“Ah-hah,” he said.
“People have described me as… (The word ‘bitch’ came to mind but I didn’t think that was the best word to use here) …feisty.”
He looked at me and raised one eyebrow and cleared his throat. “Excuse me for one moment,” he said. “I feel a bit parched. I’d like that Pellegrino after all. Thank you.”
I got up from the ‘settee’, walked behind the bar, pulled open the door to the mini-fridge, grabbed a Pellegrino and unscrewed the top. “Would you like that on the rocks and with a lime or a lemon? Or straight up?”
“On the rocks with a slice of lime, thank you.”
I opened the ice container, plucked out a few cubes with tongs, dropped them into a glass and poured the water on top. Grabbed a lime from the fridge and chopped it quickly on a small butcher block on top of the bar. I dropped a wedge in the drink, stuck another on the glass rim and handed it to him.
“Thank you.” He sipped.
“Perhaps, Mr. Philips, you could tell me why I should want this job,” I said. “Because, no offense? Right now you all are shrouded in mystery. I don’t really know what this job is, what you’re paying, or what I need to do. And frankly, as much as I like to read mysteries and adore watching them on TV? I’m a practical girl. While I’m dying to find the perfect part-time summer job? I’m not sure I’m up for more mysteries in my life right now.”
He blinked. “I see.” He placed his drink on a coaster on a side-table. “Thank you for coming here today, Miss Trabbicio. I am so sorry but we will not be needing your services.” He stood up, walked to the front door of the suite, opened it and gestured with one hand to the hallway. “I wish you nothing but the best of luck in your future.”
My heart sunk. “But, but…”
“We are very practical people as well. I apologize for any inconvenience this might have caused you.”
Another rejection. Another waste of time. I slunk toward the door.
“Wait a moment, Miss Trabbicio.” He extracted a leather wallet from his pocket, snapped it open and held out a crisp one hundred-dollar bill. “I trust this will cover your travel expenses.”
Chapter 5
I gazed hesitantly at that hundred-dollar bill. I felt like a hooker accepting a tip. But I had to keep my Uncle John at the Vail Assisted Living this month, next month and pay for my subway ride back to the south side.
I pulled the bill from his hand. “Thanks for the opportunity.” I walked into the hallway and blinked back a few tears. I had a Tupperware container of mac and cheese in the fridge, which if the electric company didn’t shut off my service, should last me a couple of days. Maybe Subway was hiring?
Mr. Philips’s phone buzzed from the bar counter. He picked it up and put it to his ear. “Yes, Lady Elizabeth. I made a calculated decision based on…” He squinted at me. “Yes, I see your point…” he winced and held the phone away from his ear. “Of course I understand how stressful this has been for you… No, I did not realize you had been fitted for a mouth guard because you were bruxating and diagnosed with TMJ disorder.”
I tried not to stare at Mr. Philips and his sweater vest as I punched the elevator button. Okay, truth be told, I slammed it five times because this was humiliating and I had to get the hell out of here. Now. I gazed up at the bank of elevator lights and realized they were stopping on Every. Single. Dang. Floor on their way up to the Penthouse.
Finally a light indicated there was a car just one story below me. I glared at its tiny beam, willed it to move, but it simply squatted there like it had all the time in the world. I hit the elevator button with my fist: Bam! Bam! Bam!
Ding! The Penthouse button light flashed. I took a deep breath. Escape was in sight. The doors slid open and I slipped into the tiny, pristine cubicle and pushed the Lobby button. I slumped against the side of the upholstered cage and dropped my head in my hands.
“Not so fast.” A woman thrust her bejeweled hand between the doors, which slammed onto her wrist. “Ow! Holy freak! God bless Fredonia!” she said.
The doors rebounded open and I peered at a twenty-something, pretty, blonde woman who winced as she held her wrist with her other hand.
“Oh, crap!” I said. “I’m sorry. If you had hollered for me to hold the elevator, I would have done that. You okay?” I asked as the doors started to slide shut again. I stuck my foot between them and they bounced off my Keds.
“I believe so.”
