The Summer We Read Gatsby Part 3

She frowned at me. "Could you be any more boring boring? Besides, I have a feeling you're going to be here a lot longer than a few weeks."

"Are you kidding?" I said. "It was hard enough to take this much time off as it was."

"This place grows on people." She waved her c.o.c.ktail at me. "Drink up."

I'd been looking at the painting above the fireplace mantel, with its swirling movement and heavy layers of paint. "That one's growing on me," I said, gesturing toward it with the still-full drink in my hand. I had no intention of waking up with another hangover like the one I'd suffered through that morning.

If I thought Peck wouldn't notice, however, I was wrong. "Would you please just drink the d.a.m.n thing?" she grumbled.

I ignored her and gestured at the painting. "Do we have any idea who painted it?"

"Listen to you. Aunt Lydia's body is hardly cool and already you're trying to make a play for her stuff?"

I explained that I wasn't making a play for it, just expressing my interest, and she put her drink down on the bar cart and pulled a chair over toward the fireplace. She stood on the chair to reach the canvas and pulled it down off the flimsy hook on which it had rested for years. She stepped down from the chair and flipped the painting over so we could look at the back. There, on the stretcher, scrawled in black marker, were the almost illegible words. She read them aloud. " 'For L.M. From J.P.' "

"Who's J.P.?" I said.

She shrugged, gazing down at the canvas she held out in front of her with two hands. "The artist, I guess. Probably one of her friends. Or a Fool-in-Residence."

She hung the painting back on its hook and took up her drink. "Let's get dressed."

I got up to my room to find Biggsy with a camera in my closet-a small walk-in crowded with Lydia's overflow and other items I hadn't yet gone through. "Oh, hi," he said, as casually as if it were perfectly normal for him to be there.

"How did you get in here?" I hadn't noticed him going up the stairs.

"I'm working on a new series," he said, as if that explained it. He spoke earnestly, fixing his strikingly blue eyes on mine. "I hope you don't mind. I'm shooting people's closets. There's an air of mystery, and also of history, to them."

"Mystery and and history?" I repeated. history?" I repeated.

"I'm using black-and-white film, very grainy," he continued. "So there's a sense of a long-buried memory, of the past, of encounters not quite remembered."

He hadn't moved yet, but I held the door to the closet open for him. "I have to get dressed for the party."

"Sorry," he said, slipping past me with his camera held high. He smelled distinctly of patchouli. "You're very pretty, you know."

I knew he was trying to win points with me, and it worked; the compliment distracted me from being bothered by his presence in my closet. I took a shower and got dressed for the party, sticking to jeans, because as my sister put it, I was "afraid to stick my neck out, playing the role of the foreign observer rather than partic.i.p.ating in life." Peck could sometimes be astute, but I wore my jeans anyway. Mostly because I hadn't packed much besides the dress I'd already worn to the Gatsby party the night before. I wasn't in the habit of going to parties at all, let alone on back-to-back evenings.

When I finished putting on makeup (lip gloss), I went to Peck's room, where it looked like she'd tried on and discarded every single piece of clothing in the very extensive wardrobe she'd brought with her to Fool's House, in three enormous vintage Louis Vuitton steamer trunks, no less. Apparently she'd also poured herself a refill of the dressing drink in the process and was parading around in nothing but a mesh thong with "the twins" on full display as she held up different options for me to judge. "Come on," she complained, when I told her they all looked fine. She fluffed out her hair and sprayed it with a product called, no kidding, Big Hair. "Offer a critique. This is what sisters do for each other. Haven't you always wanted a sister?"

It was true, I had always wanted a sister. I'd kept a picture of the two of us from our first summer at Fool's House, when I was nine and she was twelve, on my bedside table growing up, and went through a phase of talking about my half sister so often that my best friend at the time asked me to stop. So I did as Peck asked, offering a critique of the long orange dress and encouraging her to go with a short feathered number she swore was vintage Halston, "though the tag fell out," and ignored her as she made a face when I refused to make more of an effort than my jeans and a gauzy top.

