October 19
The Present
7:00 P.M.
While Todd was handling some sort of mess in the game room, Ellie had her own problems. Her billionaires were starting to arrive, and billionaires always ruined it for everybody. Ellie wasn’t sure she would have gone to all this trouble, flown so many people out, insisted on out-of-season flowers and fruit, hired the Parisian interior decorator, and booked two different DJs, if Blake, Celine, and Sanjay weren’t coming tonight. If it was de rigueur to have at least one billionaire in one’s social circle, Ellie of course had three. Billionaires were the new show ponies. Who didn’t have a close personal friend who was a billionaire these days? In 1982, there were only twelve billionaires in the United States, but by 2012, there were exactly four hundred twenty-five superrich souls. They infected society like overfed beasts, brimming with the indifference and disdain that a billion dollars conferred on a person, living, as they were, in a shellacked billion-dollar bubble.
One of Ellie’s LA girlfriends, Diana, a writer, had gone to high school with MacKenzie Bezos even. But Diana wasn’t jealous that her old friend had ended up with a billionaire; instead, Diana was incensed that MacKenzie got better reviews for her first novel than she did, just because she was a Bezos. It was all Diana talked about when MacKenzie’s book came out, how unfair it was that The New York Times had raved about it while they’d completely ignored her own book.
Ellie was amused but, unlike Diana, she was definitely jealous of the billions, especially since, with the divorce, MacKenzie would be the richest woman in the world. Numbers mattered to her. Ellie didn’t know Jeff and MacKenzie or the mistress, but she knew people who knew them, which was enough.
Blake Burberry was the worst but the most famous, with a last name that was practically synonymous with Britain, a name that came with its own plaid pattern. In fact, Blake never signed his notes, since his personal stationery already carried the Burberry logo. Maybe he wasn’t titled or royal (Blake spent his childhood playing tennis at Buckingham Palace with Prince William—okay, only twice, but an anecdote he let slip at every occasion), but his money wasn’t brand spanking new and combustible like those Silicon Valley paper billionaires either. (What on earth was a paper billionaire? Was it like a straw man? Something not quite real?) Blake liked to think of himself as a contrarian, down-to-earth, frugal, and so in London he lived in Soho rather than Mayfair; in New York he hunkered down in Brooklyn Heights rather than the Upper East Side, drove a Mini rather than a Tesla, and was currently staying at the Ace Hotel rather than the Parker, which he deemed too extravagant. And yet Blake was also building a fifty-million-dollar Malibu house and flew his beloved Goldendoodle private for vet checkups back in New York. Blake was an ass.
They’d met in London, when she was still married to Archer. She could blame her ex-husband for the number of billionaires in her life, she supposed. Blake had been younger then, and cuter, and could get away with saying all those flippantly rude things in that posh accent of his. All she knew was she’d grown up dying to wear one of those iconic checkered scarves that she could never afford. When she met Blake, almost twenty years ago now, he’d been sweet even, but after coming into his trust fund and giving up his musical career due to an obvious-to-everyone-except-him lack of talent, he had hardened into a bored, listless dilettante. Bisexual and perennially single, because not even a billion dollars could make anyone put up with Blake (which was really saying something).
She had no idea why they were friends or if they even liked each other. But then, she could probably say that about half the people at the party. At least he’d dressed up for her, was wearing a slim Tom Ford navy suit and a crisp white shirt, tan and handsome. Ellie liked her friends to be decorative, to look good in a room. She approved. Apparently, so did he.
“Darling, you’ve finally impressed me,” he smirked as he entered the house.
“Thanks, I think?” she said sharply. “What does that mean?”
“Oh, Elle,” he said, “I’m just joking.” Her never called her by her preferred name; she suspected he thought it was too gauche.
He disappeared into the party, zooming in on the friends they had in common, for he never had any interest in meeting anyone new since, as a billionaire, he figured he’d already met everyone worth knowing; everyone else wasn’t worth his time. The party bus from the Parker had arrived a few minutes before, and by now the house was packed with out-of-town friends as well as a few locals they’d met through the museum. The London contingent seemed to be getting along with the New York people. The LA people hung together, cliquey as usual, but overall, there was a happy buzz over the sound of the piano and the cocktail shakers, which was the real music to her ears.
