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Pippa laughs out loud at that one, and for the briefest of tantalizing moments I am transported back to the barn, to effervescent Lolly and her laugh. Then the bubble bursts. Pippa punches me in the arm and waggles her eyebrows. “Eh? Didn’t I tell you?” And in fact, though she has already enlightened me with her Grand Theory on Humanity, she does so again. “There are two kinds of people. Those whomustannounce that they are going to the toilet and those who would ratherdiethan mention the fact.”
The Trunchbull whips Pippa’s legs. Good thing she’s wearing riding britches. Nice and thick for this frigid weather. “Less laughter and vulgarity, Miss Klaushoffer. More attention to detail. You’ll never be aThrills, Spills, & Killsinstructor with an attitude like that.”
There are ten of us in the class, each with an area of specialization that meshes withTS&K’sbusiness plan. I shall teach polo and riding. Pippa’s teaching fire juggling, coal walking, and sword swallowing. Each one of us is a specialist in their field.
My understanding is that we’re going to study etiquette together and eventually—when we’ve shown we can deliver an entire program without offending or killing anyone, I assume—be sent to our stations around the world. I still don’t know where mine is. It could be on the moon for all I care. Because no matter where they send me, there will be a fatal flaw in the arrangements. Lolly won’t be there.
“Mr. Arias, if you would come to the head of the class and demonstrate the meal setting.” It’s not a request, but a requirement, and I’m not permitted to plunge the fish knife into The Trunchbull’s jugular. This is my life for the foreseeable future.
“You must hold your knife and fork at all times. Knife in your right hand, fork in your left. Never…” I lock eyes with Pippa, who’s my newest friend and the only way I’m going to make it through this nightmare. “…never put your knife down in the classic American way and transfer your fork from your left to your right hand.”
I know she’s waiting for me to land a punchline, if only so The Trunchbull can’t claim she’s robbed us of our souls. And it’s not going to cost me anything if I trade a few points to make Pippa laugh.
“As everyone knows, the left-handed are second only to the gingers in Satan’s handbook.” Unbidden, Lolly gallops out of my memory, flaming hair flying. The woman of my dreams is both left-handed and a ginger. I already know she’s a temptress. One who stirs feelings in me that are brand new and can only be called passion.
The ridiculousness of my situation is matched only by my despair. Why won’t Lolly read my message? When will she reply? What is she thinking? How did I get so far from the thing that matters most?
Mick Anderson, who by his own admission has never known love, told me to do anything—ANYTHING—to secure the love of my woman. What, then, am I doing in this place with a knife in one hand and a fork in the other and no Lolly?
Without her, I am lost.
Adrift.
Without a rudder.
The solution, therefore, is simple. Find Lolly and make her listen.
THE DIRTY DUCHESS
Lolly Benoit. Aunt Dottie's Dower House. The Cotswolds, England.
There are worse places to find oneself moping about than the Dower House, where my aunt is solidly installed as the village eccentric. Prison, for example. The graveyard, for another. I have nothing to complain about. Not really.
I guess there’s one thing: He sent me a text. Blah, blah, blah. Told me his heart is mine. More blah. What do words mean when he made the choice he made? He chose the dusty rich-o over me. I was second. That’s all that matters. Case closed. He can go to hell with his sexy fucking accent and raging, never-ending boners. What do I care? I leave him on read and pull the covers up around my chin.
It’s impossible to tell the time, the sky is so overcast and gray, but it’s clear Aunt Dottie has let me sleep in. Again. Since I made my bedraggled appearance on her doorstep and she squeed and squeezed me, I’ve spent more time in the guest room’s feather bed than anywhere else. I told Dot—Dottie, Dorothy, Dorothea, Queen of the Dispossessed and Champion of the Underdog (her self-chosen and preferred epithet)—it’s the jet lag. But really, it’s the siren song of her lush flannel sheets and my abject dejection that keep me hidden away in the Duchess Margaret Suite.
Fun fact for anyone trying not to think about Mariano Arias and his luscious lips and rock-hard abs and the reason he rejected me: The Duchess, who this room is named for, fell down an elevator shaft when she was visiting her chiropodist. (You could not make this shit up, but you can make it into a BBC series!) The bang on the head apparently turned her into a bona fide nympho, and when her titled husband sued for divorce he named—and supplied photographic evidence of—eighty-eight lovers in the suit, which, if you do the math, is a fair number of boinks per year.
All the suites in the Dower House are named after infamous women my aunt either knew, knows, or admires. Names change on a dime, as do the drapes on the four-poster bed. She’s never bored, my aunt, and she keeps half the village in paying work, so the Dower House is a popular destination for locals and travelers alike. I’m lucky to be here.
I drag myself out of bed, throw on my favorite jeans and a chunky sweater, and tell myself England is hardly prison, no matter how stifling it is to be plied with pots and pots of freshly steeped tea. I check my phone for new messages, studiously ignoring his.
Every night I get a photo of my sweet filly, Velveteen. The first was one of her looking out over her stall door, ears pricked. The message from EFF read:
TEXTLSTART_LOOKING FOR YOU_TEXTLEND
And each morning since, I’ve awoken to a new photo of Velveteen. The pics make me cry, though (as far as I can tell) Teena looks good. Happy. Well fed. But they also strengthen my resolve. I am going to make my own miracle.
But as for Hotstuff McPolopants? He’s sent a single message that doesn’t explain anything.
But, says my overly logical brain (which I am not a huge fan of at this moment), he was sitting beside his paying lover when I danced for him—ugh, notfor him, butto celebrate Gustavo and Nicolás—and he left her to follow me and tell me he was “free.” Whatever that means. But then, just to make sure I’m getting it, my mind goes back and underlines and bolds the sentence.HE LEFT HER TO FOLLOW YOU!As in, not exactly second choice after all. Ha!
You know, I could hide from reality and tell myself it didn’t happen, but why should I? He sought me out. But I still don’t understand why. Whyyyyyyyy? It makes me squirm and wriggle and, FFS, tingle. The temptation to have a littleménage à moiisn’t something I’m proud of, but it’ll dispel some of the frenetic energy that has built around the fact that my Polo Hottie has consigned me to Coventry, where all silent punishment is meted out.
I start slow, but the button on the lid of my personal pressure cooker has already popped, so it’s not long before I bury my mouth in my pillow so that my aunt is none the wiser. Downside to staying with your relatives? The single-engine pleasure plane has to be landed in silence.
I rearrange myself in front of the mirror, make sure I’ve buttoned my pants, and head for the main staircase. Each morning is no different from any of the other since I’ve arrived. Aunt Dottie has a full English breakfast waiting for me: sausage, eggs, bacon, fried toast, fried tomatoes, baked beans, and black pudding. I never eat the black pudding, but it makes an appearance nonetheless. Mr. Wiggins—who gets up hours before I do and cavorts with my aunt as she does Dower House and greenhouse stuff—loves a teeny pinch of the famed English blood sausage when I’m done with breakfast. Dottie never reprimands me, so we have a kind of silent accord around the rule that “no animals will be fed from the table.”
