Lauren Weisberger 5-Book Collection

by Lauren Weisberger

  ‘Max? It’s me. Don’t come out!’

  ‘Andy? What are you doing here?’ Max’s voice called through the bathroom door.

  ‘I’m just getting your mom’s necklace. Don’t come out, okay? I don’t want you to see me in my dress.’

  Andy rummaged around in the bag’s front pocket. She didn’t feel a velvet box but her hands closed around a folded paper.

  It was a piece of cream-colored stationery, heavyweight and engraved with Barbara’s initials, BHW, in a navy script monogram. Andy knew Barbara helped keep Dempsey & Carroll in business with the amount of stationery she bought; she had been using the same design for birthday greetings, thank-you notes, dinner invitations, and condolence wishes for four decades. She was old-fashioned and formal and would rather have died than send someone a gauche e-mail or – horror! – a text message. It made perfect sense that she would send her son a traditional handwritten letter on his wedding day. Andy was just about to refold it and return it when her own name caught her eye. Before she could even consider what she was doing, Andy began to read.

  Dear Maxwell,

  While you know I do my best to allow you your privacy, I can no longer hold my tongue on matters of such importance. I have mentioned my concerns to you before, and you have always pledged to consider them. Now, however, due to the imminence of your upcoming wedding, I feel I can wait no longer to speak my mind plainly and forthrightly:

  I beseech you, Maxwell. Please do not marry Andrea.

  Do not misunderstand me. Andrea is pleasant, and she will undoubtedly make someone an agreeable wife one day. But you, my darling, deserve so much more! You must be with a girl from the right family, not a broken family where all she knows is heartache and divorce. A girl who understands our traditions, our way of life. Someone who will help shepherd the Harrison name into the next generation. Most important, a partner who wants to put you and your children ahead of her own selfish career aspirations. You must think carefully about this: do you want your wife editing magazines and taking business trips, or do you desire someone who puts others first and embraces the philanthropic interests of the Harrison line? Don’t you desire a partner who cares more about supporting your family than furthering her own ambitions?

  I told you I thought your unexpected get-together with Katherine in Bermuda was a sign. Oh, how delighted you sounded to see her again! Please, do not discount those feelings. Nothing is decided yet – it is not too late. It is clear you’ve always adored Katherine, and it is even more clear she would make a wonderful life partner.

  You always make me so proud, and I know your father is looking down on us and rooting for you to do the right thing.

  All my love,

  Mother

  She heard the water turn off and, startled, dropped the note to the floor. When she scrambled to pick it up, she noticed her hands were shaking.

  ‘Andy? You still here?’ he called from behind the door.

  ‘Yes, I’m … wait, I’m just going,’ she managed to say.

  ‘Did you find it?’

  She paused, unsure of the right answer. It felt like all the oxygen had been sucked from the room. ‘Yes.’

  There was more shuffling, and then the sink turned on and off. ‘Are you gone yet? I need to come out and get dressed.’

  Please do not marry Andrea. Blood pounded in Andy’s ears. Oh, how delighted you sounded to see her again! Should she fly into the bathroom or run out the door? The next time she saw him, they’d be exchanging rings in front of three hundred people, including his mother.

  Someone knocked on the suite’s front door before opening it. ‘Andy? What are you doing here?’ Nina, her wedding planner, asked. ‘Good god, you’re going to ruin that dress! And I thought you agreed you wouldn’t see each other before the ceremony. If that’s not the case, why didn’t we do pictures beforehand?’ Her constant, unrelenting talking drove Andy crazy. ‘Max, stay in that bathroom! Your bride is standing here like a deer caught in headlights. Wait, oh, just hold on a second!’ She scurried over as Andy tried to stand and fix her dress at the same time and extended her hand.

  ‘There,’ she said, pulling Andy to her feet and smoothing her hand over the dress’s mermaid skirt. ‘Now, come with me. No more disappearing-bride antics, you hear? What’s this?’ She plucked the note from Andy’s sweaty palm and held it aloft.

