Sex and Vanity

by Kevin Kwan

  She knew then exactly what she wanted to say to George. She was going to say, “I wonder if Neruda could play Bach as well as you can.” Now she just needed to get one second alone with him. She would seize the moment after he finished playing, and maybe she could use the excuse of showing him the Diefenbachs in the refectory. But just as he was finishing the piece, Gillian, the hyperefficient wedding coordinator, marched into the chapel with a panicked look and whispered something urgently into Isabel’s ear.

  “Oh, shit! Sorry,” Isabel said to Gillian before turning to the rest of the group. “We need to get to the banquet. Apparently Dolfi’s grandmother started making a toast, not realizing that we weren’t even there!”

  The group dashed quickly toward the central cloister where the banquet was being held, and when Lucie first caught sight of the space, she gasped in delight. The vast courtyard was filled with round tables covered in silver brocade and groaning with immense antique silver candelabras that looked like they had come straight from the Vatican. Over each table were suspended silver orbs of varying sizes, each containing candles floating on water. The water and flickering candles within the translucent silver cast a rippling, gossamer light over the entire space, making the already enchanting cloister look even more luminous and otherworldly.

  Lucie quickly got to her assigned table, crossing her fingers that George would be seated there too. Instead, she found herself between an Italian youth with long blond hair who didn’t speak a word of English and, if the engraved place card next to her chair was correct, BARON MORDECAI VON EPHRUSSÍ. Her heart sank, and to make things worse, from where she was sitting she had the perfect view of George two tables away taking his seat between Sophie, Isabel’s beautiful Australian friend, and some equally stunning Asian woman named Astrid. One of the wedding’s black-clad videographers was not so discreetly documenting the scene of the photogenic trio greeting one another as if they were longtime friends meeting up at the front row of New York Fashion Week.

  Mordecai, who had been chatting with some English duchess at the next table, returned to his seat rather reluctantly and raised an eyebrow at Lucie. “Where have you been, young lady? Up to some mischief, I hope?”

  “Not quite. We were at an impromptu piano concert given by George Zao.”

  “Really? And what was our strapping young Narcissus playing?”

  “The aria from the Goldberg Variations.”

  “How predictable!” Mordecai grumbled.

  “He played it quite beautifully, actually.”

  “I’m sure he did. But just once I wish someone would bust out Schoenberg or John Cage when they sit down at a piano. There’s nothing more trite than playing the Goldberg Variations, except perhaps ‘Für Elise.’ ”

  Not wishing to challenge him, Lucie tried to change the topic. As the waiters began ladling the steaming zuppa di pesce into her bowl, she held up her spoon. “I think this is the heaviest spoon I’ve ever come across.”

  “Ah yes, the famous De Vecchi silver. Forged in Firenze in the seventeenth century, I believe. They had it flown in from the family vaults yesterday.”

  Admiring the immense silver candelabra at the center of the table, Lucie said, “It’s all so grand, I’m not sure how the wedding banquet tomorrow is going to top this!”

  “Well, since the Chius are picking up the bill for the entire wedding week, the De Vecchis obviously had to do something impressive for tonight. They couldn’t let those gauche Asians steal their thunder, could they?”

  Lucie said nothing but thought that Isabel was anything but gauche.

  Mordecai mistook Lucie’s silence for anger and began backpedaling furiously. “I do hope you weren’t offended by what I just said. I didn’t mean anything by it. I love the Asians! Some of my dearest friends are Asians, like the Chius and the Sultanah of Penang.”

  “No worries, I wasn’t offended at all.” Lucie smiled, amused that he was flustered.

  “I’m so relieved. I just think it’s fascinating to witness all this—a Chinese girl of immense fortune marrying into one of the oldest families in Europe, splashing her money around on one of the most decadent weddings the world has ever seen. It’s like Henry James all over again, avec le Chinois. I can see all the old Roman and Neapolitan families sneering in the corners. But there’s a new world order in place, and Old Europa better get used to it. I forget you’re partly Chinese, you see. I’m actually quite color blind—I don’t ever think of people in terms of their skin tone. I think of you as a New Yorker.”

