Kitabı oku: «Everyone Worth Knowing», sayfa 2

‘What, we need to be celebrating something to drink a little champagne?’ Simon asked, helping himself to a few pieces of the sliced steak their housekeeper had made for the main course. ‘Just thought it would be a nice change. Bette, what are your plans for the rest of the evening?’

‘Penelope’s engagement party. I’m going to have to head there soon, actually. The mothers put the whole thing together before either Avery or Penelope could veto it. At least it’s at some club in Chelsea, though, rather than somewhere on the Upper East Side – I think that was their one concession to their children actually enjoying themselves.’

‘What’s the name of the club?’ Will asked, although there was little chance he knew anything about it if it wasn’t dark, wood-paneled, and filled with cigar smoke.

‘She mentioned it, but I can’t remember. Begins with a B, I think. Here,’ I said, pulling a torn slip of paper from my bag. ‘It’s on Twenty-seventh between Tenth and Eleventh. It’s called—’

‘Bungalow 8,’ they replied in unison.

‘How did you both know that?’

‘Honey, it’s mentioned so often in Page Six that you’d think Richard Johnson owned the damn place,’ Will said.

‘I read somewhere that it was originally modeled after the bungalows at the Beverly Hills Hotel, and that the service is just as good. It’s just a nightclub, but this article described a concierge who will cater to any whim, from ordering in a special kind of rare sushi to arranging for helicopters. There are places that are hot for a few months and then vanish, but everyone agrees that Bungalow 8 has staying power,’ Simon said.

‘I guess sitting at the Black Door on my nights out isn’t really helping my social life,’ I said and pushed my plate away. ‘Do you guys mind if I bail early tonight? Penelope wanted me there before the hordes of Avery’s friends and her family arrive.’

‘Run, Bette, run. Stop only to reapply your lipstick and then run! And it wouldn’t hurt a damn if you found yourself a dashing young gentleman to date,’ Simon declared, as though there would be roomfuls of gorgeous, eligible guys who were just waiting for me to walk into their lives.

‘Or even better, a dashing young bastard to play with for one evening.’ Will winked, only half-kidding.

‘You guys are the best,’ I said, kissing each one’s cheek before gathering my bag and cardigan. ‘You have no compunction whoring out your only niece, do you?’

‘Absolutely none,’ Will announced while Simon shook his head gravely. ‘Go be a good tart and have some fun, for Christ’s sake, will you?’

There was a crowd – three deep and a block long – when the cab pulled up in front of the club, and if it hadn’t been Penelope’s party, I would’ve had the cabbie keep driving. Instead, I plastered on a smile and strolled to the front of the forty-person line, where a giant guy wearing a Secret Service earpiece stood, holding a clipboard.

‘Hi, my name is Bette and I’m with Penelope’s party,’ I said, surveying the line and not recognizing a single face.

He gazed at me blankly. ‘Great, nice to meet you, Penelope. If you could just wait in line like everyone else, we’ll get you inside as quickly as possible.’

‘No, this is Penelope’s party, and I’m her friend. She asked me to be here early, so it’d really be better if I could go in right now.’

‘Uh-huh, that’s great. Listen, just step aside and—’ He placed a hand over his earpiece and appeared to listen intently, nodding his head a few times and studying the line that now looped around the corner.

‘Okay, everyone,’ he announced, his voice causing immediate silence among the barely dressed would-be partiers. ‘We’re already at capacity right now, as determined by the FDNY. We’ll only be letting people in as others leave, so either get comfortable or come back later.’

Groans all around. Well, this simply isn’t going to work, I thought. He must not understand the situation.

‘Excuse me? Sir?’ He peered at me once again, now visibly annoyed. ‘You’ve obviously got a lot of people waiting to go in, but it’s my friend’s engagement party, and she really needs me there. If you only knew her mother, then you’d understand how imperative it is that I get inside.’

‘Mmm. Interesting. Look, I don’t care if your friend Penelope’s marrying Prince William. There’s no way I can let anyone else in right now. We’d be in violation of the fire code, and you certainly don’t want that.’ He backed off a bit. ‘Just hang out in line and we’ll get you in as soon as possible, okay?’ I think he was aiming for soothing, but it only served to incense me more. He looked vaguely familiar, although I wasn’t sure why. His faded green T-shirt was tight enough to show that he was quite capable of keeping people out if he so desired, but the slightly baggy, faded jeans that hung low on his hips suggested he didn’t take himself too seriously. Just as I was conceding that he had the best hair I’d ever seen on a guy – longish, dark, thick, and annoyingly shiny – he shrugged on a gray corduroy jacket and managed to look even cuter still.

