Lauren sits up in the chair. Outdoor chaises aren’t actually all that comfortable, or she’s never sat in one that is, anyway. In the end, what you want is a bed. She’s got a funny knot in her lower back, testament to the fact that she’s just drifted away into sleep, this despite the chatter Fiona and Amina keep up. They’re each flipping through a magazine, stopping every so often to jab at the thin, glossy pages with an accusing, greasy finger. Their talk is of the clothes, their cut, their color, their appropriateness for the occasion being pictured, the connotations and associations of the celebrity caught sporting said clothes by some intrepid shutterbug with a telephoto lens. Lauren’s not opposed to such discussions; she knows quite well the pleasure of sitting, feet immersed in a hot, whirling bath while a penitent Korean woman trims her cuticles, and thinking about whether a certain personage has attained sufficient fame to wear a specific garment, or whether that garment’s appearance on the frame of a reality star hasn’t forever, in her estimation anyway, cheapened their good, Italian name. It’s just she wants to sleep is all. She wants to let her mind drift up into the sky like a kite, bob and dip on the eddying air, go where it will.
Maybe she’s being unfairly uncharitable toward Amina and Fiona. It’s easy to be that. Fiona, in her unexpectedly straightforward bathing suit, reclines like Delacroix’s odalisque on the fringed pink towel, a souvenir from a trip to Kenya. Amina, all those luxurious curves, that expanse of beautiful skin. Their every movement looks choreographed, something Lauren never knows how to do. She’s sure everyone can see it, the strain on her face as she walks through a room, that awareness of being watched. Other people have it so easy.
At least Meredith has a headache. She threw up after breakfast, then disappeared into the confines of the former plantation in search of central air. Meredith can’t hold her liquor, which is a problem as these celebratory rites naturally involve a fair amount of it, on top of which the poor dear is drinking to forget, though in her drunkenness she keeps bringing the conversation back to remembering. It’s Sunday, a day that feels like departure, but they’re not leaving until tomorrow afternoon, which gives the day a still more decadent feeling, if it’s possible, after the lobster at breakfast, to amp up the decadence. The Sun King himself would probably have taken it easy on the champagne. But never mind: Someone else is paying, and they’re all celebrating. That’s the thing with the way we celebrate in this culture, Lauren’s realized this weekend: Even if you don’t believe it, at first, and don’t mean it, eventually you get so drunk you feel celebratory. Then maudlin, but that can come later. They’ve agreed to take Sunday night off from one another, room service and pay-per-view, though she can imagine that Fiona and Amina might hit the town for dinner together. They seem to have much left to say to each other. A chat about their favorite mascara.