Chasing Harry Winston (36 page)

“A husband? A baby? Some sort of life?” Emmy asked. “Any of those on the menu?”

He backed away from the table slowly, like she was a wild animal. “I, uh, I’ll be back to check on you. Enjoy,” he mumbled as he bolted.

“Christ, Emmy, get ahold of yourself. You’re scaring people,” Adriana admonished, although she secretly found the whole thing extremely entertaining.

Emmy sighed. “What else is new?”

“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking this past week,” Leigh said, looking across the table at her friends. Adriana thought this inauspicious. Leigh’s “thinking” almost always resulted in the type of decision that only made her unhappier. Adriana prepared herself for the sentence that would surely begin, “I’m thinking I should…”

“I’m thinking I should go back to school,” she said quietly.

“What?” Adriana screeched. Where could this possibly be stemming from? School? “Why on earth would you do that?”

Leigh smiled. “Because I’ve always wanted to,” she said.

“You have?” Emmy asked.

Leigh nodded. “For an MFA in creative writing. I wanted to go right after graduation—remember?—but my dad got me that assistant job at Brook Harris, and kept saying that no good editor—or writer for that matter—needed an advanced degree, that the best thing I could do for my career was to get started on it.” She laughed bitterly. “What we both failed to consider was that this wasn’t the career I wanted.”

“But, Leigh, sweetheart, you’re so good at it! Just seconds away from a huge promotion, working with a huge bestselling author—”

Leigh interrupted Emmy. “Worked with. Past tense.”

Adriana sighed. Leigh could be so dramatic sometimes! “Just because you had sex with him does not mean you can’t edit him, Leigh. If every single person refused to work with someone they’d slept with, the entire world economy would shut down.”

“I agree,” Leigh said. “We probably could’ve gotten over it. And god knows Henry wouldn’t have cared, so long as that manuscript was in on time. I just meant it was past tense because I quit already. Yesterday.”

“Stop it!” Emmy shouted. A group of middle-aged tourists turned to stare at them. “You’re joking,” she whispered.

“How come you didn’t tell me yesterday, when we were shopping?” Adriana asked, gripping Leigh’s arm. “Did you just forget to mention it?”

“I needed some time to process it. I told Henry that I wasn’t in any rush, I’d stay as long as it took for a seamless transition, but that I was definitely leaving.”

“Ohmigod,” Emmy breathed.

“How did he take it?” Adriana asked. She she couldn’t help being the teensiest bit upset that Leigh had upstaged her. After all, she had her own exciting news to announce.

“He was pretty surprised. Said he’d been getting bizarre calls from Jesse for weeks saying that he had done something—an unnamed something—that had probably made me uncomfortable, that it was entirely his fault, that it would never happen again, and apparently begged Henry not to hand him over to another editor.”

“Well, that was nice of him. You don’t think Henry knows, do you?” Emmy asked.

“No. From what he said, it sounds like he thinks Jesse came on to me in some way, made me uncomfortable, and I freaked. Figures that’s why I don’t want to work with him anymore, and he even tried to tell me that the occasional pervy author was part of the deal, a hazard of the trade or whatever.” Leigh laughed ruefully and took a sip of tea. “I wonder what he’d think if he knew I practically dragged Jesse to bed?”

“
Querida,
I can’t believe you actually quit your job! What’s your game plan?”

“Guess what? For the first time in my entire life, I don’t really know.” Leigh refilled her teacup and didn’t appear too concerned. “I want to take some time off, not rush into anything, maybe travel a little before hopefully starting school this fall. I haven’t really figured it all out, but I’ll probably have to sell my apartment and”—she paused for a minute and turned to Emmy—“find a roommate? No pressure, Em, I swear, but I know you hate your place and have been talking about moving forever, so no need to answer now, but maybe we could find a cute two-bedroom together somewhere?”

Leigh was ruining everything! Adriana had a whole plan. She had been so excited to tell Emmy about it, and now Leigh was screwing it all up. She tried to interject. “Well, guess what? I have something—”

“Ohmigod, are you kidding?” Emmy was practically shrieking. “I would love that. Love, love, love it. I can’t stand that fucking studio for one more second. I’ll move anywhere. Anywhere! My only requirement is an oven. And a stove. That should be manageable, right? Just say the word.”

