Kitabı oku: «Lauren Weisberger 5-Book Collection: The Devil Wears Prada, Revenge Wears Prada, Everyone Worth Knowing, Chasing Harry Winston, Last Night at Chateau Marmont», sayfa 24

17

‘Miranda Priestly’s room,’ I answered from my new Parisian office. My four glorious hours that were supposed to constitute a full night’s sleep had been rudely interrupted by a frantic call from one of Karl Lagerfeld’s assistants at six A.M., which is precisely when I’d discovered that all of Miranda’s phone calls were being routed directly to my room for answering. It appeared the entire city and surrounding area knew Miranda stayed here during the shows, and so my phone had been ringing incessantly since the moment I stepped inside. Never mind the two dozen messages that had already been left on the voice mail.

‘Hi, it’s me. How’s Miranda doing? Is everything OK? Did anything go wrong yet? Where is she and why aren’t you with her?’

‘Hey, Em! Thanks for caring. How are you feeling, by the way?’

‘What? Oh, I’m fine. A little weak, but getting better. Whatever. How is she?’

‘Yes, well, I’m fine, too, thanks for asking. Yes, it was a long flight to get here and I haven’t slept for more than twenty minutes at a time since the phone keeps ringing and I’m pretty sure it’s never going to stop, and, oh! I gave a completely impromptu speech – after writing an impromptu speech – to a group of people who wanted Miranda’s company but apparently weren’t interesting enough to warrant it. Looked like a giant fucking idiot, actually, and nearly gave myself a heart attack in the process, but hey, other than that, things are just great.’

‘Andrea! Be serious! I’ve been really worried about everything. There wasn’t a lot of time to prepare for this, and you know that if anything goes wrong over there she’s going to blame me anyway.’

‘Emily. Please don’t take this personally, but I can’t talk to you right now. I just can’t do it.’

‘Why? Is something wrong? How did her meeting go yesterday? Did she get there on time? Do you have everything you need? Are you making sure to wear appropriate clothes? Remember, you’re representing Runway over there, so you always have to look the part.’

‘Emily. I need to hang up now.’

‘Andrea! I’m concerned. Tell me what you’ve been doing.’

‘Well, let’s see. In all the free time I’ve had, I’ve gotten a half-dozen or so massages, two facials, and a few manicures. Miranda and I have really bonded over doing the whole spa thing together. It’s great fun. She’s really trying hard not to be too demanding, says she really wants me to enjoy Paris since it’s such a wonderful city and I’m lucky to be here. So basically we just hang out and have fun. Drink great wine. Shop. You know, the usual.’

‘Andrea! This is really not funny, OK? Now tell me what the hell is going on.’ With every degree more annoyed she sounded, my mood improved a notch.

‘Emily, I’m not sure what to tell you. What do you want to hear? How it’s been so far? Let’s see, I’ve spent most of my time trying to figure out how best to sleep through a phone that won’t stop ringing while simultaneously shoving enough food down my throat between the hours of two and six A.M. to sustain me for the remaining twenty hours. It’s like fucking Ramadan here, Em – no eating during daylight hours. Yeah, you should be really sorry you’re missing this one.’

The other line began blinking and I put Emily on hold. Every time it rang my mind went quickly, uncontrollably, to Alex, wondering if he just might call and say that everything was going to be just fine. I’d called twice on my international cell since I’d arrived and he’d answered both times, but like the expert prank caller I’d been in junior high, I’d hung up the moment I’d heard his voice. It’d been the longest we’d ever gone without talking and I wanted to hear what was going on, but I also couldn’t help feeling like life had gotten significantly simpler since we’d taken a break from the bickering and the guilt-mongering. Still, I held my breath until I heard Miranda’s voice screeching from across the wires.

‘Ahn-dre-ah, when is Lucia due to arrive?’

‘Oh, hello, Miranda. Let me just check the itinerary I have for her. Here it is. Let’s see, it says here that she was flying in directly from the shoot in Stockholm today. She should be at the hotel.’

‘Connect me.’

‘Yes, Miranda, just a moment, please.’

