Dreaming of Manderley

by Leah Marie Brown

  I remain silent because I don’t want to plaster a false smile on my face and lie to my best friend. I am not happy. I haven’t been happy for years, even before my father’s death. I yearn for something I can’t even name. Freedom. Independence. Adventure. Romance. I don’t know. Something bigger, more rewarding, than administering homeopathic hangover cures and editing someone else’s writing. Even if that someone else is my best friend. I can’t say these things to Olivia, though, not without hurting her feelings. Several seconds pass with Olivia staring glumly at the pulpy red liquid swirling in her glass.

  “I promise to be a better friend. I will support you in your writing the way you have supported me. If you want to quit and finish your novel, I will find another assistant. When you finish your book, I will help you find an agent or an editor. I swear.”

  “Thank you, Olivia. That means a lot.”

  She stops swirling and smiles. “Now,” she says, pushing the Dior bag across the table, “let’s see what you got.”

  It takes me a moment to understand what she is saying. I look at the large white bag with the Dior name embossed in gray, a sheer white and gray bow attached to the handle, and my heart skips a beat.

  I reach into the bag and remove a lambskin purse the color of leaden skies over a foggy sea, an indefinable, mutable color that is not blue, nor is it gray. A large, iconic silver Dior charm logo is attached to one handle.

  “Ooo!” Olivia coos. “That’s the Lady Dior bag in hiver bleu-gris. Jealous.”

  Hiver bleu-gris. Winter blue-gray.

  I place the purse back in the bag.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I can’t keep it.”

  “What?” Olivia snatches the purse back out of the bag and holds it to her chest as if cradling an infant. “Why not?”

  “It’s too lavish.”

  “Darling,” she says, thrusting the purse back into my arms, “a gift given from the heart can never be too lavish.”

  “So you think I should accept a four-thousand-dollar—”

  “Five,” she excitedly interjects. “The Lady Dior medium in lambskin with cannage topstitching is five thousand four hundred dollars!”

  “I can’t accept a five-thousand-dollar gift from a stranger,” I say, putting the purse back in the bag again.

  Olivia came from a poor family, while I grew up the daughter of an extremely wealthy man and the recipient of a generous trust fund from my momma. I have had designer bags and clothes. They don’t mean as much to me as they do to Olivia. I would trade all of my worldly possessions to spend one more day with my momma and daddy.

  “There are two gifts you never return: diamonds and designer handbags, darling.”

  I roll my eyes, because I know this is part of Olivia’s urbane-LA-woman shtick.

  “You’re killing me here, Manderley. Kill-ing.” She lifts her glass and drains half of her Bloody Mary in a single swallow, wipes her mouth with a napkin, and fixes me with a determined gaze. “Did Scarlett return the hat Rhett bought her in Paris?

  “No.”

  “Did Vivian return the designer clothes Edward bought her in Pretty Woman?”

  “She was a prostitute, Olivia!”

  Olivia dismisses my objection with a wave of her manicured hand. “Did Holly Golightly refuse the gifts her many beaus gave her in Breakfast at Tiffany’s?”

  “Again, call girl.”

  Olivia sighs and rubs her temple with two fingers. “Last time I checked, you are not a call girl, so I don’t think your Monsieur X is using a Dior purse to lure you into an immoral arrangement.”

  “You don’t?” I bat my eyelashes and make duck lips with my mouth.

  “Be serious, Mandy. You don’t look anything like the high-priced call girls that service the rich and famous here in the South of France.”

  “How do you know what high-priced French call girls look like?”

  “I saw Priceless!”

  “That was a movie, Olivia. Not real life.”

  “Movies often mimic real life.”

  “Okay,” I say, speaking to her as I would my slightly vapid younger sister, Emma Lee. “But the high-priced call girl in that movie was played by Audrey Tautou, who is stunning. I doubt there are any call girls that beautiful.”

  “Exactly!”

