Pineapple Street, page 21
“Is he more angry about you giving away your money or about you undermining Taconic?”
“He thinks I’m virtue-signaling. He keeps calling me A.O.C. and Comrade Stalin and insisting I’ll regret this when I have kids one day.”
“He thinks you’ll wish you could give your kids a bigger inheritance?” Georgiana asked.
“Yeah, he’s part of that generation that thinks financial stability is the greatest gift you can give your family.” He tipped his head, indicating that he was ready to move on to the next mural.
“I think there’s a difference between stability and obscene wealth,” Georgiana ventured.
“There’s a big difference. Income inequality is the most shameful issue of our time. I’m worried that my kids will look back and see a country that completely abandoned morality, that let people die of hunger while the wealthy took tax breaks.”
“Warren Buffett says he doesn’t believe in dynastic wealth, doesn’t believe your life should be determined by your membership in ‘the lucky sperm club.’ ” Georgiana blushed slightly at the word “sperm.”
Curtis laughed. “Did you know that between Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and Jeff Bezos, those three individuals hold more wealth than the entire bottom half of the population?”
“Is that true?” she asked.
They stopped in front of a mural of two enormous breasts, and they both pretended to study it briefly before moving on to the next. Art was so awkward.
“Have you always disagreed with your father’s politics?”
“No.” Curtis shook his head. “I sort of started to read beyond The Wall Street Journal in high school, but I didn’t fully engage with my own complicity until college. I think we were sort of raised in a bubble.” He looked at her questioningly.
“It’s sometimes hard to get out of that bubble,” she agreed, thinking about her tiny corner of Brooklyn Heights. If she sneezed loudly enough in her living room, her parents could probably bless her from their bedroom on Orange Street.
“Seems like you’re pushing out of your bubble,” Curtis said, and Georgiana felt flattered and then embarrassed at how much she seemed to want his approval. They wandered back to the dance area and Georgiana saw her team starting to collect the envelopes from the tables.
“I should get back to work.”
“Hey.” Curtis caught her arm. “Are you seeing anyone?”
“No, are you?” She smiled.
“No, but I thought maybe that guy? When I ran into you? After that party?” Georgiana appreciated the great pains he was taking to avoid saying, “That morning I saw you staggering down the street looking like you’d been huffing glue after you tried to lick my molars.”
“That was my brother, Cord.”
Curtis said he’d write her to set up a night for dinner and she felt a glittery happiness that carried her through the cleanup from the party, but when she got home and opened her medicine cabinet, she found a note from Brady behind her mouthwash that read “Free nose jobs for debutantes!”
Holding the folded slip of paper, Georgiana remembered the photos of Brady and Meg. She saw him standing by the plane with his backpack, hours away from the crash. He had died and his body had turned to ash, and yet Georgiana was still here, alive and dressing in stupid designer clothing, flirting at a museum gala, pretending to be a good person when she knew that she was a liar.
FIFTEEN
Darley
Tilda was throwing Cord and Sasha a gender reveal luncheon and the theme was “Mad Hatter’s Tea Party.” She had transformed the Orange Street apartment into a psychedelic wonderland, with teacups stacked in alarming towers, a candelabra with pocket watches hanging from the arms, playing cards fanned around the base, and porcelain rabbits peeking out from the floral arrangements. Frankly, the whole thing made Darley feel like the time she took too many mushrooms in Amsterdam and threw up in a canal. But she dragged Malcolm along to be a good sport and even wore a feathered fascinator she had from an old Kentucky Derby party.
“Welcome to Wonderland!” Tilda said dramatically as she threw open the door. She was wearing a hat so big it was touching the hallway on either side, and she applauded appreciatively at Darley’s outfit before handing Malcolm a black top hat with playing cards sewn in the brim. “Everyone’s wearing a mad hat! Now pick a drink. If you think the baby is going to be a girl have a Pink Lady, if you think it’s a boy have a Blue Arrow.”