It did feel sisterly, our squabbling, and I found it enjoyable. I'd grown up in a quiet house, although there were often guests, and I spent a lot of time alone in my room reading. There was often music, bootleg Dead tapes and Bruce Springsteen and the Rolling Stones, but the homes-apartments, mostly-I'd shared with my mother had been peaceful and orderly. This was something I remembered from our summers at Fool's House together, that it was fun to hang out in each other's bedrooms, even if we weren't getting along. In fact, in some ways I liked it even more when we were arguing, like real sisters.

"You know what I want want?" Peck was one of those people who always asked if you knew what they wanted. She'd call me up at odd hours, when I hadn't heard from her in months, forgetting, or ignoring, the time difference, to tell me she was craving truffles or "one of those dear little chicken pot pies." Or she'd announce that what she wanted more than anything in life was to have an audience with the pope. Or to host a dinner where she invited only comedians, twelve of them around the table, and let them duke it out. "More than anything? I want to be on the Best-Dressed List in Vanity Fair Vanity Fair magazine," she announced, as we made our way out to the porch. magazine," she announced, as we made our way out to the porch.

The porch was the best feature of the house, a wide, welcoming s.p.a.ce both contemplative and gregarious that wrapped around the entire lopsided place, accessorizing it in overly grand style. One side of the porch we had draped in an enormous American flag, because that's what Lydia had always done. At the other end was the warped wooden table where meals were taken on nice summer days. Now it was piled high with food.

Hamilton Frayn, aka Sir Ham, as Lydia liked to call him, was our first guest. He was my aunt's best friend but anyone who referred to him that way, as simply a friend friend, was always quickly corrected. "He's family family," Lydia would say. "Anyone who thinks you can't choose your family never had a friend like Hamilton Frayn."

Hamilton was gay and British and had spent thirty years of summers and weekends in a lavishly styled shingled house next to Lydia's. He was a decorator-or an interior designer, as I'd been corrected-and his place was an advertis.e.m.e.nt for a Hamptons lifestyle that seemed otherwise to exist only in magazine spreads, all plump white cushions and pale green throw blankets tossed over fat chaises, books left spread-eagled on round tables set with glistening gla.s.ses of lemonade a shade or two paler than the casually draped cashmere.

Hamilton had organized Lydia's funeral in Paris, which Peck and I had both attended, and a memorial service a few weeks later in Southampton for her many friends, but he'd been doing an installation at a client's house in Nantucket and I hadn't seen him since I arrived in Southampton. We gave each other a big hug and I thanked him for coming to the party.

"Darling, I go to everything everything. I'd go to the opening of an envelope," he said. He had an awful lot of white hair combed into an elaborate sweep on either side of his face, and eyebrows so extravagant they looked like pets. He wore his customary uniform of an unsummery tweed blazer, as though he were out in the chilly English countryside after a foxhunt and not at a casual summer party on Long Island. He also carried a fan that he waved at his face all evening, despite refusing to take off the jacket, even after I suggested it twice.

"How's your writing writing?" he asked, sounding exactly like Lydia. Hamilton was amiably ill-tempered and could be hilariously b.i.t.c.hy, but he always seemed to have a soft spot for Peck and me. "Your aunt always encouraged you to write."

"She encouraged everyone everyone to write," I pointed out. This made him laugh. to write," I pointed out. This made him laugh.

"Of course she did," he said. "But I hope you're not letting that dissuade you. She'd be ever so disappointed."

"You know what she used to love to say to me?" I asked him. " 'There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately no one knows what they are.' That was one of her favorite bits of writing advice. But she was actually a pretty good teacher. She used to make her students read a pa.s.sage from a great work and then write their own piece, using a similar technique, with a similar tone and mood, whether it was a third-person omniscient narrator, or first person. She did the same to me."

"She told me you had talent, for whatever that's worth," he said. "Talent is one of those elusive concepts that is so maddening to understand. Anyway, it's what you do with talent that counts."

I fixed Hamilton a drink from the bar cart we had wheeled out onto the porch. We had picked four bottles of expensive aged scotch, he was pleased to see. "I'm a terrible sn.o.b about the stuff," he said.

When we'd gone out to stock up on provisions for the evening, Peck had smacked my wallet out of my hand when I attempted to pay. "Your mussels are no good here," Peck had said to me, as though she were the d.u.c.h.ess of Fool's House buying out the entire liquor store. "Mussels" was one of her oft-used euphemisms for money, a word she went out of her way not to use. "I know you're concerned concerned," she said, implying that I was being tiresome about money again, the way I was when I tried to talk about selling Fool's House because we couldn't afford to keep it.

