Gap Year - 19. Chapter 19

February 7, 2004

The Waldorf Astoria

New York, NY

Will

We got out of the limo and there were photographers taking pictures, which totally freaked me out. The theme for tonight’s ball was the Regency Period, so that meant I was wearing tails and breeches, with fucking stockings on. That’s the last thing I needed was for Ryan, John, and Marie to see that and give me endless shit about it.

As we walked into the entrance there was a large mirror on the wall, and we all instinctively stopped and laughed at ourselves. I had to admit that we looked good for dudes living in 1815. I had a black velvet coat with silver piping, along with a patterned silver vest, or what they’d call a waistcoat back then. JJ was wearing a light blue satin jacket, Grand had maroon on, and Stef wore a pale-yellow floral jacket, which was outrageously awesome.

Just when we were about to walk in the room, my phone rang. I looked at it briefly and saw it was Darius, then answered it. Darius would only call me if he had a reason; he didn’t call just to bullshit. “Hang on,” I told Darius, then addressed the others. “I have to take this.”

“Well we’re not going to just stand here and wait for you,” JJ said. He had his hands on his hips and wore his annoyed expression, which was normally pretty funny, but add on to that his ridiculous outfit and it was hilarious.

“I’ll meet you inside,” I said, after I stopped laughing.

“We’re already late,” JJ said.

“I’ll be a little later,” I said, making him even more annoyed than he already was. “Hey,” I said to Darius, as I watched the rest of them scurry off, making note of which direction they were going.

“What’s JJ all pissed off about?” he asked.

“He and Stef had this big discussion about how to tie a cravat, and how to put on breeches, and that delayed us getting to this opening ball, and now they’re both stressed out,” I said. We both laughed at that.

“Dude, it’s their fault,” he said logically.

“Yeah, and that’s how they see it, and that’s why they’re being all nice about it,” I said sarcastically, cracking him up. “So what’s up?”

“That’s right, you’re in a hurry,” he said, drawling his words out slowly. He’d be so ticked if I did that to him. Phone calls with Darius were notoriously direct and to the point, and short. I didn’t say anything, I just waited for him to get to the reason he called. No way was I going to speak first and lose. “What are you doing after New York?”

“I’m going to go up to Boston for a couple of days to hang out with the kids,” I said. “That’s as far out as I’m booked.”

“We’re having a massive party on the 27^th,” he said. “You should come.”

“That sounds like fun,” I said. “You’re inviting me to a frat party? Dude, I’ll end up blowing all your brothers.”

He laughed. “They’re big boys.”

“I hope so,” I said lasciviously, which annoyed him, because I made him think about man sex.

“Yeah, and the next night Big is having a huge birthday party,” he said. When he said Big, he was referring to Trevor Buck, the oldest of the Buck kids. Trevor’s nickname was Big Buck, because he was super rich and super pumped. Their parties were legendary.

“Alright, you convinced me,” I said. “On my calendar.”

“Tell Bellona I said hello,” he said playfully, then hung up. It still cracked me up that he hooked up with her whenever he was in town. I pulled out my pocket calendar and wrote those two parties in, then went into the ballroom.

This ball was so pretentious that they were doing the seating in the same manner they used to do it back in the day. That meant that you didn’t sit next to the people you came with; all the attendees were intermixed with other people. Grand said that conversation during the Regency was an art, and this gave people a chance to appreciate new artists, more or less.

When I walked in, they asked my name and then handed me an envelope, and when they did, some major domo person read off my name over a loudspeaker. An usher directed me to my table, and as I looked at the other tables as I passed, I could see there were place cards behind each plate. I got to my table and scanned it and saw Patrick there, and sitting next to him was Tara McKinley. Her hair was done so it was all on top of her head, with all these little curls falling down around her face, while Patrick sported a gold patterned jacket with a blue waistcoat. Seeing her here next to him confused the fuck out of me, because couples weren’t supposed to be together, but I put that aside and went to pay homage to the king of our table, Karl Lagerfeld. He was smiling at me, and I walked up and bowed just like Alex had shown us how to do when we were in England. “It is a pleasure to see Your Excellency,” I said, using Grand’s stuffy attitude as my courtly voice.

“Darling, you are just as charming as always,” he said. He got up and gave me a big hug, which was so incredibly sexy I felt my dick start to harden up a bit. That almost made me panic, because I was pretty sure that the fucking breeches I was wearing would not restrict my cock enough to keep me from tenting out, but there was nothing I could do about it without being rude. “And you look fabulous!”