  Andy could actually hear the pounding in her chest; she briefly wondered if she was having a heart attack. She opened her mouth to say something, but instead a wave of nausea came over her. ‘Oh, I think I’m going to’

  Magically, or maybe just from lots of practice, Nina produced a trash can at exactly the right moment and held it so tightly to Andy’s face that she could feel the plastic-lined rim pressing into the soft underside of her chin. ‘There, there,’ Nina nasal-whined, oddly comforting nonetheless. ‘You’re not my first jittery bride and you won’t be my last. Let’s just thank our lucky stars you didn’t have any splash-back.’ She dabbed at Andy’s mouth with one of Max’s T-shirts, and his smell, a heady mixture of soap and the basil-mint shampoo he used – a scent she usually loved – made her retch all over again.

  There was another knock at the door. The famous photographer St Germain and his pretty young assistant walked in. ‘We’re supposed to be shooting Max’s preparations,’ he announced in an affected but indeterminate accent. Thankfully, neither he nor the assistant so much as glanced at Andy.

  ‘What’s going on out there?’ Max called, still banished to the bathroom.

  ‘Max, stay put!’ Nina yelled, her voice all authority. She turned to Andy, who wasn’t sure she could walk the couple hundred feet back to the bridal suite. ‘We’ve got to get your skin touched up and … Christ, your hair …’

  ‘I need the necklace,’ Andy whispered.

  ‘The what?’

  ‘Barbara’s diamond necklace. Wait.’ Think, think, think. What did it mean? What should she do? Andy forced herself to return to that hideous bag, but thankfully Nina stepped in front of her and pulled the duffel onto the bed. She rooted quickly through its contents and pulled out a black velvet box with Cartier etched on the side.

  ‘This what you’re looking for? Come, let’s go.’

  Andy allowed herself to be pulled into the hallway. Nina instructed the photographers to free Max from the bathroom and firmly shut the door behind them.

  Andy couldn’t believe Barbara hated her so much that she didn’t want her son to marry her. And not only that, but she had his wife chosen for him. Katherine: more appropriate, less selfish. The one, at least according to Barbara, who got away. Andy knew all about Katherine. She was the heiress to the von Herzog fortune and, from what Andy could remember from her early rounds of incessant Googling, she was some sort of minor Austrian princess whose parents had sent her to board at Max’s elite Connecticut prep school. Katherine had gone on to major in European history at Amherst, where she was admitted after her grandfather – an Austrian noble with Nazi allegiances during World War II – donated enough money to name a residence hall in his late wife’s honor. Max claimed Katherine was too prim, too proper, and all-around too polite. She was boring, he claimed. Too conventional and concerned with appearances. Why he dated her on and off for five years Max couldn’t explain quite as well, but Andy had always suspected there was more to the story. She clearly hadn’t been wrong.

  The last time Max had mentioned Katherine, he was planning to call and inform her of their engagement; a few weeks later a beautiful cut-crystal bowl from Bergdorf’s arrived with a note wishing them a lifetime of happiness. Emily, who knew Katherine through her own husband, Miles, swore Andy had nothing to worry about, that she was boring and uptight and while she did, admittedly, have ‘a great rack,’ Andy was superior in every other way. Andy hadn’t thought much more about it since then. They all had pasts. Was she proud of Christian Collinsworth? Did she feel the need to tell Max every single detail about her relationship with Alex? Of course not. But it was a diffe
rent story entirely reading a letter from your future mother-in-law, on the day of your wedding, imploring your fiancé to marry his ex-girlfriend instead. An ex-girlfriend he had apparently been delighted to see in Bermuda during his bachelor party and whom he had conveniently forgotten to mention.

  Andy rubbed her forehead and forced herself to think. When had Barbara written that poisonous note? Why had Max saved it? And what did it mean that he’d seen Katherine a mere six weeks earlier and hadn’t breathed a word about it to Andy, despite giving her every last detail of his and his friends’ golf games, steak dinners, and sunbathing? There had to be an explanation, there simply had to be. But what was it?