Of course, billionaires were the least of her problems. The moment she was alone, she snuck out the front door, pulled out her phone, and began texting Harry Kim to find out what was going on. She’d rung him the minute Nathaniel told her about the message, but he hadn’t picked up, so she’d texted a barrage of questions right after. But so far, there was no answer, not even the dot-dot-dot that meant he was typing a reply. Nothing. This could not be good.
She could feel nervous perspiration forming on her brow and under her arms and she willed it away. The last thing she needed was to ruin her artfully made-up face and soak through the thin silk fabric of her dress.
With relief, she noticed a boxy Honda with an Uber sticker pulling up to the curb, which meant Sanjay was here.
Ellie had assumed that all the billionaires in her life would want to know one another, but while Sanjay was curious about Blake, Blake had absolutely no interest in Sanjay. Unlike Blake, who’d inherited his wealth, Sanjay had made his own money, had earned it in his lifetime. Sanjay Kumar was another of Archer’s friends—although friends wasn’t quite the word—more like Sanjay was one of the rich people in London whom Archer invited to his parties. Like Blake, Sanjay was a certified bachelor, but he preferred to date sexy MIT professors rather than Archer’s host of jailbait models or Blake’s pretty, young rent boys. Sanjay had helped Ellie out of a bad situation back when she and Archer were living in Dubai for a spell, and for that she was forever grateful; even after the divorce, they had remained friends, actually closer than ever. She liked to tell people she’d won the friends in the divorce; okay, correction, she liked to tell Todd, as a warning. But it seemed he already knew. (“Your friends.”)
Sanjay was wearing his hedge fund uniform, a polo shirt and shorts, and he arrived at the party with his current girlfriend, who ran a tech company and boasted impressive Michelle Obama arms.
“What’s wrong?” said Sanjay as a greeting.
“Is it that obvious?” She laughed weakly.
“Only because I know you,” he said with a smile. “You remember Monica.”
She did and kissed and hugged her graciously. “Bar’s outside; try not to die in the heat.”
“Go ahead,” said Sanjay. “I’ll join you in a minute.”
“You didn’t have to get rid of her,” said Ellie when Monica disappeared inside the house. She sighed. She couldn’t hide much from her old friend. “What’s wrong with me? Nothing, everything.”
“Is it Todd?” asked Sanjay. “You guys fighting again?”
“Yeah, but that’s old news. When aren’t we fighting? No, it’s money. It’s always money.” It felt so much better to say it aloud. She grasped her phone and took a surreptitious look to see if Harry Kim had texted back. Nope.
Sanjay crossed his arms. “Money. Who cares about money?”
“Easy for you to say, Mr. Billionaire.” She’d been teasing him this way for years, ever since she intuited how rich he really was. There was a fellow mom at Glenwood Prep, where the kids went to school, who made a habit of googling everyone’s net worth and then kissing up to those who made the cut. Ellie never had to resort to that kind of web sleuthing. If someone was superrich in her circle, she knew about it instantly: It was in the air, whispered and talked about so much, the aura of a billion dollars like a heady perfume, that you knew everything about the billionaire before you even met them.
“I’ll give you some money. How much do you need?” Sanjay offered.
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah, why not? Pay me back when you can.”
“Sanjay, I couldn’t. Thanks, but no.” He’d offered before, and she always turned him down. Taking his money would change their friendship, and he was one of the few real friends she could count on.
“You’ve made your thirty million,” said Sanjay. “What could be the problem?”
“Ha,” she laughed faintly.
Thirty million. “After thirty million, it’s all the same,” Sanjay had told her once when they were having lunch in his building in New York, in the private restaurant in the lobby that was for residents only. Over at the next table was the CEO of Goldman Sachs, who was Sanjay’s neighbor and Parcheesi playmate. “There’s truly nothing out of your range after that.”
“So after thirty million, there’s nothing left to aspire to? That’s as good as it gets?” she’d asked.