Actually, I wasn't concerned. It was more that I was curious. Peck, who had no steady source of income, had always spent like she had stores of wealth at her disposal. She wouldn't talk about the stuff-she carried herself as though she were embarra.s.sed at having inherited a trust fund and thus could afford to find it rude to even discuss the topic-but she was the type who would pay more for things if she could, priding herself on her taste for the expensive.

She never actually said the word money money if she could help it, although once, the last summer we'd spent together, I heard her saying to someone on the phone, in a weary tone, as if she were exhausted by the intricate management of a complicated inheritance, "Family and money, those are two words that should never go together." I don't know what she was talking about then, probably something to do with a family drama pertaining to the person on the other end of the line, but there was that subtle implication, a tiny spray of words that formed a slightly questionable impression. She prided herself mostly on her exquisite taste, and when it came to entertaining, she was quick to let me know, she was an expert. if she could help it, although once, the last summer we'd spent together, I heard her saying to someone on the phone, in a weary tone, as if she were exhausted by the intricate management of a complicated inheritance, "Family and money, those are two words that should never go together." I don't know what she was talking about then, probably something to do with a family drama pertaining to the person on the other end of the line, but there was that subtle implication, a tiny spray of words that formed a slightly questionable impression. She prided herself mostly on her exquisite taste, and when it came to entertaining, she was quick to let me know, she was an expert.

"Maybe in Switzerland you can get away with a bottle of cheap red and a pot of fondue fondue." She p.r.o.nounced fondue fondue as if she'd grown up in a chalet on an Alpine ridge. "But in Southampton? There's no point in having a party unless you're going to do it right." as if she'd grown up in a chalet on an Alpine ridge. "But in Southampton? There's no point in having a party unless you're going to do it right."

This was her usual tone with me, peeved and impatient with my lack of either enthusiasm or understanding about the way things worked in this world into which she'd imagined she'd been born. I was the naive newcomer and she was the native, and any time I presumed to behave otherwise-like when I suggested that n.o.body would ever open the bottle of Midori liqueur she felt was necessary for our "full bar"-it irked her. "After all," she kept pointing out, "you don't know anyone anyone."

Hamilton accepted the scotch gratefully. "Lydia would have adored this party. You girls have done a wonderful job. The Fool's Welcome. The unofficial start to summer."

Like most of our guests throughout the time we lived at Fool's House that summer, he had an opinion about what we should do with the house we'd inherited: sell it, keep it, renovate it, rent it out. At the time I thought this was a very American thing to do, to offer an unsolicited and strongly felt opinion about something as personal as a home. But I've since come to realize that this is not an American quality so much as a New York one, and that the suggestions were meant to be helpful.

Hamilton kindly suggested we not feel guilty about selling Fool's House. "If you can," he added. "Price it to get out quickly. That's exactly the way Lydia would have wanted it."

"But that's not good for the value of your your home," I pointed out. "If we sell it too cheap, just to get rid of it, won't that make all the houses along here less valuable?" home," I pointed out. "If we sell it too cheap, just to get rid of it, won't that make all the houses along here less valuable?"

"Darling, don't you worry about me. You couldn't buy a hamburger at the 21 Club for what I spent on my place when I bought it. It was the seventies seventies." He grinned, as though remembering a particularly wild decade. "I have a broker for you. Laurie Poplin. She's good. A little tall, if you know what I mean, but she can sell houses."

"Tall?" I repeated.

"Tall women are always so keen on making one aware of their height, no?"

I nodded, and then told him we still hadn't been able to open the safe. That morning, with Finn, we'd tried all different dates pertaining to Jasper Johns's paintings but we hadn't been able to open the door. I also went through more of Lydia's papers on the cluttered desk but hadn't been able to find anything having to do with the safe, which remained firmly closed.

"I don't know why she had a safe. She never even locked her doors." He rattled the ice cubes in his drink and his eyes clouded, as though he were remembering a specific moment with Lydia. After a pause, he added, "What would she have kept in there?"

"Jewelry?" I guessed.

He shook his head. "You saw the stuff lying all over the house. All costume, the bigger and more fun the better. She wasn't the diamonds and emeralds type, was she?"