  I shake my head to clear the cobwebs of confusion spun by Olivia’s ridiculous logic. We have always had vastly different approaches to love and life, but Olivia’s unorthodox approach is one of the reasons she is so precious to me. She challenges me to peek outside of my rigid box. While I come from a place of maybe, if, Olivia comes from a place of yes!

  “So you are saying I should model my behavior after two fictional call girls and keep this expensive purse?”

  “I’m saying, little Miss Literal”—she points her celery stick at me–“you are searching for a hidden, nefarious motive behind this gift when there might not be one, which, I think, says more about you than him.”

  “Meaning?”

  “You don’t think you are worthy of extravagant kindnesses, Manderley. Maybe it was losing your mother at a young age or growing up the eldest of three girls, but somewhere down the line you decided you needed to put your wishes last.”

  Olivia is right. I do put my wishes last, because that is what my mother did, and all I have ever wanted to be is a strong, silent, pleasing Southern woman. Like my momma.

  “There is something else to consider,” Olivia says.

  “What’s that?”

  “Maybe Xavier is a good guy.” She finishes her Bloody Mary before speaking again. “Maybe your chance encounter on the cliff the other day was the beginning of your happily-ever-after; maybe it was your meet cute.”

  My meet cute. Leave it to Olivia to see a potential screenplay in a meaningless encounter. I can hear the trailer voice-over. Sometimes, when you’re standing on the edge of a cliff, you might need Fate to give you a little push. Manderley Maxwell, Xavier No Last Name, in . . . Falling for You.

  My stomach growls and I press my hand to my abdomen.

  “Was that your stomach or your inner sex-kitten letting out a satisfied meow?” Olivia wiggles her eyebrows.

  “My stomach. I am starving.”

  “Go to La Plage, have brunch. You will see things more clearly after you eat something.”

  “Do you want to join me?”

  She pops a piece of bacon in her mouth before stumbling back to her bed. She climbs beneath the covers and snatches the eye mask off the nightstand. “No,” she says, pulling the mask over her head. “I need more time to recover from the Grande Dames.”

  “If you’re sure.”

  “I’m sure.”

  I gather the gift card, Dior bag, and purse, and tiptoe across the suite into my room. I am about to close the connecting door when Olivia’s voice follows me.

  “Diamonds and designer handbags, darling.”

  Chapter Four

  La Plage Barrière Majestic is one of the restaurants attached to the hotel’s private beach club, a posh place with sweeping views of the Mediterranean, a VIP area, a nautical center with watercraft, and hundreds of sun loungers and parasols artfully situated on the narrow swath of sand. Billowy white curtains and potted paradise palms act as a partition, sectioning the restaurant from the rest of the club. Black-and-white photographs of movie stars decorate the walls over banquettes strewn with plump pillows and sleek white Scandinavian tables.

  The maître d’ greets me with a closemouthed smile. “Bonjour, mademoiselle.”

  “Bonjour,” I say. “Manderley Maxwell. I have a reservation.”

  He taps the home button on the iPad in his hands and slides his finger down the screen. “Had.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Your reservation was for 11:45, not 12:02,” he says, shrugging. “I am sorry, mademoiselle, but when you didn’t arrive, we offered your table to another party.”

  “Manderley?”

  I turn at the sound of m
y name. Reed and two of the wannabes are crowded around a small table set for two.

  My table.

  Reed waggles her long, manicured fingers in a Hollywood wave, a smarmy smile curling her heavily painted lips. I apologize to the mâitre d’ and walk over to Reed.

  “Good Morning, Reed.”

  “Manderley! Do you have a reservation? We were lucky enough to snag this table after the loser who booked it was a no-show. Score, right? So, what are you doing here?”

  The wannabes, and several guests lounging on nearby tanning beds, focus their attention on me. Scorching heat spreads from my cheeks to my sandaled feet, an effect not caused by the Mediterranean sun.

  “I was going to have brunch”—I ignore the pitying stares of the beautiful lounging people and focus my gaze on Reed—“but it appears I missed my reservation and there’s not a table available.”

