Scene 8
New Year’s, Part 1
It was impossible to determine who arrived first, for two cars vied for attention in the driveway. The drivers leaped out of their seats and pointed surprised fingers at one another.
“What are you doing here?” Adrienne left the engine of her rental car running and looked over the top of her door frame. “Don’t tell me you got roped into this mess too!”
“Fantastic!” Eva tossed her hands into the air. “At least if this turns out to be a murder house, we’re both going down together!”
They got back into their cars and made their girlfriends do the dirty work of texting each other.
“What the fuck is going on here?” Amber texted Nadia. “Why are you guys here???”
“I’m assuming we’re here for the same reason you are. Did you guys get an invitation too?”
“Remember when I texted you about the guy who tracked us down to give us a message in Tuscany? It was an invitation to this place for New Year’s.”
“No way. Eva got an invitation at midnight on Christmas Eve! I wonder if it was the same guy.”
“What the hell is going on? Do you know anyone else wrapped up in this mess? Because the Coles had no idea what was going on.”
Nadia tucked her phone back into her purse as the car rounded a bend and revealed a stately Californian manor – but hardly any green grass to show how much money the owners possessed. “Your guess is as good as mine regarding what’s going on around here,” she muttered.
Eva handed her phone to Nadia. “Do me a favor and turn on that app that tracks where I am. God only knows what we’re getting ourselves into.” The last thing Eva would admit was how nervous she suddenly was. Earlier that year, her darling Nadia and Ms. Amber Mayview were the subjects of a violet attempted kidnapping on this very coast. What if something sinister like that was afoot once more? She should have hired some bodyguards. Maybe the same ones that saved some asses earlier that…
She slammed on the breaks as soon as she saw who ascended the front steps to the house. Adrienne almost rear-ended her.
“What the fuck!” came a harried cry from behind.
But both Eva and Nadia were too dumbstruck to respond. The only thing that happened was the windshield wipers turning on because enough mist had accumulated on the glass.
On the steps, where the housekeeper and one security guard welcomed the first round of guests, Stella conjured Jade’s attention and pointed to the luxury vehicles stalled at the end of the driveway. “Ain’t that the chicks we guarded earlier this year?”
A similar confrontation erupted between old friends not too many minutes later.
Only this time, the recognition was met with relief instead of utter shock. For the past several hours, poor Victoria Nicholson had been beside herself with anxiety over this visit to a mysterious mansion in the Californian countryside, and she was more than relieved to find Maxine nearly mowing the hedges over.
The vehicular crisis was such that two security guards bounded out of the house and acted as traffic police, since the hosts of the party had not considered the need for valet parking when only six cars were expected. Common sense also dictated that not everyone would arrive at the same exact time. In fact, the only stragglers to rumble up long after everyone else were none other than a pair of newlyweds fresh from their Hawaiian honeymoon. By then, exasperated conversations erupted in the foyer as everyone removed their coats, gloves, and manners. There would certainly be no prim and proper ladyship that night.
“Oh my God,” Jenny swallowed the rest of her self-respect when she recognized half the women in the foyer, long before any of them realized she was there. “What… the fuck?” Two of the women in here were important investors to her company! Awkward, much?
“I feel like I’m in the gayest game of Clue right now!” Eva, the tallest of the bunch even though she was surrounded by stilettos, was the first to realize what had happened once all of the guests were amassed in the foyer. “Seriously, what the fuck is this? Dykes Sing Auld Lang Syne?”
The housekeeper, dressed in a full French maid’s uniform, bowed her head and kindly asked the guests to move into the adjacent lounge. Someone quipped about secret passages to the kitchen – or was it the conservatory? – before anyone dared to be the first to step into the other room. God only knew if there were poisonous gas or pistols ready to fire in there. For as soon as everyone admitted that it was a terrible idea to come when they didn’t even know who the host was, they likewise admitted that curiosity would be what killed these kitties.
“I just want you to know,” Stella said, never too far from her girlfriend, “that if we’re killed tonight, I’m glad to be going to Hell with you.”
Everyone had quieted right when she said Hell. Someone snorted. Nobody would deny that they were all going to Hell for one offense or another. Maybe this was some kind of elaborate purge. Gather up all the rich gay women and somehow take over the world. The question was – what side of the great purge were they on?
