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Authors: Laura Levine

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BOOK: Pampered to Death
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“Leave me a note if you want a chocolate on your pillow tonight,” she called out. “It’s twenty bucks per chocolate. Twenty-five with nuts.”
 
YOU’VE GOT MAIL
 
 
To: Jausten
From: Shoptillyoudrop
Subject: So Darn Mad!
 
I’m so darn mad it’s not even funny! Not only hasn’t Daddy gotten rid of the darn things, he’s actually put up a sign on our lawn that says
SAVE THE GNOMES
!
 
Plus he just sent away for a bunch of
I
MY GNOMES
boxer shorts and T-shirts. And spent a small fortune to have the stuff overnighted.
 
It’s bad enough the little monsters are camping out on our front lawn, now they’re invading the house, too!
 
Honestly, honey, I don’t see how things could possibly get any worse.
 
XXX
 
Mom
 
 
To: Jausten
From: Shoptillyoudrop
 
Omigod. Things just got worse.
 
To: Jausten
From: DaddyO
Subject: DADDY FOR PRESIDENT!
 
Exciting new development in my fight to Save the Gnomes! I’m running for president of the Tampa Vistas Homeowners Association.
 
That’s right, lambchop. I was over the clubhouse and saw a notice announcing the upcoming elections. Lydia Pinkus is running for president just like she always does—unopposed. And right then and there I decided to throw my hat in the ring. That damn battleaxe has been president of the association for five years in a row—that’s five years too long, IMHO. If you ask me, she’s nothing but a despot in support hose.
 
True, the election’s in just five days. But that’s not going to stop me. No, siree. I’m entering the race as a write-in candidate, and plan to conduct a campaign that’ll knock “La Pinkus” to kingdom come.
 
It’s time Tampa Vistas had a president with vision and integrity and the courage to speak out against the plight of lawn gnomes everywhere! In other words, your very own DaddyO!
 
Love and kiss from,
 
Daddy (aka Mr. President)
 
PS. How’s this for a campaign slogan?
Time to Get Rid a Ya, Lydia!
 
To: Jausten
From: Sir Lancelot
Subject: A Tad Miffed
 
Jaine, Sweetie—
 
I know you must be a tad miffed with me for tricking you into staying at The Haven. But you know I only did it because I love you and care about you. Trust me, you’ll thank me when we’re shopping for skinny jeans at Bloomie’s.
 
Hug hug, kiss kiss,
 
Lance
 
PS. Had dinner last night at a great new Italian restaurant on Melrose. The risotto was divine!
B
reakfast was a depressing affair of hot lemon water and chopped cardboard (which Olga insisted on calling cereal). As I choked it down, I felt a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. Partly it was from the chopped cardboard. But mainly from the e-mails I’d read when I’d gone to my room to shower and change.
Don’t get me wrong. My parents are sweethearts of the highest order, and I love them to pieces. But for some reason, wherever they go, disaster seems to follow. Daddy’s the main culprit, of course. This is a man who attracts trouble like white cashmere attracts wine stains. He’s broken so many of the bylaws at my parents’ retirement community, they’ve practically got his picture up at the local post office. I shuddered at the thought of him running for office on his Save The Gnomes platform.
And as for Lance, how do you like the nerve of that little weasel? Stuffing his face with risotto while I was starving in diet hell! Just wait till I get my hands on him!
But all thoughts of Lance and Daddy were interrupted after breakfast when Olga took me aside, and announced:
“Time for your weigh in!”
“My weigh in?” I gasped, beads of sweat popping up on my brow.
“It’s a routine procedure. We weigh you now so you can see how much weight you’ve lost by the end of the week.”
The last time I stepped on a scale of my own free will was, well, never. So you can imagine how upset I was.
“Can’t we just make a guestimate?” I asked. “Say, somewhere between 120 and
The Biggest Loser?
”
Olga nixed that plan in no uncertain terms and herded me over to The Haven’s gym.
Like the Spa Therapy Center, the gym was a charmless box of a building, fluorescent-lit and linoleum-clad, used mainly—as my poor muscles would soon discover—for aerobics.
As we walked inside, I saw a buff young couple working out on some treadmills.
“Jaine,” Olga said, gesturing to them with pride, “meet Sven and Shawna, two of my most valued employees.”
Sven was a throbbing hunk of nonstop muscles and piercing blue eyes; Shawna, an equally striking blonde, with lush eyelashes and lusher lips.
Clearly these two were prominent members of the Ken and Barbie family tree.
“Sven and Shawna are both aerobics instructors,” Olga explained, “as well as licensed massage therapists.”
They flashed me twin Ultra Brite smiles, nearly blinding me in the process.
“Get the record book, Shawna,” Olga said, snapping her fingers. “It’s time for Jaine’s weigh in.
I groaned to see my long-time nemesis, Mr. Detecto, the scale, lurking in a corner, along with a strange egg-shaped piece of equipment.
Shawna clambered off her treadmill and scooted off to retrieve a ledger from a small office adjacent to the gym.
“Okay, Jaine,” Olga barked, pointing to the scale. “Get your fanny up there!”
“Can’t I take off my shoes first? And my watch? And my scrunchy? And this tissue in my pocket—”
“On the scale!” she glowered. “Now!”
Reluctantly I stepped on the scale, holding my breath in the mistaken belief that it would somehow make me thinner.
Olga’s eyebrows shot up in disapproval as she moved the weight bar over a notch or two.
“What a tub of lard!”
Okay, she didn’t really say that. But what she did next was almost as bad. She shouted out my weight, all three depressing digits, in a voice that could be heard in the next county. Along with Colonel Sanders’ herbs and spices, my weight happens to be a carefully guarded national secret, and I didn’t appreciate her blabbing it at the top of her lungs.
Over at his treadmill, Sven had the grace to pretend he couldn’t hear what was happening.
I’d barely stepped down off the scale when Olga whipped out a tape measure from one of her pockets and cinched it around my middle.
“My God, Jaine, I’ve measured radial tires smaller than your waist.”
Okay, she didn’t say that, either, but I could tell that’s what she was thinking as she shouted out my measurements for Shawna to enter in the record book.
Shawna dutifully noted them down, shooting me a sympathetic smile.
Olga finished taking my measurements, making the most annoying
tsk tsk
sounds when she got to my hips. At last my ordeal was over, and I was just about to make a break for it, when she shoved her sinewy arm in my path.
“Not so fast. You still have to do the Fat Vat.”
“The Fat Vat?”
“A body composition assessment machine,” she said, pointing to the egg-shaped contraption I’d noticed earlier. “It measures your body fat. We call it the Fat Vat.”
I now saw that it was hooked up to a computer.
Olga swung open the machine’s door, revealing a bench inside.
“Go ahead. Grab a seat.”
I did as instructed, and she slammed the door shut.
Good heavens, I felt like a chick about to be hatched. It was awfully close in there. And something about the air pressure made my ears start to pop. I watched through a thick glass window as Olga fiddled at the computer. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity but was probably only five highly claustrophobic minutes, she let me out.
It turns out I had a thriving colony of fat cells. A regular fat cell condo, if you will. My poor muscles were about as out of place on my bod as an Amish family in Vegas.
“We certainly have our work cut out for us, don’t we?” Olga sneered.
Refusing to dignify her barb with a reply, I gathered my fat cells and started for the door, entertaining serious thoughts of Lance-o-cide.
 