  2

  learning to love the hamptons: 2009

  It had long been a point of pride for Andy that she almost never went to the Hamptons. The traffic, the crowds, the pressure to get dressed up and look great and be at the right place … none of it felt particularly relaxing. Certainly not much of an escape from the city. Better to stay in the city alone, wander the summer street fairs and lay out in Sheep Meadow and ride her bike along the Hudson. She could walk into any restaurant without a reservation and explore new, uncrowded neighborhoods. She loved summer weekends spent reading and sipping iced coffees in the city and never felt the least bit left out, a fact that Emily simply refused to accept. One weekend a season Emily dragged Andy out to her husband’s parents’ place and insisted Andy experience the fabulousness of white parties and polo matches and enough Tory-Burch-clad women to outfit half of Long Island. Every year Andy swore to herself she’d never go back, and every summer she dutifully packed her bag and braved the Jitney and tried to act like she was having a great time mingling with the same people she saw at industry events in the city. This weekend was different, though. This particular weekend would potentially determine her professional future.

  There was a brief knock at the door before Emily barged in. Judging from her expression, she was displeased to find Andy flopped on the luxurious duvet, one towel wrapped around her hair and another under her arms, staring helplessly at a suitcase exploding with clothes.

  ‘Why aren’t you dressed yet? People are going to be here any minute!’

  ‘I have nothing to wear!’ Andy cried. ‘I don’t understand the Hamptons. I’m not of them. Everything I brought is wrong.’

  ‘Andy …’ Emily’s hip jutted out in her magenta silk dress, just under where the billowy fabric was cinched tight by a triple-wrapped gold chain belt that wouldn’t have fit around most women’s thighs. Her coltish legs were tanned and accessorized with gold gladiator sandals and a glossy pedicure in the same shade of pink as her dress.

  Andy studied her friend’s perfectly blown-out hair, glimmering cheekbones, and pale pink lip gloss. ‘I hope that’s some sort of sparkle powder and not just your natural exuberance,’ she said uncharitably, motioning toward Emily’s face. ‘No one deserves to look that good.’

  ‘Andy, you know how important tonight is! Miles called in a trillion favors to get everyone over here, and I’ve spent the past month dealing with florists and caterers and my fucking mother-in-law. Do you know how hard it was to convince them to let us host this dinner here? You’d think we were seventeen and planning a kegger the way that woman went over all the rules with me. All you had to do was show up, look decent, and be charming, and look at you!’

  ‘I’m here, aren’t I? And I’ll do my best to be charming. Can we agree on two out of three?’

  Emily sighed and Andy couldn’t help but smile.

  ‘Help me! Help your poor, style-challenged friend put together something remotely appropriate to wear so that maybe she’ll look good while begging a bunch of strangers for money!’ Andy said this to appease Emily, but she knew she’d made some strides in the style department over the past seven years. Could she ever hope to look as good as Emily? Of course not. But she wasn’t a total train wreck, either.

  Emily grabbed a pile of the clothes from the middle of the bed and scrunched her nose at all of them. ‘What, exactly, were you planning to wear?’

  Andy reached into the mess and extracted a navy linen shirtdress with a rope belt and coordinating platform espadrilles. It was simple, elegant, timeless. Perhaps a touch wrinkled. But certainly appropriate.

  Emily blanched. ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘Look at these gorgeous buttons. This dress wasn’t inexpensive.’

  ‘I don’t give a shit about the buttons!’ Emily shrieked, tossing it clear across the room.

  ‘It’s Michael Kors! Isn’t that worth something?’

  ‘It’s Michael Kors beachwear, Andy. It’s what he has models throw on over bathing suits. What, did you order it online from Nordstrom?’

  When Andy didn’t say anything, Emily threw up her hands in frustration.

  Andy sighed. ‘Can you just help me, please? I’m at a reasonably high risk of getting back under these covers right now …’

  With that, Emily flew into high gear, muttering about how hopeless Andy was despite Emily’s constant efforts to tutor her in cut, fit, fabric, and style … not to mention shoes. The shoes were everything. Andy watched as Emily ferreted through the tangle of clothing and held a few things aloft, immediately scowling at each one and unceremoniously discarding it. After five frustrating minutes of this, she disappeared down the hallway without a word and reappeared a few moments later holding a beautiful pale blue jersey maxidress with the most exquisite turquoise and silver chandelier earrings. ‘Here. You have silver sandals, right? Because you’ll never fit into mine.’

  ‘I’ll never fit into that,’ Andy said, eyeing the beautiful dress warily.

