“I know you’ve had a rough couple of weeks—”
“No, I don’t think you understand, princess. This is all I’ve got. I don’t have the option of shilling yogurt or marrying well because I’m so very, very pretty—practically perfect since the new nose and fake tits.” He taps the bridge of her nose, pulls his finger back before she swats it away. “People don’t just give me things on the off chance I might sleep with them.”
“Says the great wandering womanizer. Stop.”
“You should be an escort; it would be more honest.”
The terrifying thing that will haunt her is that this moment, with her blood furious and heart in hyperdrive, could go either way. Sure, she wants to slug him. But she also wants to slam him to the wall and devour his mouth, wrap her legs around his hips and carve hieroglyphics in his back with her nails while he fucks her.
Her palm stings after she slaps him.
His hand balls into a fist. For a fractured second that’s more interesting than scary, Phoebe thinks he’s going to hit back, channel all that energy into a weapon, wonders what it would feel like to have her nose broken again, this time without anesthetic.
But he’s still Adam, taught by his grandparents to call people “sir” and “ma’ am,” to hold doors open, say “please” and “thank you,” and never, ever contemplate striking a woman.
Not physically at least.
Exhaling something between a laugh and a sigh, he unclenches his fist and runs fingers through his hair—a gesture she knows means he’s stressed. Under the pink of her handprint, he’s ashen, purple half-moons beneath his eyes; she’s about to apologize.
“You’d never actually need to be an escort, though, would’ya, princess?” he says, placid and deadly. “Wouldn’t it save everyone a lot of hassle if we admitted your daddy is the one I actually owe two months’ rent?”
Tears stinging her sinuses, she’s in her room, door shuttered, before he can say anything else.
A smash.
Peeping through the gap in the door hinges, she notes there’s a hole in the living room wall and Adam is muttering, shaking his hand. It looks like it hurts; she hopes it does.
According to the Rolex her dad and Gennifer gave her for graduation, it’s ten past four, six in Chicago. She catches her father before he leaves for his daily jog.
“It’s a little early out there,” he says. “Everything okay, princess?”
Poor, poor Princess Phoebe.
“I was just missing you guys.” She tries to sound normal. “Can I come home for Thanksgiving?”
* * *
The next morning (noon, really) there’s still a hole in the wall, but the entire apartment has been scrubbed, scoured, and swept. Shoes she kicks off in the living room (all those fancy high-heeled sandals she can afford because her father still supplements her income) neatly lining the wall outside her bedroom.
Though he’s not in it, Adam’s room, too, has been cleaned, mounds of dirty clothes and wrinkled issues of Variety gone. The only thing not filed or folded away is a new box of résumé paper and a cartridge of printer ink on the slim desk by the window. Laundry detergent smell as she sits on his bed and picks up a framed photograph from the nightstand—Adam and his mother at the base of the hills, the Hollywood sign in the background too iconic to be real. Phoebe had taken the picture and gotten it framed for Adam’s birthday.
After he filmed Goners, Adam had paid for his mother to come to LA and then slept on the couch for a week so she could have his bed (a completely alien notion to Phoebe, whose own parents would never contemplate staying anywhere less than a four-star hotel when they visited). Worn and achingly beautiful, Anna Zoellner looked a decade older than Phoebe’s mom despite being ten years younger. Every aspect of Anna had fascinated Phoebe—from the mystery of Adam’s father (“I’ve never met him,” the only thing Adam ever said on the subject) to the fact that Anna brought Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past to the beach—it was intangible, a lesson locked in the lines around Anna’s eyes and the white threads in her raven hair, how looks and intelligence apparently didn’t guarantee shit. So Phoebe had tagged along when Adam took his mother to all the touristy places—the Walk of Fame and Santa Monica Pier—places Phoebe hadn’t been since Oliver drove out with her after high school. As she was leaving for the airport, Anna hugged Phoebe, whispered in her ear, “Take care of my baby.” Phoebe had to swallow back tears; it was the first time in twenty-five years anyone trusted her to do anything more important than look pretty.
What a fabulous job she’s doing.