"What do you think she meant when she said she wanted us to find a thing of utmost value?"

Hamilton took an appreciative sip of his drink and said, "The thing she wanted you to find and the contents of the safe may not be the same. What she valued valued were not material things, remember?" were not material things, remember?"

Peck had been fussing with the food and she came over to wrap her arms around Hamilton. "Thank G.o.d you're here," she said to him. "My sister is driving me mad mad."

"Oh dear," he said, raising his elaborate eyebrows comically in my direction.

"She's already divvying everything up," Peck complained. "Wants to just clear it all out, sell the house, and go on back where she came from, as if this place never even existed."

"That's really not true," I protested. "I'm just trying to do what Lydia told us to in her will."

Hamilton glanced from one to the other of us. "At least there are two of your father's paintings. One for each of you."

He was right. Two of the paintings hanging in the hallway had been painted by my father. They were both abstract landscapes, Lydia had explained to us the first time Peck and I stayed with her, although it was hard for either of us to see anything resembling the dunes and sky that Lydia insisted were miraculously conveyed in the murky colors. My mother had always called my father a genius. "Your father, the brilliant artist," she would say, when she spoke about him, which was rare. It was my introduction to sarcasm, but it wasn't until many years later, when sarcasm became my native tongue, that I recognized it. At the time I read into the resentment in her tone-"the brilliant artist"-her desire to have kept hold of him, rather than any commentary on his actual output. I thought she was alluding to the time and attention he'd put into his work, rather than into their short-lived marriage.

She'd kept several of my father's paintings, large, murky abstracts that moved with us from Rome to Belgium and then to Switzerland. I hung them in the tiny apartment I shared with Jean-Paul after she died, and then in the tinier one I moved into when our marriage reached its inevitable end. I'd never had much of an opinion about whether they were "good" or not. They were art and they were my dad's and they had sentimental value, if nothing else.

And even though I would go on to speak fluent sarcasm and therefore should have understood my mother perfectly well, I'd always continued to believe my father had at least some talent. He did sell some of his paintings. There had been a gallery in SoHo that represented him and I remember seeing a picture of my father and my much younger mother at an opening.

Aunt Lydia, on the other hand, infused no irony into the word brilliant brilliant when applied to her brother. She had a fondness for such terms as when applied to her brother. She had a fondness for such terms as masterpiece masterpiece, stunning stunning, or even genius genius. When she used the same words as my mother to refer to him-"your father, the brilliant artist"-she meant them literally. But the two paintings in the hallway were not any better than the ones I had at home.

Peck didn't have any of his paintings. "You can keep them both, if you like," I said to her now.

She made a face. "I think they should stay right here at Fool's House, where they belong," she said, giving Hamilton a pointed look. "Anyway, Mum always told me our father was never a good artist. What he had was charisma. Which apparently I inherited in spades." She patted me on the shoulder, indicating her sympathy that I, unfortunately, had not inherited any such qualities.

As the early guests made their way up to the porch, I was distracted by the sight of a figure moving slowly across the driveway from the garage. From my perspective it resembled an old-time traveling peddler, laden with items of odd, protruding shapes for sale. As he drew closer, though, I could see that it was Biggsy, with camera, lights, and cables draped over his shoulder, like a one-man Scorsese film crew, looking to set up a shot. He wore another variation of the shrunken suit, this one in a vivid shade of crushed purple velvet, had tied a floppy silk bow at his neck, and wore his magician's hat at a jaunty angle. None of the other guests seemed at all fazed at the elaborately dressed person in their midst. In fact, they hardly seemed to notice him, which struck me as very blase.

Only Hamilton had a comment about the costumed figure. "He's still here, is he?" He pointed. "I thought he moved out over the winter."

I noted the shift in his tone. "Biggsy? There doesn't seem to be any point in forcing him to move out now when he's going to have go as soon as we sell the place anyway."

"I wouldn't trust him as far as I could throw him," Hamilton said, as we watched the young artist set up his equipment. "I always told Lydia that. Though I do so enjoy the sight of a handsome chap dressed for a party."

"Why wouldn't you trust him?" I was surprised. Peck and I had both become somewhat enamored of the eager young artist in the four days we'd been at Fool's House, or at least enamored of the idea of him. And he'd been so helpful.