I put her on hold and switched back to Emily. ‘That’s her, hold on.’

‘Miranda? I just found Lucia’s number. I’ll connect you now.’

‘Wait, Ahn-dre-ah. I’ll be leaving the hotel in twenty minutes for the rest of the day. I’ll need some scarves before I return, and a new chef. He should have a minimum of ten years’ experience in mostly French restaurants and be available for family dinners four nights a week and dinner parties twice a month. Now connect me to Lucia.’

I knew I should’ve gotten hung up on the fact that Miranda wanted me to hire her a New York chef from Paris, but all I could focus on was that she was leaving the hotel – without me, and for the entire day. I clicked back to Emily and told her that Miranda needed a new chef.

‘I’ll work on it, Andy,’ she announced while coughing. ‘I’ll do some preliminary screening and then you can talk to a few of the finalists. Just find out if Miranda would like to wait until she gets home to meet them or if she’d prefer if you arranged for a couple to fly there and meet with her now, OK?’

‘You can’t be serious.’

‘Well, of course I’m serious. Miranda hired Cara when she was in Marbella last year. Their last nanny had just quit and she had me fly three finalists to her so she could find someone right away. Just find out, OK?’

‘Sure,’ I muttered. ‘And thanks.’

Just talking about those massages had sounded so good, I decided to book one for myself. There wasn’t an appointment available until early evening, so I called room service in the meantime and ordered a full breakfast. When the butler delivered it to me, I’d already crawled back into one of the plush robes, donned a pair of the matching slippers, and prepared myself to feast on the omelet, croissants, Danishes, muffins, potatoes, cereal, and crepes that arrived smelling so good. After devouring all the food and two cups of tea, I waddled back to the bed I hadn’t really slept in the night before and fell asleep so quickly that I wondered if someone had slipped something in my orange juice.

The massage was the perfect way to top off what had been a blessedly relaxed day. Everyone else was doing my work for me, and Miranda had only called and woken me once – once! – to request that I make her a lunch reservation the following day. This isn’t so bad, I thought, as the woman’s strong hands kneaded my twisted neck muscles. Not a bad perk at all. But just as I started to drift off once again, the cell phone that I’d grudgingly brought along began its persistent ring.

‘Hello?’ I said brightly, as if I weren’t lying naked on a table covered in oil, half-asleep.

‘Ahn-dre-ah. Move my hair and makeup earlier and tell the Ungaro people I can’t make it tonight. I’ll be attending a small cocktail party instead, and I expect you to come with me. Be ready to leave in an hour.’

‘Um, sure, uh, sure,’ I stammered, trying to process the fact that I was actually going somewhere with her. A flashback from yesterday – the last time I was told at the very last minute that I was to go somewhere with her – flooded my brain, and I felt as though I would hyperventilate. I thanked the woman and charged the massage to the room even though I’d made it through only the first ten minutes, and I ran upstairs to figure out how to best maneuver around this newest obstacle. This was getting old. Quickly.

It took just a few minutes to page Miranda’s hair and makeup people (who, incidentally, were different from my own – I was pieced together by an angry-looking woman whose look of despair on seeing me for the first time haunted me still, while Miranda had a pair of gay guys who looked like they stepped directly out of the pages of Maxim) and change her appointment.

‘No problem,’ Julien squealed in a thick French accent. ‘We will be there, how you say? Wearing bells! We clear our schedules this week just in the case that Madame Priestly need us at different times!’

I paged Briget yet again and asked her to deal with the Ungaro people. Time to hit the wardrobe. The sketchbook with all my different ‘looks’ was displayed prominently on the bedside table, just waiting for a lost fashion victim like myself to turn to it for spiritual guidance. I flipped through the headings and subheadings and tried to make sense of it all.