* * *
Adam isn’t home by the time Phoebe leaves for work. Not there when she returns nine hours later, feet knotted, dress stained with spilled soda. But the hole in the wall has been plastered, a slight discoloration the only indication anything ever happened. That’s been painted when she gets home the next night, and there’s a bowl of the pears she likes on the kitchen counter with a note advising her to help herself. Adam’s door is closed, lights out. Pressing her palm to the paneled wood, she can’t decide if he’s snoring or not.
Phoebe doesn’t actually see Adam again until the next afternoon, when she catches a glimpse of him leaving the bathroom, towel around his waist. She doesn’t talk to him until the day after that, when he calls Rosebud at the start of her shift. Melissa hands her the phone.
“Sorry to bother you at work.” He sounds normal, if a bit hesitant. “Your friend Evie called and said she needs to know about a reservation on Wednesday night. She made it sound important, so I thought you might want to call her back before you got slammed.”
Next to Phoebe, Melissa mouths, “Invite him here.”
“Oh, thanks.” Phoebe lowers her eyes, as if he were in front of her and she couldn’t look at him. “I, um, I’m going home for Thanksgiving, and my high school friends are planning this dinner.”
“When’s your flight?”
“The red-eye Tuesday night.”
“I’ll take you to the airport,” he says.
To get him off the phone, she agrees, and then avoids him for the next three days.
* * *
Tuesday Phoebe ignores a note on the refrigerator from Adam reminding her he’ll take her to the airport, and then nurses a latte at Peet’s Coffee until it is actually time to leave. At the apartment, she grabs her bag, calls a car, then doubles back to Adam’s room, hesitates before entering the half-open door. Clearly he hadn’t meant to fall asleep, pretzeled in a torturous angle on his still-made bed, a few copies of his résumé—not the one with his acting credits but the one he uses for temp agencies—littering the comforter. She wants to slink out without saying good-bye, or maybe write a note—something benign and cowardly: Have a good weekend!
Instead Phoebe runs her fingers along his forehead. He jerks and makes a small, helpless sound that purees her major organs.
“What time is it?” Propping himself on an elbow, he blinks away eye gunk.
“Ten fifteen.”
“Oh.” Sitting up, he takes in Phoebe’s jeans and hoodie, duffel bag over her shoulder. “Lemme get my shoes and I’ll take you.”
“I got a cab,” she says and watches his face fall. Something in her heart catches, and she wonders how they got into this horrible place of unclear outcomes. “It’s on the way.”
“That’s silly.” On his feet now, grabbing a sneaker. “I’ll drive—”
“It’s not a big deal.” She sighs. “You know me, I’ll put it on my dad’s credit card anyway. I just wanted to wish you a happy Thanksgiving.”
Outside, a horn.
Adam follows her to the living room, holds her arm.
“Wait.” His eyes blazing into her, she wants to look away. “I’m sorry.”
She starts to say the taxi is easier, but they both know that’s not what he’s talking about.
Phoebe should say she’s sorry, too, but she’s unclear what to apologize for. For slapping him? Blowing Lawyer? Jake James in the men’s room? For occasionally p
retending Adam is Oliver, not during sex, really, but when she lay in his arms afterward—fantasizing that Adam feels about her the way Oliver did? For not keeping her promise to his mother?
“No worries.” On tiptoes, she brushes lips across his brow because saying anything else might cause Adam to look sadder than he already does, and she feels like she’s having an asthma attack, needs to get outside and into Adam-free air immediately.
“At least let me carry your stuff—”
She waves his hand away. “It’s really light.”
“Well, call to let me know you got in okay.”
It’s a weird echo of what her father always says as he drops her at O’Hare, of what she asked Oliver to do seven years ago when he headed back to Chicago for school. But no one calls to say they got in all right; the reason to call would be not getting in okay.
“Yeah. I’ll try you later.”
* * *
She actually does want to call Adam almost immediately after landing at eight in the morning, when she bumbles off the jetway to find not her father or Gennifer waiting at the gate, but her brother. Though it takes her a few seconds to recognize Chase. He’s shaved the goatee that had been a permanent fixture since he started at the University of Wisconsin five years ago, and instead of his usual ironic T-shirts—Oscar the Grouch or bald and menacing Captain Rowen—he’s wearing tailored slacks and a jacket she’s almost certain is Prada.