Hamilton looked alarmed at the question. "Oh darling. Gone soft on the fellow already, have you?"

"He's been cooking and cleaning since we got here," I explained. "He mows the lawn, he chops the lemons, he helps with the laundry. Oh, and he pretends to throw up. Then he eats it. Which I hear is one of Lydia's favorites."

"Yes, I've seen that performance." Hamilton shrugged, his eyebrows dancing up and down.

Peck was standing right near Biggsy, as though she were the director and he the cameraman, and I went over to see what was going on. "What's he doing?" I asked her as the porch began to fill with chattering people, with more filing up the driveway in color-fully dressed packs, but none of them seemed at all bothered by Biggsy's camerawork.

"I don't know," she said. "And I don't care. He says it's art."

She was puzzled by my lack of a c.o.c.ktail in hand and immediately set about rectifying the situation by walking over to the bar cart and pouring me a Southside. "I've just had a text from him."

"Who?" I asked, still watching Biggsy.

She paused, with a cigarette halfway to her lips, incredulous. "Barack Obama." She lit the American Spirit and blew organic smoke at me in a perfect ring. "Who do you think? Miles n.o.ble. Have you not been listening to a word I've said?"

I wouldn't have been entirely shocked to learn she had had extended an invitation to the presidential hopeful. She'd invited several high-profile people-social figures and a celebrity whom she'd spotted at the Golden Pear-in the hopes that they would come. And some of them had come, I was surprised to note. The porch was now full of people, with more gathered in clumps on the lawn, where we'd set votive candles on the tables Lydia kept in the garage just for parties. extended an invitation to the presidential hopeful. She'd invited several high-profile people-social figures and a celebrity whom she'd spotted at the Golden Pear-in the hopes that they would come. And some of them had come, I was surprised to note. The porch was now full of people, with more gathered in clumps on the lawn, where we'd set votive candles on the tables Lydia kept in the garage just for parties.

In the mix-Peck prided herself on her mix-were beautiful pencil-thin women, like the Girls, as glossy and groomed as movie stars at awards shows, and homely ones in elaborate summer outfits who looked as if they'd been forced to develop their personalities. There were the sad young men, of course, and lots of good-looking ones and flamboyant gay ones wearing summer sweaters in sorbet colors. There were a few hipsters, artistic types in un-Southampton black leather, and one or two stodgy older women in very Southampton pearl chokers. There were Europeans with their cigarettes and their accents and their combination of disdain and awe for American summer traditions. There were writers and artists, and a couple of Russians. A movie star made an appearance. Someone brought a hip-hop mogul. There were chignons and dreadlocks and a particular kind of blonde that seemed to exist only here in Southampton.

It was quite a mix. What they all had in common, though, was that they all appeared to adore Peck. She was clever and witty, playing the role of the eccentric hostess-madcap heiress coming through, folks, pay attention-as though she'd inherited it from Lydia along with the house. The ramshackle old porch was soon stuffed to the roof with people laughing raucously and dancing. They seemed unabashedly unafraid to look silly, wiggling their hips and hopping up and down to the thumping beat of a song that exhorted all of us to Be the love generation, come on, come on, be the love generation. Be the love generation, come on, come on, be the love generation. This invitation- This invitation-We got to love, yeah, we got to love-seemed to be all the encouragement some of our guests needed to throw their arms wildly in the air and push up, raising the roof.

"I've arrived," Peck kept telling people. And "Je suis arrivee," because she was one of those women who insisted on "using" their French. (Never mind that her French consisted of about fourteen words, including the ability to order "pommes frites" at the McDonald's along the Long Island Expressway, much to the bewilderment of the pimpled young fellow attempting to help us for his minimum wage.) "He said he wasn't sure he was going to make it," Peck said, of another text from Miles. "And of course I couldn't care less. I've got that Hamptons high."

"I thought n.o.body calls it that," I pointed out, as an ominous-looking black Escalade sped down the short driveway, spraying gravel. It had dark tinted windows and flashy tires and the license plate said MAN1.

"It's my drug lord." Peck threw her hands up in the air as if to say, Can this get any better better?