“Done!” Leigh said. “Let’s start looking right away. I’m ready to move as soon as my place sells.”

“Hellooooo? Do you two hear me? Hello!” Adriana said, a bit more peevishly than she intended. “I have something that might be of interest to you both.”

The girls turned and looked at her expectantly.

“So, nothing’s finalized yet—and I probably shouldn’t even be saying anything—but I will most likely be moving to Los Angeles.”

That silenced them. It was satisfying to watch Leigh gasp and Emmy’s mouth drop open.
What’s a girl got to do to get a little attention around here?
Adriana thought.

“What?”

“Why?”

“Is it Toby?”

“Are you moving in with him?”

“Do your parents know?”

“Is it definite?”

“Are you getting married?”

This was absolutely delicious, better even than she had hoped. She sighed dramatically. “Okay, okay, I’ll tell you everything. Just calm down.” By which she meant, of course,
Keep firing questions at me, I love it!
Happily, her friends obliged, and Adriana reveled in their curiosity until she got to utter the words she never thought she’d hear herself say, words that made her prouder and more excited than she could possibly have imagined.

“I have a job offer, and I plan to accept it,” she said and sat back to relish her friends’ reactions. It was so delicious springing exciting news on her unsuspecting friends. How else could you get them to pay attention?

“A what?” Leigh asked with a puzzled expression.

“What, exactly, do you mean by ‘job’?” Emmy asked, looking equally confused.

“Oh, come on! What do you think I mean?” This was exasperating! Was it really so impossible to imagine her with a job just because she’d never kept one before? Puh-lease. The whole world worked; she was sure she could handle it, too.

“Okay, Adi, don’t make us beg for it. Give us the rundown,” Leigh said, leaning forward over the table.

Adriana took a deep, dramatic breath. So kill her for wanting to enjoy this! It wasn’t every day Adriana de Souza was taken seriously. “Let’s see, the CliffsNotes version is fairly straightforward. You already know about the
Marie Claire
column?”

Both girls nodded.

“Well, we were out to dinner the other night with some of Toby’s colleagues at Paramount. He was bragging about my columns getting picked up—you should’ve seen it, he was absolutely adorable—and one of the women, a producer of some sort, started acting all interested. She kept asking all these questions about me, the columns, how
Marie Claire
found me, when the first one was getting published…and like a million others. I sort of thought she was just being polite, but she called the next day and told me that she was interested in—are you ready for this?—developing my ideas into a movie!”

“Ohmigod,” Emmy breathed.

Leigh looked dumbstruck. “No way. No, no, no way!”

Adriana nodded happily. “Yes, yes, yes! I e-mailed her the samples I’d submitted to
Marie Claire
and she called back later that very same day. Said she wanted to preempt anyone else and start working on it before the first column actually gets published and, in her words, ‘inevitably becomes a phenomenon.’ She called me the next Candace Bushnell.”

“Shut up!” her friends called out simultaneously.

“I’m completely serious.”

Leigh leaned even closer; she was practically pressing her face against Adriana’s. “So what does that mean? What will you do for her?”

“I didn’t totally understand, either, but Toby said that the first step is to get an agent—he’s recommending someone good—and then they’ll negotiate a consulting contract on my behalf. The producer has a deal with Paramount and a trailer on their lot, and she’s going to pair me with a screenwriter to work on developing a script. If everything goes through, I’ll be moving in the next two months.”

What she hadn’t told her friends was that the producer was fine with her working from New York—had expected it, even—and that it was entirely her choice to move to LA. It was just time for a change. Adriana had been in New York since the day she’d graduated, and she knew she’d move back sooner than later. If she didn’t try living somewhere else now, it might never happen. Plus, the idea of getting even farther away from her parents and their meddling restrictions was immensely appealing.

“Adriana, that is so incredible. Incredible. Congratulations!” Leigh said as she pushed herself up from the table and went to hug her friend.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Adriana asked Emmy, who had begun tearing up.

“Sorry,” she sniffled. “I really am so happy for you. I just can’t believe you’re going to move.”