  “Bum-mer! I would invite you join us, but there isn’t enough room. Sorry.” She draws the last word out, placing special emphasis on the ending ee sound, so it sounds like SOR-eeee. “Buh-bye!”

  The wannabes snigger.

  My fight-or-flight response kicks in—actually it is only my flight response—and I turn around so fast I collide with a waiter carrying a tray of mimosas. The champagne glasses tip over, spilling their orange liquid down the front of the waiter’s white shirt.

  Reed snickers. The wannabes giggle. I want to let the sun melt me so I can slide down to the ground and between the cracks in the patio. I am about to run away when I feel the warm pressure of a hand on the small of my back.

  “There you are,” Xavier murmurs in my ear. “I hoped to see you this morning. Come. You will join me, won’t you?”

  “I wouldn’t want to impose.”

  “Nonsense.”

  His hand still on the small of my back, he leads me over to his table, but not before I catch Reed’s open mouth and wide eyes. He pulls a chair out for me and I sit on the edge of the seat, my back stiff, my hands clutched nervously in my lap.

  “Thank you,” I say, once he is seated across from me. “You didn’t need to do that, you know?”

  “Do what?” His flinty gaze remains focused on my face and I realize he is being gallant, pretending as if he didn’t hear Reed humiliate me. “Don’t you want to have breakfast with me?”

  “Of course I do!”

  He smiles and I realize how eager, how naïve I must appear to this urbane Frenchman.

  A waiter appears. I order scrambled eggs and a pot of tea. While Xavier orders a cappuccino and toast, I look at his angular face, broad shoulders, and strong, tanned forearms. He is wearing only a T-shirt and a pair of Dolce & Gabbana boat shorts, but he holds himself with such dignity and self-assurance you would think he was posing for a high-fashion magazine shoot. When the waiter finishes taking his order and bows away, Xavier turns his full attention on me.

  “Your friends,” he says, nodding his head to indicate Reed and the wannabes, “they don’t look like the sort of people you would associate with.”

  I steal a quick glance over my shoulder at Reed, her glossy, Alex Polillo–styled, honey-blond hair hanging down her back, and self-consciously smooth my side-swept bangs.

  “They aren’t my friends.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I don’t care to spend my evenings getting drunk on expensive champagne at Bâoli in the hope I will meet someone who can advance my career,” I say, my shyness momentarily replaced by my indignation. “And because I believe a person’s worth should be measured by their morality, not by the amount of plastic surgery they’ve had or the number of designer dresses hanging in their closet.”

  “You’re awfully young to be so jaded.”

  “Living in Los Angeles can do that to a person.”

  “A person of quality,” he says, smiling so that dimples appear on each of his stubbly cheeks. “I am glad you don’t want to spend your nights at Bâoli.”

  “You are?”

  “Very. I have formed a picture of you and I shouldn’t like it ruined by learning you dance on top of tables to EDM.”

  I am suddenly and painfully aware of my simple cotton sundress and my mother’s conservative pearl studs at my ears and imagine the composite he has mentally drawn of me to be drab, boring. A bookish sort of girl in tortoiseshell glasses. The sort you sip tea with, not guzzle champagne with and dance until dawn. Self-conscious, I focus my attention on the napkin lying across my lap, twisting one corner around my pointer finger.

  “I meant that as a compliment.”

  “You did?” I look up and am surprised to discover him staring at me earnestly, a gentle, almost compassionate smile curving his lips.

  “Of course.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  His unexpected compliment has the same effect on me as when I stepped out of the air-conditioned hotel lobby into the warm, sultry sunshine. I want to stretch and bask in it, prolong the wonderful sensation. “There is something I must thank you for.”

  “What is that?”

  “Your gift. The purse.”

  “You like it, then?”

  “It is lovely.”

  “And yet, you are not carrying it.” He fixes me with an unreadable, unnervingly direct gaze. “Perhaps you think it too generous a gift?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “It would only be too generous if I couldn’t afford it, but I can. Besides, you looked sad last night and I thought a gift might cheer you up.” His gaze alters, his eyes darken and his lips press together in a thin line. “It has been my experience that, no matter how low they may be, a woman’s sagging spirits can be lifted with a gift.”