  Lucie nodded diffidently. Just when she thought Mordecai could do no worse, he piped up again. “Tell me, dear, what do you consider yourself?”

  “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  “When you look in the mirror, do you feel more Asian or more Caucasian?”

  “Well, I’m equal parts both…”

  “But do you lean toward a particular side? It’s rather marvelous that you could pass for either.”

  Lucie gritted her teeth, finally angry. “You know, I’ve never tried to pass for anything. I feel like I’m just me.”

  “Very well put, young lady. Very well put. Now, tell me, are you out?”

  “I’m assuming you’re referring to the cotillion and not the closet?”

  “Har har! Yes, indeed.”

  “I decided not to take part in all that debutante stuff, although my grandmother wanted me to.”

  “This would be your Churchill grandmother? Tell me, how exactly are you all related to the English Churchills?”

  Lucie reached for the crystal goblet in front of her. She wasn’t much of a drinker, but if she had to endure this inquisition for another three courses, she might as well get completely shitfaced. She gulped down the entire glass of wine, and the rest of the evening soon blurred at the edges. She was feeling super chill for a while, and then events started happening as though everything was in fast-forward, going so fast until there was nothing but flashes of moments…

  …tasting an incredibly tender rack of lamb that, in the words of Baron von Ephrussí, went “improbably well with the Musigny.”*2

  …trying to use Google Translate to converse with the golden-haired Italian youth seated to her left. His name was Sandro, and he was Dolfi’s seventeen-year-old cousin from Como. He liked drum and bass. And Reese Witherspoon.

  …watching a dish of delicious-looking zabaglione with Venetian white peaches being placed in front of her, but not recalling if she actually ate it.

  …feeling a hand on her shoulder and Isabel saying to her, “Let’s ditch this joint!”

  …taking a tender to an immense, futuristic yacht moored just off Marina Piccola, where Isabel’s girlfriends had arranged the “Couture Costume Bachelorette Party.”

  …putting on a gold Jean Paul Gaultier bustier top, Azzedine Alaïa cheetah-print leggings, and electric-blue eye shadow.

  …gobbling down four red velvet cupcakes in a row before realizing that they were infused with cannabis.

  …going to the karaoke lounge and the girls all wanting to sing 1980s hits.

  …belting out Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance with Somebody” with Isabel and Daniella.

  …staring at the Italian paratroopers storming the yacht by helicopter as the girls screamed and screamed.

  …realizing that the absurdly over-tanned paratrooper in the shaggy wig was Dolfi when he stripped off all his clothes and did a cannonball off the top deck of the yacht.

  …seeing another guy colliding midair with one of the drones as he tried to do a somersault into the sea.

  …getting blindfolded and being forced to play Pin the Tail on the Donkey with someone dressed in a furry donkey costume.

  …hearing Isabel shouting, “No, guys, leave her alone! Don’t touch my little angel! Lucie has immunity tonight!”

  At some point, she remembered s
tumbling belowdecks vomiting red velvet into the pristine white toilet with a sleek automatic lid that kept trying to decapitate her, and curling up in a big circular bed with an immense white fur throw thinking how warm and cuddly it was but how sad that it had to be made of so many cute dead animals, and all of a sudden she was back in the chapel again, where a choir of Italian boys dressed in white robes stood in front of her singing Crowded House’s “Don’t Dream It’s Over” a cappella, and as she sat there listening to their angelic voices, she looked up at the fresco on the ceiling again, staring skyward at Jesus, and suddenly his bare pink torso transformed into the golden-brown perfection of George’s chest, and there she was too, floating above the clouds next to George in his blindingly white Speedo, as he turned to her, saying, “You have a freedom within, Lucie, you have a freedom without.”

  Lucie found herself saying, “I’m ready!”

  Stretching out his arms Christ-like, George grabbed her hand, and together they plunged headlong out of the heavens and into the deep, unknown depths of the sea.

