Taste I
“You see what the problem here is, don’t you Mr. Frederick?” She swept up her arm, letting a series of platinum bangles and cuffs rain clanging down her forearm, in a gesture that took in the Olympic-size swimming pool, sixteen chaise lounges, four paintings whose blues and golds perfectly accented the Italian mosaic tile of the floors and walls, and a dressing area discretely hidden by a Japanese folding partition at the other end of the vaulted hall. She kept her well-spangled arm extended as if she were showing off a prize at a gameshow. But her face told Mr. Frederick that there would be no prize at the bottom of this hour.
He burrowed his left hand in his suit pocket, adjusted his glasses with his right, and narrowed his eyes looking for an obvious flaw in the enormous open space.
When it hadn’t leapt out immediately at his trained eye she cried, “The paintings are hung horizontally!”and stamped her black leather heel on the gleaming new floors, whose tiles carried the sound to the end of the great hall and back again.
He looked at the monumental gilt frames holding the abstract paintings of long, foggy bands of color before taking a long breath and confirming, “Yes, Mrs. Bartholomew, they are indeed horizontal paintings.”
“I specifically discussed this with the contractor. I want them hung vertically, you know, for the eye.”
Mr. Frederick’s upper lip curled in slight snarl. “For the eye?” he asked, his vocal chords noticeably tighter and strumming at a higher pitch.
“Don’t you know anything about horizontal stripes? It’s bad feng shui. Or, bad chai. It’s… it’s like white after Labor Day!” She snapped two fingers at finding a satisfactory metaphor. The ropey muscles of Mr. Frederick’s throat momentarily flexed and flushed while Mrs. Bartholomew scanned her person looking for errant red hairs clinging to her suede dress, finally plucking a radiant strand off her left shoulder and letting it fall to the floor.
“I’ll have Ramone rehang them immediately.”
“Would you? Oh thank you Mr. Frederick. You’re a doll.” She put her hand on his arm and gifted him with a prize after all, a glossy smile dripping from incisor to incisor. “You remember our housewarming party is tomorrow now. It’s game time!” And she pumped her fist in the air, for Team Bartholomew wins every time.
Taste II
She liked the sound of her heels on the new floor, the swirling blues and golds of the mosaic tile she had taken to calling her “Italian Chiclets”, which she had chosen, with a team of experts, from among dozens of samples shipped directly from Florence. In these intense sessions she had held each precious sample of porcelain aloft toward the light to closely examine the colors and thought in another life I would have been a designer.
But in this life she would have to make due with the available talent, and though she respected Mr. Frederick’s sense of style, she wondered if it wasn’t her taste, her vision, her eye for detail that was driving this whole enterprise and if it wasn’t she, rather than this highly sought-after interior decorator, who was in fact the real creative genius.
At least he dressed well, she thought, glancing over at his suit as he swung open the double doors to the indoor pool. Armani, no doubt. He will cut a good figure at the housewarming party. With the thought of the party, her heart jumped into a happy somersault. Robbie and Laura and Stevie and Caterina, not to mention all the girls from the tennis club, will be choking with jealousy this time tomorrow night. If the ‘his’ and ‘hers’ steamrooms upstairs don’t do them in, the Olympic-size indoor pool will.
She deserved a little recognition. The house was, after all, her baby, a big bouncing baby mansion to whom she had thoroughly committed herself and her time. Four years, a sizable chunk of her husband’s inheritance, and several rounds of stress-defying Botox later, it was finally complete and would be presented in its full splendour to friends, those who would appreciate as much as she did the sound of good heels on excellent Italian tile.
But in this life she would have to make due with the available talent, and though she respected Mr. Frederick’s sense of style, she wondered if it wasn’t her taste, her vision, her eye for detail that was driving this whole enterprise and if it wasn’t she, rather than this highly sought-after interior decorator, who was in fact the real creative genius.
At least he dressed well, she thought, glancing over at his suit as he swung open the double doors to the indoor pool. Armani, no doubt. He will cut a good figure at the housewarming party. With the thought of the party, her heart jumped into a happy somersault. Robbie and Laura and Stevie and Caterina, not to mention all the girls from the tennis club, will be choking with jealousy this time tomorrow night. If the ‘his’ and ‘hers’ steamrooms upstairs don’t do them in, the Olympic-size indoor pool will.
She deserved a little recognition. The house was, after all, her baby, a big bouncing baby mansion to whom she had thoroughly committed herself and her time. Four years, a sizable chunk of her husband’s inheritance, and several rounds of stress-defying Botox later, it was finally complete and would be presented in its full splendour to friends, those who would appreciate as much as she did the sound of good heels on excellent Italian tile.
