“Mom,” I said, “helicopters kind of freak me out a little.” I did not add, “And so do you, and I wish I were back home drinking mint chocolate milk shakes with Skags and making fun of the Beasts and those giant summertime sunglasses that make them look like overgrown flies.” I don’t think she would’ve understood a single word I said.
She unleashed another laugh. “Oh, darling. The Fairweathers fly the same helicopter as the president! A Sikorsky—what’s it called again, Merilee?” She rattled off model numbers and some facts and figures, which I ignored. Clearly, I was going to lose my copter V-card whether I wanted to or not. “Naomi, I really have to hang up—Merilee reminded me of the strict no-phones policy in the club, and people are starting to notice. I’ll see you soon.”
I got off the phone and stared out the window for the rest of the ride to the heliport. I was just clambering out of the huge SUV while the driver got my suitcases when I heard an unmistakable sweet voice (the kind of high-pitched but whispery girly tone Skags calls Marilyn Voice) call, “Naoooooomi Ry-yyyyyyye!”
I looked up, and there was Delilah Fairweather, slowly walking off the tarmac to where I stood. She seemed to float above the ground like Glinda the Good Witch when she makes her appearance in Oz. I guess that would make me Dorothy, but I usually feel more like a Munchkin when I’m standing near Delilah Fairweather. For one thing, Delilah’s around five foot ten in flats. She’s also gorgeous, with perfect tanned skin and abnormally huge blue eyes. She has one of those cutesy Cupid’s-bow mouths, and when she smiles, her teeth gleam bright enough to blind passersby. For real, she should hand out those Beast-approved giant sunglasses as a precautionary measure before she grins. And of course she’s got long blond hair. Of course. And somehow—and I’m not saying they’re fake—she ended up with a pair of D cups on that super-slim body. She is a walking, talking, living, sexy Barbie doll, if Barbie enjoyed skiing in Aspen, shopping in Paris, and smoking copious amounts of marijuana.
“Naoooooomi Rye,” Delilah said again in her breathy little-girl way, stretching out the syllables as if it were a novel experience for her tongue. She delicately stepped over to me on those impossibly long legs and bent down to give me the world’s best-smelling hug, which immediately sent tingles up and down my spine as if Delilah were actually electric. Delilah always smelled like some combination of movie popcorn and cotton candy and caramel and other foods she never allowed past her full, bee-stung lips. I’d known her since we were kids, and I’d never seen her eat more than a teensy portion of anything. Still, I found it impossible to hate her—she treated me kindly, for one thing, and for another, she had this way of training her eyes on you and making you feel like you were the only important person in her entire life. She always seemed to have one foot in this world and one foot in some other, rarified realm where magical elves twirl inside sparkling soap bubbles that float on the surface of an enchanted sea.
She lifted a handful of my hair and breathed into my ear, “Your hair looks stunning this summer.” Her eyes met mine, and she shook her head in wonder. The compliment briefly made me feel as if I had won the lottery.
I have to give Delilah credit for never being mean to me, through all the years my mother tried to force me on her—and, what’s more, for making a real effort to be welcoming and kind, in her own flighty way. When the adults had clambakes at Baxley’s and the kids ran down to the ocean to play, Delilah complimented me on my bathing suit or made sure I had a pail in which to collect shells. When we got older (like, seventh grade) and my mother finagled invitations to various house parties, Delilah invited me to hang out with the other kids at the far edge of the property. I always followed her and her friends at a safe, respectful distance down to the lake or past the pool house or whatever, and she oversaw the passing of the joint or flask. On the frequent occasion that the kids tried to skip me over, she scolded them sweetly and made sure I got my chance. If I took a drag, it was always quick—I don’t like pot, and anyway, I don’t know how to inhale. I do better with booze, because it’s hard to mess up an action as simple as swallowing liquid. Pot smoking, though—there’s some kind of weird art I haven’t figured out. Probably I never will.
Delilah introduced me to her companions as if I were her real friend and not just the daughter of her mother’s ex-caterer. But she was much in demand and couldn’t sit around and babysit me the entire night, of course. Consequently, it was up to me to fend for myself at these outings, which inevitably ended the same way. I’m not much of a conversationalist, which makes a handful of people back home (the Beasts included) think I’m a snob. I’d much prefer that reputation to the one most people ascribe to me: “Naomi Rye? Oh, she’s such a good listener.” That was what always ended up happening at these Hamptons parties: everyone else would get wasted while I’d stay sober, and before you knew it, one girl or another would corner me and start pouring out a sob story about how her boyfriend was off in the bushes, having sex with another girl, or how her parents didn’t really love each other and everyone knew, or how her brother had tried to commit suicide but failed because the chauffeur had found him in the garage before he could finish hanging himself, or any one of the usual awful things that happen to very rich people. I didn’t want to know this stuff, because proud people who confide in you in their weakest moments inevitably end up resenting you, but I managed to collect an arsenal of wealthy teenagers’ tales. When those kids become governors and CEOs, which they will, I could make a fortune selling their darkest secrets off to gossip columnists. Of course, I would never actually do that (even though Skags says I should).
Looking past Delilah, I saw two handsome guys on the heliport, waiting for her. One I recognized as Delilah’s longtime boyfriend, the ex–child actor Teddy Barrington. I could lie and say I didn’t have a poster of him on my closet door when I was ten, but would you really believe me? Every girl I knew loved Teddy back then, when Oh, Those Masons! was the number one show on television. Even Skags was into him, before she realized she was way more into the girl who played his hot older sister. Not only had Teddy once fueled many a young girl’s tween fantasies, he was also an heir to the Barrington Oil fortune. I’d gone with my mother when she catered his tenth, eleventh, and twelfth birthday parties, and they were the most insanely lavish events, each one featuring a private performance by Cirque du Soleil as well as appearances by all his famous co-stars and a bunch of his favorite sports heroes.
But Oh, Those Masons! was canceled when we were thirteen, and Teddy’s family announced that he was retiring from acting to focus on his education. (There were rumors that he couldn’t get hired for any other roles, but he was so adorable that you just knew those rumors were invented by jealous, mean people.) The over-the-top birthday parties continued each summer, but by then my mother was too busy taking over the world to cater, so I only saw him now and then at a clambake or a pool party—and he never remembered me. Now, six feet tall with light brown hair, broad shoulders, and one of those heroic square jaws, Teddy was the kind of thick-necked handsome that starts to get paunchy in college unless it is continually worked out by university-level athletic competition.