“You took the words right out of my mouth,” I said, and gave him a really sexy kiss on his cheek, allowing my cheek to touch his longer than normal, and then slowly sliding back and away from him. I made sure I exhaled as I did. He was wearing a jacket cut like the rest of us, only it was in a bright green pattern.

“I am so glad you are at my table, but we have a problem.” He said the last part sotto voce, whispering in my ear in a conspiratorial way. He was a lot like Stef, in that he loved all the drama that happened when you brought a bunch of divas together. “Your seat is occupied.”

“Ah,” I said. So that was why Tara McKinley was sitting next to Patrick. She was in my seat. “I’ll handle it.”

“No drama,” he whispered strongly, as if he was hoping things would be handled with no scenes. He didn’t care about that at all.

“Maybe a little,” I said, and winked at him. I walked around the table, pausing to say hello to the other people, until I got to Tara. Sure enough, she was in my place, because there was my name on the place card. “Excuse me, you seem to be in my seat,” I said politely. This entire time I’d been here, I had avoided making eye contact with Patrick, and I still refused to look at him. Instead, I focused on Tara, who truly was beautiful. She didn’t bother to get up, she just looked over her shoulder at me.

“I’m supposed to be over at that table,” she said, gesturing to the table Grand was at. There was an empty seat right next to him. “I was wondering if you’d just swap with me?” She made it sound like it was a done deal.

“I’m sorry, I can’t do that,” I said firmly. “You’ll have to move.”

“Excuse me?” she asked in disbelief.

“Here, allow me to help you up,” I said, and held her chair in preparation to move it when she got up. Karl Lagerfeld had his hand over his mouth, but it was easy to see him giggling.

She got out of the chair and turned to face me. “I can’t believe you’re being this… this… uptight,” she said, glaring at me.

I leaned in a bit so no one else would hear me. “Look, there’s a reason things were set up this way. If you make a scene about this, you will piss off all the people who organized it.”

“Whatever,” she said in a snitty way, and then went back over and took her seat next to Grand.

“Bravo,” Karl said, and clapped for me, making everyone else at our table laugh. I took a bow, then took my seat, and after I did, I finally turned and looked at Patrick. “Good to see you,” I said.

“Hey Will,” he said nervously.

“Dude, you still have shitty taste in women,” I said, shaking my head, then turned to talk to the guy on my right.

“And you still chase them away,” he said with an awkward smile, then turned to talk to the lady next to him, who I learned was the Countess of Albemarle.

I turned to my right and found a very handsome Italian guy, Giacomo Michelli. He must have been from Northern Italy, I reasoned, because he had lighter coloring, both in his skin and hair. I would put him at 35 years old, and he was very very sexy. “Buona sera,” I said.

“Buona sera,” he replied, in that tone that said he thought I was patronizing him by using a well-known Italian phrase to imply that I spoke Italian.

“It’s nice to meet someone I can speak Italian with,” I said in that language. He stared at me, a bit stunned, while I raised an eyebrow and turned back toward Patrick. “Who’s this guy?” I whispered.

“He’s the Assistant Editor for Mode in Italy,” Patrick whispered back. “He’s from Milan.”

“Thanks,” I said, then glanced over to where Tara was looking at me and ranting to Grand, probably about me. He looked trapped and totally uncomfortable, and that made me laugh out loud.

“What’s so funny?” Patrick asked.

“I’m just watching my grandfather try to think of a way to escape from your girlfriend,” I said, gesturing at them.

He started laughing with me. “Can’t see the two of them having a stimulating conversation.” He turned back to Lady Albemarle, and I watched Grand squirm and continued to giggle until Giacomo was finished with the woman on his other side. He was sitting next to Bijou Phillips, who was about as smart as the glass holding my wine.

“How exciting that you speak Italian,” he said. “You do not look Italian. How did this happen?”

I shrugged. It was weird because when I spoke in Italian, French, or Spanish, I instinctively shrugged, that quintessential Mediterranean gesture. “I had a step grandfather who spoke Italian, and I picked it up from him and my father,” I said. “Plus, it’s similar enough to French and Spanish that it wasn’t too hard.”

“You speak as if you were a native, although without perhaps the accent of someone raised in Italy,” he said.

“Now I know you’re lying, because I am not that good,” I said, flirting with him. We bantered back and forth, then I turned back and chatted with Patrick some more. “So when’s your show?”