Shows:

1 Daytime

2 Evening

Meals:

1 Breakfast meeting

2 LunchCasual (hotel or bistro)Formal (The Espadon in the Ritz)

3 DinnerCasual (bistro, room service)Midrange (decent restaurant, casual dinner party)Formal (Le Grand Vefour restaurant, formal dinner party)

Parties:

1 Casual (champagne breakfasts, afternoon teas)

2 Stylish (cocktail parties by nonmajor people, book parties, ‘meet for drinks’)

3 Dressy (cocktail parties by major people, anything at a museum or gallery, postshow parties hosted by design team)

Miscellaneous:

1 To and from the airport

2 Athletic events (lessons etc.)

3 Shopping excursions

4 Running errandsTo couture salonsTo upscale shops and boutiquesTo the local food store and/or health and beauty aid

There didn’t appear to be any suggestions for what to wear when one was unable to establish the major-ness or non-major-ness of the hosts. Clearly, there was the opportunity to make a big mistake here: I could narrow the event down to ‘Parties,’ which was a good first step, but at that point things got gray. Was this party going to be a simple number 2, where I’d just pull out something chic, or was it really a 3, in which case I’d better pay attention to choose something from the more elegant choices? There were no instructions for ‘gray area’ or ‘uncertainty,’ but someone had helpfully included a last-minute handwritten note toward the bottom of the table of contents: When in doubt (and you never should be), better to be underdressed in something fabulous than overdressed in something fabulous. Well, OK then, it looked like I now squarely fit into category, party; subcategory, stylish. I turned to the six looks that Lucia had sketched for that specific description and tried to figure out what might look less ridiculous once it was actually on.

After a particularly embarrassing run-in with a feather-covered tank top and patent-leather thigh-high (as in yes, over the knee) boots, I finally selected the outfit on page thirty-three, a flowy patchwork skirt by Roberto Cavalli with a baby-T and a pair of biker-chick black boots by D&G. Hot, sexy, stylish – but not too dressy – without actually making me look like an ostrich, an eighties throwback, or a hooker. What more could you ask for? Just as I was attempting to choose a workable bag, the hair and makeup woman showed up to begin her frowning and disapproving attempts at making me not look half as horrific as she clearly thought I did.

‘Um, could you maybe lighten the stuff under my eyes just a little?’ I asked carefully, desperately trying not disparage her handiwork. It probably would’ve been better to have a go at the makeup myself – especially since I had more supplies and instructions than the NASA scientists commissioned to build the space shuttle – but the Makeup Gestapo showed up like clockwork whether I liked it or not.

‘No!’ she barked, clearly not striving for the same sensitivity as myself. ‘It looks better this way.’

She finished painting on the thick black paint along my bottom lashes and vanished as quickly as she’d arrived; I grabbed my bag (alligator Gucci bowling bag) and headed to the lobby fifteen minutes before our estimated time of departure so I could double-check that the driver was ready. Just as I was debating with Renaud whether Miranda would prefer for us to each take separate cars so she wouldn’t have to speak to me or actually use the same one and risk catching something from sharing a backseat with her assistant, she appeared. She looked me up and down very slowly, her expression remaining completely passive and indifferent. I’d passed! This was the first time since I’d started working there that I hadn’t received a look of all-out disgust or, at the very least, a snarky comment, and all it had taken was a SWAT team of New York fashion editors, a collection of Parisian hair and makeup stylists, and a hefty selection of the world’s finest and most expensive clothing.

‘Is the car here, Ahn-dre-ah?’ She looked stunning in a short, shirred velvet cocktail dress.

‘Yes, Ms Priestly, right this way,’ Monsieur Renaud interrupted smoothly, leading us past a group of what could only be other American fashion editors also there for the shows. A deferential hush fell over the super-hip-looking crowd of über-Clackers when we walked past, Miranda two steps in front me, looking thin and striking and very, very unhappy. I nearly had to run to keep up, even though she was six inches shorter than me, and I waited until she gave me a ‘Well? What the hell are you waiting for?’ look before I ducked into the backseat of the limo after her.

