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"Yes, Tony, and I like my roommate, Jennifer, very much. I'd like to invite her to Farthinggale, and the other girls in my group."
"Anytime," he replied. "As long as your mother approves," he added ominously.
I asked him about Troy.
"He's getting stronger every day. The doctor says we will be able to take him home either Wednesday or Thursday, so he will be at Farthy when you return next weekend," he told me. I was anxious to see him, but I was also anxious to spend a weekend at the school. The "special club" went to movies together and shopped together, and some weekends there were mixers, dances organized between Winterhaven and boys' prep schools like Allandale.
When we arrived at Farthy and I entered the big house, I was immediately impressed with the silence, especially without little Troy scampering up and down stairs and through doors, calling my name or calling for Tony. There was barely a footstep echoing through the great rooms; this, in contrast to the world I had just left--a school filled with teenage girls laughing and singing, music coming from the rooms, girls chattering together in the hallways, bells ringing, dishes clanging, friends calling to each other through the corridors--a world of energy, noise, young life. Once again, Farthy seemed like a museum, a house of whispers.
"Your mother's probably in her rooms," Tony said, looking at his watch. "She's only just returned from a bridge game, I'm sure."
I ran up the stairs to see Momma. I was filled with mixed emotions--eager to see her since we had been apart a whole week, anxious to tell her about the girls and the things we had said and done; but also angry, angry and hurt that she hadn't once called to see how I was, and still angry that she hadn't come along with Tony and me that first day. Tony was right--she had just returned from a bridge game and was preparing to take a shower and dress for dinner.
"Oh Leigh," she said as soon as I entered her bedroom. She looked surprised. "I forgot you were coming home today, forgot today was Friday. Can you imagine? That's how busy I have been this week." She stood there in her slip, her hair down. Then she smiled and held out her arms, expecting me to run into her embrace. There was an awkward moment, then she lowered her arms to her sides quickly. "But wait," she said, "let me look at you. You look so much more mature, or is that a look of reproach? Are you angry with me for some reason?"
"Momma, how could you not even call me all week? I called you once and left a message with Curtis. He said you were out
with friends, shopping, and in Boston! You could have stopped by the school," I complained.
"Oh Leigh, how would that look--me bringing all these sophisticated women along to visit my daughter who had been away only a few days. They would think I was babying you. And besides, you don't know what it's like going places with these women. They gossip and chatter so much, we barely have time to do anything. I'm the one who's always saying, 'Ladies, please, let's move along or we won't get to do this or do that.' They simply adore me, though. They say I'm the freshest, brightest person they've met in ages and ages.
"No, you must not be angry with me," she insisted. "It's not that I haven't been thinking about you. I asked Tony to stop by to see you during the week and he did, didn't he?"
"Yes, but it's not the same thing, Momma," I protested.
"Oh, poo. You're getting to be as stuffy as your father. It's those puritanical VanVoreen genes you've inherited," she declared. I was so angry I nearly told her what I knew and demanded she stop lying to me.
"And besides; Tony wanted to do it. You've become very important to him, Leigh, which is something I think is wonderful. You can't begin to understand how much easier this has made my life. Please, don't be angry," she cajoled and then held her arms out for me again.
I wanted to resist; I wanted to talk and talk until she understood how cruel she had been to me, but she wore that same gentle smile I loved to see when I was a little girl, the smile she wore while she brushed my hair and told me about all the wonderful things that would happen to me, the places I would go, the princes I would meet, the world of magic and love that awaited. She had spun my childhood dreams and fantasies on a magical loom and had made the world outside seem nothing but candy canes and rainbows.
I hugged her and let her hold me. She warmed my cheeks with kisses and stroked my hair, and part of me hated that it made me happy but it did. Then she sat me down on her bed beside her to tell me about all the new friends she had made, each one richer than the next, all from well-known families, pure blue bloods.
"Why do you still look so sad?" she asked, suddenly. "Was it because of your dinner with your father?" Her eyes grew small with suspicion. "Tony told me he was coming to take you to dinner."
"No, Momma. Well, yes, that's part of it," I confessed, and I told her of Daddy's plans to establish a European office and why that meant I wouldn't see much of him.
"It doesn't surprise me, Leigh," she snapped. "And don't think he wouldn't have done something like this even if we hadn't divorced. Oh, when I think of the precious time I've wasted, the youth I've wasted!" Her face burned with frustration and anger for a few moments and then she caught her image in the mirror.
"Oh, I must not let myself frown!" she cried with such desperation, I actually jumped. "Do you know one of the best beauty experts says frowning speeds up wrinkling." She sounded frantic. "I've been reading an article he wrote. People with quiet, happy dispositions age far more slowly than people who are always annoyed and upset. The trick is to keep your anger subdued and to quickly think of something pleasant. He compared it to throwing water on a fire.
"The fire burns, consumes your youth and beauty, if you permit it to, so you have to smother, stifle and extinguish it as fast as you can." She smiled widely as if to demonstrate.
"Now, I must take a warm shower and give myself a facial before dinner. Then you and I will sit down and you will tell me all about Winterhaven, okay?"
My head was spinning from all the different subjects she had covered in minutes. "But I want to ask you something, Momma. I've already asked Tony and he said it would be fine with him if it would be fine with you."
"What is it?" She started to grimace as if preparing herself for a horrible question or terrible demand.
"I've made some nice friends at Winterhaven, especially my roommate, Jennifer Longstone. I'd like to invite them here on weekends."
"On weekends! Oh, not for a while yet, Leigh, please. I can't have you conducting tours of girls through the estate and being occupied with these new friends. I need you to help me occupy Tony. He wants to teach you how to horseback ride and ski. He told me so himself, and he's looking forward to using the weekends to do it.
"You promised you would help me in this way. You did, Leigh," she reminded me, her face twisted in a look of urgency. "I'm sure Tony was only being polite when you asked him. He would much rather have you all to himself, at least for a while.
"And then, we'll let you invite your little friends here one at a time."
"But Momma, there's so much room. We can have more than one at a time!" I exclaimed.