“Pretty much.”
Sanjay spent as much as she did a year, they both lived at about three million dollars net, which meant he was frugal and she wasn’t. But it did mean they took a lot of family vacations together, and met up at Art Basel Miami Beach in December, Aspen in January, and the Hamptons or Positano over the summer, if their schedules allowed. Sanjay was her only friend who ever called her on the phone instead of texting, and she suspected they were that close because he’d never been in love with her and vice versa. She was too stupid for him, she liked to joke (although it was true). But maybe they’d never been lovers because she’d done the same thing he did, white-knuckled her way, fighting and clawing to the top of the point-zero-zero-zero-one percent. They were allies, comrades. Sanjay had one child, a daughter from a previous girlfriend, his only heir, and it was Ellie’s dearest wish that one of her twins would win Isadora Kumar’s hand one day and make them a real family. Plus, all that lovely money couldn’t hurt.
All this talk of money was making her stomach churn. If Harry Kim pulled out of the deal, she was fucked. She needed that deal like her life depended on it because her life depended on it.
“Seriously, Ellie Belly, what do you need?”
“From you, honey? Nothing,” she said. “Seriously. I’m okay. Don’t worry about me. It’s nothing I can’t fix.” She couldn’t tell Sanjay how badly in hock she was to the bank. It was too humiliating. How all this—the party, the house (all her houses), her entire life—was on borrowed time and money, and if that deal with Harry didn’t come through, she wasn’t even sure if she could pay the caterer tonight, let alone the two DJs.
She had to change the subject before she sweat through her dress and ruined it. “Forty years, can you believe I’m this old?” she asked.
“Um, no,” he said. “Although I thought for sure you’d never admit to it. Models never do. I mean, I don’t remember you ever turning thirty. Only twenty-five, five times.” He shot her a cheeky grin.
“I was hoping to push it off for a few more years,” she confessed.
“With that Botox you could’ve gotten away with it. By the way, I love your house,” he said admiringly.
“Thanks, so does Blake. He said I ‘finally’ impressed him,” she said wryly. She kind of liked that Blake had been so rude; it gave her a juicy anecdote to tell everyone at the party.
“Asshole.”
“Douche.”
“Why are you even friends with him?”
“I ask myself that question every time,” said Ellie. “Maybe I’m just a sucker for nostalgia. He reminds me of being young in London.”
“I remind you of being young in London.”
“You’re right. I guess I should get rid of him.”
“You say that every time, and you never do. It’s fine. I have a new little venture he might be interested in,” said Sanjay, who was always working. “Anyway, this house! It’s fantastic. It’s so much better than mine.”
“What are you talking about! I love your Hamptons house!” she cried. “This is nothing!”
Sanjay was forever lamenting the state of his beach house, which never seemed to live up to his expectations, and they talked about renovations and remodeling, the problem of architects and contractors, the headaches of permits and fees, the merits of Caesarstone versus veined marble. Rich-people chatter. To be rich in America meant to be in a state of constant renovation. Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Mean Celine, aka billionaire number three.
“Happy birthday, cupcake!”
“Mean Celine!” Ellie gushed as Sanjay made a graceful exit to let them catch up. “You made it!”
“We just touched down,” said Mean Celine, who had a habit of flying her jet to events and then flying back home at the end of the evening, as she was allergic to “hotel sheets” and preferred the comfort of her own bed—by far the ultimate privilege.
Mean Celine’s husband bought and sold airplanes and airplane parts to airlines all over the world, and thus Mean Celine was always telling her friends which airlines to avoid. “Oh god, never fly that shitty airline; they buy the oldest planes in our fleet!”
Mean Celine knew that everyone called her Mean Celine and she found it amusing, if a little too on the nose. She owned LA’s two basketball teams and ran the boards of the philharmonic, the art museums, and the best private schools in the city, as well as every university that mattered in the area, including all the way to Stanford, which mattered the most. Outside of Hollywood, where she had little to no interest (Hollywood money was insignificant compared to hers), she was hands-down the most feared woman in all of Los Angeles: She wielded her money like a knife. She had taken Ellie under her wing years ago. Mean Celine’s youngest daughter was Sam’s best friend since seventh grade.
