Kimmie grabbed a plush robe from the closet before disappearing into the bathroom and closing the door behind her. I heard it lock, so it was clear she’d be in there for a while. I decided to go for a stroll.
This wasn’t a house. It was its own village. Emily Walker’s Napa estate had its own tennis court, two pools, a hot tub, a pool house with an area for manicures and massages, a room just for hot yoga, three kitchens—including one large enough for a full professional staff to prepare meals—four wings, four garages, a movie room and that’s just what I’d seen so far. Did I mention there was an elevator? I wouldn’t have been at all surprised to open a closet door to Narnia.
As I walked down a set of cement stairs from the main garden to the spa, I ran into a familiar face: Janice Paulsen, the do-gooder mom who matched foster kids to families. She wore a thoroughly bedazzled gray sweatsuit.
“Ashley! It is so wonderful to see your beautiful face! I’m Janice” she said in a Minnesota accent.
Ah, Janice. The needlepoint queen of the great Midwest. She’d found way to inject her love of craft needles into every single challenge. For the Marriage Challenge, she’d even knitted a set of yarn lingerie that I’d never be able to unsee.
“It’s nice to meet you in person.” I smiled, feeling like for once I was nailing a social interaction with someone old enough to use the bathroom alone.
Janice took my hand as if she was trying to prevent me from leaving too quickly. “Lauren,” she yelled, calling to a woman at the bottom of the stairs who was tying her shoe. “Lauren, Ashley’s here. Remember? The tush girl?” she said, waving Lauren over furiously.
Tush girl? They couldn’t mean the first video chat fiasco. There’s no way they were talking about me.
Lauren, a woman with chestnut hair in a low ponytail, wearing bedazzled jeans and a T-shirt, hightailed it up the stairs. I recognized her from a particularly long post about how bedazzling saved her life.
“Tush girl!” Lauren exclaimed, loudly enough for everyone in the zip code to hear. She ran over to me and gave me a bear hug. “I tell your story to everyone I meet. You’re practically famous in my book club. I love your little tattoo, by the way!”
I tried to will my body to melt into the ground.
“Thank you...for...it’s nice to meet...” My words left my brain again.
“Hey.” Lauren touched my shoulder and drew me close. “If you need anything bedazzled you let me know. I brought my Rhinestanator 2000 and have been hooking everyone up.” I looked the women up and down, and by the no less than six trillion plastic gems on their outfits sparkling in the sunlight, I knew she wasn’t kidding.
“I’ll let you know!”
Somehow I managed to slink away from the conversation before they asked to take a photo of my tattoo for their scrapbooks.
Once safely back in my room, I opened the bathroom door to find Kimmie standing as naked as the day she was born in the shower with her arms and legs spread wide. She was wearing some kind of protective goggles and a woman wearing the same eyewear was spraying her with a large canister attached by a hose to an even larger tub.
I screamed.
Kimmie pulled up one side of her goggles. “Geez, Ash. You almost gave me a heart attack. What happened to knocking?”
I shielded my eyes with my hand. “I’m sorry, it was unlocked. I’m sorry.”
I backed away into the door and bumped against it.
“No need to freak out,” Kimmie said, folding down her goggles. “Amanda, meet Ashley. Ashley, meet Amanda. She’s my personal tanner. She’s staying at a nearby hotel. There’s no way I was going on TV without a fresh one, am I right?”
“Yes, right, right,” I said, finally finding the doorknob with my eyes closed. “Okay, enjoy yourself.”
I sat down on my bed and opened my computer. One missed FaceCall request from David. I clicked on the notification and it started dialing.
He picked up after one ring. I could hear running water and the sound of someone gagging.
“David? Are you there?” The screen only showed the bathroom ceiling.
“ASHLEY!” I heard David yell before gagging again. “ASHLEY, HER DIAPER EXPLODED!”
“David?”
His face popped up over the monitor. His eyes were full of fear and there was a bandana tied around his nose.
“Ashley, I’m dealing with a Level Ten Poopsplosion right here and am two seconds away from—” He retched loudly.
“Oh, David...” I could hear Aubrey giggling hysterically in the bathtub.
“Ashley. If I pass out I’m going to need you to call 911.”
I tried to hold back my laughter. “David, you’re not going to pass out. Are her clothes off yet? Let them soak a bit before you wash them—”
“Too late,” he said, looking around wildly. “I had to cut them off. They were an unfortunate casualty.”
It was then that I noticed he was wearing the yellow gloves I use to wash dishes.
“Feel free to burn those when you’re done,” I said.
David paused for a minute before I heard him say, “Oh, no, no, no, it’s happening again. There’s more coming out of her. Why is this happening? Is she possessed? Is she possessed by a demon? I need a young priest and an old priest. I gotta go, Ashley. I’ll call you later.”
“David, you’re going to be okay.” Before the camera clicked off, I’m almost positive I heard him chanting in Latin.
“Don’t forget to get under my butt cheeks! They won’t be on camera but I’ll know!” I heard Kimmie scream from the bathroom.
I opened the bedside table drawer and found a pair of purple eye covers. They smelled lightly of lavender. I slipped them on over my head, lay back and, before I knew it, was in a deep sleep.
I woke up to Kimmie shaking me. “Ashley. ASHLEY! It’s time for dinner. Geez, you sleep like a rock.”
Kimmie walked over to the full-length mirror. She was stunning in a floor-length pale pink evening gown. Her wrists and neck were dripping with what I could only assume were real diamond and gold jewelry.
“You look beautiful,” I said, pushing myself up to sitting.
“You look tired. Get dressed. You know dinner starts in fifteen minutes, right?”
“Fifteen minutes!” I flew out of bed and toward the closet. “Why didn’t you wake me up earlier?”
Kimmie shrugged. “I’m not your mommy.” I don’t know if I imagined it, but I thought I saw a smirk. Was this her competitive side?
“I’ll meet you down there.”
Kimmie walked out the door and shut it behind her. I tore through my clothes and looked for something that would even come close to the level of elegance my roommate had achieved.