“
Querida!
You went first, remember? Culinary school in Cali? As if there aren’t perfectly good schools on the East Coast. But you came back, and I will, too. Besides, I have something that might make you feel better.”

“What?” Emmy asked. She said it petulantly, like a stubborn, curious child.

“I think you’re really, really going to like it.”

“What? Tell me! What?”

“Well, I was wondering if you wouldn’t want to live in my apartment while I’m gone. And”—she paused dramatically and turned to Leigh, who was just staring at her—“you, too,
querida
. I didn’t realize you two were planning to live together, but what could be more perfect than my place? I spoke to my parents and they were thrilled about Emmy staying there, and I’m sure they’ll love it even more if you’d both be there. Three bedrooms, rent-free, of course, with only two caveats: You have to send them their mail wherever they are once a week, and you have to deal with their occasional visit to New York. Which should be significantly less frequent since I won’t be here. What do you both think?”

“Gee, I don’t know,” Leigh said. “Sounds like a shitty deal to me.”

“Yeah, seriously. Fucking miserable. A free three-bedroom, its only responsibility a once-weekly trip to the post office. Christ, Adriana, how could you even suggest it?”

“Please,
querida
! The post office? Uch! We have an arrangement with UPS; they come to the apartment, pick up the mail bundle, package it, and ship it. You’ll only need to collect it from the lobby mailbox,” Adriana said in her best isn’t-it-obvious voice.

Leigh slammed her hands against the table. “Holy shit, it just occurred to me. The penthouse means the top floor.”

“Stating the obvious, Leigh,” Adriana said.

“And the top floor means no one banging on the ceiling! Ohmigod!” she started to laugh and cry at the same time. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited about anything in my entire life!”

Emmy made a dramatic show of raising her arms and staring at the ceiling. “Penthouse A, here we come!”

“And you, Adriana?” Leigh asked. “Where, my dear, are you going to live while Emmy and I sleep in blissful nonclomping silence? Do I sense some cohabitation in your immediate future?”

Adriana smiled. This might be the best part of all. “Well, Toby did ask me to move in with him,” she said as the girls clapped, “and while things are going really well with us—surprisingly well, actually—I think that’s even more reason not to jump into anything.” She stopped, sipped her tea, and pretended to ponder something. “So…I’m going to take the money I’ll earn from the consultant project and the columns and rent my very own little apartment in Venice Beach. Just a little studio, as close to the beach as possible. Near the farmers’ market, I think.”

Emmy turned to Leigh and sighed. “Leigh, do you believe it? Our little girl is growing up. Doing everything all on her own!”

Adriana held up her hands for silence. “Not so fast,
querida
. I do have one favor to ask of you, and it’s a big one.” She could feel herself tense up, praying that Emmy would say yes.

Emmy peered at her with curiosity. “A big one, huh? Bigger than Penthouse A? Hit me, Adi.”

“I was hoping you might let me, uh, borrow Otis for the year? Oh, Emmy, I know he’s your pet, and I know it’s crazy to drag the poor thing across the country, but we’ve just bonded so much these past few weeks. In a weird way—and please don’t laugh at me for this—I think of him as my good-luck charm. My life just sort of fell into place when he arrived. Would you mind terribly?” Adriana knew Emmy wouldn’t mind—would in fact be ecstatic that she wanted to keep him—but there was no harm in letting Emmy think she was pulling one over on her, right? It was a small gift for a best friend.

“Hmm,” Emmy murmured, pretending to mull this over. “I guess it would be okay. I mean, who am I to stand in the way of someone’s good-luck charm? If you’d like to take Otis with you, then by all means, he’s yours.”

“To Otis,” Leigh said, raising her teacup.

“To Emmy on her birthday. In the immortal words of our waitress, may everyone look so good at thirty!” Adriana added, holding her teacup aloft.

Emmy was the last to raise her cup and clink it with her friends’. “To the three ringless wonders. May we be every bit as wonderful but hopefully not so ringless in another thirty years.”

“I’ll toast to that!” Leigh said.

“Me, too,” Adriana added, filled with excitement about everything that lay ahead. “Cheers,
queridas
. Cheers to us.”

