Love from London (2 page)

“Yes, I’m that Shalimar — formerly — now I go by Monti,” she smirks. “Didn’t Arabella say?” I’m unsure whether she means the name change or the fact that her mother’s a major icon in the fashion-rock world.

“No,” I shake my head. “She kept…pretty quiet about her — your — family.”

Monti nods. “Doesn’t surprise me in the least — Arabella’s never tolerated hangers-on — you know — the ones who just want to be a step closer to the ridiculous world of RAF.”

“RAF?” I quickly run through a list of possibilities — and decide that Monti probably doesn’t mean the Royal Air Force.

“Rich and Famous, of which we are certainly a part — but choose not to be defined as such…” she rambles on, her voice echoing in the cavernous hall, talking about how they’ve tried to raise the kids outside of the pubic eye (haven’t we all?) and teach them that having parents with big names might open a door but won’t keep it ajar, and so on.

“Forgive me blathering away,” she says and for a second sounds slightly non-English. “You must be famished. Do come to the breakfast nook for a bite to eat.” Casually she strolls me into “the nook” (nook=giant circular room off the kitchen with a rounded widow seat and an enormous antique table all set with food).

During breakfast (toast served on little sterling silver racks, personal jam and butter containers, smoked salmon and eggs — a girl could take up permanent residence here. Forget Corn Flakes) I expect the typical parental questions; age, academic standing, summer plans, likes, dislikes. Instead I have a barrage of brainy and cool ones:

Do you feel that you’re defined by your origin?

Where haven’t you traveled that you’d like to?

Do you believe in past lives or the circularity of life forms?

Have you ever really been in love?

Trying not to feel like I’m in Ethics class a la last term at Hadley Hall, I do my best to answer all of these. I figure that if Monti’s cool enough to ask them, I should be mature and mod enough to tell her — except the last one I manage to breeze over, which probably means no, of course no. But then Angus Piece, Arabella’s dad who shows up in the middle of my rant about wanting to go to India and makes me go back to the
in love
question. Which is not what I want to be discussing with my friend’s parents, especially after fifteen minutes of sleep and upon first meeting. Angus Piece — surely he’s not
the
Angus Piece, the playwright? The one we study at Hadley Hall?

“Come on, Love — dish it out,” he says, his accent Scottish and thick so I have to go over practically everything he says twice to make sure he hasn’t said something more banal like
yum, salmon is good
.

“I’m not sure,” I say and sip my coffee, taking time to butter my toast.

“Fucking hell,” Angus smiles. “Kids these days know shite about love.”

Blush from me, smile from Monti. “Don’t mind his filthy mouth,” she says and stands up near Angus. Then she full-on makes out with him. Talk about breakfast entertainment. Pass the scones.

They look at me like nothing’s happened so I just focus on the food. Angus points to me, “Let that be a lesson to you, girlie. When you find love, you’ll know it — none of this ‘I’m not sure crap’.” Angus is tall and very dark-haired with the same eyes as Arabella and he smiles at me, instantly reminding me of how much I miss her. “Anyway, welcome, welcome. Our house, as they say — is yours. Just don’t mind your manners.”

And so begins my uncommon stay at Bracker’s Common. Monti shows me to my gymnasium-sized room — a king-sized bed on the far wall, set between two floor to ceiling windows and covered with a fluffy cream duvet trimmed in deep blue silk. On the other wall is a dressing table set with various potions and lotions, all new (“The stupid fashion people still send me all that junk — as if I’m interested in Burberry or anything so insipid,” Monti says — yet she lovingly arranges all the bottles in front of the beveled —edge mirror.) Then, way over to the left side of the room is a claw-foot tub. A huge one, set on a raised tiled platform. A silver tray that goes across the tub holds Kheil’s shampoo and Joe Malone bath gels and soaps.

“You just draw the room divider like this,” Monti shows me, pulling a faded blue sliding screen from one end of the wall. “And then bathe in peace…or Piece…” she laughs and points to herself. “No pun intended.”

“Ha,” I smile. “This is incredible. Really.” It’s like I’m in some funky Swedish castle — it’s not ostentatious with gaudy golds — it’s more farmhouse-chic, with an old fashioned washing basin.

Monti smiles as she looks around the room. “I hope you’ll feel at home here, Love. Arabella has told us so much about you — and I know what a good friend she’s found in you.”

