It's barely a week into the school year when Sparky calls me. "Hey Valentina," he says.
"Hi dad," I respond, "how's Manchester?"
"Great. Have you made friends?"
"Yeah. I know Tae Seung-jun—his dad does tech in South Korea. And there's Manon Allard. Her family are landlords for half of Andorra." I list off the others in our group, carefully excluding a certain Rochester.
Sparky listens in silence until I finish my list. As the silence lapses longer, I hear something in the background of the call. Something that sounds like ... "Dad, are you on a boat right now?"
"Yeah, that was what I was gonna ask about," he says. "I'm on this guy's boat right now in Monaco. Not Manchester; Manchester's been great, but I met him and he suggested we come out here for a weekend. He's a cool guy. His daughter goes to Arbourne too, you know her?"
"Well who is he?"
"Anathi Mnisi."
I do a double take. "Yeah, I know his daughter. She's my roommate."
"The two of you get along?"
I think about it for a moment. Noelise has been blunt and remarkably tactless every time I talk to her, but I doubt she's trying to be rude. It's just part of her personality. Most of Arbourne seems to have accepted that Noelise is ridiculous and gone along with her shenanigans. "We're not super close, but we get along fine."
"Great. Make friends with her—Anathi's a great guy. You know, there's a yacht show here in a couple weeks. I'm gonna find a jet to send you over here; it'll be good for getting to know people. You might even see some of your classmates."
That's news to me. I've never attended this show before, mainly since I wasn't in Europe. "When?"
"The 27th. That's a Friday; you can come down here after school."
I grin. "I love Monaco."
"I know."
"I'll make sure to be there and make lots of friends."
Sparky pauses, about to hang up. "Yeah, alright. Make friends with Mnisi's kid. And by the way, don't make anyone your enemy. It's already hard enough. You got that?"
I grimace, but keep silent. A bit late for that revelation. "I got that," I lie easily. "Love you, dad."
"Love you." With a click, he hangs up.
I toss my phone onto my bed, sighing deeply. No enemies, huh. I have nearly no enemies. Just one. Just one big, bad enemy.
Ever since Es's outburst, Jasper and I have been toeing the line between overt confrontation and silent dislike. I don't share any classes with him, a relief, but I see him enough since we're in the same friend group. I talk shit about him behind his back and I guarantee that he does the same. Our group seems to have essentially accepted that the two of us hate each other's guts. I know Seung-jun at least finds it very entertaining.
Sometimes he catches me unawares, observing me. It's almost like he's studying me, trying to psychoanalyse my every move with that cold blue gaze of his. Sometimes I look up and I manage to catch him before he tactfully looks away. It's annoying as hell so I've taken to staring intently at him every time I catch his gaze. Nobody ever said I wasn't petty.
The more I watch him, the more I come to understand what Seung-jun meant when he said he was untouchable. Jasper always does whatever he wants, constrained only by the bare minimum of social expectations. He's brazen and competitive and talented too, so no matter what it is, he usually wins. And if he challenges you, you just can't say no, because you're not supposed to say no to Jasper.
I win the bet, by the way. The first girl Jasper brings to our lunch table is a gorgeous Egyptian girl whose parents own an oil superpower, and she's from Somerset House. I can always see him whispering things in her ear, his gleaming smile bright and shark-like. More often than not, he 'whispers' loudly enough for me to know that they're talking shit about me. That relationship lasts as long as any of the others from what I've been told. By next week, the girl is gone.
It feels a lot like the calm before a storm. Tense, silent, eerily still.
꧁꧂
"Valentina!" Sparky exclaims as I descend the steps of the private jet. According to him, a friend in Monaco loaned it to him.
"Hi dad," I say, squinting into the setting sun. Monaco is sunny. It's a lot like Italy; I suppose that's a given, considering how close the two are. Even from here, I can smell the salt of the ocean on the wind.
I'm still wearing my school uniform. I had barely enough time to throw some things haphazardly in a suitcase before one of the hired chauffeurs picked me up and drove me to the nearest airport. The flight was a little over two hours, much of which I spent studying. We don't have much homework but after I got my first test grades back, I quickly realised that I kind of needed to study. I was supposed to come here and make connections, I think irritatedly, not do hundreds of pages of practice problems.
But that's whatever. I'll have a nice time in Monaco and go back to school refreshed.
School is nice, apart from the studying at least. There are all sorts of clubs and rich-people activities. There's a golf club, a sailing club, a tennis club—those are more of Es's sort of thing, but I'm not half-bad at tennis myself. There's a chess club, a school newspaper, an equestrian club—those are Jasper's clubs and I avoid them as much as possible. I haven't joined any myself; usually I just drop by occasionally to whichever ones my friends attend and play around. Everyone seems to enjoy my presence.
Then there are the weekends, which are amazing. Most people will fly out to somewhere tropical for the weekend; I stay since Sparky is too busy most of the time. Every weekend there are different people staying and we have a glorious time making our own fun. I remember just last week, someone took us for a drive in a racing car that wasn't even out on the market yet. And before that, there was the time that someone brought edibles and our group got high as kites (I declined to participate—I don't have anything against those kinds of substances, I'd just rather have a clear head).
Sometimes we'll go into the city too—depending on who can drive us, there's fun to be had in Manchester which is only an hour away. We terrorize the designer stores and buy expensive perfume and do basically whatever we want. We haven't snuck into a club yet, but that's on my to-do list. The main thing about staying in York though is the weather, which is very depressing. I'm glad I'm in Monaco now.
We get in Sparky's black Rolls Royce (it's his favourite, he brings it everywhere) and he hands me a pair of sunglasses. I look at the brand label. It's my favourite, at least for sunglasses. "Cartier? You know me so well."