Mr. Philips and a coiffed, twenty-something brunette chick stood close to the suite’s doorway in the hall behind her and watched us.
I felt a new batch of tears welling and I didn’t want to lose it in front of complete strangers. “I’m sorry, miss. I need to make tracks. Are you coming—”
She latched onto my arm and yanked me out of the elevator. I spun around and landed on my ass on the hallway’s lush, tapestry carpeted floor.
What kind of girl would rip me out of an elevator at the Drake Hotel?
“Who are you?” I gazed up at her. “And what do you want from me?”
“I’m Lady Elizabeth Theresa Billingsley of Fredonia. I want to hire you to be my Personal Assistant for a part-time job. I’ll pay you a king’s ransom, I’ll give you a signing bonus and I’ll throw in a makeover and wardrobe expenses. Say yes. I insist.”
Oh my God!
“Yes!”
She smiled and clapped her hands excitedly. “Swell-zies!”
The elevator made a low whooshing sound behind me as it departed and I wondered:
What the heck was Fredonia? And what kind of part-time job had I just signed up for?
Elizabeth leaned over and peered at me like I was a delectable but doomed mouse that a cat had cornered in the kitchen. “I’ve been looking for you for almost a month now.” She held out one perfectly manicured hand. “Close your mouth. Stop gaping like a fish out of water and get up.”
“All-righty.” I took her hand and she hauled me to standing.
“Mr. Philips is my employee. I’m the one hiring you. You—whatever your name is—have captured my interest. I am incredibly sorry. I never forget a face, but I am terrible with names. What is your name again?”
“Lucille Marie Trabbicio.”
“Right. I read your job application and I instructed Mr. Philips to invite you to interview,” she said.
Elizabeth had glossy, styled blonde-highlighted hair, shiny white teeth, impossibly long eyelashes and immaculately groomed eyebrows. She looked like she could grace the screen in an animated Disney Movie. I squinted because her perfection blinded me or perhaps I’d poked an eye out during my fall.
“How motivated are you?” she asked.
“Very.”
The brunette from the Penthouse’s open door approached us. “Elizabeth—let me handle this.”
Elizabeth shook her head. “I’m fine, Zara. What do you know about sports?” she asked.
“What kind of sports are you asking about?”
“Start with soccer.”
“David Beckham’s career was long but is basically over,” I said. “American parents will take out a second mortgage on their house to finance their kid’s way into soccer camps and clubs and tournaments. All for the dream.”
She nodded. “Why did you drop out of high school?”
“My parents died unexpectedly,” I said. “It threw me.”
She paused and bowed her head for a moment. “I’m sorry. I lost my mother when I was ten. It’s not easy.”
“No it’s not.”
“Elizabeth, this has to be taxing,” Zara said. “I’ll take it from here.”
“You’ll take it from here when I tell you to take it from here. Lucille—your Uncle John Trabbicio is in an institution for the mentally challenged. Does this affect your every-day-life?”
I shoved my hands on my hips. “Would it affect your every day life?”
“There’s one in every family,” Zara said. “My cousin practically cut off my dead grandmother’s chubby, inflexi
ble fingers to procure her rings seconds before we closed her casket. Elizabeth simply wants to know that you can get the job done.”
I frowned. “Uncle John was with dad at the hospital after the motorcycle accident. He held his hand when he died. He lost it a few months later. I pay for him to live at Vail instead of County.”
“I see,” she said. “That’s sad. It also means you’re motivated. When can you start?”
“When do you want me to start?”
She eyed me up and down and crinkled her nose. “You’re raw material, rough-around-the-edges. Mr. Philips, Zara and I need to train you and we need to do that quickly. Considering we have our work cut out for us, I think we should start immediately. You can start immediately, yes?”
“Um. Sure?”
“Fabulous. Zara—make the phone call please. I need to excuse myself for a moment.” Elizabeth turned and raced back inside the Penthouse.
Zara slid her iPhone from her purse and hit one button. “I’d like to speak to D’Alba please. Tell him Zara Wentworth is calling on behalf of Lady Billingsley. No I will not leave a message. Yes, you can put me on hold but only for a moment. He’s expecting her call.”