Invitations had been brought as proof of summons. Guests compared the verbiage and noted that each one had been personally written by their unknown host. Even so, they couldn’t discern who had written it and why. All they knew was that the complimentary drinks were excellent and the house that turn-of-the-century kind of classic chic that either beguiled the soul or, at the very least, disinterested it. Maxine, Stella, and Lydia, the resident Californians, could not give a crap about Yet Another Rail Tycoon’s country mansion while the New England contingent bemoaned that this kind of modern ingenuity was not seen often enough in their pocket of America. That left Jade, who had no idea what the fuck they were talking about and drank more to compensate.
Security guards dressed in black watched over the exits, but did not forbid any of the guests from going to the bathroom across the hall or poking their noses into the adjacent den, where a large TV gathered dust and old family photos of people they didn’t know hung on the walls. However, nobody was allowed beyond those parameters. They were assured that there were guest rooms set up for every couple, but beyond that? Stay in the damn lounge until further notice.
They were definitely going to Hell in a rainbow-colored handbasket, weren’t they?
Finally, twenty minutes after arriving in the lounge, they were finally graced with their host’s presence. Or at least one of them.
“Hello!” Natalie swept in like a tiny torrent of event planning. She wasn’t the shortest woman in the room, but she was the most petite, and if some of the giants around her didn’t deign to turn their noses down they might miss her entirely. Good thing Natalie Chen had the presence of a queen when she was in the mood. “I’d like to thank everyone for making it to tonight’s party. My partner has been looking forward to meeting all of you.”
Eva snapped her fingers, although her demeanor implied she had no idea where she remembered Natalie from. “You… I know you.” Beside her, Nadia cleared her throat and politely looked away. There was no way Ms. Gaines had expected to see one of her old lovers in their midst.
“Who the hell are you?” Maxine crossed her arms. “And what is going on here?”
“Yes, I’m sure you ladies all have a million questions. Please rest assured that my partner has their reasons for keeping their identity a secret until now. Things are a bit in transition right now, and we had to keep things secret, lest the press catch wind of things they’re not supposed to know about…” She briefly made eye contact with Nadia and looked away before she could miss too long of a beat. “Anyway, the press isn’t supposed to yet know a few things about my partner. Things that will become quite clear once you meet them. For some of you, it will not be the first time you’ve met.”
“I’m gonna need another drink.” Adrienne shoved past two of the other guests to get to the champagne bar. “I’m starting 2018 drunk off my ass.”
“So where’s your ‘partner’?” Jenny asked.
“I’m right here. Good evening, ladies.”
Every head in the room turned to the entrance, where Erica stood in her most recently acquired bespoke suit. But unlike most of her other suits through the years, this one was tailored to her female form – without restriction, and without regard for concealing parts of her body she once hid from the world. To the untrained eye, she didn’t appear to be anyone the guests knew. Of course, they all swore that they had seen her before. They just didn’t know where.
“My name is Erica Mann. You may have known me by a different name before tonight.”
Eva’s jaw dropped open. “Wow,” she said. “I think I might have drunk too much, because I do not remember you looking this way before, Mr. Mann. I mean…”
“Until recently, I had concealed my true sex and gender from the world. There were reasons I would rather not get into right now. But if we’ve met before, then it was under the pretense that I was a man named Eric. As of this month, however, I am re-debuting as the woman I am meant to be.” She corrected her statement before anyone could take it the wrong way. “I mean, I was born a woman. I’m just now… uh…”
Natalie stepped in with a kind hand to her girlfriend’s shaking arm. “Please excuse her. She’s getting used to the wording. I’m afraid there has been a great injustice done to Erica throughout her life. The short story is that she was forced to pose as a man. Now that it’s no longer a requirement, she’s decided to let the world know that she is a woman.”
“What she said.”
“Hoooold on a second,” Victoria interjected. “Is this what Heather was telling me about the other day. She said there was some super-secret thing she was really excited about. All she would tell me is that she scored an interview with someone who was about to shock the business world with their new identity.”
“Yes, it was probably me. I granted Ms. Lang first rights to the story. We’ve already conducted the interview.”
“Wow.” Victoria decided she also need more drinks.
“Please forgive me for the strangeness surrounding this meeting. I swear there is a reason I invited each one of you to my family’s vacation estate. Please. Let us adjourn to the dining room for dinner. I’ve taken care to ensure that there is something for everyone tonight.”
“You mean I have…” Natalie mumbled.