Definitely a model. I restrained myself from announcing something super-snotty about what a power trip this must be for someone who most likely hadn’t made it past seventh grade, and skulked to the back of the line. As repeated attempts to call both Penelope’s and Avery’s cell phones went straight to voice mail, and the front-door goon was only allowing in an average of two people every ten minutes, I stood there for the better part of an hour. I was fantasizing about the many ways I could humiliate or otherwise harm the bouncer when Michael and his girlfriend slinked outside and lit cigarettes a few feet from the door.

‘Michael!’ I shrieked, aware of how absolutely pathetic I sounded, but not really caring. ‘Michael, Megu, over here!’

They both looked over the hordes of people and spotted me, which probably wasn’t hard considering I was screaming and waving with zero dignity. They waved me over, and I practically ran to them.

‘I need to get inside already. I’ve been standing outside this goddamn hellhole forever, and that guy won’t let me in. Penelope’s going to kill me!’

‘Hey, Bette, great to see you, too,’ Michael said, leaning over to kiss my cheek.

‘Sorry,’ I said, hugging first him and then his girlfriend, Megu, the sweet Japanese med student with whom he now shared an apartment. ‘How are you guys? How on earth did you both get out for this?’

‘It happens like once every six months.’ Megu smiled, taking hold of Michael’s hand and tucking it behind her back. ‘The schedule just falls into alignment for one twelve-hour period when I’m not on call and he’s not at work.’

‘And you came here? What, are you crazy? Megu, you’re a really good sport. Michael, do you realize what a girl you have here?’

‘Sure do,’ he said, gazing at her adoringly. ‘She knows Penelope would kill me, too, if we didn’t make an appearance, but I think we’re out. I’ve got to be at work in, oh, let’s see, four hours now, and Megu was hoping to sleep for a full six-hour block of time for the first time in a few weeks, so we’re going to bail. It looks like people are headed inside now.’

I turned to see a massive exchange of gorgeous people: one crowd surged outside, apparently on their way to a ‘real’ party in TriBeCa, and another seeped in through the door when the bouncer lifted the velvet rope.

‘I thought you said I was next on the list,’ I said flatly to the bouncer.

‘Feel free to visit Princess Penelope,’ he told me, sweeping expansively with one arm and adjusting his earpiece to hear what I’m sure was crucial information with the other.

‘See, there you go,’ Michael said, pulling Megu out into the street with him. ‘Call me this week and let’s grab a drink. Bring Penelope – I didn’t get a chance to even talk to her tonight, and it’s been forever since we all caught up. Tell her I said good-bye.’ And they were gone, undoubtedly thrilled they’d managed to escape.

I turned around and saw that there were only a few people loitering on the sidewalk, talking on cell phones, apparently indifferent to whether they went inside. Just like that, the crowd had evaporated, and I was finally being granted entry.

‘Gee, thanks. You were extraordinarily helpful,’ I said to the bouncer, brushing past his massive frame and walking through the velvet rope he held open. I yanked open the giant glass door and stepped into a dark foyer, where Avery was talking very closely to a very pretty girl with very big breasts.

‘Hi, Bette, where have you been all night?’ he said, immediately moving toward me and offering to take my coat. In the same second Penelope bounded over, looking flushed and then relieved. She was wearing a short black cocktail dress topped with a sequined shrug and extraordinarily high-heeled silver sandals, and I knew immediately that her mother had dressed her.

‘Bette!’ she hissed, grabbing my arm and leading me away from Avery, who immediately resumed his intense conversation with the girl. ‘What took you so long? I’ve been suffering alone all night.’

I raised my eyebrows and looked around. ‘Alone? There must be two hundred people here. All these years, and I didn’t know you had two hundred friends. This is quite the party!’

‘Yeah, really impressive, right? Exactly five of the people in this room are here to see me: my mother, my brother, one of the girls from the real-estate department, my father’s secretary, and now you. Megu and Michael left, right?’ I nodded. ‘The rest are Avery’s, of course. And my mother’s friends. Where have you been?’ She took a gulp of her drink and passed the glass to me with slightly shaking hands, as though it were a pipe and not a champagne flute.

‘Honey, I’ve been here for over an hour, as promised. Had a bit of trouble at the door.’

‘You didn’t!’ She looked horrified.

