academy, too?” she asked, deciding to use the same shortening for the Wilson Academy that Lynette had just employed.
“God no!” Marjorie exclaimed. “Never married — never found anyone willing to sign a prenup.” She laughed and drank half of her martini.
“Marjorie’s family owns half of Culver City, and most of the oil under it,” Lynette explained.
“Which I’m going to need when I have my brows lifted next week,” Marjorie said, signaling the waiter for a second round of drinks only a moment after he’d delivered the first. “The price has doubled since my last one. Ten thousand for two lousy eyebrows! Can you believe it? It’s not like he’s giving me brand-new ones, for Christ’s sake.”
“Who’s doing it?” Lynette asked, sipping her martini.
“Conrad, of course — who else would I trust?” She leaned toward Risa. “You must be costing him a bundle, the way he’s raising his rates!” Then, as Risa felt her face flushing, Marjorie Stern raised her glass. “And more power to you!” She leaned back in her chair, drained the rest of her glass, and eyed Risa speculatively a moment before the waiter set another martini down. “So what’s next for you?” she asked.
Risa stared her. What was the woman talking about? Had she missed something?
“Nips and tucks, Risa,” Lynette offered, reading Risa’s confusion.
“You mean surgery?” Risa asked. “I’ve never actually—”
“Oh, my God!” Marjorie barked. “We have a virgin! So then, let me rephrase: what’s scheduled first?”
“First?” Risa echoed. “I wasn’t planning on having anything done.”
Lynette and Marjorie stared at her blankly.
“You’re kidding, right?” Marjorie finally said into the ensuing silence.
Risa felt as if she’d said something wrong. “Why? What have you had done?”
“Me?” Lynette laughed, then held up one hand and started ticking off her fingers one by one. “Let me count. Chin implant was first — and you should consider that first, too, since it’s really easy. Then my nose and eyes. Breast reduction when I turned forty, which was a true load off my back. And I had a brow lift last year.”
As Risa’s fingers went self-consciously to her chin, Lynette turned to Marjorie, who had just finished the second martini. “Come on, Marj — give her the list, and don’t leave anything out.”
“Good lord,” Marjorie said. “I don’t even know if I can remember everything. I’ve had breast implants twice, a brow lift, my nose, my eyes, my turkey wattle tightened up, liposuction…” She sighed and shook her head with mock ruefulness. “Jesus, it seems like it’s always one damn thing or another.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Risa blurted without thinking. A split second later, realizing how her words must have sounded, she tried to recover. “I mean, I just never would have known — looking at both of you—”
“Oh, come on, Risa,” Lynette cut in. “Look around here! Do you actually think there’s a single woman in this place but you that hasn’t had at least half a dozen procedures?” She nodded toward a woman with beautifully coiffed white hair who was clad in what even Risa knew had to be at least ten thousand dollars worth of elegantly casual clothes and several hundred thousand dollars worth of perfectly cut diamonds. “How old do you think she is?”
Risa tried not to stare too long at the woman, and finally shrugged uncertainly. “Fifty? I’d say in her forties, except for her hair.”
“Try eighties,” Lynette replied. “And not early eighties, either. You need to rethink your ideas about surgery fast, Risa.” Lynette’s voice dropped and took on a serious note. “If you want to stay married to Conrad for very long, you’d better learn to always look your very best, and I don’t mean just your clothes and hair. You’re going to be the first person people think of when they’re deciding who’s going to work on them. You, and Alison.”
“Which means you’re both going to have to be perfect,” Marjorie added, just in case Risa might not have understood Lynette’s words.
Risa felt herself flushing again. “Conrad’s not that shallow,” she said, but even as she spoke, she wasn’t entirely sure she believed it.
“Then I’m afraid you’re underestimating exactly how much Margot did for his practice,” Marjorie said. “And how much work he did on her.”
Risa stared at her drink, unwilling to look at either Lynette or Marjorie Stern.
“It’s not really about being shallow,” Lynette said, trying to alleviate some of the sting she could sense Risa feeling. “Making women beautiful isn’t just Conrad’s job — it’s his passion. And both you and Alison would be making big mistakes if you didn’t use his services.”
Marjorie reached out and gave Risa’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “Let him make you gorgeous before it’s too late.”
“And get Alison with the program, too,” Lynette advised. “Did she tell you that she borrowed Tasha’s falsies the other day?”
Risa stared at her mutely, shaking her head.
“There was no swimming suit top that would fit her without them.” She leaned forward again. “You can’t let Alison be Wilson Academy’s first wallflower, Risa — it’s just not fair to her.”
Risa sat back in her chair, barely able to believe what she was hearing.
“Take a good look around here,” Lynette said. “Look at everybody. Do you see a flat chest or a wrinkle anywhere?”
Risa scanned the women who filled the club. This was Conrad’s world, and this was Conrad’s club.
And every woman in it — even their waitresses — was perfect.
Lynette was right — there was no way either she or Alison could compete with these people, not without all the help her husband could give them. Maybe she ought to ask Conrad for a consultation and a professional appraisal, not only of Alison, but of her, too. She hadn’t forgotten their honeymoon night, when Conrad had called out Margot’s name as they made love, and if she was going to be honest with herself, their sex life wasn’t what it should be for newlyweds.
Was Conrad already losing interest in her?
Would something as simple as a little plastic surgery fix that?
She didn’t know, but she intended to find out.
ALISON GAZED dolefully at the black zippered bag emblazoned with the Neiman-Marcus logo that was already hanging on the hook on her closet door, then turned away from it, pulled the textbooks out of her backpack, and settled down at her desk to start organizing her homework for the evening.
But even with her back to the black bag hanging on her closet door, she couldn’t get it — or its contents — out of her mind. Maybe she should take another look at herself in the dress before she sent it back. What if she was wrong? What if the dress really did look good on her, as Tasha and Dawn kept insisting when she told them she was going to return it? What if they were right, and it was the perfect dress for her birthday party?
Maybe she should show it to her mother. That would do it — her mother would hate the dress, and she’d be right, it was way too old for her, and nothing at all like the kind of stuff she and her friends in Santa Monica always wore. The most dressed-up they ever got was a skirt and blouse instead of their usual jeans and shirts.
Except she wasn’t in Santa Monica anymore, and her new friends never wore the kind of stuff she used to wear all the time. Pushing the still unopened history book aside, she left her desk, pulled down the zipper on the bag, then shed the jeans and cotton sweater she’d been wearing that day.
The dress shimmered even in the daylight of the room — under the lights of a birthday party, it would be spectacular. She took the nearly weightless dress gently off its hanger, careful to do nothing that might render it unreturnable, and slipped it over her head. The straps dropped onto her shoulders, and she delicately adjusted the fit.
She stood on tiptoe, seeing how her legs would look if she were wearing the high heels the dress demanded. And as she looked at herself in the mirrored wall surrounding the closet door, she had to admit that Tasha and Dawn were right; the dress was absolutely spectacular, and except for the bodice, it actually looked right on her.
There was a soft knock, immediately followed by her mother’s voice, muffled by the heavy wood of the bedroom door. “Honey?”
Alison hesitated, feeling like a child caught with her hand in the cookie jar, then let her heels drop back to the floor. She hadn’t done anything wrong; in fact, the next thing she’d intended to do was ask her mother about the dress. “C’mon in,” she called, bracing herself for what she was sure would be an instant rejection. “You better