Thankfully the driver appeared to know where he was going, because I’d been paranoid for the past hour that she would turn to me and ask me where the unknown cocktail party was being held. She did turn to me, but she said nothing, choosing instead to chat with B-DAD on her cell phone, repeating over and over that she expected him to arrive with plenty of time to change and have a drink before the big party on Saturday night. He was flying over in his company’s private jet, and they were currently debating whether or not to bring Caroline and Cassidy; since he wouldn’t be returning until Monday, she didn’t want the girls to have to miss a day of school. It wasn’t until we’d actually pulled up in front of a duplex apartment on Boulevard Saint Germain that I wondered what it was exactly that I was supposed to do all night. She’d always been rather good about not abusing Emily or me or any of her staff in public, which indicated – at least on some level – that she knew she was doing it in the first place. So if she couldn’t really order me to fetch her drinks or find her someone on the phone or have something dry-cleaned while we were standing there, what was I to do?

‘Ahn-dre-ah, this party is being hosted by a couple with whom I was friendly when we lived in Paris. They requested that I bring along an assistant to entertain their son, who generally finds these events rather dull. I’m sure the two of you will get along well.’ She waited until the driver opened her door, then she daintily stepped out in her perfect Jimmy Choo pumps. Before I could open my own door, she had climbed the three steps and was already handing her coat to the butler, who was clearly awaiting her arrival. I slumped back into the soft leather seat for just a minute, trying to process this new gem of information she’d so coolly relayed. The hair, the makeup, the rescheduling, the panicked consultation with the style book, the biker-chick boots, were all so I could spend the night babysitting some rich couple’s snot-nosed kid? And a French snot-nosed kid, no less.

I spent three full minutes reminding myself that The New Yorker was now only a couple months away, that my year of servitude was about to pay off, that I could surely make it through one more night of tedium to get my dream job. It didn’t help. All of a sudden, I desperately wanted to curl up on my parents’ couch and have my mom microwave me some tea while my dad set up the Scrabble board. Jill and even Kyle would be visiting, too, with baby Isaac, who would coo and smile when he saw me and Alex would call and tell me he loved me. No one would care that my sweatpants were stained or my toes were frightfully unpedicured or that I was eating a big, fat chocolate éclair. Not a single person would even know that there were fashion shows going on somewhere across the Atlantic, and they sure as hell wouldn’t be interested in hearing about them. But all of that seemed incredibly far away, a lifetime actually, and right now I had to contend with a coterie of people who lived and died on the runway. That, and what was sure to be a screaming, spoiled little boy speaking some French gibberish.

When I finally pulled my scantily-but-stylishly clad self from the limo, the butler was no longer expecting anyone. There was music coming from a live band and the smell of scented candles wafted outside from a window above the small garden. I took a deep breath and reached up to knock, but the door swung open. It’s safe to say that never, ever, in my young life had I been more surprised than I was that night: Christian was smiling back at me.

‘Andy, darling, so glad you could make it,’ he said, leaning in and kissing me full on the mouth – a bit intimate considering my mouth had been hanging wide open in disbelief.

‘What are you doing here?’

He grinned and pushed that ever-present curl off his forehead. ‘Shouldn’t I be asking you the same thing? Because you seem to follow me everywhere I go, I’m going to have to assume you want to sleep with me.’

I blushed and, always the lady, snorted loudly. ‘Yeah, something like that. Actually, I’m not here as a guest, I’m just a very well dressed babysitter. Miranda asked me to come along and didn’t tell me until the last second that I’m supposed to be watching the hosts’ bratty son tonight. So, if you’ll excuse me, I better go make sure he has all the milk and crayons he’ll need.’

‘Oh, he’s just fine, and I’m pretty sure the only thing he’ll be needing tonight is another kiss from his babysitter.’ And he cupped my face in his hands and kissed me again. I opened my mouth to protest, to ask him what the hell was going on, but he took that as enthusiasm and slid his tongue into my mouth.

‘Christian!’ I was hissing quietly, wondering just how quickly Miranda would fire me if she caught me making out with some random guy at one of her own parties. ‘What the hell are you doing? Let go of me!’ I squirmed away, but he just continued to grin that annoyingly adorable smile.