‘I did. Very cute bouncer, but a total creep.’

‘Oh, Bette, I’m so sorry! Why didn’t you call me?’

‘I did, a few dozen times, but I guess you couldn’t hear your phone. Listen, don’t worry about it. Tonight’s your night, so try and, well, uh, enjoy it?’

‘Let’s get you a drink,’ she said, pulling a cosmopolitan from a circling waiter’s tray. ‘Do you believe this party?’

‘It’s crazy. How long has your mother been planning this?’

‘She read in Page Six weeks ago that Gisele and Leo were seen “canoodling” here, so I guess she called and booked it right after that. She keeps telling me that these are the kinds of places I should be patronizing because of their “exclusive clientele.” I didn’t tell her that the one time Avery dragged me here the clientele was basically having sex on the dance floor.’

‘It probably would’ve only encouraged her more.’

‘True.’ A model-tall woman wedged herself between us and began air-kissing Penelope in a manner so insincere I actually cringed, gulped my cosmo, and sneaked away. I got pulled into some inane conversation with a few people from the bank who’d just arrived and who looked a little shell-shocked to be away from their computers, and I chatted as briefly as possible with Penelope’s mother, who immediately referenced both the Chanel suit and the heels she was wearing and then pulled Penelope by the arm to another cache of people. I surveyed the designer-clad crowd and tried not to shrink in my outfit, which had been purchased online from a combination of J. Crew and Banana Republic at three in the morning a few months ago. Will had been particularly insistent lately that I needed ‘going out’ clothes, but the catalog orders were not what he had in mind. I got the feeling that any of these people could – and would – feel perfectly comfortable roaming around naked. Even better than the clothes (which were perfect) was the confidence, and that came from somewhere else entirely. Two hours and three cosmos later, certifiably tipsy, I was considering going home. Instead, I grabbed another drink and ducked outside.

The line to get in had cleared up entirely; only the bouncer who’d held me in club purgatory for so long remained. I was preparing my snide remarks should he address me in any way whatsoever, but he just grinned and returned his attention to the paperback he was reading, which looked like a matchbook in his massive hands. Shame he was so cute – but jerks always are.

‘So, what was it about me that you didn’t like?’ I couldn’t help myself. Five years in the city and I’d tried to avoid places with doormen or velvet ropes unless absolutely necessary; I’d inherited at least a bit of my parents’ egalitarian self-righteousness – or intense insecurity, depending on how you looked at it.

‘Pardon?’

‘I mean, when you wouldn’t let me in before, even though it’s my best friend’s engagement party.’

He shook his head and half-smiled to himself. ‘Look, it’s nothing personal. They hand me a list and tell me to follow it and do crowd control. If you’re not on the list or you show up when a hundred other people do, I have to keep you outside for a little while. There’s really nothing more to it.’

‘Sure.’ I’d all but missed my best friend’s big night because of his door policy. I teetered a bit and then hissed, ‘Nothing personal. Right.’

‘You think I need your attitude tonight? I’ve got plenty of people who are far more expert at giving me a really fucking hard time, so why don’t we just stop talking and I’ll put you in a cab?’

Perhaps it was the fourth cosmo – liquid courage – but I wasn’t in the mood to deal with his condescending attitude, so I turned on my too-chunky heels and yanked the door open. ‘I hardly need your charity. Thanks for nothing,’ I snapped and marched back inside the club as soberly as I could manage.

I hugged Penelope, air-kissed Avery, and then beelined to the door before anyone else could initiate any more small talk. I saw a girl crouched in a corner, sobbing quietly but with a pleased awareness that others were watching, and sidestepped a strikingly stylish foreign couple who were making out furiously, and with much hip grinding. I then made a big show of ignoring the meathead bouncer who, incidentally, was reading from a tattered paperback version of Lady Chatterley’s Lover (sex fiend!) and threw my arm in the air to hail a cab. Only the street was completely empty, and a cold drizzle had just begun, practically guaranteeing that a taxi was nowhere in my immediate future.

‘Hey, you need some help?’ he asked after opening the velvet rope to admit three squealing, tottering girls. ‘This is a tough street for cabs when it rains.’

‘No thanks, I’m just fine.’

‘Suit yourself.’