“I got moved up to Wednesday,” he said. Last fall he was toward the end of the week.

“Is that like a promotion?” I joked.

“Let’s call it that,” he said in his relaxed way, making me smile.

“So it’s a good thing?”

“I think it will be a little less stressful, and a lot better for business,” he said. I stared at him, non-verbally asking him to explain that. “I won’t have it hanging over me all week, so I can actually relax and enjoy the rest of the show without being totally paranoid that I’ll fuck things up. And if it goes well, I’ll have time at these gatherings to talk to people about deals.”

“That makes sense,” I said, and pulled out my calendar. “What time do you need me to be there on Wednesday to help out?” He blinked at me.

“Dude, you do not have to do that,” he insisted.

“I mean, if I did a shitty job last fall, I can understand why you wouldn’t want me around,” I said. “I’m sorry if I fucked things up.” Both of us knew that wasn’t true.

“You’re so full of shit,” he said, shaking his head. “You were awesome.”

“So when do you want me to be there?” I asked.

“I’ve got some free time tomorrow afternoon,” he said. “Let’s meet and talk about it.”

“I can do that,” I said. “Meet me here.” I handed him a card with Bryant Hotel and my room number written on it.

“Dude, I don’t know about that,” he said, and looked petrified.

“Up to you,” I said, and he still looked pretty freaked out. “I’m not gonna rape you. If you want to pick a different place, let me know.”

“Alright,” he said. The conversation at the table became more general, dominated by Lagerfeld, and I had a blast listening to his hilarious stories about all the people there. He was marvelously bitchy, and extremely talented.

“That green suit you sent me got me a seat at one of Sydney’s best restaurants, even though I didn’t have a reservation,” I told him.

“Then it must have looked good on you,” he said.

“The maître d’ complimented me on it, and I told him you sent it to me,” I said. “He’s a huge fan, but then again, who isn’t.”

Everyone chuckled at that. “It is something I am used to,” he said, pretending to be egotistical, even though we all knew it wasn’t entirely an act.

Dinner ended up being a great time, and as I looked around, our table seemed to be one of the liveliest. The people at Grand’s table did not look like they were having fun at all. After the main course, I decided it was time to pee, especially since I’d been drinking wine like a fish. “Please excuse me,” I said as I got up, directing that mostly to Karl. No one replied, which was fine.

The bathroom was pretty crowded, but like most really nice places, the stalls were made so the partitions and doors went all the way from floor to ceiling. I managed to snag one toward the back, and just as I walked into it, I looked back and saw Zac Posen ogling me. He was just so damn cute, and so fuckable, I couldn’t resist making a play for him. I gestured for him to follow me into the stall with my head, then closed the door and left it unlocked. I pulled out my dick and started peeing, and was just finishing up when I heard the door open and turned to see him slip in. “What?” he asked at a whisper volume, like he didn’t know why he was in here, and like he hadn’t locked the door behind him. I stroked my cock, thinking about how good it would feel to pound his cute ass, and that got me hard as a rock.

“Dude, I need some help getting dressed in these funky clothes,” I said. I leaned forward and flushed the toilet.

“That should be easy,” he said. I turned around and stood there with my cock hard as a rock, sticking out and slightly up. “Holy fuck!”

“Think you can help me?” I asked. He looked around, as if someone would be watching inside the stall. I was hoping he’d let me fuck him, but instead he sat on the toilet seat and started blowing me. “That’s good, that’s fucking great,” I cooed at him to encourage him. I was pretty wound up, and we were in a hurry, so it didn’t take me long to get to the point of no return. “Close!” I said urgently. He smiled up at me with his eyes and didn’t miss a beat. I groaned as quietly as I could as I blasted my load into his mouth, but he couldn’t swallow fast enough, and some dripped out on his waistcoat.

He finished me off, squeezing the last drop out of my dick, then stood up. “That was fun,” he said.

“Want me to help you out,” I said, as I grabbed his dick through his breeches.

“I’m good. I have to get back,” he said. He made to leave but I stopped him. I grabbed some toilet paper and wiped off the cum on his vest, making him notice it. “Fuck!”

“Sorry,” I mumbled, like it was my fault.

“I’ll wash it off at the sink,” he said, even as he scrubbed it off with the toilet paper. While he was doing that, I pulled up my breeches and exited the stall, glad that no one else was waiting for it. I made sure my outfit was in good shape, then headed back to the table.