  Hey now, hey now, don’t dream it’s over.

  *1 The annual Young Fellows Ball at the Frick Collection is one of the highlights of the New York social season, partly because it is one of the few charitable events that manages to draw a chic “under-forty” crowd, or rather people who claim to be under forty.

  *2 A 1988 Domaine Comte Georges de Vogüé Musigny Cuvée Vieilles Vignes, to be exact, put away in the year of Dolfi’s birth precisely for this occasion.

  XIII

  Villa Lysis

  CAPRI, ITALY

  “I’m surprised you’re even alive,” Charlotte remarked when Lucie appeared at the hotel’s poolside café just as she and Olivia were finishing lunch. “How hungover are you?”

  “Actually, I feel fine,” Lucie said, downplaying it by a mile.

  Olivia peered at Lucie’s bloodshot eyes and chuckled.

  “This is completely unlike you, Lucie! Disappearing like that without telling us and partying all night on a yacht? I had to find out where you were from Mordecai, of all people, and you know what loose lips that man has,” Charlotte chided as she took the last bite of her parmigiana di melanzane.

  “Charlotte, there’s nothing scandalous for him to say. It was Issie’s bachelorette party. It was my duty to attend.”

  “Well, clearly her duty did not involve thinking of your well-being. You are so much younger than her other friends, and I wasn’t born yesterday—I’m sure you all did not spend the night on board a super yacht playing Cards Against Humanity,” Charlotte quipped.

  Olivia leaned in toward Lucie. “I heard a rumor that there were mountains of pure Colombian cocaine and Isabel’s friends hired male strippers dressed as ninjas?”

  “Ninjas? There were no drugs, just fashion, and the ‘male strippers’ turned out to be Dolfi and his crew,” Lucie said, trying to sound blasé but quietly alarmed that she couldn’t recall anything about the evening past a certain point. Her roommate at Brown would come back to the room on weekends after getting completely trashed, claiming to not remember a thing, but Lucie never believed it was possible. Now she believed.

  “What do you mean ‘fashion’?” Charlotte probed suspiciously.

  “There were all these fun couture designer costumes waiting for us on the yacht, and we each picked an outfit. I wore a vintage bustier that had been designed for Madonna’s ‘Blond Ambition’ tour, and we all sang karaoke and ate cupcakes,” Lucie explained.

  Charlotte gave her a dubious look. “Thankfully you appear to have all your limbs, or I would not know what to say to your mother! Now, Olivia and I are off to the hair salon. You clearly forgot about your one p.m. appointment.”

  “Oh, shoot!” Lucie sighed, rolling her eyes.

  “Well, get some food into your system and take a hot bath. You don’t have all day, you know. We have to leave for the wedding by four o’clock at the latest, and it’s already almost one thirty. God knows how long our appointments will take with these Italian stylists! If you are dressed and ready by the time we get back, I might just help you with your updo,” Charlotte said in a gentler tone as she got up from the table.

  Olivia leaned over and patted Lucie on the shoulder. “Tomato juice with a raw egg. It will fix you right up. I’ll order you one on our way out.”

  Lucie slumped into her chair and put her sunglasses on, feeling the first twinges of a headache. Several squealing German kids sprinted through the garden and did cannonballs into the pool, the sound of their splashes causing her to have a flashback to the night before. She was in the pool on the yacht…the smaller one on the top deck…and were someone’s toes getting sucked? It wasn’t hers…thank God not hers. And then suddenly she recalled seeing George last night. He was definitely on the yacht. Was he the one in the donkey costume? Yes, it was him. The hair on the nape of his neck was a little wet from being in that furry mask for so long, and she knew that because her fingers were caressing his head as they were dancing, right before she had to rush into the bathroom to throw up. Yes, that’s what happened. How mortifying. Did he see her throw up? Did she say something idiotic to him that she might regret for the rest of her life?

