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"Is everything all right?"
"Yes. My stepfather left a while ago. He was concerned, but he's not going to make any big deal over it, and he's not telling my mother anything. Don't worry, and anyway, I don't care. We didn't do anything wrong. I wanted you to kiss me," I confessed.
"And I wanted to kiss you. It was a wonderful party, Leigh. The best party I have ever attended."
"It was wonderful because you were here and we could spend time together. Will you come see me at school next weekend?"
"Of course. William and I are already planning something to do."
"I can't wait. Good night, Joshua."
"Good night, Leigh."
"Angel says good night, too," I added laughing. I brought my portrait doll to the receiver as if she could really hear him and speak.
"Good night, Angel."
Joshua laughed, too.
After I cradled the receiver, I held Angel close to me. I put out the lights and closed my eyes, expecting to remember Joshua's kiss and the way it had made me feel, but instead, I saw Tony standing before me, his eyes fixed pointedly on my face, his lips glistening, his smile tight. In my mind it was his hand, not Joshua's, on my breast.
"I want to show you, warn you, teach you," he had said. Why did those words make me tremble? He was only trying to be a good stepparent, wasn't he? Yet did he have to touch me there to demonstrate?
I wished I could tell my mother and ask her what she thought, but how could I do that without telling her everything: Joshua and I sneaking away from the party and going to the cottage and kissing and my permitting him to touch me?
No, no, I thought, she only would say that Tony had done the right thing.
I wouldn't talk about all this; it was better to simply forget it. No one but my doll Angel would know how Tony Tatterton had held me and touched me and kissed me in my bedroom tonight, but I felt sure this was only the beginning. There would be many more secrets kept between my portrait doll and myself.
I finally fell asleep with her in my arms.
If Tony ever did say anything to my mother about the cottage incident, she either forgot it or didn't think much of it, for she never mentioned it. Joshua and I stopped talking about it, too, although we didn't forget the way we had kissed and had held each other. My body would tremble whenever I dreamt of him holding and kissing me like that again. We did kiss when we went to the movies, but it wasn't the same because we weren't alone. There weren't many opportunities to be alone. Boys were forbidden to be in our rooms at Winterhaven and girls were forbidden to be in boys' rooms at Allandale.
My mother permitted me to remain at Winterhaven many more weekends than I had expected. Joshua, I, William and Jennifer became the talk of the school. We were always going places, doing things.
Marie and-the "special club" softened toward us, too. Before Christmas we were all speaking to each other openly, inviting them to our room and once again being invited to all of theirs. One day Marie formally asked us to rejoin them. We said we would, but the truth was we didn't have the time to spend with them as we first had. All our weekend time was spent with Joshua and William.
The portrait dolls became a huge Christmas item for Tatterton Toys. Tony ran advertisements in magazines and newspapers throughout the country. The Boston newspapers produced articles on the dolls and I saw myself featured on the pages. Just as Tony had predicted, most of the girls at Winterhaven wanted portrait dolls, too, and soon dozens of them had put in their orders. Tony was ecstatic about it, and every weekend that I returned to Farthy, he had much to show me and tell me about the project.
During the winter months, he did some more traveling, establishing new markets for the dolls in Canada, France, England, Spain and Italy. He was happy about the success he was having competing with the European companies that had been doing similar things. Momma joined him for only one trip, the trip that included a week at St. Moritz and the Palace Hotel.
Unfortunately, that was the week of the school play. I had a big part, but neither she nor Tony could attend. I had secretly hoped Daddy might come because he had written to tell me he would be on the East Coast around March for meetings in New York City and Boston, but he never answered my letter inviting him.
I half hoped he would come anyway, that I would peep out through the curtains and see him and Mildred come in and take front-row seats, but he never showed up. A week after the play, another letter arrived full of apologies, and I learned that he had been unable to keep to his schedule and hadn't yet gone to New York. He was still on the West Coast. He said he had seen an advertisement for the Tatterton portrait doll and he thought it was beautiful.
By the time spring came, the portrait dolls had become a multimillion-dollar part of the Tatterton Toys empire. Tony never stopped thanking me for being the first model. He told me he was setting aside a share of the profits in a trust fund in my name. Momma thought this was all wonderful and reminded me how silly I had been for hesitating to pose.
"Tony has made you a star after all," she told me. "Isn't that sensational?"
I supposed it was. I was the envy of all the girls at school, I had a wonderful doll myself, and now I was even making my own fortune because of it. Tony turned out to be a considerate and sincere person after all, I thought, and the negative things I had felt about him, the things that he had done and said that had frightened me, all drifted away. The world that had turned !, ay and dreary after my parents divorced became bright and happy again. Sunlight had broken through the clouds. I had friends, a boyfriend, a fascinating home and everything any girl my age could ever want--clothing, jewelry, records, anything.
It wasn't the same for Momma, despite her enormous wealth, despite her being married now to a handsome, bright and wealthy businessman, she was always complaining about one thing or another. She was still upset about her weight and what she thought were imperfections in her figure. Finally, in late May, she announced she was going to Switzerland to a "wonder spa" she had learned about from her wealthy friends. She would be there for at least a month, or "however long it took." The best thing for me was she said I could stay at Winterhaven straight through until the school year ended.
She left the last week in May. Two weeks later my second year at Winterhaven ended. Joshua, William, Jennifer and I made all sorts of plans for the summer. I hoped I would be able to do half of what we dreamt of doing. I thought I would begin by inviting them all to Farthy the very first weekend back, but when I told Tony, he said it would be better if I waited for my mother's return before I went anywhere or had friends come visit.
It was our first argument and we had it during our first dinner together. Even little Troy became very upset.
"I'm not a little girl, Tony. I don't have to have my mother's permission for every single thing I do," I