She glanced at her diamond-encrusted watch, then back at me, and frowned. “Have you ever had your eyebrows waxed?”
“Absolutely not. I read those horror stories that describe—all too graphically might I add—what happens to body parts when you over-wax them. I tweeze my brows.”
“You do know you’re supposed to tweeze between your brows?”
I harrumphed.
“Can you work late tonight? She’ll pay overtime.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Yes,” Zara said.
“Yeah, we confirmed that,” I said.
“When speaking the affirmative we use the word, ‘Yes.’”
“Okay,” I said.
She shook her head. “You need to say, ‘Yes.’”
“I already said ‘Okay’. I can stay late tonight.”
“For the love of God, say, ‘Yes,’” Zara said.
“How many times do I have to say it?” I hollered and suddenly wondered if she was hearing impaired. A wave of guilt swept over me and I felt terrible. It was wrong and incredibly insensitive of me to yell at some young, overly-coiffed woman who was hearing impaired.
Zara ground her teeth and spoke into her phone. “Tell D’Alba it’s Lady Zara calling. This is in regards to the situation they discussed last week. The one where Elizabeth promised to pay him twice his going rate. Yes, dear. We will see him in twenty… what do you mean he can’t see us for two hours?” She jabbed her thumb into her temple and grimaced. “Fine. We’ll see him in two hours. Tell D’Alba I’m not as nice as Elizabeth. He’d better be giving us his A game or I’ll be spilling-all on the royal circuit. And this time it will be about who really wore the tiara or what riding the polo ponies hard actually means.” She hung up the phone and massaged her temples. “Good help is so hard to find.”
“Yes,” I said. “Yes it is.”
This was totally my opportunity to impress upon Elizabeth’s friend that I would not be simply good help—I would be great. I was not only hard-working but I was also a take-charge kind of girl who would go the extra mile.
“Why don’t we work on something else before we meet with this D’Alba dude,” I said. “I could get you all something to drink, and then we could organize Elizabeth’s closets, or clean out her purse.” I paced. “We could talk Mr. Philip Philips into wearing a shirt without a sweater vest?”
She arched one eyebrow. “Good luck with that one. Hmm. Not a bad idea, however. How long have you walked like a football player?”
“I know—good, huh?” I smiled. “That wasn’t an easy gait to learn.”
“I imagine not,” she said.
“I had to toughen-it-up a bit after my parents died. Just ’cause I was single, young and unprotected, I didn’t want guys thinking they could take advantage of me. I watched a bunch of Bears football games and imitated the linebackers until I had it down.”
“Kudos on your determination. Unfortunately, you can’t walk like a gorilla if you’re to successfully assist Elizabeth.”
“Gorilla?”
She punched a button on her phone. “Mr. Philips?”
“Yes, Zara,” he said.
“We’re conducting our first lesson with Elizabeth’s new assistant. I require a larger room than this claustrophobic hotel suite. Ideas?”
“Absolutely. Let me make a few calls.”
“Splendid. Bring the feather duster.”
“What exactly does this part-time job entail?” I asked.
Chapter 6
It was a little after one p.m. The Drake’s Grand Ballroom was filled with round tables draped in white-linen tablecloths surrounded by chairs in preparation for tonight’s festive event. But the only people here were Zara, Elizabeth, Mr. Philips and myself. An aisle cut down the middle of the ballroom and several steps led to a stage.
Elizabeth sat on one side of the aisle, her feet up on a folding chair, a frown on her pretty face as she furiously texted on her iPhone. Zara sat next to her. Mr. Philips stood on the opposite side of the aisle with ramrod straight posture holding a pink feather duster protruding from a very long handle.
I slumped at the back of the ballroom and dabbed my sweaty brow with the hem of my Cheswick’s shirt. I’d already marched, sashayed, strode, and slinked down this walkway thirty times. Apparently once you learned how to walk like a linebacker, you’d always walk like a linebacker. Similar to cigarette smoking, and crack cocaine, this was a tough habit to break.
