The Playboy Party: The Price of Admission

May 29, 2020.

I check my suit in the mirror, straightening out my bowtie. I look decent, but it would be nice to get a second opinion on the matter.

Ella Sue usually does that job for me, but tonight, she’s out gone over to Sean’s place to prepare. I take a picture of myself in the mirror anyways, sending it over to her for any thoughts she might have. She’s got a good eye for this kind of thing.

I’m heading to the Playboy party alone. I would have taken Tiffany, but she said she’d rather have a quiet night alone with an old movie and some friends, which means that my back-up plan of asking Clarie to come with me is off the table too. I guess I could ask Mandy, but something tells me that she’d sooner tear my head off.

I promptly get a reply from Ella Sue: You look dashing! Sean says you need to get a new watch, but I like the style.

I look down at the Lange and Söhne timepiece on my wrist. It’s the only expensive watch I own at the moment. Erin might have set me up with enough money to keep myself comfortable, but I don’t feel the need to splurge on a new watch for every occasion. Claude certainly wouldn’t.

With my outfit down pat, I head out the front door, ready to take my bike out for another spin.

The Playboy Mansion looks just as grandiose in real life as it does on TV. It’s decked out in harsh orange and blue lights, giving the exterior an almost nightclub-like feel. There are a few guys in suits lingering out on the green. A couple hands over their invites and heads into the mansion proper as I pull up by the front, parking my bike between an Aston Martin and a Lamborghini.

I approach the bodyguard by the door, passing him my invitation. I walk forwards, expecting for him to open the door for me, but he instead cuts me off, and I bump into his chest.

“No girl tax means no entry,” he grunts.

“There’s a girl tax?” I ask, confused.

The bodyguard hands me back the invite.

“New policy this year. We’re keeping the gender ratio at least one to one. Each guy’s got to come in with at least one girl.”

“Give me a second,” I mutter, puling out my phone. “Do they need an invite too?”

“Yes,” the bodyguard says.

“Fuck,” I curse under my breath, and I step away from the bodyguard and onto the green.

Who could I get to show up? I try dialling Claire’s number first, because even if she’s hanging out with Tiffany, I think I could convince her to come out tonight. I sit with my phone pressed up against my ear, making brief moments of eye contact with the other guys on the green, suddenly understanding why they’re standing out here too, waiting for the line to connect.

When it doesn’t, I sigh and try again. It doesn’t work the second time either. She must have put her phone away for the movie.

I try dialling Mandy next.

“What’s wrong, you’re not having enough fun with the Playboy Bunnies?” she snarks at me.

“I need you to come out to the party with me,” I say. “This is a chance to follow-up on the lead that Claire and I worked on. We could still flip the script on the Simonds.”

“We’re flipping the script on the them tomorrow,” Mandy laughs.

“Yes, but this way we’ll—” I start to say, when I realise that she’s hung up on me.

Who next? I briefly consider Morgan Merrygold, but I realise that I’d never bothered to collect her number. Besides, she’s probably already got a date for tonight. I scroll through my limited contacts on my phone. I’ve not been the most social person, even after coming out with my public identity as an artist. There aren’t that many names on this list that I could call. My finger hovers over the last option that could work.

“Hanna Maria,” I say, as I hear her picking up on the other end. “Do you have an invite to the Playboy Party tonight? Could I persuade you to come out with me?”

“I do happen to have an invite,” her cool voice answers over the phone. “But after how you treated me at the last party? I think I’ll stick with my husband tonight.”

“I’m sorry about last time,” I say, realising that I’m quickly throwing away this one opportunity that I might have. “That was a mistake, and I promise it won’t happen ever again. You don’t even have to stay for long—there’s just a ‘girl tax’ this year, and…”

“I’m sorry, Claude, but you’re asking me to be your sidepiece just so that you can get yourself into this party?” she asks.

“You’re right, I shouldn’t have asked you,” I say, apologetic. “But… if I could come over and pick up your invitation, you wouldn’t have to come. I could find somebody else to come with me…”

On the other end of the phone, Hanna Maria sighs. It’s a deep, weighty thing, in sharp contrast to those sighs of pleasure she’d had under me just a week ago. It’s a sigh of disappointment.

“I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t like you so much,” she says. “I’ll send somebody over with the invite—you’re at the Mansion right now?”

“Yes, and thank you,” I say, scarcely able to believe my ears.

“Wouldn’t want the invite to go to waste,” she says, and then she hangs up the phone.

Great. Now all I need to do is to find someone who’d be willing to come into this party with me. I watch as a model dressed in a V-neck champagne dress steps out of a chauffeured car, one of the guys on the green smoothly approaching her and throwing an arm around her shoulder. The guy hands the bodyguard two invites and in they go.

My contact list looks as bare this time around as did last time. I groan, wondering if I’m going to have to pick up some random girl off the street, when a name floats to the top of my mind. I don’t have her number, but a quick search on Google later and…

“Hello, this is J at the New York Times speaking,” a tired sounding voice on the other end of the phone says.

“Sounds like you could use a pick-me-up,” I say.

“…” she pauses a moment, trying to place my voice. “Claude Ashworth?”

“I’ve got an extra invite to the Playboy Party tonight. You want to come along with me? You can treat it as work if you want, there’ll be plenty of familiar faces there, but…”

“Of course I want to come! I’d be insane not to!”

“Great,” I smile. “I’ll meet you in front of the mansion whenever you’re ready. Just give me a call.”

Jenny ‘J’ Sterling shows up dressed in a fiery red dress, her light brown hair combed to a soft sweep down her right shoulder.

“You look stunning,” I say, taking her arm.

She laughs a bit at the compliment.

“You should see what I can do when I’ve got more than half an hour’s notice,” she says. “I was busy doing my make-up on the Uber here, so it’s good to know I didn’t mess everything up on the car.”

“You could have fooled me,” I say.

We approach the bodyguard, who this time, takes my two invitations and actually does open up the door.

We step into the Playboy Mansion together and are instantly sucked into the light and sound of the party.