“When will she get here, do you think?” I ask and can’t help but look longingly at that bed. It’s the sort of bed that cries out to be shared, ahem, but anyway.

Monti frowns for the first time, but still is the essence of glamour. “That is a question I cannot answer. Obviously — we don’t impose rules of her — that’s just hierarchical bullshit — the concept of time. But — we do hope she exercises her choices and decides to make an appearance.”

No wonder Arabella didn’t tell me much about her family — where would you even start? Monti leaves me to my palatial suite (my own sitting room, of course) and the tiny stocked library off of the bathroom. Of course I find a ton of Angus Piece’s plays — all the ones I drew a blank on upon meeting him. He’s the Scottish Sam Shepard or something like it — cutting edge but well-respected. While reading through one of the scripts that’s in the tiny library I’m reminded of the Hadley Hall speech team’s attempt a dramatic reading of
You, Like Night
, one of the award-winning plays Angus wrote before I was even born.

I decide to save my luxurious bath for later and slide out of my clothing and into the billion count sheets of my giant, fluffy bed, and go to sleep, feeling like the princess and the pea (minus the legume). Only when I roll over onto a large brown envelope which scratches my back do I reenter reality. I pull the thing out from under me and look at the front. Addressed to Miss Love Bukowski, the return address is LADAM. A brief rifling reveals my class schedule (my “provisional” acceptance was such that I didn’t get to choose my courses, since they were pretty much all filled and I never had an interview to inform them of my “personal preferences”. I’m trying not to assume that means I’m stuck with the shit classes no one wanted). Also included are directions around the campus. My pulse speeds up just looking at the information — I’m excited but in some ways feel like I so quickly made the decision to come here that I haven’t figured out what to make of it all. Or maybe I’m not supposed to have it figured out yet. I take a final glance at the term’s schedule, the room I’ve been assigned to in student housing (note to self: ask why every dorm room in every college/boarding school catalogue always looks like it was photographed in 1983 with horrible carpet and outdated sweater, big-collar combos), and my welcome letter (which, unlike the ones Hadley Hall sends out, isn’t filled with exclamation points — this one’s just like
yup, welcome, the work is hard, go audition but expect not to be cast in anything
— um, sounds fun). I slide all the long papers (A4 size/, not 8 ½ x 11) back into the cave from whence they came and curl myself up fist-tight, determined to enjoy my winter break before dealing with more school.

When I wake up, the light in the room has shifted enough so that I know its past noon. Cat-stretching myself out in the silky sheets, I have to do a double-take when I survey the room again. Mable once described a palace hotel she’d stayed at in Finland during her traveling days, and I have to think it looked like this. I get my digital camera (thank you, Dad, for giving me a departing gift I’ll actually use) and, still clad only in a tee-shirt, bum bare for the world (world=no one) to see, I snap a few shots to email her later. Then I remember that Bracker’s Common has no modern amenities such as DSL — or a computer for that matter. Angus Piece mentioned in passing that he still creates all his plays in a journal and then transcribes them onto a typewriter. Quaint, cool, and totally apropos of the
I’m such an eccentric
lifestyle to which he and Monti cling.

I stare longingly at the lovely tub but eschew the shower/bath combo for a walk around the grounds instead. My jeans are crispy from the dryer but I wiggle into them and slip on a thin black turtleneck and boots and head downstairs to see if Arabella’s “chosen to exercise her choices” or whatever gibberish Monti called it (basically, if she’s shown up yet).

To the right, the hallway outside my room leads to the formal staircase I climbed on my half-tour with Monti. Curiosity gets the better of me and I head left, checking out the library (complete with those sliding ladders for reaching the top shelves), the billiards room (where I feel like Ms. Scarlet in Clue! Except not the Asian stereotype dressed in red silk and smoking with a cigarette holder), and almost go down a whole other wing but decide not to. Probably weird Clive’s (former English exchange student whose only redeeming feature is that he’s Arabella’s brother) bedroom is down there and I have no desire whatsoever to see him nor his (no doubt desperately trying to be cool) bedroom.

So I wind up taking the back stairs, secretly hoping for a Potteresque adventure (not so much magic as say a hidden passageway and a hot sorcerer), but aside from being awed by the wealth and wonder (understated, tatty in that Anthropologie catalogue way) there’s nothing remarkable that happens on my way out the kitchen-side door.

