Bold and Simful

Less formal and stuffy and with far less problems than their neighbors, the Bettencourts are more than prepared to celebrate the joyous Christmas season.

“So he hops in and tells me that Elizabeth is pregnant! Of course I suspected all along but I didn’t want to say anything just in case I was wrong, but I wasn’t! OMG, can you believe it?” The news burst out of Veronica. She would have told her sister earlier, but Maleena had been sleeping when she arrived home.

“You snuck out? with Xavier?” Maleena asked, coughing on her burnt pancakes, “Yuck, we gotta stop mom from cooking.”

“Yeah, is that the most important thing right now? Elizabeth Mendenhall, Miss Perfect 2008, is pregnant and refuses to reveal who the father is!”

“I heard you, but you’re dating Xavier?” Maleena was stuck on the topic.

“Good God! Pay attention would you?” Veronica exclaimed, then went on to theorize, “So who do you think the baby’s father is? I’ve only ever seen her with one guy, but I can’t imagine. Ewwww…there must be someone else, who does she talk to?” Veronica’s questioning was cut short by the school bus. For once, she was eager to get to school, she just had to see what Elizabeth would do now.

“I bet she plays sick today,” she called over her shoulder to her sister who was still absorbing the influx of information so early in the morning.

“We’ll need you through the holiday season and possibly afterward if things work out,” Maxine said. “The agency said you would be available, is that the case?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Arcadia Santander nodded and grinned widely. She was incredibly relieved to find that the call for a daily had come from the Bettencourts rather than the Mendenhalls. Everyone at the agency knew that working for Catherine Mendenhall meant that you needed as many arms as an octopus just to fend off Catherine’s flirtations.

“Great! We’ll be having our neighbors over tonight, so if you could get the house in order while I finish the decorating that would be fantastic,” Maxine said and turned to open the box of Christmas decorations, leaving the maid to find her own way around Bettencourt Hall.

“What’s wrong, Elizabeth?” Robert Bettencourt was honestly concerned, the girl looked so maudlin, especially considering that Christmas was just few days away. His own girls were bouncing off the walls and tearing the house apart looking for where he had hidden their presents.

“Nothing, Mr. B. Your house is so much more…well, it’s just different here than at my house,” Elizabeth answered with a sigh.

“You’ll get in the spirit as soon as your family puts up the tree!” Robert asserted, hoping to draw the girl out.

“Oh, it’s already up. Mom hired the same decorator as last year, white and gold was his theme this year,” Elizabeth answered and turned away from the cute little Santa and fun stockings.

Robert watched her mope away and thought, ‘Now why didn’t I think of that, I hate putting the lights on the tree!‘ but he knew that he would never let that happen, Christmas was supposed to be fun.

Robert heard his daughter’s squeals and come to see what all the fuss was about. “The vase is beautiful, Xavier,” he said to his neighbor’s kid who currently had his daughter Veronica wrapped up in a hug.

“I thought Roni would like it,” Xavier replied, extricating himself from his girlfriend.

“I do, I do,” the squeals and hugging started again and Robert decided to leave the couple alone, but as he left he wondered just how much a Shang era vase cost.

“So this is the girl that has stolen my son’s heart,” Catherine Mendenhall admired Veronica’s looks and mentally calculated the net worth of a Mendenhall-Bettencourt union.

“I guess so,” Veronica giggled, hoping that this was a sign of approval from her boyfriend’s parents. She hated Xavier sneaking out to go on their dates, it wasn’t that her morals were offended just that nothing was open between 1 and 4 am.

Leaving her mother to repair her own relationship with Catherine, Veronica ran upstairs to find the others. As she was walking through the door, she heard her mother start to apologize.

“Catherine, I’ve been meaning to apologize,” Maxine almost choked on the word, “for the comment I made at your house. You were being hospitable while I was being catty. Please accept my, uh hem, apologies.”

“I had forgotten all about that,” Catherine lied, she didn’t forget anything, “Now, who did you hire to do your house?”

Veronica found everyone upstairs hanging out on the floor and promptly joined them.

“I’m going to go to a finishing school for the last semester, then I’ll join you guys at Hunter,” Elizabeth explained. Her brother hung his head at the lie, he knew that Veronica knew which meant that Maleena probably knew that his sister was lying but as long as she didn’t know he decided to keep up the pretense.

