Insufferable Proximity (6 page)

She headed directly to her mother’s secluded spot off to the left of the pool area, her lip twitching in irritation as a group of scantily clad women tried to crowd around her and say hello. Deciding today was not the day to break tradition, Heaven did as she always did, she continued past them without saying a word.

“Sevigne!” she heard Maude’s voice and could not help but stop as the tiny platinum haired pixie sprinted over to her, wearing a scandalous black and white zebra print bikini. As soon as Maude was close, she grabbed Heaven in a tight bear hug. Maude knew that Heaven was not the type who appreciated hugs, but ignored her stiffening body and hugged her anyway. “How have you been, we haven’t seen you all week.” she exclaimed, “You know your mother gets frantic when you’re away too long.” her brilliant smile filled with the warmth she naturally exuded.

“I’ve been working.”

“Always the busy bee.” she stopped the waiter walking by and grabbed a glass of champagne for Heaven. Maude knew she would not drink it, but she in return would never stop offering, hoping one day she would accept it. “I hope you came to have a good time and forget about work for a little while.” she said although she knew there was no chance of Heaven not dwelling about work, even in a party atmosphere.

“My darling daughter!” Heaven heard her mother calling her and she headed towards her direction. Her mother had wanted something more private to get away from the partying when she was ready and had set up a beautiful lounge area under a large white wrought iron gazebo. There were several oversized, white-velvet chaise loungers with chocolate-brown, leopard-print pillows, cylinder shaped pearl-top end tables and a personalized buffet.

“Hello mother.” she watched her mother stand up from the chaise lounge with the regality of a queen.

“Where have you been? I haven’t seen you all week!” she hugged Heaven as if she had not seen her in over ten years before pulling back to look at her, “Are you purposely trying to give your mother a heart attack, darling?” 

“I’ve just been so preoccupied with work.” Heaven explained, although she knew mentioning her job would irritate her mother.

“Ugh, work, it’s always about work. Wait, isn’t today your day off?” Sybille scoffed.

“Yes.”

“Then why were you at work in the first place?”

“Sybille.” Heaven needed to stop her mother before she got started, because once Sybille began, it was hard to get her to stop. She was tired of her mother’s opinion about her job and the strenuous hours she worked.

“Stop calling me Sybille.” She frowned.

“Then stop harassing me about how I earn a living.”

“But that job is killing you!” Sybille put her ringed hand over her heart dramatically

“Mother.”

“Yes dear?” she feigned innocence.

“Don’t start.”

“Start? Moi?” Sybille bated her eyelashes innocently.

“Yes you.” Coco said as she came up from behind, and then hugged her niece. “Hi sweetie, I’m glad you could make it.” Coco had been a second mother to Heaven all of her life and had taught her about the things her mother refused to be bothered with.

“My darling daughter was just asking me to not mention how much of her life is taken up by that- that job!” she exclaimed, unable to keep her mouth closed on the subject. “I mean really, you work 21 hours a day and 7 days a week, you never take a day off.”

“I don’t need a day off.”

“Everyone needs time off!” Sybille objected.

“Actually with this position open, I need more time.”

Heaven was quite confident about getting the position, she had analyzed her competition and in truth, there was none. The only one who managed to bring her Confidence to a pause was Julian. The position should have been his as it was, but he was too busy screwing off to obtain it. Now, for some crazy reason he wanted the position, which did not settle well with her. He alone could stand in her way, he was very intelligent after all, despite his shortcomings and his adolescent sex drive. Really, the man was a freak of nature, and a freak by nature, he was constantly being caught with his pants down and not only did he not seem to care, he was still able to be one of the best attorneys she knew.

“How is everything going with that?” Coco asked in excitement, she was beyond proud of Heaven and her accomplishments.

“It’s down to me and the boss’s son.” she frowned.

“The horrible Mr. Julian King.” Coco joked.

“The repulsively horrible Mr. Julian King.” she took a baby carrot from the vegetable tray on the table. “you’d think it’d be easy considering the man spends most of his day having sex with secretaries instead of focusing on work, but he has proven to be quite clever.” she shook her head, wishing she could just throw Julian King off the building and be done with him.

“Then you know what to do to win.” Coco loved to fuel her niece’s competitive nature.

“Stop encouraging her Coco!” Sybille shook her head, “Enough talk of work! I’d like to know how that date went last weekend.”

“What date?” Heaven asked.

“You know very well which date.”

“Oh, I cancelled it.”

“You what?” Sybille slammed her glass of iced tea down and Heaven watched as drops of amber liquid seeped into the tablecloth.

“I cancelled the date.” she said nonchalantly.

“Why?”

“He was weird.” Heaven took a sip of her ice tea.

“You never even met him.”

“No, but I talked to him on the phone.” Heaven’s disgust was more than evident in her frown.

“Only once and it was less than five minutes.” Sybille reminded her.

“Trust me that was all the time I needed to discover he was a sex-obsessed cornball.” Heaven shook her head in disgust, “Really mother, where do you find these deviants?”

“But he’s Grace Gerick’s son.”

“Well tell Grace that her son is a pervert and she should have told him that just because my mother runs a brothel does not mean that I trade sex for cash.”

“I will have his head!” Sybille roared like a Viking lord. Heaven watched the fury ignite in her mother’s eyes then turned to see her Aunt Coco chewing her lip, a habit she had when plotting revenge. “After all I have done for that woman and this is how she repays me?”

“I told you not to set them up!” Coco berated her, she was tired of her sister meddling in her niece’s life. Sybille needed to stop trying to force romance down Heaven’s throat and let nature take its course. Heaven was a beautiful woman with a high intellect and a successful career, she would find romance when she was ready.