Minutes were starting to feel like hours, and the warm summer sprinkles had rapidly become a cold, persistent rain. What, exactly, was I proving here? The bouncer had pressed himself against the door to get some protection from the overhang and was still reading calmly, as though unaware of the hurricane that now whipped around us. I continued to stare at him until he looked up, grinned, and said, ‘Yeah, you seem to be doing just fine on your own. You’re definitely teaching me a lesson by not taking one of these huge umbrellas and walking a couple blocks over to Eighth, where you’ll have no trouble getting a cab at all. Great call on your part.’

‘You have umbrellas?’ I asked before I could stop myself. The water had soaked entirely through my shirt and I could feel my blanket-thick hair sticking to my neck in wet, cold clumps.

‘Sure do. Keep ’em right here for situations just like this. But I’m sure you wouldn’t be interested in taking one of them, right?’

‘Right. I’m just fine.’ To think I’d almost begun warming up to him. Just then a livery cab drove by, and I had the brilliant idea to call UBS’s car service for a ride home.

‘Hi, this is Bette Robinson with account number six-three-three-eight. I need a car to pick me up at—’

‘All booked!’ barked back an angry-sounding female dispatcher.

‘No, I don’t think you understand. I have an account with your company and—’

Click.

I stood there soaking wet, anger boiling inside me.

‘No cars, huh? Tough,’ he said, clucking sympathetically without looking up from the book. I’d managed to skim Lady Chatterley’s Lover when I was twelve and had already gleaned as much about sex as possible from the combination of Forever, Wifey and What’s Happening to My Body? Book for Girls, but I didn’t remember anything about it. Perhaps that had to do with a poor memory, or maybe it was the fact that sex hadn’t even been a part of my consciousness for the last two years. Or maybe it was that the plots of my beloved romance novels crowded my thoughts at all times. Whatever it was, I couldn’t even recall something snide to say about it, never mind clever. ‘No cars.’ I sighed. ‘Just not my night.’

He took a few steps out in the rain and handed me a long executive’s umbrella, already unfurled, with the club’s logo emblazoned on both sides. ‘Take it. Walk to Eighth, and if you still can’t get a cab, talk to the doorman at Serena, Twenty-third between Seventh and Eighth. Tell him I sent you, and he’ll work it out.’

I considered walking right past him and getting on the subway, but the idea of riding around in a train car at one in the morning was hardly appealing. ‘Thanks,’ I mumbled, refusing to meet what would surely be his gloating eyes. I took the umbrella and started walking east, feeling him watch me from behind.

Five minutes later, I was tucked in the backseat of a big yellow taxi, wet but finally warm.

I gave the driver my address and slumped back, exhausted. At this hour, cabs were good for two things and two things only: making out with someone on your way home from a good night out or catching up with multiple people in three-minute-or-less cell-phone conversations. Since neither was an option, I rested my wet hair on the patch of filthy vinyl where so many greasy, unwashed, oiled, lice-ridden, and generally unkempt heads had rested before mine, closed my eyes, and anticipated the sniffling, hysterical welcome I would soon receive from Millington. Who needed a man – or even a newly engaged best friend – when you had a dog?

3

The week following Penelope’s engagement party was nearly unbearable. It was my fault, of course: there are many ways to piss off your parents and rebel against your entire upbringing without enslaving yourself in the process, but I was clearly too stupid to find them. So instead I sat inside my shower-sized cubicle at UBS Warburg – as I had every day for the past fifty-six months – and death-gripped the phone, which was currently discolored by a layer of Maybelline Fresh Look foundation (in Tawny Blush) and a few splotches of L’Oreal Wet Shine lip gloss (in Rhinestone Pink). I wiped it off as best I could while pressing the receiver to my ear and rubbed my grubby fingers clean underneath the desk chair. I was being berated by a ‘minimum,’ someone who only invests the million-dollar minimum with my division and is therefore excruciatingly demanding and detail-oriented in a way that forty-million-dollar clients never are.

‘Mrs Kaufman, I truly understand your concern over the market’s slight decline, but let me assure you that we have everything under control. I realize your nephew the interior decorator thinks your portfolio is top-heavy with corporate bonds, but I assure you our traders are excellent, and always looking out for your best interests. I don’t know if a thirty-two percent annual gain is realistic in this economic environment, but I’ll have Aaron give you a call as soon as he gets back to his desk. Yes. Of course. Yes. Yes. Yes, I will absolutely have him call you the moment he returns from the meeting. Yes. Certainly. Of course. Yes. Naturally. Yes. A pleasure hearing from you, as always. All right, then. Bye-bye.’ I waited until I heard the click on her end and then slammed down the phone.