Murmurs erupted among the small crowd as they shuffled from the lounge and into the dining room down the hall. Variants of “Is that Eric Mann?” and “We’re definitely in a purge,” tickled the air. The housekeeper awaited them at the dining room door and gestured to the place cards carefully left in front of every seat. Erica was at one end and Natalie at the other. On either side of the table were six chairs.
Erica had been right to sit people where she had. She kept the richer women and their girlfriends at her end, while those who were used to dealing with middle incomes stayed near Natalie. This also meant that friends sat with friends. Eva and Nadia were sat across from Adrienne and Amber, who were kept close to Erica for practical and networking reasons. (And to keep Nadia’s embarrassing presence far from Natalie at the other end of the table.) Smashed in the middle were Victoria and Madison, as well as Maxine and Lydia, who were well acquainted. The stragglers of Stella and Jade and their counterparts Jenny and Nicole sat beside Natalie. Everyone was given the same porcelain plate and a wineglass already filled with enough elixir to get them through the first part of dinner. The only obstruction separating party members sitting across from one another were candlesticks and garlands of fresh greens.
The conversation had turned from curiosity to gobsmacked whispers. “Did you know?” “No, I had no idea! Did you?” “Who even is this person/” “Someone rich, of course. What else do we expect by now?” “So is she gay? Is that what this is all about?” “She must be. She keeps going on about her partner, and unless gender discourse has really gone off the rails, that’s definitely a woman. Gay. Super gay.”
Erica remained standing at her end of the long dining table. “I do owe you all an explanation, but I wanted to wait until we were comfortably seated before diving into the meat of it.” She wetted her throat with some wine before removing her other hand from her pocket and rearranging the napkin by her plate. “For the past thirty years of my life, I have been known as a misnamed person. It may sound impossible to some of you, but I’m sure the others are already calculating how their own families would have covered up a similar scandal. What do you do when your only son dies at a young enough age to start passing his sister off as him? If you’re rich like my parents, you did everything in your power to turn this house into a place of brainwashing and cultural home studies that left in its wake someone who now pays a considerable amount of money for therapy. It’s been a rough year, to say the least.”
More than one woman at the table did calculate how their families would have swung that. Eva had always been open about her role as the “spare” in her family. Maxine was cynical enough to know that her own parents might have done it had they the thought and gumption. Victoria was the only one having a serious moment of, “My God. I’m so glad my parents didn’t have that idea. What better way to correct my shameful lesbian ass?” All three women took their girlfriends’ hands beneath the table. They may be in safe company, but reassurances were sorely needed.
“It was Natalie who opened my eyes to being my true self once and for all, and not only behind closed doors to those trusted enough to know me.” Erica acknowledged her girlfriend at the other end of the table with a lift of her wineglass. “I’ve decided to take her advice and bring together some of the like minds I know and make a proposition to everyone present. But that comes later. First, let’s eat.”
Nobody was in a huge hurry to dig into dinner, because barraging Erica with questions was much more delectable. Too bad most of them had enough tact to keep their mouths shut – to her, anyway. Nobody would whip out their cell phones, either, but the knowing looks across the table and clearing throats insinuated that they couldn’t take it anymore.
“Who here already knew this?” Maxine leaned back in her seat. Beside her, Lydia covered her face in embarrassment. “Because I get the distinct impression that most of us are blindsided while someone else eats as if nothing has happened. “That was directed to Madison, who sat across from Lydia.
Madison dropped her fork. Victoria whipped her head around in disbelief. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Madison preoccupied her mouth with more wine.
“It’s fine,” Erica said. “Ms. Ricci is simply being professional because of her former employment.”
“Knew it,” Natalie muttered into her soup.
“Oh my God.” Victoria rubbed her forehead with a sweaty hand. “You knew?”
“Sooo what is this former employment?” Stella asked. “Sounds sexy.”
Eva picked up the ball everyone else dropped on the table. “She works at my sister-in-law’s place of business. Which is a brothel, by the way.” She hucked back the last of her wine. “Sorry. Figured that was fair game to talk about.”
“I have nothing to hide,” Madison insisted. “Yes. It’s true. I work at Le Chateau. I’m sure most of you know what that is.”
Stella and Jade didn’t have a clue, but they didn’t say anything. Anyone who didn’t know what it was right away, soon guessed based on snippets they had heard through their respective grapevines over the years. Expensive escorts. Even more expensive alcohol. Old school courtesan house. Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge.