  The air leaves my lungs in a rush. That statement says as much about Xavier as it does about the women he has known. “Perhaps that is true of some women, but . . .”

  “But?”

  “But I am not like most women. I know it probably sounds old-fashioned and hopelessly lame, but I am like Marianne Dashwood from Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility. I would much prefer a man to read me poetry than buy me hot-house flowers.”

  He leans back in his chair and chuckles as if I said something humorous. The sound nettles me and makes me sad all at once. What a bleak view he has of women . . . of me.

  “You gave me something far more valuable than a designer handbag, monsieur,” I whisper, my cheeks flushing with heat. “You gave me your compassion and security. For that, I will forever be in your debt.”

  He stares at me for several uncomfortable seconds and when he speaks again, the hard edge to his voice has dulled. “No, I don’t think you are like other women, Manderley Maxwell. Not at all.”

  A new wave of heat floods my cheeks. I look down at the napkin I am clutching in my hands. My palms are sweaty and my knuckles white. I release my hold on the napkin, spread it on my lap, and smooth the wrinkles away.

  “Stop fidgeting,” Xavier commands. “There is no reason for you to be nervous. And, please, stop calling me monsieur.”

  “What should I call you?”

  “Why, Xavier, of course.”

  The waiter arrives with our food.

  “Ah, here is our breakfast.”

  I busy myself with pouring tea from a small silver pot into my cup and adding two packets of sugar.

  “You take your tea sweet?”

  I look up. His expression has altered again, rapidly, unexpectedly, like the weather along the Côte d’Azur. The dark clouds behind his gaze have drifted away, leaving bright blue.

  “Guilty,” I say, smiling. “You can take the girl out of the South, but you can never take the South out of the girl.”

  “You’re from the South? I wouldn’t have guessed. You don’t have an accent.”

  “I lost it while I was in New York.”

  “What were you doing in New York?”

  “Attending college. I graduated with a degree in literature from Columbia University.”

  He looks up from his cap
puccino and smiles enigmatically. “You are a dark horse, aren’t you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Never mind.” He takes a sip of his cappuccino. “Go on now, eat your scrambled eggs before they grow cold.”

  When I have finished my eggs and Xavier his toast, we sip our drinks quietly, staring out at the sea. It’s not one of those awkward silences often present when strangers are becoming acquainted.

  Xavier pushes his empty cappuccino cup away and leans back in his chair, staring at me as if I am a puzzle he wants desperately to solve.

  “How do you spend your time—that is, when you are not acting as Olivia Tate’s life preserver?”

  It takes me a few seconds to answer, not because I am lacking in interests, but because I have spent the last four years living in a narcissistic bubble called Los Angeles, a bubble inflated with the hot air produced by people talking about themselves. Nobody asks me what I like, what I think, what I feel.

  “I like to read, watch old movies, and write. I also take photographs.”

  “You’re a photographer? Are you any good?”

  “Moderately.” My cheeks flush with heat.

  Xavier chuckles. “Are you always this refreshingly honest?”

  “Of course.”

  He rests his elbows on the arms of his chair, steeples his fingers, and regards me with open, undisguised curiosity, as if he is not accustomed to conversing with an honest person.

  “What about you?” I say, smiling. “What do you like to do?”

  “Pfff! You don’t want to hear about me. I live a relatively boring existence.”

  “I can’t believe that.”

  “Why not?” he snaps, narrowing his gaze. “Have you heard something?”

  What an odd question. “No,” I say, clutching my napkin. “What could I have heard?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” He reaches for the leather bill presenter the waiter left on our table and scrawls his name across the bottom of the check.

  “Please, won’t you let me pay for breakfast?” I say, reaching for my wallet. “It’s the least I could do.”

  “Don’t be absurd.” He stands suddenly, circling around the table and pulling my chair out. “Shall we?”