Nearly five years and I’d yet to utter the word no, as apparently you need to have at least seventy-two months’ experience before being qualified to go there. I went to send Aaron a quick email begging him to return Mrs Kaufman’s call so she would finally stop stalking me and was surprised to see that he was back at his desk, busily blast-emailing us his daily inspirational bullshit.

Good morning, folks. Let’s remember to show our clients our high energy levels! Our relationships with these good folks comprise our whole business – they appreciate our patience and consideration as much as our results-oriented portfolio handling. I’m pleased to announce a new weekly group meeting, one that I hope will allow us all to brainstorm ways we may better serve our clients. It will be held each Friday at 7 a.m. and will provide us with an opportunity to think outside the box. Breakfast is on me, folks, so bring yourselves and your thinking caps and remember, ‘Great discoveries and improvements invariably involve the cooperation of many minds.’ – Alexander Graham Bell.

I stared at the email so long my eyes began to glaze over. Were his insistence on using the word folks and his constant references to ‘thinking outside the box’ more or less annoying than his inclusion of the phrase thinking caps? Did he craft and send these emails just to add to the all-pervasive misery and hopelessness of my days? I pondered this for a few moments, desperate to think about anything other than the seven A.M. meeting announcement. I managed to move beyond it long enough to field another frantic call, this time from Mrs Kaufman’s nephew, that lasted a record fifty-seven minutes, ninety percent of which he spent accusing me of things that were entirely beyond my control while I said nothing or, occasionally, just to switch things up, agreed with him that I was, in fact, as dumb and useless as he claimed.

I hung up and resumed staring listlessly at the email. I wasn’t exactly sure how Mr Bell’s quote applied to my life or why I should care, but I did know if I planned to escape for lunch, now was my only chance. I’d abided by the no-leaving-for-lunch policy my first few years at UBS Warburg and dutifully ordered in each day, but lately Penelope and I had brazenly begun sneaking out for ten, twelve minutes a day to retrieve our own takeout and cram in as much whining and gossip as possible. An IM popped up on my screen.

P.Lo: Ready? Let’s do falafel. Meet at the 52nd Street cart in five?

I punched in the letter Y, hit Send, and draped my suit jacket over the back of my chair to indicate my presence. One of the managers glanced at me when I picked up my purse, so I filled my mug with steaming coffee as additional proof that I hadn’t left the premises and placed it in the middle of my desk. I mumbled something about the bathroom to my fellow cubicle dwellers, who were too busy transferring their own facial grime to their telephones to even notice, and walked confidently toward the hallway. Penelope worked in the real-estate division two floors above me and was already in the elevator, but like two well-trained CIA operatives, we didn’t so much as glance at each other. She let me exit first and circle the lobby for a minute while she ducked outside and casually strolled past the fountain. I followed as best I could in my ugly, uncomfortable heels, the humidity hitting my face like a wall. We didn’t speak until we’d blended into the line of midtown office drones who stood both quietly and restlessly, wanting to savor their few precious minutes of daily freedom but instinctively getting pissy and frustrated at having to wait for anything.

‘What are you having?’ Penelope asked, her eyes scanning the three different carts of sizzling and highly aromatic ethnic food that men in varying costumes and facial hair were steaming, slicing, sautéing, skewering, frying, and heaving toward the hungry suits.

‘It’s all some sort of meat on a stick or dough-filled something,’ I said tonelessly, surveying the smoky meats. ‘Does it matter?’

‘Someone’s in a great mood today.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot, I should be thrilled that five years of slave labor have turned out so well. I mean, look at us, how glamorous is this?’ I waved my arms expansively in front of us. ‘It’s sad enough we don’t get to go out to lunch at some point in the middle of a sixteen-hour workday, but it’s fucking pathetic that we aren’t even permitted to pick out our food ourselves.’

‘This is nothing new, Bette. I don’t know why you’re getting so stressed about it now.’

‘Just a particularly lousy day. If it’s possible to distinguish one from the next.’

‘Why? Anything happen?’

I wanted to say ‘Two rings?’ but restrained myself as an overweight woman wearing a skirt suit worse than mine and a pair of white leather Reeboks over her tights spilled hot sauce down the front of her embroidered, ruffled blouse. I saw myself in ten years and nearly lurched forward with queasiness.

‘Of course nothing happened, that’s the whole point!’ I all but screamed. Two blond guys who looked fresh off the Princeton eating club path turned and looked at me curiously. I thought about composing myself for a minute since, well, they were both really cute, but I soon remembered that these obscenely hot lacrosse players were not only way too young, but most likely also had obscenely gorgeous girlfriends eight years my junior.