“And before that I was an escort in New York. So, now you all know.”
“I know for sure now,” Jade whispered to Stella.
“Ms. Ricci is a consummate professional. She would never tell her tales.”
“Especially if there’s a strict NDA involved, Ms. Mann.”
“Wait.” Adrienne slammed her elbow on the table. “So… y’all fucked, huh?”
Too much alcohol had been consumed between the lounge and dinner. Way too much. Women may not have been swaying in their seats, but the filters were off and no fucks could be given after being blindsided by Erica Mann’s existence. Hence, nobody gasped at Adrienne’s unladylike outburst.
Madison remained mum on the subject. After all, she had signed one helluva NDA a couple of years ago. That left Erica to say, “We have met before. That’s all I’ll say.”
“They fucked,” Stella coughed into her hand. “Guess that means she’s the only one here who knew the truth before the rest of us.”
Victoria was too shocked to say anything. That left her friend Maxine to say, “What an exciting turn of events.”
“Sure,” Eva continued, “and my girlfriend fucked that little lady at the end of the table. We’ve got our own L Word chart going on here already.”
“Eva!” Nadia blushed. “Don’t!”
“Everyone’s gonna figure it out within ten minutes, babe. The way you two keep avoiding eye contact is ridiculous. Just shyly share some coy looks and be done with it. ‘Cause that’s how you do it…” She leaned back in her seat and called down the table, “Isn’t that right, Jenny?”
Jenny knocked over her empty wineglass. Her wife, who had suspected as much between Jenny and Ms. Warren, kindly picked it up and wiped the one drop that got on the tablecloth. “I… uh…”
This led to Stella asking, “Who here hasn’t slept with someone – not their girlfriend, by the way – else at this table? I wanna know how small this world is.”
Only four hands went up, Adrienne’s the most triumphant of all. (As if she had anything to prove.) But it was Adrienne who turned to her girlfriend and said, “Excuse me? Who the fuck have you slept with here?”
Amber shrugged. “I made out with Eva once. That counts, right?”
“It does not,” Eva insisted. “And we didn’t make out. Really. You stole one kiss.”
“Don’t remind me,” Nadia said. “I was there.”
Nicole leaned in toward her exasperated wife. “I feel like I’m really missing out here,” she whispered. “I’ve gotten into this game way too late. I need an annulment so I can play the field.”
“This is not a dating service, honey.”
“You sure? ‘Cause maybe I should make out with Evangeline Warren too.”
“She’s a womanizer!”
“I heard that.” Eva sat up straight again. “Is there something wrong with that, by the way?”
“Please don’t encourage her,” Nadia said.
“Yeah, don’t encourage me. I’ve still got you in my black book, Jen.”
Jenny scoffed at the exaggerated wink coming in her direction. The nerve of one of her own investors! And in front of their partners! Eva truly had no shame. But Jenny also knew that’s what privilege and wealth did to an heiress. Nicole would’ve been just as bad if given the chance. Good thing she had locked her down when she had!
“Well,” Erica said with a sigh, “this wasn’t what I thought was going to happen within ten minutes of dinner starting.”
“So you’re that new to this whole lesbian thing, huh?” Eva said. “Because you can’t get a bunch of dykes who run in the same circles into a room and not expect there to be bedroom drama brewing in our cauldrons.”
Nicole wrote something down in her pocket notebook. Her wife rolled her eyes, because Nicole was a little too eager to learn the ins and outs of lesbian drama.
“It’s not that unexpected,” Natalie attempted to say with a smile, “it’s something women bond over, right?”
“What? Who fucked our girlfriends?”
Everyone looked in Victoria’s direction. She shrank into her seat with lowered eyes. Madison was the only one who didn’t seem to care about that little outburst. Why would she, when she was already used to Victoria’s insecurities about someone’s sexual past?
“Nice house, by the way.” Eva accepted more wine from the maid making the rounds. “Reminds me of my cousin’s place in the Hamptons.”
Erica drummed her fingers on the table. She proposed they change the subject to anything else beyond their collective sex life. Even politics was more palatable.
***
The big announcement for why everyone was invited was finally made toward the end of dinner, when guests had gorged themselves on scandal and mutual misery. Something Erica had not seen coming, for her experiences with socializing in large groups of women usually hinged on her playing a male role – and women were quite different when not in the presence of any men.