“Where’s Dad?” She sounds accusatory, and Chase grins, universes older than she remembers, as if six months at a New York investment bank has turned him into her senior.
“We were already up for our run, and I never get to drive anymore.”
The “we” stops everything. Busy contemplating new Prada/professional Chase, Phoebe hadn’t noticed the brunette next to him in a smart leather trench coat, pantyhose, and stacked heels no less than five inches high.
“Sharon Gallaher, only one G,” says the woman. “It’s great to finally meet you. I’ve heard so many stories.”
Yes, a few weeks ago (or was it months; time in her vampire life is nebulous), Chase had mentioned he was dating someone, but he was always dating someone—usually a blond someone—and he’d never brought any of the someones home before.
“You’re even more luminous than in the Dannon commercials.” Sharon is still talking. Despite the grown-up clothes (early in the morning on a day no one works), she’s probably not more than twenty-three, cheeks round and dewy in a way that’s never natural past twenty-five. “I love the bob.”
Unconsciously, Phoebe’s fingers go to the blunt edge of her hair. Sharon sounds sincere, which isn’t always the case; shards of blame are often tucked into compliments from other women.
“It’s really short,” her brother says, sounding almost clueless enough to be pre–Wall Street Chase Fisher.
Although as kids they could communicate whole schemes behind their parents’ backs using nothing more than eyebrows, when Phoebe tries meeting her brother’s gaze to ask who this girl is, Chase offers no explanation, just takes Phoebe’s bag and throws it over his shoulder. And she remembers all the messages she didn’t return because she was so caught up in her non-relationship with Adam. All those things that she could never tell her brother because he’d been protective of her long before there was anything to protect her from.
“You ready?” Chase frowns. “Did you not bring a coat?”
And in case there was any doubt, it socks her in the gut—like the frozen Chicago air will a few minutes later—that she’s not in LA anymore.
* * *
In the breakfast nook three hours later, Gennifer is clearing platters of bagels, whitefish, and sturgeon that cloyingly thoughtful Sharon brought from New York; Phoebe’s father and brother are beaming at Sharon’s election analysis; and Phoebe is staring into her coffee mug as if it contains vital information.
“Florida aside, Gore should’ve had this in the bag,” Sharon says, still in the heels. After extensive contemplation, Phoebe determines that Sharon’s round face is pleasant but forgettable, save for killer Columbia-blue eyes about 15 percent larger than normal. Phoebe’s not sure if she doesn’t like Sharon for real or simply because the girl is dating her baby brother—flash of Chase following her and Oliver around on their first date.
“The problem was that he separated himself too much from Clinton.” Sharon is still talking. “Monica, Whitewater—people still love Bill Clinton.”
Having watched Adam watch CNN for the past three weeks, Phoebe could jump in at several points in the conversation but doubts anyone would hear. It turns out being ignored by her family might be more hurtful than being pitied for not having a career and living with a too-polite aspiring actor.
Phoebe learns, mostly through Chase’s glowing recaps, that he and Sharon met at a wash-and-fold in the West Village, where he wooed her by carrying her laundry bag up four flights to her apartment. Sharon had graduated from NYU a year early, majoring in English and something called American Studies, and now she’s working on a master’s in creative writing. She is, in fact, twenty-two, which would have made her a freshman when Adam was a senior. Phoebe has no desire to ask if they knew each other.
“Have you been to Chicago before?” Phoebe asks when everyone else has stopped talking about Al Gore and she hasn’t said anything in a really long time.
“Oh, yeah.” Sharon nods. “I grew up in Cincinnati, and we came here a lot. I adore Chicago.”
“Sharon’s setting her novel here,” Chase offers, unsolicited.
“Umm-hmm, I adore the architecture; it’s the perfect backdrop for the story I want to tell,” Sharon says, and quick as that, any thought that Phoebe’s hair clog of dislike for this girl was unwarranted slides down the drain.
“You’re writing a novel?” Phoebe’s father sounds intrigued, not likely to tell Sharon it’s a idiotic pipe dream and ask if her father sends her checks, too.