‘Seriously, Bette, I don’t know what you’re looking for. I mean, it’s a job, right? It’s still work. It doesn’t matter what you do, it’s never going to be like sitting at the country club all day long, you know? Sure, it sucks to spend every waking minute at work. And I don’t exactly adore finance, either – I never fantasized about working at a bank – but it’s just not that bad.’

Penelope’s parents had tried to push her toward a position at Vogue or Sotheby’s as the final finishing school in the pursuit of her Mrs degree, but when she’d insisted on joining the rest of us in corporate America, they’d acquiesced – it was certainly possible to find a husband while working in finance, as long as she kept her priorities straight, didn’t display any overt ambition, and quit immediately after the wedding. Truth be told, though, while she whined and complained about the job, I think she actually liked it.

She handed over a ten-dollar bill to cover both of our ‘kebab’ plates, and my eyes were drawn to her hand like a magnet. Even I had to admit the ring was gorgeous. I said as much, for the tenth time, and she beamed. It was hard to be upset about the engagement when she was so obviously giddy. Avery had even stepped it up since the proposal and had managed to impersonate a real, caring fiancé, which of course had made her even happier. He’d met her after work so they could go home together, and had even brought her breakfast in bed. More important, he had refrained from clubbing, his favorite pastime, for a full three weeks now, the only exception being last week’s soiree in their honor. Penelope didn’t mind that Avery wanted to spend as much time as humanly possible wedged in between banquettes – or dancing on them – but she wanted no part of it. On the nights he was out with friends from his consulting firm, Penelope and I would sit at the Black Door, dive-bar extraordinaire, with Michael (when he was available), drinking beer and wondering why anyone would want to be anywhere else. But someone must’ve clued Avery in that while it’s acceptable to leave your girlfriend home six nights a week, ditching your fiancée is different, so he’d made a concerted effort to cut back. I knew it would never last.

We retraced our steps to the building and sneaked back into the office with only a single dirty look from the rule-abiding UBS shoe-shine guy (who, incidentally, was also forbidden to leave during lunch in case a pair of wing tips desperately needed a spit-shine between one and two P.M.). Penelope followed me back to my cubicle and planted herself on the chair that was theoretically for guests and clients, although I’d yet to host either.

‘So, we set a date,’ she said breathlessly, digging into the fragrant plate she balanced on her lap.

‘Oh, yeah? When?’

‘Exactly one year from next week. August tenth, on Martha’s Vineyard, which seems appropriate since that’s where it all began. We’ve been engaged for a few weeks, and already our mothers are going berserk. I seriously don’t know how I’m going to put up with them.’

Avery’s and Penelope’s families had been vacationing together since the two were toddlers. There were scads of photos of the whole lot of them sporting grosgrain flip-flops and cheap-chic L.L. Bean monogrammed totes in Martha’s Vineyard during the summer and Stubbs and Wootton slippers during ski vacations in the Adirondacks each year. She’d gone to Nightingale and he’d been at Collegiate and both of them had spent a good chunk of their respective childhoods being paraded around by their socialite mothers to various benefits and parties and weekend polo matches. Avery embraced it, threw himself on every junior committee of every foundation that asked, went out six nights a week with his parents’ unlimited line of credit, and was one of those New York-born-and-bred kids who knew everyone, everywhere. Much to her parents’ chagrin, Penelope had no interest whatsoever. She repeatedly rejected the whole circuit, preferring to spend all her time with a group of misfit artist types on scholarship, the kind of kids who gave Penelope’s mother night sweats. Avery and Penelope had never really been close – and certainly not remotely romantic – until Avery had graduated high school a year before her and headed to Emory. According to Penelope, who’d always harbored an intense secret crush on Avery, he’d been one of the most popular kids in school, the charming, athletic soccer player who got adequate grades and was hot enough to get away with being really, really arrogant. From what I could tell, she’d always blended into the background, like all exotically pretty girls do at an age when only blond hair and big boobs count, spending a lot of time getting good grades and trying desperately not to get noticed. And it worked, at least until Avery came back for summer break after his freshman year in college, looked across the hot tub at their families’ shared house in the Vineyard, and saw everything about Penelope that was long and graceful and gorgeous – her doe-like limbs and her stick-straight black hair and the eyelashes that framed her enormously wide brown eyes.