“What’s a Blue Arrow?” Malcolm whispered to Darley.
“Blue curaçao and gin. Avoid,” Darley whispered back.
Cord and Sasha were already there, Cord wolfing down heart- and spade-shaped tea sandwiches and Sasha looking flushed and pretty in a flower crown.
“I love your headpiece,” Darley complimented her, kissing Sasha hello.
“Oh, your mother had it made for me. She came over yesterday to see what outfit I was planning to make sure it would go.”
“Of course she did,” Darley said and laughed.
The table was teeming with food: cucumber and cream cheese on pillowy white bread, chicken salad with grapes, egg and watercress, each plate with a little tag that read “EAT ME.” The cocktail table had similar tags reading “DRINK ME.”
“Oh my God, ‘Eat me’?” Darley scrunched her nose.
“Really classy, Dar,” Cord grinned. “This is a family party.”
“So, is it a boy or a girl? You can tell me, I won’t tell anyone,” Darley wheedled.
“We don’t actually know,” Sasha said. “We had the doctor write it on a piece of paper, and your mother gave it to her caterer. When we cut the cake it’ll be either pink or blue inside.”
“Wow, that’s cheesy,” interrupted Georgiana, walking up and popping a cherry tomato in her mouth.
Sasha laughed tightly. “It wasn’t our idea.”
“NMF,” said Malcolm, winking at Sasha. Darley pretended she didn’t know what their little private code meant.
Georgiana had brought her best friend, Lena, and Darley was happy to see her. She had known Lena since she was a little kid, and Darley had fond memories of babysitting them when she was home from college, painting their nails and letting them eat entire tubs of cookie dough while watching Zac Efron movies. Georgiana had been so erratic lately—it seemed like she was already tipsy—and it made Darley glad to think Lena was also watching out for her.
“Let me taste that.” Malcolm gestured to Georgiana’s cocktail, which looked like antifreeze in a martini glass. He took a sip and winced. “That’s like naked-wasted stuff.”
“Well, it is a gender reveal party,” Cord joked, clearly slightly hyper. “We didn’t say whose gender we would be revealing.”
Sasha had invited a handful of her friends, some from work and some from art school, including Vara, and Darley made a point of introducing herself to everyone, steering them away from the blue drinks when possible. Sasha’s parents had canceled at the last minute— her dad wasn’t feeling well—and Darley’s heart broke a little they wouldn’t get to be a part of this, drinking Pink Ladies and seeing Sasha in her flower crown. But Tilda was relishing her role as the matriarch, swanning about in her hat, breaking her own edict and sipping a glass of champagne, unwilling to stain her teeth either boy or girl colored.
* * *
—
After an hour of eating and mingling, the party gathered around the cake, a gargantuan, wedding-style tower with three tiers covered in white and yellow roses. Sasha’s friends pulled out their iPhones to document the reveal, and she and Cord used a Tiffany knife to make the cut. Cord held the first slice aloft—but the inside of the cake was white.
“What does white mean?” Cord asked the room.
“Cut farther into it! Maybe there’s a filling!”
They cut again, this time all the way to the center. White. Cord dramatically started spearing each layer as though he were a magician attempting the woman-in-a-box trick. It was white all the way through.
“Oh raspberries, I’ll call the bakery,” Tilda announced, batting her hat brim out of her eyes and punching their number into her phone. It turned out the bakery had also filled an order for a fiftieth wedding anniversary that day, so somewhere across town a couple of old people were eating bright blue or pink lemon curd. The party gathered around the iPhone so that the baker could read aloud the note from Sasha’s obstetrician.
“It’s a boy!” the baker cried from the tiny screen, and Tilda screamed merrily and hung up on her. “What fabulous news!”
Cord and Sasha laughed and kissed, and everyone who had punished their livers with the Blue Arrow cocktails raised their glasses in victory. A boy! Darley was happy. The baby would be six years younger than Hatcher, but her kids would have their first cousin. And Cord would be an unbelievable father. As she looked around the room at their friends and family eating and laughing over the cake debacle, she noticed Georgiana wasn’t smiling.