Thoughtfully, the cloak room (oh, I feel so British when I say that) has a row of jackets in varying sizes and styles (Barbour ones, riding style ones in quilted navy and green) so I grab a shearling (if you’re gonna go communal, you might as well snag the top pick, right?) one in a buttery caramel color and feel cozy and chic as I crunch over the gravel drive and wander towards the lake.

In the pastures, cows graze freely, as if even they are well-to-do. I wish Arabella were here so I could gush to her, but it occurs to me that maybe that’s one of the reasons she didn’t want to arrive with me — so she wouldn’t have to deal with my
oohs
and
ahhs
. Quite possibly, another reason is because she was rushing to a royal rendezvous with Lord Tobias Wentworth-Jones. Arabella is so obviously besotted with Toby I feel bad for even questioning slightly the reality of her relationship with him — but the fact that he’s a famous face still gives their dating an odd sense of Hollywood glam that is completely out of my realm of normalcy.

I put my hands into the pockets of the borrowed coat, and suddenly think of a camera filming this scene. I fantasize I look like a sexy Anne of Green Gables but then feel like a bit of an imposter — a coat that’s not mine, a house that’s someone else’s, grounds that are so far beyond what I’d consider normal to live on…

“You look lost.”

I stare at the guy in front of me — forget Anne of Green Gables, how about DH Lawrence, whatever that book was about the gorgeous gardener.

“I’m not lost,” I say — why must everything I utter sound so defensive?

“Just aimless wandering, then?” The mouth attached to the face of wonder says. He’s like someone from a bygone era — tall and slim, with straight dark hair, lanky, partially falling over his bright green eyes, chiseled face, hands that are — whoa reaching out to me. “Asher.”

“Hi,” I say, “Nice to meet you. I’m Love.”

He nods and must be one of the first people not to make a cutesy comment about my name or ask for an explanation. Then again, with a name like Asher, he must know what it’s like to forever have complicated intros.

“I can show you down to the lakeside,” he says. With a gloved hand he gestures and adds, “There’s a secluded path that way — through the topiary gardens.”

Secluded — warning, red flag red flag — I am not supposed to go with strange men (or boys) anywhere, but the many security cameras must ward off complete crazies, right? He clearly knows his way around, and judging by his commenting on all the flowers and tress as he walks, he’s got to be the gardener — or one of them since a place this large must have an entire grounds crew.

Asher starts off towards the path without pausing to see if I’ll follow — which of course I do because a) who wouldn’t follow such a creature of beauty and b) I was — seriously — heading in that direction anyway and c) I have always harbored a secret handyman fantasy (not in the Nick at Nite, One Day at a Time yucky Schneider guy way. More like Johnny Depp as a mechanic/guy with a trowel — or do I mean hoe?).

“You seem to know your way around here,” I say for lack of anything interesting. “Do you know when the house was built?”

“The main house — presumably where you’re staying — was constructed in the seventeen hundreds by some count and then the addition is new.”

“How new?” I try to picture contractors and Ty Pennington coming to knock out a new wing in one day or something.

“New as in Eighteen hundred and one — the music and ballrooms were added on.” Asher smiles and stops. “Ridiculous, isn’t it?”

“What is?” We’re paused at the entryway to what I presume is the garden path.

“All this,” Asher says and sweeps his arms out like he’s displaying a (loud voice) BRAND NEW CAR on a game show. Then he reconsiders. “But beautiful, too.”

“Is that Alice?” I ask as we go under a trellis which is still covered in roses (winter blooms, Asher informs me).

“As in the girl who fell down the rabbit hole — or whatever the symbolism is there — yes. Angus Piece, master of the house, has a thing about topiary — God knows why.” It seems odd to me that Angus — a man so wanting everything to be au natural — would want to impose shapes on nature. I say this to Asher and he nods. “Exactly.”

Asher puts his hand on top of a tree-shaped Alice and lets me walk around the various clipped shrubs. Some are twirls of shrubbery (no Monty Python jokes here I remind myself — that would be way too Clive) that point up into the gray and darkening sky, others are characters like Alice, the bong-loving Caterpillar, and other non-Wonderland creatures like a flamingo. Or, wait, didn’t the Queen of Hearts play croquet with a flamingo? Does it matter, Love?