Three Months Later

“Emmy!” Leigh called from Adriana’s old bedroom, which with the addition of her fluffy down comforter, a cluster of silver picture frames, and her favorite reading chair she had easily made her own. “The car’s downstairs. We’re going to be late!”

She heard her friend stomping back and forth between rooms, inevitably packing every item that wasn’t nailed down. “Have you seen my Nano? Or my phone charger? I can’t fucking find anything!”

Leigh zipped up her neatly packed carry-on roller and carefully placed the matching satchel on top of it. She ran through a mental checklist and, after satisfying herself that she hadn’t forgotten anything, pulled her belongings into the hallway. She walked into Emmy’s room—previously the de Souzas’ guest room—went directly to her dresser, and plucked both Nano and phone charger from the giant glass fishbowl Emmy used as a catchall. “Here. Throw these in your purse and let’s go. We are
not
missing this flight!”

“Okay, okay,” Emmy mumbled, yanking a brush through her hair. “This is an obscene hour to be awake, never mind actually moving. I’m doing the best I can.”

It took another fifteen minutes to get Emmy out the door and ten more for the car to circle around the block, pick them up, and head to JFK. They were exactly thirty minutes behind Leigh’s preferred schedule—just because the airlines suggested you should be there two hours beforehand didn’t mean that two and a half wasn’t better—and normally she’d be a wreck, but today she was too excited to let anything bother her. It had been almost three months since they’d last seen Adriana, sent her off with a blowout going-away dinner at the Waverly Inn with twenty-five of her nearest and dearest friends, and they were finally headed west for a visit.

Once Adriana moved, Emmy hadn’t even bothered giving thirty days’ notice on her apartment; she just paid two months’ rent and moved out immediately. Leigh expected it would take some time to sell her place—after all, it had taken her over a year to find it—but the broker called two days after the first viewing to say they had an offer. She ended up selling it to the very first couple who saw the place (newly engaged, naturally, and giddy with excitement) at twelve percent more than she’d purchased it for a year earlier. Even less the broker’s commission, Leigh earned enough on her initial investment to finance a few months’ worth of doing absolutely, positively nothing—or at least nothing constructive—before she began school in September.

“So, do you think we’ll go to the Ivy?” Emmy asked, cradling her Starbucks thermos between her hands. “I mean, I know it’s hideously clichéd and trite and all that, but it
is
our evaluation brunch. I sort of think we have to go for it.”

Despite the predawn hour, Emmy couldn’t seem to stop talking.

“I don’t know,” Leigh said, hoping she wouldn’t encourage her.

“Can you believe it’s been a year since that first dinner at the Waverly Inn?” Emmy asked.

“I know. Crazy, isn’t it? It feels like yesterday.”

“Yesterday? You’re fucking nuts. It feels more like a decade ago. This must have been the slowest year of my life. It’s as though time just stood still. Like I’m living in this complete warped time freeze of—”

“Em, sweetheart, please don’t take this the wrong way, but I need you to stop talking. Just until we get there,” Leigh said.

Emmy held up a hand and nodded. “Enough said. No offense taken. I have no idea why I get like this. It’s like exhaustion and this compulsive need to talk go hand in hand. The more tired I am, the chattier—”

“Please.”

“Sorry. I’m sorry.”

Leigh’s phone rang. She got that flippy feeling in her stomach when she saw the caller ID. “Hi!” she breathed into the phone. “What are you doing up so early?”

“What would you say if I told you I set the alarm just so I could wish you a safe trip?” Jesse asked, sounding tired but happy.

“I’d say you were a giant liar and that you should tell me the real story.”

He laughed and Leigh felt herself start to grin. Just the sound of his laugh was enough to make her feel giddy with excitement. “Well, in that case, you probably already know I’ve been up all night. Literally, just sitting here, waiting to call you.”

“The up all night I’ll believe, but try again on the waiting.” She turned to see Emmy glaring at her while flapping her hands open and closed to imitate talking. Leigh smiled and blew her a silent kiss.

“All right, you got me. Up until three writing, then from three to six playing
Grand Theft Auto
, then coffee, then calling. More believable?” he asked.

“Much.”