“What are we waiting for, Miss Trabbicio? The second coming?” Mr. Philips crossed himself.
“Try it again, Lucille,” Zara said.
“I don’t know what you want,” I said. “Maybe you could give me a little demo?”
Mr. Philips regarded Elizabeth who wiped a few tears from her eyes. Zara leaned over and rubbed her arm. He sighed, lumbered to the back of the ballroom and stood next to me. “Despite my aching back I will try my very best to interpret what Lady Zara has in mind.”
“While you’re obviously a man of many talents—I’m not sure prancing lady-like down aisles is one of them,” I said.
“Lady Elizabeth has employed me for seven years now,” he said. “You’d be surprised what I’ve endured—I meant—learned in seven years.”
I raised an eyebrow and pointed to the center aisle. “Your red carpet awaits.”
Mr. Philips composed himself. Sucked in his stomach, stood very tall and strolled down the aisle gracefully. “Imagine you are walking down an aisle at a royal court. There are important people, even a few celebrities gathered for a posh, news-worthy event in this formal room.”
“How important?” I asked.
“Dukes, Duchesses, a couple Earls, someone from Dancing with the Stars and perhaps a member of Britain’s Royal Family.
My eyes widened. “Like Prince Harry? I normally don’t go for redheads, but he’s hot—in a ginger kind of way.”
Mr. Philips clutched his lower back. “You can imagine Prince Harry is in the audience if that helps you walk more lady-like. We’re just beginning your training, but it’s critical you learn these lessons. The people in your future audience are judgmental, gossipy, and pretentious. They smile widely with their pearly-white capped teeth while they examine your every move, hoping and praying you will commit a giant faux pas that they can gossip about to all their friends.”
“Why would they want to do that?” I asked.
“You dropped out of high school early, but do you remember the lunchroom?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Yes,” Zara hollered.
“Yes.” I sighed.
“These people are the high school bitchy girls—but on steroids,” Mr. Philips said. “Your every move, your every little nuance needs to be as pristine as possible. Watch me closely.” He minced down the aisle. “You sashay throug
h public places like a moving airport walkway is under your pretty, delicate feet.” He stared at my Keds and sighed.
“Size seven and a half,” I said. “Delicate.”
“Every step you take is elegant. You radiate wide-eyed innocence and virginal bliss. ” He walked down the aisle and despite his bad back—for a few seconds—he moved so smoothly it appeared like he was skating.
“Zara—I need to step out for a bit. Will you…?” Elizabeth asked.
“Yes. Go. I’ve got this,” she said.
“Try the walk again, Lucille,” Mr. Philips said. “Imagine you look ethereal. Middle-aged women weep when they see you.” He pretended to cry. “Older women want to kiss your blushing cheeks and press you to their bosoms.” He stooped over like a crone with a bad spine, winced, and placed a hand on his lower back.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Mr. Philips,” I said. “But you totally pull off the old-lady thing.”
“Good to know. I fear my bad disc slipped again. I’m currently unable to stand up straight.”
“Oh my God!” I said. “Lay on the floor. I’ll walk on your back. I took a Learn All About It Annex course in Thai Massage. I’m pretty good.”
“Thank you so very much, but my vest is designer and I fear it wouldn’t survive. Back to the matter at hand. Girls your own age either want to be your BFF or rip your eyeballs out. But remember, you are the epitome of sweet and kind, and to-the-manor-born. You are a dream girl. You are—a princess in training.”
I closed my eyes and repeated to myself, “I am a princess-in-training.” I pictured Prince Harry waiting for me at the other end of the aisle and kept walking. I imagined the fancy attired audience members rising to their feet as they beamed encouraging smiles and applauded.
“Much better. Now I want you to close your eyes, think of something you desire even more than Prince Harry and try that walk again.” Mr. Philips said.
I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and thought of one of my favorite things in the entire world. I fluttered my eyes open and moved down the aisle as I smiled and nodded to my imaginary onlookers.
Part-time Princess Page 4