Or at least Alex used to be Sam’s best friend.
Things were a tad frosty between the two of them lately, ever since Alex and Sam had started their freshman year at Stanford. The girls had had their ups and downs before, especially in ninth grade when they somehow ended up in warring cliques. But not like this. Sam complained Alex was “clingy” at college, while Alex told her mother that Sam was acting stuck-up. Privately, Ellie thought that it was because Sam had finally hit her stride and found her place among the supergeeks, while Alex, who didn’t have the grades or the scores but whose last name graced the auditorium, was the one who was out of her element for once.
“Is that Sam? She came home for the party? How sweet. If I knew she’d be here, I would have made Alex come with,” said Mean Celine, who seemed to have decided to pretend that the girls were still besties.
“I didn’t know she was going to be here,” said Ellie, who wasn’t about to admit to any failure on Sam’s part, especially not to Mean Celine.
Mean Celine popped a caviar-and-potato-chip confection into her mouth from a passing tray and shook her head. “How’s that new boyfriend of hers?”
“Sam’s? You mean she finally has a boyfriend?” she asked, shocked into blurting a truth. Sam had never dated anyone, ever. Which was why Ellie was wondering if she might be gender-fluid or something.
“Yeah, something like that, I think.”
“She hasn’t said anything to me.”
“Well, you are her mother,” said Mean Celine. “Last to know.” Mean Celine looked around at the house and the party, and Ellie braced herself for criticism. This was the billionaire problem right here, the fear that you would never be good enough for those who could not only afford the best but could buy the entire world.
But Mean Celine was gracious. “You look gorgeous, not a day over twenty-five, doll. You and your good genes. And the house is perfection. This is the Gulf House, right? You know I grew up going to this house; my parents were friends with the Gulf family.”
“Of course you did,” said Ellie. That was another thing she noticed. All the rich people in her life knew one another. Sanjay was on the board of Mean Celine’s husband’s company, and Mean Celine knew Blake’s mom socially. Sometimes, Ellie felt dizzy at the heights she’d scaled, that she was welcome, if not celebrated, in such company. These were her friends. People who knew when the market would tank before the market tanked. People whose money pushed the world in a certain direction. People who knew which airlines to fly and which to avoid, even as they flew their own private planes around the world. Todd was forever asking about when they would get their own jet. Not yet, but hopefully soon, she’d told him. And even on borrowed money, they didn’t have enough for a jet, only a jet share at the moment. It grated.
At least she wore real diamonds. “Celine, are those . . . ?” she asked, her fingertips brushing her friend’s dangling rocks, as big as robin’s eggs.
“Aren’t they great? I got them at Claire’s!” she hooted.
Mean Celine could buy all of Cartier and Harry Winston with the snap of her fingers, yet wore ten-dollar paste. She also carried a fake Chanel handbag. Since everyone assumed everything she owned was real, why should she spend the money? It was just a waste. Ellie shook her head. Rich people.
Sanjay returned with another round of drinks and escorted Mean Celine out to the pool, leaving Ellie in the hallway with her thoughts.
So many billionaires. So little time. If she were a billionaire, she’d have white tigers on jeweled collars and the hottest chicks from Crazy Girls dancing in cages above the pool, fireworks shooting out of their pasties. Sanjay’s idea of a good time was a game of backgammon. Oh, he had his fancy wine collection and the annual white truffle auction in Hong Kong that he chaired for charity, where he and his fellow ten-figure friends bid on certain Italian pigs’ ability to root out the tubers. But the man was just as happy with a McDonald’s meal.
Blake’s new hobby was his publishing empire; he liked to rescue newspapers and magazines for sport, run them into the ground, then toss them in the trash like, well, yesterday’s news. Mean Celine worked, raising money for all those schools and endowments and scholarships, and bought fake diamond earrings at the mall.
Boring.
Ellie wouldn’t do any of that. She would be such a fun billionaire.
Except of course, she was broke.