I did not get very far, however, because just as I was leaving, the rest of the inmates came filing in for a fresh round of exercise hell.
“Welcome everybody,” Sven said, flashing a blinding smile. “I’m Sven, and this is Shawna. Today we’ll be leading you in your first aerobics class.”
“Well, hello,” said Mallory, raking her eyes over Sven’s abs of steel. “Where do I sign up for private lessons?”
Sven blushed under his perfect tan.
“You must be new here,” Mallory cooed.
“My wife and I started working at The Haven about two months ago,” Sven managed to stammer.
“You’re married?” Mallory pouted in mock disappointment.
Next to me, Kendra whispered, “That’s never stopped her before.”
“Yes,” Shawna said, staking claim to her man. “We’ve been happily married for almost six years.”
“Enjoy it while you can, honey,” Kendra muttered.
Poor Shawna. If Mallory decided to make a play for her husband, I feared she’d be in deep doo doo. Her beach bunny good looks were worthy of a wolf whistle or three, but she was no match for the spectacular Mallory, who had shown up in bike shorts and a tight white tank top, leaving nary an inch of her bodacious bod to the imagination.
“Okay, everybody,” Sven clapped his hands. “Let’s get started.”
He then proceeded to lead us through a series of exercises last practiced on a Viking slave ship. Before long, muscles I didn’t even know I had were screeching in agony.
As Sven demonstrated the exercises, Shawna circulated among us, correcting our form.
The class had been divided into two rows, with the “A” list up front and the Untouchables in the rear. Mallory had positioned herself directly in front of Sven, where she was making sure to expose every possible inch of cleavage, her emerald pendant bouncing with each strategic jiggle.
Alongside her, Clint was breezing through the exercises on autopilot, his mind a million miles away. He probably did stuff like this in his sleep. Nor did Harvy and Kendra seem to be having any trouble keeping up. As part of Mallory’s entourage, they were no doubt used to working their tails off.
Only Cathy and I were struggling. And compared to me, Cathy was an Olympic champ.
Needless to say, Shawna was spending a lot of time at my side.
“Can’t you raise that leg a little higher?” she asked during one particularly hellish routine.
“Not without a forklift.”
Finally, when my muscles were on their knees, begging for mercy, Sven called out, “Okay, everybody. That’s it for the warm up.”
The warm up?? Dear God, don’t tell me there was more!
Indeed there was.
Seconds later, Shawna was passing out “exercise bars,” yard-long metal poles that weighed about as much as a small refrigerator. Sven then began leading us in a whole new set of exercises, designed to torture a whole new set of muscles.
I did my best to keep up with the others, wielding the metal tube with all the skill of an asthmatic drum majorette.
By now I was looking back fondly on the old good days of the nature hike.
At last the session was over. Shawna pulled me up from where I had collapsed on the floor while everybody else filed out the door.
Everybody, that is, except Mallory, who had chosen to linger behind.
“Let me help you put these away,” she said to Sven, exposing her cleavage as she bent down to pick up her exercise bar.
For heavens sakes. Talk about shameless. Didn’t she realize the man’s wife was standing not two feet away?
“That’s okay,” Sven said, with an awkward smile. “Shawna and I can take care of it.”
“Yes, we’ll be fine,” Shawna added, hurrying to Sven’s side, a big fat phony smile plastered on her face.
But as Mallory sauntered out the door, working every inch of her mojo, I saw fear in Shawna’s eyes.
And I didn’t blame her. Not one bit.
Sven was staring at Mallory like a starving man at an all-you-can-eat buffet.
For Shawna’s sake, I just hoped he could resist temptation.
BOOK: Pampered to Death
6.01Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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