  ‘Sure you will. I bought it in a size bigger than I normally wear for when I’m bloated, and there’s all this draping around the midsection. You should be able to get into it.’

  Andy laughed. She and Emily had been friends for so many years now that she barely even noticed those kinds of comments.

  ‘What?’ Emily asked, looking confused.

  ‘Nothing. It’s perfect. Thank you.’

  ‘Okay, so get dressed.’ As if to punctuate her command, the girls heard a doorbell ring downstairs. ‘First guest! I’m running down. Be adorable and ask all about the men’s work and the women’s charities. Don’t explicitly talk about the magazine unless someone asks, since this isn’t really a work dinner.’

  ‘Not really a work dinner? Aren’t we going to be hitting everyone up for money?’

  Emily sighed exasperatedly. ‘Yes, but not until later. Before then we pretend we’re all just socializing and having fun. It’s most important now that they see we’re smart, responsible women with a great idea. The majority are Miles’s friends from Princeton. Tons of hedge fund guys who just love investing in media projects. I’m telling you, Andy, smile a lot, show interest in them, be your usual adorable self – wear that dress – and we’ll be set.’

  ‘Smile, show interest, be adorable. Got it.’ Andy pulled the towel off her head and began to comb out her hair.

  ‘Remember, I’ve seated you between Farooq Hamid, whose fund was recently ranked among the fifty most lucrative investments this year, and Max Harrison of Harrison Media Holdings, who’s now acting as their CEO.’

  ‘Didn’t his father just die? Like, in the last few months?’ Andy could remember the televised funeral and the two days’ worth of newspaper articles, eulogies, and tributes paid to the man who had built one of the greatest media empires ever before making a series of terrible investment decisions right before the 2008 recession – Madoff, oil fields in politically unstable countries – and sending the company into a financial tailspin. No one knew how deep the damage ran.

  ‘Yes. Now Max is in charge and, by all accounts, doing a very good job so far. And the only thing Max likes more than investing in start-up media projects is investing in start-up media projects that are run by attractive women.’

  ‘Oh, Em, are you calling me attractive? Seriously, I’m blushing.’

  Emily snort
ed. ‘I was actually talking about me … Look, can you be downstairs in five minutes? I need you!’ Emily said as she walked out the door.

  ‘I love you too!’ Andy called after her, already digging out her strapless bra.

  The dinner was surprisingly relaxed, far more so than Emily’s hysteria beforehand had indicated. The tent set up in the Everetts’ backyard overlooked the water, its open sides letting in the salty sea breeze, and a trillion miniature votive lanterns gave the whole night a feeling of understated elegance. The menu was a clambake, and it was spectacular: two-and-a-half-pound pre-cracked lobsters; clams in lemon butter; mussels steamed in white wine; garlic rosemary bliss potatoes; corn on the cob sprinkled with cotija cheese; baskets of warm, buttery rolls; and a seemingly endless supply of ice-cold beer with limes, glasses of crisp Pinot Grigio, and the saltiest, most delicious margaritas Andy had ever tasted.

  After everyone had stuffed themselves with homemade apple pie and ice cream, they shuffled toward the bonfire one of the servers had set up at the edge of the lawn, complete with a s’mores spread, mugs of marshmallowy hot chocolate, and summer-weight blankets knit from a heavenly soft bamboo-cashmere hybrid. The drinking and laughing continued; soon, a few joints began circulating around the group. Andy noticed that only she and Max Harrison refused, each passing it along when one came to them. When he excused himself and headed toward the house, Andy couldn’t help but follow him.

  ‘Oh, hey,’ she said, suddenly feeling shy when she ran into him on the sprawling deck off the living room. ‘I was, uh, just looking for the ladies’ room,’ she lied.

  ‘Andrea, right?’ he asked, even though they’d just sat next to each other for three hours during dinner. Max had been involved in a conversation with the woman to his left, someone’s Russian-model wife who didn’t appear to understand English per se, but who had giggled and batted her eyes enough to keep Max engaged. Andy had chatted with – or rather listened to – Farooq as he bragged about everything from the yacht he’d commissioned in Greece earlier that year to his most recent profile in The Wall Street Journal.