And then there he was, stepping out of the backseat carefully, as though expecting to fight off the paparazzi. He had an unfortunate nose, through which he spoke. "Cute place," he said as Peck glided over to him with a queenly air, giving the impression she'd half forgotten she'd invited him, but would draw on her innate good manners to greet him as warmly as she would any guest.

"Welcome to Fool's House," she said, with just a hint of frost to her smile.

I could see this was exactly the right note to strike with someone like Miles n.o.ble. Peck seemed to know this instinctively, the way she would always know exactly what fork to use and when to ask for a favor. He appeared slightly cowed, as though she really had descended from a long line of artistic aristocrats, as she kissed him on the cheek as casually as she had all her other guests and offered him a drink.

I was admiring the way Peck easily pulled Miles through the crowd when Finn Killian appeared before me. "Hey, kid," he said, and instantly I felt as jittery and alert as if I'd had four espressos. I'd never met anyone to whom I had such a physical response and I didn't like it, that intense b.u.t.terflies-in-the-gut feeling of nerves. Had I ever felt that way about Jean-Paul?

"I brought you something," he said, handing me an envelope. "My mother let me take this for you. It was in an alb.u.m of hers."

I opened the envelope to find a crinkled photograph that seemed, from the way Lydia looked and the way she was dressed, to have been taken in the eighties. It was an image of a younger and very beautiful Lydia standing in front of the fireplace in the living room at Fool's House, arm in arm with a woman I didn't recognize. She had short brown hair brushed back off her forehead and a broad smile. The two of them looked like they'd just been laughing and had composed themselves briefly for the photo. "That's my mom," Finn said, pointing at her. "Did you ever meet her? She was at the funeral in Paris."

Those few days had been a blur of tears and meeting people, hundreds of people, all of whom claimed to have been good friends of Lydia's, and I stared at the woman in the photo, wondering if I could have met her. She looked fun and sporty and exactly the sort of woman to have given birth to five boys, several of whom, I would learn, became gifted college athletes.

"I was sorry I couldn't be there," he said. "I was in Asia on a disastrous site visit. But I went to the memorial service here."

"And I was sorry I couldn't be at that one," I told him, still gazing at the kind woman who grinned up at me from the photo with her arm wound tightly around Lydia's. "I took three days off when I went to the funeral. And then I'd already asked my boss about taking this month to come here, so I couldn't exactly come twice."

He too was looking down at the picture of the two smiling women in my hand. "How did did you manage to take a whole month off?" you manage to take a whole month off?"

I gave a little laugh, recalling the face my boss, Guy, a persnickety Belgian editor, had made when I asked him about finally using some of the eighteen weeks of vacation I'd earned since I started working at the magazine. Until Aunt Lydia's funeral, I'd only taken three days in the entire seven years I'd worked there, and that had been for my honeymoon. I told Finn about him and the month's leave he'd begrudgingly granted me when I promised to send him amusing anecdotes about the place he'd never visited called "ze Hamptons." "I suppose next you'll be wanting to write a book," he'd complained. "Like ze rest of my staff."

"Your mom looks nice," I said to Finn, gesturing at the photo.

"She is is nice," he said. "I got lucky." nice," he said. "I got lucky."

His words struck a chord in me. "My mom was nice too," I said of the strikingly clever woman I'd called at her insistence by her first name, Eleanor. She'd never finished her PhD, but she'd always seemed to know so much, especially about people, and now that Lydia too was gone, I felt the loss of my mother even more. She died too young, of a particularly virulent pancreatic cancer that was cruelly, but in some ways mercifully, swift. That was only a few months before I spent my last summer with Lydia, the summer I met Finn for the first time. By the following summer I was married.

"You must miss her a lot," he said gently, noting the shift in my mood. "I remember how tough that summer was for you."

It started to come back to me then, how kind he was. Finn was a nice guy. How had I not remembered that part? Around us, the party careened as my impression of him shifted slowly. We talked, exchanging details about our families, our jobs, our friends.

Eventually things on the porch were starting to wane. I walked with Finn off the porch and into the yard. "I used to drop in every once in a while to play backgammon with Lydia," he said before he waved good-bye, leaving me wondering if that was a warning or a promise. Was he looking for an invitation?

Hamilton was still there, and he approached me with a tiny elf of a man in a flowered tie. "I want you to meet a friend of mine. Ian. He's called Scotty, though, for obvious reasons. Just listen to him speak."