With any other man, she would’ve been horrified to discover a video-game addiction. It had even once been on her list of nonnegotiable deal-breakers (right there alongside excessive back hair and/or sweating, a penchant for bathroom humor, and any type of religious fundamentalism), but despite her ardent attempts at disapproval (mocking, eye-rolling, relentless teasing), she secretly found it adorable. And truth be told, she rather liked it when he let her choose the gang-bangers’ outfits at the beginning of each game. Was this love? She wasn’t ready to say that yet, but damn, it had to be close.

“Are you in the car?” he asked.

Leigh sighed, picturing him stretched out under the covers, getting ready to sleep for a few hours before hitting up Estia’s for his late-morning rounds. “Yeah. We’re actually almost there, so I should go. I miss you.”

“I miss you,” Emmy whispered. “Oh, Jesse, baby, I miss you so much. How can I live without seeing you for an entire four days? Ohmigod, like two star-crossed lovers.” Leigh reached over to poke her friend, but Emmy managed to flatten herself against the car door.

“What’s she saying?” Jesse asked.

“Nothing at all.” Leigh laughed. “I’ll call you when we land, okay? Get some sleep.” She resisted making a kissing sound into the phone for Emmy’s benefit.

“My god, it’d be nauseating if it weren’t so goddamn cute,” Emmy said with a long, dramatic sigh.

It was nauseating, Leigh knew this, but she was too happy to care. Jesse had called incessantly for two straight months after “the incident,” as they both now called it; he e-mailed, left messages with her assistant, texted her phone three, four, fives times a day. She screened him each and every time, not wanting to confuse her already screwed-up life any more. Just because it felt complicated didn’t mean it was; regardless of how many times he called or apologized or tried to explain himself, the fact remained that Jesse was married. Period. She’d made a big enough mistake already just by sleeping with him; she didn’t need to make everything worse by getting further involved.

Which worked, all said and done, until she decided to leave Brook Harris. She was still going into the office every day, but it was only to help transition her authors to their new editors. Henry had wisely taken Jesse on himself and, in that way that only an über-experienced editor can, had coaxed Jesse into cleaning up the writing without mortally offending him. When she read the galley, Leigh could only shake her head at its improvement: Jesse surely had another huge hit on his hands. Leigh had even managed to keep him mostly out of mind until the day he e-mailed her in all caps. It had no subject line and read, “MEET ME AT THE ASTOR PLACE STARBUCKS TONIGHT @ 7 P.M. I JUST WANT TEN MINUTES. AFTER THAT, I’LL LEAVE YOU ALONE IF YOU WISH. PLEASE COME. J.”

Leigh did what any sane female faced with such an e-mail would do: deleted it to resist the temptation of replying, cleared her trash to resist the temptation of recalling it, and then called tech support to restore all her recently deleted e-mails. She briefly toyed with the idea of forwarding it to Adriana and Emmy for input and analysis, but then ultimately decided it would be a total waste of time; obviously, she would go.

By the time she arrived at Starbucks that night—a Monday, no less!—she was a wreck. Second-guessing herself like crazy, reminding herself what an absolute moron she was for even entertaining the idea of talking to Jesse, ex-lover and ex-author extraordinaire. What was the point? So she liked him—so what? There, she’d admitted it to herself. What did she want for that, some sort of prize? It only made it stupider and more masochistic to subject herself to such a meeting, one that would surely bring even more disappointment in an already less-than-stellar month. The fact that Jesse finally arrived, ten minutes late, flanked by an Asian girl so young she could be his daughter did not improve Leigh’s outlook.

“Leigh,” he said with a huge smile, holding his hand out to her. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

“Mmm,” she replied, not standing up to greet either of them. Not that there was any need to stand—the smiling girl was pulling up a chair, and soon she and Jesse were both seated across from Leigh.

“Tuti, I’d like you to meet Leigh. Leigh, this is Tuti…my wife.”

Leigh’s eyes shot first to Jesse, who appeared not the least bit uncomfortable, and then back to the girl, who upon further inspection Leigh decided was probably even younger than she’d first thought, although not as pretty. Tuti had beautiful thick black hair, but it was cut in an awkward shape for her full face. “Oh dear god,” Leigh said aloud before she could stop herself.

Tuti giggled sweetly, and Leigh saw that she had a significant overbite. Had this happened under any other circumstances, Leigh thought she would have found this girl adorable. Charming, even. But tonight? Like this? It was more than she could bear.