“Ooo, where’s the school?” Maleena wondered, knowing full well that she was forcing Elizabeth to elaborate on the lie.

“It’s in…over by…well, it’s far away and very exclusive,” Elizabeth stalled. She wasn’t adept at lying, she hadn’t been called to do it very often.

“What’s the name of the school?” Maleena was just being vicious now, she kinda enjoyed watching Miss Perfect fumble around.

“The name? Uh, Lawrenceville Prep, you probably never heard of it though,” Elizabeth fidgeted, crossed and re-crossed her legs and looked gratefully at her brother when he changed the topic.

Veronica hugged her friend and maintained the lie by wishing her well and telling her to remember to call. She felt bad that Maleena had pushed the topic, but Maleena never was one to just play along and Elizabeth’s shift to slight snobbishness had gotten under her skin. Veronica was more compassionate about the situation and could understand how Elizabeth had gotten herself in this mess, she and Xavier had had a scare of their own.

The lie irritated her a little though, it allowed Mrs. Mendenhall to maintain the “perfect family” facade that her own mother was killing herself trying to keep up with.

A few days later, while shopping for their prom dresses in Rigel Heights, Veronica and Maleena ran into Mrs. Mendenhall who gloated that Elizabeth had been invited to spend a semester at a “prestigious, east coast finishing school”. They maintained straight faces while she talked but as soon as her back was turned, Maleena did her wino impression and they both lost it.

‘They can’t know, they can’t possibly know. No one knows except me and Elizabeth,‘ Catherine thought upon hearing the giggling behind her.

That night the security of the gated Orion Bay community was breached by a common thug who tip toed into the Bettencourt’s front door and promptly set off the alarm.

Which woke the entire family, who gathered to watch the fight take place in their entry hall. Though it didn’t look like it he would first, Officer Parker O’ Kuma managed to gain the upper hand and the miscreant was roughly escorted to the waiting police cruiser.

Thanks to the quick response time of the police, nothing was stolen and the family, though understandably upset by the event, returned to bed.

“What was he after?” Robert asked his wife when they were back in their bedroom. Neither could sleep and, in spite of Maxine’s temptation, Robert wasn’t in the mood.

“I don’t know, hon. Almost everything we own is valuable,” Maxine answered, honestly perplexed at which of their furnishings might have been the target, “the more important question is how did he get passed the gates?”

Robert pondered the question while Maxine nuzzled his ear, “Hon, not now!” he pushed her away, “I got it! The maid! Maybe this is what they call “an inside job”, you know?”

“No, no. Arcadia is so sweet and nice and she’s been such a help. I haven’t cleaned a toilet all week. I really don’t think so,” Maxine defended her new employee.

“Well, I’m going to ask her. Sweet and nice could be a cover,” Robert determined.

“Fine, just don’t upset her. I hate cleaning toilets,” Maxine relented.

The very next morning, Robert rushed downstairs as soon as he heard the agency’s van pull up and confronted Arcadia in the kitchen.

Glowering at her, he grilled her about how she came to be the one the agency sent when they requested a maid, about her friends, about where she lived, about almost everything. ‘Hey, I’m pretty good at this detective stuff,‘ he congratulated himself.

All the while, Maxine ran interference, interpreting her husband’s questions with “What he means, dear”s and “you understand, don’t you”s.

Much to Maxine’s surprise, Arcadia was very understanding about the situation and could see how, as the latest addition to the house, she was suspected. Her confidence and forthright answers soon satisfied Robert and she returned to her regular duties as if nothing had happened.

“Whatcha lookin’ for, Mom?” Veronica asked.

“Hmmm? Oh, just looking for anything about the break-in. You would think that it would make the front page here, but there’s nothing,” Maxine flipped another page and still found not a single story or even a mention of the break in. “The Crime Log only mentions a vandalism in Rigel Heights, how bizarre!”

“Maybe they want people to think that nothing bad ever happens in Orion Bay,” Veronica answered, loosing interest quickly.

“Huh? Oh, I guess,” but Maxine didn’t sound convinced.

 

Posted on May 7th, 2008 under Bettencourt. Tags: arcadia, Bettencourt, catherine, elizabeth, maleena, maxine, robert, veronica, xavier. RSS 2.0 feed. Leave a response, or trackback.