‘Andy, since you seem to be a little slow on the uptake here, this is my house. My parents are hosting this party, and I was clever enough to have them ask your boss to bring you along. Did she tell you I was ten years old, or did you just decide that for yourself?’

‘You’re joking. Tell me you’re joking. Please?’

‘Nope. Fun, right? Since I can’t seem to pin you down any other way, I thought this might work. My stepmother and Miranda used to be friendly when Miranda worked at French Runway – she’s a photographer and does shoots for them all the time – so I just had her tell Miranda that her lonely son wouldn’t mind a little company in the form of one attractive assistant. Worked like a charm. Come on, let’s get you a drink.’ He put his hand on the small of my back and led me toward a massive oak bar in the living room, which currently had three uniformed bartenders administering martinis and glasses of Scotch and elegant flutes of champagne.

‘So, let me just get this straight: I don’t have to babysit for anyone tonight? You don’t have a baby brother or anything like that, do you?’ It was incomprehensible that I had driven to a party with Miranda Priestly and had no responsibilities for the entire night except to hang out with a Hot Smart Writer. Maybe they’d invited me because they were planning to make me dance or sing to entertain the guests, or perhaps they were really short one cocktail waitress and figured I was the easiest last-minute fill-in? Or maybe we were headed to the coat check, where I would relieve the girl who sat there now, looking bored and tired? My mind refused to wrap itself around Christian’s story.

‘Well, I’m not saying you don’t have to babysit at all tonight, because I plan on needing lots and lots of attention. But I think it’ll be a better night than you’d anticipated. Wait right here.’ He kissed me on the cheek and disappeared into the crowd of partygoers, mostly distinguished-looking men and sort of artsy, fashionable women in their forties and fifties, what appeared to be a mix of bankers and magazine people, with a few designers, photographers, and models thrown in for good measure. There was a small, elegant stone patio in the back of the townhouse, all lit by white candles, where a violinist played softly, and I peeked outside. Immediately I recognized Anna Wintour, looking absolutely ravishing in a cream-colored silk slip dress and beaded Manolo sandals. She was talking animatedly to a man I presumed to be her boyfriend, although her giant Chanel sunglasses prevented me from being able to tell if she was amused, indifferent, or sobbing. The press loved to compare the antics and attitudes of Anna and Miranda, but I found it impossible to believe that anyone could be quite as unbearable as my boss.

Behind her stood what I presumed to be a few Vogue editors, eyeing Anna warily and wearily like our own Clackers eye Miranda, and next to them was Donatella Versace.

I sipped my glass of champagne (and I thought I wouldn’t be having any!) and made small talk with an Italian guy – one of the first ugly ones I’d ever met – who spoke in florid prose about his innate appreciation for the female body, until Christian reappeared again.

‘Hey, come with me for a minute,’ he said, once again navigating me smoothly through the crowd. He was wearing his uniform: perfectly faded Diesels, a white T-shirt, a dark sport coat, and Gucci loafers, and he blended into the fashion crowd seamlessly.

‘Where are we going?’ I asked, keeping my eyes peeled for Miranda, who, no matter what Christian said, was still probably expecting me to be banished to the corner, faxing or updating the itinerary.

‘First, we’re getting you another drink, and maybe another for me as well. Then, I’m going to teach you how to dance.’

‘What makes you think I don’t know how to dance? It just so happens that I’m a gifted dancer.’

He handed me another glass of champagne that seemed to appear out of thin air and led me into his parents’ formal living room, which was done in gorgeous shades of deep maroon. A six-piece band was playing hip music, of course, and the couple dozen people under thirty-five had congregated here. As if on cue, the band started playing Marvin Gaye’s ‘Let’s Get It On’ and Christian pulled me against him. He smelled of masculine, preppy cologne, something old-school like Polo Sport. His hips moved naturally to the music, no thinking involved, we just moved together all over the makeshift dance floor, and he sang quietly in my ear. The rest of the room became fuzzy – I was vaguely aware there were others dancing, too, and somewhere someone was making a toast to something, but at that moment the only thing with any definition was Christian. Somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, there was a tiny but insistent reminder that this body against mine was not Alex’s, but it didn’t matter at all. Not now, not tonight.