“Tuti, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ve, uh—” She was automatically going to say “heard a lot about you,” but it was too fraught with meaning. Instead, she said, “I hate to run, but I was just stopping by.”

With this announcement, Tuti’s face fell. “So soon?” she asked with a frown. “Okay, then I am going to get something to drink and leave you two alone. Leigh, Jesse? Something?”

Jesse patted her shoulder and shook his head no, and Tuti scampered off toward the counter.

“What were you thinking, bringing her here?” Leigh heard herself ask, as though her brain and mouth were no longer in contact. She popped three Nicorettes into her mouth and waited for the calm to wash over her. “No, don’t answer that. I don’t care what you were thinking. I just want to go.” She began to gather her things, but Jesse clamped his hand down over her arm.

“She’s twenty-three and from Indonesia. Island of Bali, village of Ubud. I ended up there about a year after
Disenchantment
was published, went with a group of super-rich Europeans for a month-long party at someone’s daddy’s house. That was all well and good until one of them overdosed, and then the next day al Qaeda blew up that nightclub in Bali.”

Leigh nodded. She remembered that.

“Needless to say, the party moved on, but something kept me there. I left Kuta, the city of the bombing, and headed inland, toward the mountains and the rice-paddy villages, where I’d read all of the artists and craftsmen and writers of Bali live. And sure enough, Ubud was just overflowing with them. The place was incredible! Every day was a festival of some sort, a huge, brightly colored celebration of the seasons or a holiday or a life event. And the people! My god, they were gorgeous. So welcoming, so open. Tuti’s father and I became friends. He’s only four years older than me, and he has her…” At this, Jesse shook his head. “He’s a talented woodworker, more of an artisan really. We met one day when I went to his shop, and he invited me home for dinner. Beautiful family. To make a long story much, much shorter, I owe Tuti’s father a great deal. He got me back on track with my life—in a lot of ways he saved it, I think—so I didn’t really have a second thought when he asked me to marry Tuti.”

Leigh wasn’t sure where this story was headed, but she was fascinated—not to mention it now made perfect sense why the tabloids hadn’t gotten hold of the story. Damned if she was going to show him that, though; instead, she took a sip of her coffee, tried to appear aloof, and said, “She’s very sweet, Jesse. I can see why you married her.” What she didn’t say was
Why are you telling me this?

Jesse laughed. “Leigh, I was being quite literal when I said I married Tuti because her father is very dear to me, and he asked me to. She was a child—still is—and I’m unspeakably fond of her, but we’ve never had a romantic relationship, and certainly never will.”

“Ah, yes, well, that makes perfect sense.” She didn’t want to go the sarcastic route, but this whole situation was so confusing.

“After nine-eleven, the U.S. placed Indonesia on its short list of terrorist countries. So even though the island of Bali is ninety-eight percent Hindu—as opposed to the rest of the country, which is the same percentage Muslim—Tuti was denied a visa to so much as visit America. Her parents worked their entire lives to send her to the States for an education—as they did with her older brother—but the new political situation made it impossible. That’s where I came in.”

“You married her so she could get a visa?” Leigh asked, shocked. Didn’t that only happen in the movies?

“I did.”

Leigh could only shake her head in disbelief.

“Do you really find it that appalling?” Jesse asked. “This is why I didn’t want to get into it before now.”

“I don’t think
appalling
is the word I’d use, but it’s definitely…weird.” Leigh peered at him, examined his face. “Didn’t you ever want to get married one day to someone you actually love? Or was that not even a consideration?”

“I know this probably sounds strange to you, but to be perfectly honest, no, that was not a consideration. I’d recently come off this massively successful first book, and I was all caught up in the traveling and partying and women; marriage was the last thing on my mind. What was I really sacrificing by marrying Tuti in name only? She lives with three roommates in a walk-up on the Lower East Side. Goes to school at night, has a new boyfriend who seems like a nice kid. I take her out for lunch twice a month, and she loves bringing her laundry to my apartment because my cleaning lady does it for her. It’s like having a niece, or a little sister. And it’s never had any kind of negative impact on my life…until now.”