“You were gone for a bit,” Patrick said with a suspicious tone.

“Sometimes things take longer than you plan,” I said opaquely, then stared out at the dance floor, where Donald Trump was foxtrotting with Lady Albemarle. He was such a clod-footed buffoon I could see her trying to keep from getting her feet stepped on. “Why’s he dancing with her?”

“He wants to seem classy, and he figures by dancing with an English lady that will rub off on him,” Patrick said, shaking his head.

“That guy is about as classy as a Mafia Don,” I said. The music ended and the band started playing a new song, one that had a tempo that was so quick it could almost be a Viennese waltz. I saw Lady Albemarle looking around a bit frantically as he made to dance another number with her, so I got up and went to her rescue.

“I am terribly sorry to bother your ladyship, but you made me promise to find you as soon as they played a waltz,” I said.

Trump frowned at me. “I certainly did, and that’s exactly what this is. Thank you for remembering,” she said, then turned to the asshole. “I hope you will forgive me Donald, but I don’t want to disappoint this nice young man.”

“That’s fine,” he grumbled, and moved his fat bulk off to bother someone else.

I held her in the waltz position, and then we were off. “My goodness you are a good dancer,” she said as we twirled around.

“I am only as good as my partner,” I said, smiling at her. “I was worried that your feet would be bruised from having them stepped on.”

She laughed. “I must thank you for rescuing me.” I led her back to our table after the dance and found that it was like Alex’s wedding reception: all the older ladies wanted to dance with me. The end result was that I ended up dancing and dancing. After I danced with someone, I pointed out Grand and told the woman in question he was an amazing dancer, so he’d been pretty busy too. I guess it was my night to torture him. I had a really good time, but I was ready to be done with this. I just finished a tango with Princess Alexandra of Greece and spotted Paris Hilton, so I made a point to go talk to her before I got roped back out onto the floor.

“Hey there,” I said. “You look hot.” She was wearing this dress where the waist went up to right below her boobs.

“Willy!” she said and gave me a monster hug. “Oh my God! I didn’t know you were going to be here!”

“I was in Australia, and I wasn’t sure I’d get back in time,” I said. “Is Nicky here?” Her sister usually came to these things.

“Of course,” she said. “Look at you all dressed up like it was 1776.”

“It’s the Regency era,” I corrected. “That was around 1815.”

“Dork,” she said.

“You’re calling me a dork? What the fuck is with that show? A Simple Life? Dude you spent a month in fucking Arkansas. You looked miserable,” I said.

“I was working, making money so I can go to fun events like this one,” she said.

“Yeah, because you need money,” I said. “From one heir to an heiress, you know you’re doing just fine.” She and I laughed at that.

“I saw you dancing,” she said, being snarky.

I listened briefly to the music and picked up the beat. “You want to rhumba?”

“As if,” she said, cracking us both up. “There’s a party tonight at the Marquee.”

“Oh yeah? When?”

“Whenever I get there,” she said, cracking me up.

“Yeah, the whole world revolves around you,” I said, shaking my head.

“Duh,” she replied. “You should show up in a couple of hours, after you change out of that costume. It’s like fucking Halloween.”

“I’ll see you there,” I said. I spotted JJ talking to Bellona, so I went over to interrupt them. Neither one of them seemed to mind.

“If you have come to ask me to dance, you are wasting your time,” she said in a friendly way, then gave me the obligatory faux kisses.

“That is such a disappointment,” I said, pretending to be sad. “I’ll be alright with that, as long as you promise to dance with me the next time we’re at one of these things.”

“We’ll see,” she said.

“Darius told me to tell you he said hello, and that he was sorry he couldn’t make it out,” I said.

“Send him my regards,” she said, even though her eye twitched a bit. She strolled away, leaving JJ and me alone.

JJ started laughing as soon as she was out of earshot. “Dude, I heard about Tara. That was hilarious!”

“Bitch was in my seat,” I said, then laughed with him. “You know who she ended up sitting next to?”

“Who?”

“Grand,” I said. We both started cracking up, so we decided to head into the area outside the room so we didn’t attract attention. “I got to watch him squirm through dinner, trying to figure out how to get rid of her.”

“Yeah, she’s not much for conversation,” he said. “She and Patrick bailed right after dessert.”

“Yeah, she was pretty ticked off,” I said.

“What do you care?” he asked, probing.