But this was also what she had dreamed of for the past several weeks. Even longer, if she let herself indulge in faraway fantasies from the past. Since deciding to come out as who she was, Erica had longed for a safe space where she could interact with women who had the best shot of understanding where she came from, in terms of her struggles with her identity and the toxic shit that often sprang from having parents with too much money and influence. She had picked women whom she had either met before or heard about through acquaintances and from reading the press. Women who both had minds for business and a soft spot for the other women that they loved.
And, honestly, some could come in handy for her on a professional level.
Her pitch began with her desires to transform the ranch into something more. More than her childhood prison, more than a place in the Californian landscape that one wealthy family used as a convenient escape, and more than a waste of damned money. She had considered selling it and being done with the place. It was a ranch only in name, since the only people who relied it on it for their livelihoods were the cleaning, cooking, landscaping, and security staff. Not as many people as Erica made it sound when she laid out her business plan, and they could all be repurposed either in the same location or at another property.
No, what Erica wanted most was to turn this place into a resort for businesswomen who needed to take mental health sabbaticals, go on honeymoons with their new brides, and find a quiet retreat for them to exert their creative side, whether for work or pleasure. The main draw was that, aside from a few of the staff, there would be no men on site. Erica wanted a safe space for the women she now considered her peers. And herself, as well.
If she could take this hell hole that represented some of the darkest years of her childhood and transform it into a refuge for those struggling to succeed and live in a man’s world, the world she was forced into against her will, then she would consider it a grand use of the property. The staff would be able to keep their jobs without interruption as well. All that was needed were a few renovations both in and out of the house to make it more appealing to those in search of a hideaway that they might have to share with others. The whole ranch could be reserved for a certain amount of time, but Erica’s ideal included sharing the space with other women. There were plenty of bedrooms to go around. Some of them could even be renovated into yoga studios and office spaces.
This idea was presented to the business and financial-minded women in attendance. While the likes of Eva Warren, Adrienne Thomas, and Maxine Woodward kept their initial thoughts to themselves, their girlfriends made their opinions clear – sounded like a sweet deal to them.
The other women were there for different reasons. Erica requested that the design-oriented minds of Jenny and Nicole use their creativity and connections to decide how the resort would best look and function. Victoria and Madison likewise had extensive networking potential, and Victoria’s contributions to the writing world meant she would be perfect for coming up with the literary side of the project – as soon as she got over Madison’s connection to Erica, anyway. As for Stella and Jade, the two women Erica had heard were not only responsible for saving the lives of two other women present, but quite adept in the personal investigation world as well? They would best know how to construct a formidable but reassuring security force.
(Oh, and she required Stella’s expertise regarding a personal matter involving a man named Sam Garrett, but that could be discussed later, as it had nothing to do with the ranch.)
Most of this information was fed shortly before midnight, but everyone was too shocked to cheer in the New Year. The most that occurred were a couple of exchanged kisses and toasts to a decent year. It felt strange to hope for a “good” year, even though for some of them, 2017 had been decent to great on a personal level.
The guests went to bed that night overwhelmed by not only each other’s presence, but the sense that too much information had been dispensed in such a short amount of time. They promised to get back to Erica with their thoughts in the morning.
“That went well, didn’t it?” Natalie said, once she and Erica were back in bed. Natalie curled up in her negligee while Erica rubbed her fingers against the collar of her cotton T-shirt. “Way better than my father’s family at Chinese New Year, let me tell you.”
“Did it?” Erica responded. “Go well, that is. I honestly couldn’t tell.”
“They didn’t throw drinks in your face and run out into their cars screaming, so that’s a start.”
“I’m not encouraged by that baseline for success.”
“The fact you made them all sign NDAs announcing they wouldn’t disclose what happened here tonight was a bit much. We really need to work on your etiquette when it comes to NDAs. You scare people.”
“Suppose I learned a lot of bad habits in this house.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.” Natalie rolled toward her. “I bet you that everyone is in their rooms right now talking about how excited they are for your project. Or they’re having fights because someone slept with someone else.”
“Not what I planned for.”
“Eventually, you’ll know to plan for it whether you want to deal with it or not.”
Erica continued to stare at her ceiling after Natalie turned off the light. “What’s The L Word?”
“Good night, Erica.”
“No, seriously, what it is?”
Natalie was already pretending to be asleep.