.”
“Naturally.” Jamie checked her messages. It was from Jenny. Could be a life-or-death emergency. Who knew?
“Have you picked out your third bridesmaid yet? I’m going nuts here trying to figure out how to do two without having it look so terrible! Help me out! PICK SOMEONE!!”
Jamie looked up from her phone. “Do you want to be my bridesmaid?”
It was the coarsest way she could ask this woman she barely knew – and who happened to be her fiancée’s ex-girlfriend. As expected, Adele jerked her head up, gobsmacked. “I… well, that’s quite the honor you foisted upon me.”
A heavy breath eased its way past Jamie’s lips. “I know how much you mean to Etta.”
“Yes.” Adele cut her off faster than if they were in traffic. “Which is probably why she already asked me to be her best man. Er, woman.”
Jamie’s phone slipped right out of her hand. “What?”
“Oh, I was shocked too. She did it last week. Took me out to lunch for seemingly no other reason. I have to admit, it felt like a date the way she was courting me for an hour.” Adele leaned back in her seat, crossing her arms in a huff.
“Reminiscing about Yale… the years we dated… well, I’ll spare you the details.
I was almost afraid she was saying she was getting cold feet with you and wanted to have an affair with me.
I’m serious! It was the strangest thing until she finally dropped the bomb.
She said she couldn’t imagine anyone else having such an important distinction at her wedding.
I felt bad for her. The woman doesn’t have any other friends close enough to ask!
Her only best friend turned out to be the biggest creep around.
Who am I? A woman who came back from nowhere because she heard Etta was looking for a business partner. ”
Jamie’s jaw dropped. “So you… said yes?”
“Of course I did. How could I tell that poor woman no? So…” Adele drank her water in the sloppiest way possible. So much for manners. “I can’t be your bridesmaid, sorry. I’m already engaged elsewhere in your wedding party.”
“Oh… well. That’s unexpected.” Jamie sighed.
“Things are so crazy right now. Everything is coming together except for my personal shit. I can’t even find a dress.
” Ever since her flop of a trip to New York, Jamie realized she didn’t actually like any of the dresses in her magazines.
They were fine. They were beautiful. But they weren’t her.
They didn’t make her feel like the beautiful, regal bride Etta deserved.
“I don’t have enough friends who can be my bridesmaids.
We’ve barely looked at cakes. It’s amazing we’ve picked out a color!
I dunno, maybe I’m too wound up. This is coming down to the wire way too quickly.
I’m getting married in two months! I thought I had over a year to plan these things. Then the paper…”
“Then the paper suggested that she and I were getting married instead.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. It’s not fair to you.” Adele stood, plucking her purse out of its basket. “Unfortunately, I have a teleconference at two that I need to prepare for. I hope things work out for you… and I’ll see you at the luncheon tomorrow.”
Adele never stuck around to converse much with Jamie.
It didn’t bother her. Not really. There were a lot worse ways for Adele to behave.
She was a businesswoman at Etta’s level.
It made sense that she would be a bit high-strung and always on the go, especially since she was now the “face” of Thompson-Coleman.
Still, that didn’t save Jamie from any of her predicaments. She looked at Jenny’s text and shook her head, unsure of what to do. Her only recourse was to call one of the first numbers in her phone and hope for the best.
“Hey, girl,” Nala said on the other end of the line. “What’s up? Hope you know it’s only almost eleven here. Feel lucky that I had class and am bumming around campus this early.”
This early? Did people on the West Coast really sleep in until noon all the time, like Jamie sometimes heard?
Or was Nala the quintessential 21-year-old college student who stayed up until seven in the morning playing co-op video games?
Yeah, that. Yet she managed to bag one of the hottest tech savants in the Pacific Northwest. Jamie couldn’t fault that.
“I’ll take that into consideration in the future,” said Jamie, who was rarely out of bed later than nine. “I’m calling because I need a favor. A big favor.”
“Who do I have to kill? I’m a frightening secret agent now, you know.”
“No kidding.” Jamie pushed herself up against the table in front of her. “I’m asking you to be my bridesmaid at my wedding.”
“What! I barely know you!”
“I know, I know… but I can’t find anyone else to be my third bridesmaid, and if I don’t find one soon, I am in so much hot water that…”
“You’re asking me to fly out there at the end of June – right after I finish school for the semester, mind you – to be a bridesmaid in some big fat wedding that I don’t know anyone at. What’s in it for me?”
“Well, uh…” Jamie’s voice became meeker by the second. “Bachelorette party?”
“I’ll think about it. Not like I wasn’t going to go anyway, but…”
“I know, I know. Being a bridesmaid carries a bit of responsibility.”
“I’ve done a great job staying out of the news. You’re having a high-profile wedding, right?”
“Probably.” Jamie fielded the photography requests to Jenny, who was better at vetting which magazine spreads would be the best fit for the Colemans.
“I know you and your girlfriend aren’t into popularity of any kind.
” Jamie was jealous. In her neck of the woods, that wasn’t an option. “I’d appreciate it, though.”
“Like I said, I’ll think it over. I’ve gotta get to class now, though. Talk to you later. Good luck with the wedding stuff. Let’s game sometime soon. Your girlfriend against mine.”
That would be a sight. Last Jamie checked Nala’s girlfriend was a “professional hobbyist” in the gaming world, whereas Etta hadn’t picked up a controller until she started getting serious with Jamie. Even then, she still sucked whenever she played.
Jamie remained at the table for a few more minutes, staring at the place settings and debating what she should wear for the luncheon the next day. She had a feeling Adele would later text her with some flawless suggestions. Whether Jamie felt okay taking such suggestions was another matter.
I do it for Etta. She stood, hoisting her purse strap over her shoulder as she turned and headed out. Jamie glanced at her engagement ring, twinkling in the fluorescent lights of the cafeteria. I do it because I love her and I want her to succeed. What is it to me? I have no…
No, she couldn’t go there. She couldn’t remind herself that she had no other friends, no ambitions, and nothing to put her name to. For as long as she would have her name, anyway.