I shrugged. “I don’t want to cause Patrick problems.”

“So you wouldn’t sleep with him?” he asked me, raising his eyebrow as he did.

“I didn’t say that,” I said, and laughed. “I’m going to bail and go back and change, then there’s a party at the Marquee. You want to go?”

He seemed to ponder his options. JJ loved events like this, but once they were over, he was rarely into going to do something else. “I think I’ll go back and make sure everything is ok. Have to be a good host.”

“Your call,” I said. “I’ll check up on you before I leave to see if you changed your mind.” I looked around to try and spot Stef or Grand, and JJ figured out what I was doing.

“I’ll tell Stef and Grand that you left,” he said, letting me bail. “We won’t need the car before it takes you home and comes back.”

“Awesome,” I said. “Thanks.”

February 8, 2004

The Bryant Hotel

New York, NY

Will

There was a mouth next to my ear and a hand on my ass, both of those things trying to coax me out of a deep sleep. “What?” I asked quietly.

“I have to go,” Giacomo said. “You can stay here as long as you want.”

“Thanks,” I said, as I rolled over to look at him, my morning wood sticking up like a flagpole. He grabbed it playfully, but I slapped his hand away. I was too hungover for sex. “Where am I?”

He laughed loudly, which pierced my brain like a firecracker. It was all I could do not to punch him. “The Bryant Hotel. I will see you later.” He kept laughing as he left, and I had never been so relieved when I heard the door close. I tried to piece together how I’d ended up here, and slowly it came back to me. I’d gone to the Marquee and danced like a freak, done a bunch of coke, and drank even more. Somehow, I ended up coming back here with Giacomo, although I couldn’t remember if that was his idea or my idea. We’d fucked, and it had been okay, but it hadn’t been great. Even as fucked up as I was, I remembered that he was pretty engaged until he was done, then he was done. No wonder I was hard this morning. I sat up in the bed, then propelled by my bladder, I went to the bathroom and peed. I didn’t have a key to my room here, but I knew which one it was. I sighed and went out into the room and tracked down my clothes, which had been thrown all over the place. I made sure I had all of my stuff, then left. I was torn between going to the front desk and going up to the rooms, but the thought of being in the lobby with a bunch of people was enough for me to try the room first.

I knocked on my door, but no one answered, then I rolled my eyes at my own stupidity and tried the main suite. It only took a few seconds for Tom to open the door. He looked at me and chuckled. “You look knackered, mate.”

“Thanks,” I growled, which just made him chuckle more.

“Here’s your key,” he said, handing me a little envelope.

“Thanks,” I said, in a more genuine way. I went out that door and used my key to go into my room. It was a nice hotel room, but nothing too terribly fancy. I heard a knock on the suite door so I undid the lock and opened the connecting door.

“I heard you were here,” Stef said, as he eyed me up and down. “I take it you had a rough night.”

“I get it. I look like shit,” I snapped, then put my hand up to my head to try and stop the pain I just inflicted on myself. “I’m sorry. I’ll be better in a few hours.”

He chuckled. That was evidently the thing for everyone to do, to laugh at my hungover ass. “We are going to meet some people and will probably be in and out all day.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “I’ll probably sleep.”

“We will have to catch up later,” he said. “JP is at the condo, so if you end up there, ask him about his night.”

“Oh?”

“It seems that he did not enjoy his dinner partner much and found himself dancing most of the night after someone mentioned that he is an excellent dancer,” Stef said, laughing as he did.

“I was just stating a fact,” I said, laughing softly with him. He gave me a kiss on the cheek.

“You will find some spare clothes in your closet,” he said. I looked at him, wondering how he’d figured that out. “It seemed like a good thing to do since you did not come home last night.”

“I really appreciate that,” I said sincerely. That was awesome. It was really sweet the way he thought of me and planned that just to help me, so I thought I’d pay him back with some gossip. “I’m supposed to meet Patrick today.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Here?”

“I gave him the room number and he had a cow,” I said. “I promised I wouldn’t rape him.”

“Maybe it is not you he does not trust, maybe it is himself,” Stef said.

“Well he’s not gonna rape me either,” I said, and started to get hard thinking about sex with Patrick. Unlike Giacomo, he was one amazing lover. “It would totally be consensual.”

“You will have to let me know how things turn out,” he said.

After they left, I ordered a massive breakfast from room service, and while I was eating I got a text message from Patrick telling me he’d be there at 1:00.