  It was a question she was still pondering three hours later when she arrived at the gates of Villa Lysis for the event that everyone had been anticipating and speculating endlessly about—the wedding ceremony! From the lovely beach club lunch and divine dinner held in an ancient grotto to the exclusive Villa Lachowski excursion and the grand banquet in a fourteenth-century monastery, each event had been more spectacular than the last. How on earth was Isabel going to top all that?

  Isabel did not disappoint.

  Villa Lysis was arguably the most advantageously situated house in all of Capri. Perched on the easternmost edge of the island, high up on the mountain, the secluded villa was an homage to Louis Seize and classical Greek architecture, boasting Ionic columns decorated with filaments of gold mosaic tiles and marble steps spanning the entire front facade and leading down to a circular garden of towering trees that framed a commanding view of the sea, the dramatic cliffs, and Marina Grande in the distance.

  Today, it looked as though God had sprinkled millions of seeds from the heavens onto the estate, as the villa appeared to be in full bloom. Flowers burst from the ground to the rooftop, from every corner and crevice; boughs of white and pink delphiniums draped over the grand portico, while camellias and stephanotis wound up each column and millions of rose petals blanketed the terrace in front of the house, creating an ombré pattern so that the petals gradually intensified from white to blush to the most intense magenta in the middle, where they formed the shape of a blooming lotus flower. On this decadent carpet of flowers were hundreds of gold Hepplewhite chairs meticulously arranged into a spiral pattern, ending in the very center at the lotus.

  “It’s like a giant mandala made out of rose petals! Can you imagine how many flowers it must have taken to cover this whole garden? Are there any roses left on the planet anymore, or did they all sacrifice themselves for this?” Olivia said, shaking her head in disbelief.

  “It’s just beyond! The flowers alone must have cost Isabel’s family several million,” Charlotte surmised.

  “The Chius own the biggest plastics manufacturer in Taiwan—I wouldn’t worry too much about it,” Olivia quipped.

  “I’m kicking myself for not thinking to cover this wedding for Amuse Bouche. I wonder who has the scoop. Is someone from Vogue or Harper’s Bazaar here? Or Town & Country or maybe even Elle Decor?” Charlotte wondered, thinking like a competitive magazine editor as she observed the army of black-clad videographers piloting the UFO-like drones that circled over the villa, capturing every moment of the event from different vantage points.

  “Isabel is much too private to have any media covering her big day. Didn’t you see in the orientation letter that they requested no one pos
t any pictures on social media?” Lucie reminded her cousin.

  Rosemary Zao suddenly appeared next to them in a gold lamé ball gown with immense ruffled sleeves and said, “Lucie, let’s take a selfie and I’ll put it on WeChat!”

  “Um…Mrs. Zao, I’d be happy to take a picture with you, but I don’t think we’re supposed to post anything,” Lucie replied.

  “Nonsense! I just won’t tag our location, and no one will know we’re at Isabel’s wedding. You look so pretty in that dress. Lanvin, right?” Rosemary asked, admiring Lucie’s deep scarlet gown, which had a tea-length skirt of translucent pleated panels that created the most beautiful rippling effect as she moved.

  “Um, no, it’s Morgane Le Fay.”

  “Huuuuh? I’ve never heard of that designer. Is he French?”

  “No, she’s Argentinean but based in New York—her real name is Liliana Casabal, and she’s got a great boutique in SoHo.”

  “You know all the coolest designers. If I had a daughter, I’d want her to dress just like you!” Rosemary praised.

  Charlotte, who looked rather regal in her buttercup point d’esprit lace Oscar de la Renta gown and a four-strand pearl choker borrowed from her mother, gave Rosemary a mischievous look. “And who designed your dress? Alexis Carrington?”

  Rosemary let out a loud gasp and slapped Charlotte on the arm excitedly. “Hiyah, how did you know? This is vintage Nolan Miller! I bought it at a charity auction and they said that Joan Collins actually wore the dress on Dynasty! I think it was the episode when Blake tried to choke her to death.”*1