It was after one when I actually remembered that I was there with Miranda; it had been hours since I’d last seen her, and I was certain she’d forgotten all about me and headed back to the hotel. But when I finally pulled myself away from the couch in his father’s study, I saw her happily chatting with Karl Lagerfeld and Gwyneth Paltrow, all of them apparently oblivious to the fact that they would all be waking up for the Christian Dior show in just a few hours. I was debating whether or not I should approach her when she spotted me.

‘Ahn-dre-ah! Come over here,’ she called, her voice sounding almost merry over the din of the party that had become noticeably more festive in the last few hours. Someone had dimmed the lights, and it was abundantly clear that the partyers who remained had been well taken care of by the smiling bartenders. The annoying way she pronounced my name didn’t even bother me in my warm and fuzzy champagne buzz. And even though I thought the evening couldn’t get any better, she was clearly calling me over to introduce me to her celebrity friends.

‘Yes, Miranda?’ I cooed in my most ingratiating, thank-you-for-bringing-me-to-this-fabulous-place tone. She didn’t even look in my general direction.

‘Get me a Pellegrino and then make sure the driver’s out front. I’m ready to leave now.’ The two women and one man standing next to her snickered, and I felt my face turn bright red.

‘Of course. I’ll be right back.’ I fetched the water, which she accepted without a thank-you, and made my way through the thinning crowd to the car. I considered finding Christian’s parents to thank them but thought better of it and headed straight toward the door, where he was leaning up against the frame with a smugly satisfied expression.

‘So, little Andy, did I show you a good time tonight?’ he slurred just a little bit, and it seemed nothing short of adorable at that moment.

‘It was all right, I suppose.’

‘Just all right? Sounds to me like you wish I would’ve taken you upstairs tonight, huh, Andy? All in good time, my friend, all in good time.’

I smacked him playfully on the forearm. ‘Don’t flatter yourself, Christian. Thank your parents for me.’ And, for once, I leaned over first and kissed him on the cheek before he could do anything else. ‘G’night.’

‘A tease!’ he called, slurring just a little bit more. ‘You’re quite the little tease. Bet your boyfriend loves that about you, doesn’t he?’ He was smiling now, and not cruelly. It was all part of the flirty game for him, but the reference to Alex sobered me for a minute. Just long enough to realize that I’d had a better time tonight than I could remember having had in many years. The drinking and the close dancing and his hands on my back as he pulled me against him had made me feel more alive than in all the months since I’d been working at Runway, months that had been filled with nothing but frustration and humiliation and a body-numbing exhaustion. Maybe this was why Lily did it, I thought. The guys, the partying, the sheer joy of realizing you’re young and breathing. I couldn’t wait to call and tell her all about it.

Miranda joined me in the backseat of the limo after another five minutes, and she even appeared to be somewhat happy. I wondered if she’d gotten drunk but ruled that out immediately: the most I’d ever seen her drink was a sip of this or that, and then only because a social situation demanded it. She preferred Perrier to champagne and certainly a milkshake or a latte to a cosmo, so the chances she was actually drunk right now were slim.

After grilling me about the following day’s itinerary for the first five minutes (luckily I’d thought to tuck a copy in my bag), she turned and looked at me for the first time all evening.

‘Emily – er, Ahn-dre-ah, how long have you been working for me?’

It came out of left field, and my mind couldn’t work fast enough to figure out the ulterior motive for this sudden question. It felt strange to be the object of any question of hers that wasn’t explicitly asking why I was such a fucking idiot for not finding, fetching, or faxing something fast enough. She’d never actually asked about my life before. Unless she remembered the details of our hiring interview – and it seemed unlikely, considering she’d stared at me with utterly blank eyes my very first day of work – then she had no idea where, if anywhere, I’d attended college, where, if anywhere, I lived in Manhattan, or what, if anything, I did in the city in the few precious hours a day I wasn’t racing around for her. And although this question most certainly did have a Miranda element to it, my intuition said that this might, just maybe, be a conversation about me.