“Violet!” Sybille bellowed looking around for her soon to be ex-personal assistant. Violet was proving to be better suited elsewhere in the brothel.

“I told you there was something strange about Grace.” Coco said in irritation.

“So she’s a little eccentric, but I didn‘t think her son was a presumptuous pervert.” Sybille was shocked that Grace could spawn such a disrespectful cretin.

“Well he definitely is.” Heaven nodded.

“And Darling, you know mother doesn‘t run a brothel.” Sybille corrected Heaven as she fixed her hair.

“Well whatever you’re calling the sex-shack now.” Heaven replied watching Violet scurry towards them, her pale amethyst colored eyes were rimmed in hot pink and her cheeks were stained with tears.

“Yes?” Violet sniffled pathetically.

“I want the entire Gerick family banned from this establishment!” she roared and Violet nodded wiping a tear from her eye. “What’s the matter dear?” Sybille asked, although she had a good idea what was wrong.

“It’s Antonio,” she cried harder, “he- he broke up with me!”

“You mean the Antonio you just met last month?” Sybille asked with a frown.

“Yes.” she answered.

“The same one you were crying about last week because you found out he was engaged?” Coco raised her brows.

“Yes.” Violet sniffled.

“So why are you crying? You should be thankful.” Coco asked in disgust.

“Because I love him!” Violet sobbed harder.

“You can get a chocolate bar at the grocery store and get the same effects as that chemical reaction you’re calling love.” Heaven informed her.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do without him.” Violet cried unabashedly.

“You were fine last month before you met him.” Coco reminded her.

“But I need him, I don’t know how to live without him.” she cried over dramatically.

“If you’re that desperate for companionship,” Heaven turned to her with a frown, “and you don’t mind being shit on, you should just get a dog Violet, at least you can eventually train it to shit on your floor instead of you.”

“Just go upstairs and get some rest dear, I’ll come up later and we can talk.” Sybille said compassionately as Coco and Heaven rolled their eyes.

“Alright.” Violet’s crying intensified as she walked away.

“I had the cook whip up one of your favorites, caramel lava cakes with vanilla ice cream.” Sybille smiled as she changed the subject, “and there are fresh warm chocolate chip cookies.”

“I told you I wasn’t eating sweets this year.” Heaven replied.

“I thought that was last year and the year before and the year before that.” Sybille said sarcastically.

“And this year too.”

“You need to stop depriving yourself of everything good.” Sybille said in frustration, not understanding the lengths her daughter would go to retain control.

“Good? What’s good about consuming 3 thousand calories?”

“It tastes good.”

“Well it doesn’t look good on my butt after I eat it.”

“One day you will indulge yourself Heaven Sevigne Deville and you won’t know what hit you.” Sybille just did not know about her daughter, she was uncaring, controlled and unkind. Heaven also happened to be unpredictable and un-malleable at best, nothing like her fun loving mother and her motley gang of outcasts.

“Well that’s not happening today.”

“Oh, I almost forgot!” Sybille clapped her hands in excitement, “Shelly and her son are coming tomorrow.”

“Shelly Ono?” Coco asked in horror.

“Yes.”

“Please tell me she is not coming back already, I cannot stand that indecisive idiot.” Coco snapped.

“What do you mean already? We haven’t seen her in almost two years now.”

“I know! Isn’t that soon enough, Sybille?” Coco protested.

“She is coming tomorrow night and you better be nice, Coco.” Sybille warned her younger sister.

“Bullshit.” Coco replied, not intending to be nice to Shelly.

“She’s bringing her son, I believe his name is Peter, I think you should meet him Sevigne.”

“No more dates.” Heaven instantly objected.

“Just this last one-”

“Absolutely not! I mean it mother!”

“Just one little date, Sevigne.” Sybille rarely called her daughter by her middle name, it was usually only when she wanted something or was trying to sweeten her up. Since she refused to be called, Heaven, Sybille in return refused to call her Sevigne, opting instead to call her darling or some other term of endearment.

“If you ask me one more time I am leaving.” she said.

“I worry about you.” Sybille could not help herself.

“Don’t start with that.” she shook her head, ready to leave, “I’m 26 years old, stop worrying about me.”

“I can’t believe you just told me to stop worrying about you Heaven, you are my daughter.” on the other hand, when Sybille was upset with her daughter she referred to her by her first name.

“I can’t believe you just called me that, Sybille.” Heaven frowned in exasperation.

“You do not call me Sybille!” Sybille cried dramatically, as if Heaven had ripped her heart from her chest.

“Then you don’t call me Heaven.”

“I named you that for a reason.”

“A reason still unbeknownst to me.” she stood up, “I have to go.”

“But you just got here!” Sybille whined, “And you know we are leaving for vacation.”

“I’ll call you later.” Heaven said before leaving.

“She gets colder by the year.” Sybille spoke as if she recited a pivotal line in cerebral drama film.

“She is not cold, she’s business oriented, and there is nothing wrong with that.”

“Nothing wrong? She is 26 and not only has she never had a date, she seems to hate the opposite sex!”

“What do you expect? We raised her to avoid men.”

“Not all men, just the customers.”

“How was she supposed to know the difference, especially at that age?” Coco shook her head, wishing she had a time machine to go back and re-raise Heaven.

“If only I knew then what I know now.” Sybille sniffled dramatically, “This is my entire fault.”

“It’s not your fault, she’s working hard to achieve her dream, she just doesn’t have time for a relationship.”

“Will I never have grandchildren?” she sobbed dramatically, holding her leopard print silk scarf up to her eyes “is that too much to ask? Is this my payback for raising her in a brothel? I never meant to hurt her I only wanted to give her things we never had, but still she hates me!”