“This is such a fucked-up thing to be celebrating, you guys,” she said loudly, and the party quieted as though someone had called for a toast. She was swaying lightly, her cheeks aflame as she spoke. “It shouldn’t matter if it’s a boy or a girl. Gender is a spectrum.”
“Georgiana, dear, nobody knows what on earth you’re talking about,” Tilda admonished her from beneath her enormous hat. “We would be just as happy if it was a girl.”
“That’s not the fucking point, Mom,” Georgiana said dismissively.
“Georgiana, do you want to come talk in the kitchen?” Sasha intervened. She was suddenly at her elbow and steering her out of the room.
“No, I’m fine, Sasha.” She said her name as though it were a swear.
“You’ve been through a lot,” Sasha said quietly. “It’s okay for you to be angry.”
“Don’t act like you know everything,” Georgiana hissed. “You don’t!”
“Okay, I don’t,” Sasha backpedaled. “I just think you’re ruining a family party when you’re actually hurting about something else.”
What the hell are they talking about? Darley wondered.
“I’m not ruining anything. This whole party is so out of touch. Gender isn’t binary. Gender isn’t about genitals!”
“Jesus, keep your clothes on, George.” Cord tried to reel his sister in, but she was only escalating, and Darley suddenly saw that tears were running down her face.
“Georgiana, let me walk you home.” Sasha reached for Georgiana’s elbow.
“Don’t!” Georgia jerked her arm out of Sasha’s grasp.
“I think you’ll feel better—” Sasha pressed.
“Sasha, back off. This isn’t even your house.” Sasha looked as though she’d been slapped, but Georgiana kept going. “Is this all you care about, Sasha? Your big house and your heir? It’s fucking embarrassing. You’re all embarrassing.” She looked around, glaring as if daring anyone to speak, and when nobody did, she stormed out, down the hall, into her parents’ bedroom, and slammed the door.
“What the hell was that?” Darley asked nobody in particular.
“Well, who knew we’d be in for a bit of dinner theater?” Tilda announced with a laugh. “Now everyone please have a slice of cake! Well, the slices Cord hasn’t defeated in a fencing match!”
Darley was often amazed at her mother’s ability to gloss over awkward situations. It was either incredibly sophisticated or completely psychotic, but in these moments, she supposed she was grateful for it. People quickly shoveled down slices of cake and then made their excuses to leave. Lena had been standing at the bedroom door, trying to talk to Georgiana, but the door remained locked.
“What’s up with her?” asked Darley.
“I don’t know.” Lena shook her head. “She’s been kind of chaotic.”
“What kind of chaotic?”
“Getting drunk really easily. Obviously mixing with anxiety meds. Kissing some guy she hates at a party then beating herself up about it and wallowing in self-loathing.”
“Yikes.” Darley felt her eyes go round. How has she missed so much? She rapped on the door. “George? It’s me. What’s going on, babe? Open up.”
Tilda joined them. “Sweetheart, everyone’s gone home now. Come on out and let’s talk about what upset you. I apologize if my theme missed the mark,” she tried.
There was a thump, a click, and the door swung open. Georgiana stood before them, her hair wild, her lips stained blue from curaçao, radiant with fury.
“George, what’s going on?” Darley begged, her eyes filling with tears seeing her sister in such pain.
“Ask the Gold Digger,” Georgiana said, glaring at Sasha, who stood frozen at the end of the hall. “Ask the fucking Gold Digger.” And with that she swept out of the apartment and left her family gaping in her wake.
SIXTEEN
Sasha
Sasha told them. They sat in the living room and Sasha explained what Georgiana had confessed the day she found her sobbing in the closet. She had fallen in love; she didn’t know Brady was married. After she had found out, she did the unthinkable and kept sleeping with him. They were having an affair. Then the plane crashed, Brady died, and Georgiana couldn’t stop the grief.
