The Real Housewives of Bath-erly Hills

Kyle Richards might quarrel with her, but Camille Grammer could find no quarrel with herself.

In her own surgically lifted eyes, Camille always deserved the best treatment because she never put up with any other – from women, at least – though it was beyond her how a former child actress like Kyle could be so insolent in her wit to a woman of her character, age, and situation. But upon reflection, and after consulting with her makeup artist and three of her four nannies, she realized that only jealousy, that plague upon the feminine half of the populace, could explain Kyle’s incivility, that and only a party could put relations to right, or at least educate Kyle in respectable decorum.

The first invitation went out to Lisa Vanderpump, well known for her wise management of a series of dining establishments in the spa towns of Cheltenham and Bath, as well as her equally wise semi-replacement of her graying husband with a mini Pomeranian. (Ken Vanderpump was no cad, certainly, but saddling a good lady with such an unfortunate last name was almost unforgiveable.)

Upon hearing Camille’s voice on the other end of the line, Lisa suppressed a shudder, then smiled as widely as the Botox would allow.

“What a lovely idea,” she cooed as she waved away Cedric, her permanently shirtless permanent houseguest. “I am excessively diverted. But how has Kyle affronted you this time, darling?”

“I confess I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look or the words, which laid the foundation. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun,” Camille sighed as she looked out the window past the gardens below. “But I do recall her saying something about people only `tolerating’ me because of my famous actor husband, Kelsey.”

“Oh, Camille, darling, do not vex yourself over such a trifle!” Lisa cautioned with her usual good sense. “For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbors, and laugh at them in our turn?” She recognized, after all, that it was not fair to expect Camille to feel how very much she was Kyle’s inferior in talent and all the elegancies of mind. The very want of equality, Lisa reasoned, might prevent Camille’s perception of it.

“Precisely why I thought a little pool party would be most agreeable! I know the sight of myself in a bikini never fails to raise my spirits — as well as those of most of the men around me,” she tittered behind her hand. “We’ll just get the girls together for a few drinks, a few hands of whist, and perhaps you will play the pianoforte?”

“That is so thoughtful, Camille,” Lisa approved as she attempted to wrestle a miniature sombrero onto the tiny and recalcitrant head of her dog.

“Well, Lisa, there is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves! It is not my nature,” Camille sighed at her own munificence.

“Of course, dear. Cheers!”

Camille next dialed the number of Adrienne Maloof, the most exotic and accomplished of her friends, who broke from her kickboxing routine to accept the call, however reluctantly. While certainly one of the more amiable members of society, Adrienne well knew that Camille Grammer was the natural daughter of nobody knows whom, with no settled provision of her own — though she would soon be eligible for a 50-million alimony settlement due to her famous husband’s perfidy — and certainly had no respectable relations. Granted, she had a little beauty and a little accomplishment as an MTV dancer and featured player in a few soft core porn productions, but these honors led most of Adrienne’s set to view Camille with the disdain for the vulgar normally reserved for the Misses Kardashian.

“Oh, Camille,” Adrienne said rather hesitatingly. “Are you quite certain this is the soundest of plans? Angry people are not always wise, you know.” And Camille was, despite her affectless smile, one of the angriest people Adrienne knew. Surely this party would prove once more that vanity working on a weak head produces every sort of mischief.

Camille paused, sensing a polite and cowardly dodge in the offing. Obviously even the incomparable Ms. Maloof was not immune to that most pernicious of female maladies.

“I have no wish to incommode you,” Camille assured her, “but do come.”

Before returning to the kickboxing ring – and breaking her husband’s nose for a third time – Adrienne promised she would at least try to make the engagement, though, privately, she could foresee any number of fortuitous obstacles to this plan.