“She’s published a bunch of short stories and is considered the best in her program,” Chase is saying as Sharon blushes, the color lovely on full cheeks.
“How exciting. Where can we read them?” Gennifer, who had also sat out the political portion of the conversation, is back in her comfort zone. “I read everything.”
“Do you write from your own experience or make it up?” Phoebe’s father, who has never once asked if Phoebe is a method actor, never coordinated a West Coast trip to see one of her workshop showcases.
Right then Phoebe decides she’ll never take another cent from her father. When she gets back to LA, she’ll demand they promote her to bartender at Rosebud, or she’ll get a second job or sell some of her shoes.
Before Sharon can explain how she spins words into poetry and poop into gold, Phoebe puts her coffee cup in the sink, says she’s going to take a nap.
“Aww, you must be tired.” Gennifer loops toned arms around Phoebe, her absurd mane of hair tickling Phoebe’s nose.
“You feel okay, princess?” Her father looks up, bushy eyebrows pup tents of concern.
“I’m fine.” Sullen and childish perhaps, but physically tip-top. “Something about planes wears me out.”
“I was going to show Sharon around Evanston a little later if you wanna come,” Chase says.
“Yeah, maybe,” Phoebe says, though the thought of tagging around as her brother and Sharon cuddle and coo is slightly sickening.
Satisfied, everyone nods and returns to Sharon and Chase and their fabulous life in Manhattan as Phoebe heads up the stairs.
It would be wrong to call Phoebe’s room her childhood bedroom because she really only lived there full-time for a year. It does look exactly the way she left it seven years ago. Framed photos of her and Oliver at prom, her long hair whipped into an updo with side curls. With Nicole and Evie on Santa’s lap at Old Orchard Mall, aware of without fully understanding the power of their sex—three good-looking teens playing little girls, wiggling on a grown man’s lap. Phoebe and Chase visiting their mother in Hawaii,
everyone wearing leis and looking unhappy.
It’s barely 9:00 A.M. in Los Angeles, but Phoebe calls her apartment.
“You’ve reached Phoebe Fisher and Adam Zoellner. We can’t come to the phone right now, but if you leave a message, we’ll return your call as soon as possible.” Her voice on the machine is an octave lower than normal and official sounding, in case the caller is an agent or casting director or someone else of importance.
“Hey, Z,” Phoebe says, even though she never calls Adam “Z.” That’s a nickname used by guys on his softball team and girls he remains friendly with after sex. “Wanted to let you know I got in. Give me a ring when you can.”
The television on her dresser still has cable, and she turns to CNN. As she’s falling asleep, she sees, not without satisfaction, that Sharon was actually wrong about the date the Florida court set to certify election results.
When she wakes up, VP candidate Dick Cheney has apparently been taken to the hospital with chest pains, and the sun is already setting just after five.
Across the street, lights are on in every room of Evie’s parents’ house. Dinner isn’t until seven, but she can go over a little early. Scalding shower, another short black dress, and heels as high as Sharon’s but much less sensible, with an open toe. Hair so shiny it appears metallic, bronzer dusted across fine bones, lips the deep sangria that’s become her signature. It’s enough that her parents, Chase, and Sharon all stop watching the news when she comes downstairs. The finished product is somewhat compromised when Gennifer insists Phoebe wear her fur-trimmed puffy coat because it’s thirty degrees outside and Phoebe forgot her own jacket.
“Let us know if you go out somewhere after dinner,” Chase says. “Shar and I might join you for a drink.”
Phoebe nods, and Gennifer walks her to the door, gives her another hug, somehow more motherly now, when the fourteen years between them should barely be significant. “It’s good you’re seeing the girls,” she says. “You three were so close in high school.”
* * *
“Phoebe Fucking Fisher.” Evie has inexplicably acquired a slightly British accent despite moving to Manhattan after graduating from Bennington. She gives a double European cheek kiss to hammer home this point before taking Phoebe/Gennifer’s coat. “You’re so thin! Please don’t tell me you’ve become one of those ano LA bitches.”
In Some Other World, Maybe: A Novel Page 6