“The secret has been tearing her apart,” whispered Lena. “She told me she broke it off with him.”
“The plane crash was more than two months ago.” Darley winced. “She said she didn’t know the people who died.”
“Brady died. And her friend Meg,” Sasha said quietly.
“You’ve known this the whole time?” Cord asked, and the look on his face was one of such betrayal Sasha could barely stand it.
“I’m sorry,” Sasha whispered. “She told me in confidence.”
“She’s twenty-six,” Darley spat. “She’s a baby. She was dealing with something incredibly traumatic. She needed help.”
“I tried to help her, but guess what? She shut me out, just like everyone in your family!” Sasha shot back defensively. “I called her and called her, but she didn’t want help from a gold digger.”
“Why do people keep saying that?” Tilda interrupted.
“Because that’s Georgiana and Darley’s nickname for me: the Gold Digger. They think I married up. They think I give two shits about what clubs you belong to or how to set a fucking table. They think I actually wanted to move into your family museum of antique crap.”
“Hey, Sasha, simmer down,” Cord said and frowned.
“No, I won’t simmer down. Georgiana is spoiled and selfish and has been rude and snide to me since the moment I met her. And you,” Sasha turned to Darley. “It’s almost worse because you pretended to be my friend while joking about me behind my back.”
“This isn’t about you, Sasha,” Darley snapped.
“It never is, is it? I’m over all of you. I am sick and tired of everyone acting like I should be kissing the flea-bitten Oriental rugs in gratitude just so I can keep living in a janky Grey Gardens full of old toothbrushes and moldy baskets. And guess what?” She glared right at Tilda. “The governor’s couch gave me a rash!” Cord looked at her and shook his head, too far, but Sasha was done anyway, spent. Her face was sweaty and with her wilting flower crown she looked like some kind of demented Medusa. She turned and, with as much dignity as one can muster while surrounded by a family in weird hats, stomped out the door.
* * *
—
In the wake of the party the Stockton family closed ranks. Cord would take phone calls from Darley and walk into the bedroom, shutting the door firmly behind him. He went to Orange Street so that he could huddle with his mother and discuss the Georgiana problem, presumably while rubbing her feet pornographically.
Cord thought Sasha had overreacted. So they called her a name, so what? Georgiana had loved someone who died. Sasha’s problems paled in comparison. He couldn’t see that it was about so much more than that, couldn’t see she’d been ostracized all along. With each passing day after the party she felt the curtain being drawn between them, making it clear as day that she was not and would never be a Stockton.
To Sasha’s surprise, Darley didn’t text or call. Sasha knew she and Cord were mad about her house comments, they were mad she had kept Georgiana’s secret, but didn’t Darley feel any shame for calling her a gold digger? Maybe Sasha should have told them about Georgiana, but at the same time she couldn’t fathom how they would have reacted if she had sounded the alarm two months ago. Georgiana already treated her with such disdain, what if she’d broken her trust? She felt she had seen something the Stocktons wouldn’t have liked her to see. They were all so private. They were secretive. They were desperate to keep up appearances and make sure no cracks showed in their facade. Well, Sasha had seen the cracks and now they hated her for it.
The more Sasha thought about it, the angrier she felt. She was stuck in a lose-lose situation, a member of a family in which she had no voice, she had no vote, where doors were closed and envelopes remained sealed and money was a string that tied them all together and kept them bound and gagged. To Sasha it suddenly made sense that the Stockton family had settled in the fruit street neighborhood of Brooklyn Heights all those years ago, that they wanted to live in homes protected by a historical preservation society: they didn’t actually want to change, they wanted to stay exactly as they were.
* * *
It was a Monday afternoon and Sasha was working, trying to choose which shade of cream to use in an advertisement for bed linens. She had narrowed it down to coconut cream, double cream, and cannoli cream—the whole thing was making her hungry—when her mother called her from her pantry.
“They are going to keep your father overnight for observation,” she said, her voice muffled by bags of rice and pasta.