The dusk breeze is cool and refreshing. As we coast around a bend, I can see the ocean—glimmering and expansive. From our vantage on a winding mountain road, all the buildings and yachts of Monaco are laid out beneath us. They cluster at the coastline, all facing the ever-present sea. The sun has dipped below the ocean now, leaving the sky a beautiful dark blue.
"So what are we doing tomorrow?"
"You go have your fun around Monaco. If Noelise is here, I want you to talk to her. Then there's a party on Anathi's yacht tonight, so find a dress."
"What kind of party? Formal or ...?"
"From what I hear, he's sent invitations to the local gentlemen's club."
Oh, it's that kind of party. "Informal then," I decide. "You think red is a good colour?"
It's a short drive to the place we're staying at, the Hôtel de Paris Monte-Carlo. Sparky's booked an expansive two-bedroom suite with a wide terrace overlooking the sea. I toss my luggage carelessly into my room and join him downstairs for dinner in the hotel restaurant.
The next morning, I awake to a room flooded with bright sunshine. When I check the lounge, I see that Sparky's left me a note. Apparently he's gone for a tennis lesson with Mnisi and we're having lunch with them. He highly suggests that I get my shopping done in the morning so I can spend time chatting up Noelise in the afternoon.
Sparky's so annoying. He keeps making plans without telling me. But I suppose I'll go along with it out of filial piety. That's funny.
I toss on a white muslin dress with ruched sides at the waist and billowy sleeves. It's something I picked up from a designer in Italy. I thought I'd never get the chance to wear it because of England's cold weather, but now I'm glad I packed it. As an afterthought, I also put on a wide-brimmed sun hat.
After breakfast, I leave the hotel to wander the streets of Monaco. It's much like Italy, tightly packed with winding streets. Everything is bright and colourful, nothing like Arbourne. I pass restaurantes and creameries and boutiques, idly searching for something that might catch my eye and be appropriate for the party.
Rich people have exactly two kinds of parties. The first kind is the formal type, where you're constrained by a black tie dress code and most of the partying consists of standing around and talking to important people while sipping expensive but awful champagne.
The second kind is what's taking place tonight. An all-out, bring whatever guests you want, music and girls, free drinks until the sun comes up, type of party.
So of course, if I want to stand out, I need something suitably dazzling (read: slutty). People will be wearing designer and straight-off-the-runway looks because they've most likely known about this for months. I, however, don't have time to drop by a fashion show and buy all the clothes there, so I'll have to settle for something sub-par.
In the end, I go to a tiny designer store tucked away in an alley. I alight on a little satin red bodycon dress, with a low-hanging cowl neck and a hemline which is sinfully high. The assistant at the checkout doesn't bat an eye when I pull out my black card. I guess they must get a lot of rich people shopping around Monaco.
I drop the dress off at the hotel before calling Sparky. "Where should I meet you?" I ask.
"Vintage green convertible outside, can't miss it."
I don't miss it. It's emerald-green, beat-up and rusted, but with a certain charm to it nonetheless. Sparky sits in the passenger seat. Noelise slouches sullenly in the back. The driver is a man with the same ebony skin and features as Noelise, dressed in a terrible Hawaiian shirt and bermuda shorts.
"Valentina!" Sparky says, waving.
"Hi dad," I say, sliding into the seat in the back. "It's good to meet you, Mr. Mnisi."
"Likewise. Marco, your daughter's taste is immaculate. I wish my own daughter would dress more like her," Mnisi says. His voice is deep and loud and friendly. Completely the opposite of Noelise. If not for their shared features, I wouldn't even think they were related.
Noelise doesn't respond to that, crossing her arms and sinking lower into the car. She's not dressed for Monaco. She's dressed like she's going to a rave in Berlin. Her piercings twinkle in the sunlight, and she wears a black crop top which shows her additional piercing on her belly. Her baggy black jeans look much too thick to be comfortable in this weather, but Noelise shows no sign of discomfort.
"I love your piercing," I say.
"Which one?"
"That one," I say, pointing to the one on her belly. It's harsh metal carved in the delicate shape of a winding snake.
She doesn't say a thing, just nodding once and returning to staring off into the distance. Rude, much? I don't care that much, but she's definitely making my job hard.
Mnisi drives us to a small but high-end seafood restaurant overlooking the ocean. The food is delicious. I'm slightly off-put by Noelise pointedly eating the lemon slices that are in her water, but I'm not so weak as to be intimidated by that. After dinner, Sparky and Mnisi start talking about finance. Remarkably boring. Their conversation goes like this:
"Have you heard about the predicted drop in the GDP of that country?"
"Oh yes, but it's because they're investing more in durable houses, isn't it?"
Very, very boring. I finally find something in common with Noelise—we're both bored to death of our fathers talking finance. I try to strike up a conversation. "So how long have you been at Arbourne?"
Noelise raises four fingers, looking at me like she thinks I'm the most annoying person on Earth.
"That's fun. Who do you hang out with usually? I never see you around."
"Nobody."
It's an ordeal. I fish around, trying to think of a conversation topic that she might enjoy. I catch sight of the band on her t-shirt. "You like Cage the Elephant?" I attempt.
Noelise narrows her eyes, like I'm tricking her or something. "Do you listen to them too?" she asks.
Good! That's good! I've gotten her to say more than two words.
"Some songs," I lie.
"I like Cigarette Daydreams," Noelise says, naming a song I've never heard of.
"I haven't listened to that one. I'll try it."
Noelise doesn't go as far as to smile, but she does relax almost imperceptibly. "Alright."
I'll take that as a win. It's not great, but it's a start.
꧁꧂