Page 24 of Storm in a D Cup

I stopped and watched as his eyebrows shot up. ‘Genie Stacie? I can’t believe it! How are you?’

The voice, which I could hear as clearly as a bell, was high-pitched and babbling. She went on and on and Julian glanced at me, guiltily (at least that’s what I think now) and nodded, repetitively, trying to get a word in edge-wise.

‘Yes, but how – sure, but – when would you—?’

In the end he hung up, dazed.

‘Who thehellwas that?’ I chuckled.

He scratched his head. ‘An old friend – well, an old girlfriend of mine, Genie Stacie. We dated for a spell ages ago. She found me through my agent. She’s in the area, so…’

I stared at him. ‘Genie Stacie? As in the model slash actress Genie Stacie?’

‘Uh, yes…’

Julian had datedher? She was possibly the prettiest thing in L.A., with long, long legs, a slender frame and a mane of platinum blonde hair. She’d been on the cover ofSports Illustratedmore times than I could count. She’d had a whirlwind romance with Scottish actor Tom Jackson a few years ago and had had a kid as a result. I knew all this because she was also, God help us all, Maddy’s absolute idol. It was thanks to Genie Stacie’s lack of taste and dignity that I’d had to speak to my daughter about her haste to grow up and the length of her skirts.

Maddy and I had had an agreement last year before she started to mutate. An agreement by which I decided and she had no choice but to accept a number of things, i.e. apart from ballet concerts and exams, no make-up until she was sixteen, and no dating until she was eighteen, the legal adult age in Italy for driving and voting and…marriage. I shuddered at the thought. She was in too much of a hurry for my taste. Luckily she was as smart as a whip and could smell lies a mile away. And she was very specific about what she wanted in a boy. I knew I could sleep sound. Except for when she was like this.

‘Mom! That’s so unfair!’ she’d shrieked in her melodramatic voice so similar to Marcy’s.

‘That’s my decision, Maddy, like it or not.’

‘And stop calling me Maddy! I’m not ten anymore! I’m a conscientious teenager now!’

If she considered herself conscientious during her morning tantrums because her black tights or favorite top were still in the wash, or while screeching at anything fried on her dinner plate and sayingduhat something I’d said in front of any of her friends, then we were in big trouble. And now my conscientious teenager’s amoral lifestyle icon was coming to our home. Great, juuuust great.

‘Genie Stacie says she needs to come and see me,’ Julian informed me, his gaze lost in an imaginary maze of memories. Memories I didn’t need to hear about, by the way. Luckily, he wasn’t volunteering them.

‘See you?’ I echoed. ‘What for?’

Julian shrugged, his hand stealing to the back of his neck, rubbing softly. Funny – in seven years I’d never ever seen him do that before. It was like a sign of…embarrassment.

‘She said she’s in a bit of trouble, and that only I can help her.’

‘Hmm… I wonder what kind of trouble?’

‘I’m not quite sure. She didn’t elaborate. I said it’s OK. Is it OK?’ he asked dubiously.

You invite a sex bomb into our home where we have a twenty-year-old boy who’s champing at the bit to be a man and a fifteen-year-old-girl who thinks sheisGenie Stacie and then ask me if it’s OK?

‘Sure,’ I said, sporting a smile I didn’t feel. Please God, not that pre-divorce, teeth-baring grin again. I couldn’t stand it. It had taken me seven years to gain a modicum of self-confidence, and now this. I got a terrible feeling. I was also getting a terrible migraine.

‘She’ll be here tomorrow afternoon around six,’ Julian informed me.

‘On our anniversary and just in time for dinner,’ I said, not bothering to hide the sarcasm in my voice.

‘I was going to take you to L’Archetto,’ Julian said as he took my hand and kissed it.

Damn, my favorite restaurant.I sighed. ‘Forget it. What should I cook? What does she like?’

Julian thought about it. ‘Nothing, if I remember correctly. Genie Stacie eats practically nothing.’

It figured. I sighed again and turned the tap on, and an awkward silence fell as we finished our evening chores.

‘I’ll make it up to you, I promise,’ he whispered, nuzzling my neck.

‘Damn right you will,’ I assured him. Then a terrible thought began to mushroom in my mind. ‘Are you going to fall in love with her all over again and dump me?’ I said and stopped, unable to believe I’d actually said that.

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