Dream Girl

by Lauren Mechling

  “It was fun,” I told her. Trying to ignore the lovebirds next to me I detailed my every move—except the part about misinterpreting a dream and hiding behind my sunglasses and hood to spy on Rye as she flirted with her canine lover. I wrapped up with, “And then I took a bubble bath and watched four and a half episodes of The Twilight Zone.”

  “Did you say The Twilight Zone?” Rye screeched. I nearly fainted—from the sound of her voice and the simple fact that never in my life would I have pegged her as a Rod Serling fan. “I think I’ve seen every one,” she said, and went on to profess a preference for the episodes not involving robots or outer space—which did narrow things down. “My all-time favorite one is about the woman in the hospital who keeps getting plastic surgery so she can look like everybody else—”

  “But then it turns out she’s a babe,” I jumped in, “and everyone else has pig faces!”

  “Sounds like some of my friends and neighbors,” Becca’s mother said. “I’m not sure, but I think I’d rather look my age than try to see through two tiny little slits.”

  “Not with the slit talk again,” Becca’s dad said. “How many times do I have to tell you that you’re beautiful the way you are?” He rubbed his wife’s back and kissed her on the lips.

  “God, you guys are so corny!” Becca covered her face with her hands. “What are we going to do about them?” Through her fingers, she looked over at Andy for support, but he was too wrapped up in his hot girlfriend to notice his little sister.

  Dejected, Becca brought her hands down to her lap and pouted.

  I knew the feeling.

  { 19 }

  Red-Light District

  What is it with planes? They have roughly the same effect on me that double espresso has on others. Rye had taken an earlier flight back home, and I was the sole member of our party who wasn’t tired out from a half-day spent skiing. The only other person on our flight back who wasn’t napping was Becca’s mom, and even she looked dozy as she circled items in the in-flight shopping magazine. Becca was snoring in the seat next to me, our shared Teen Vogue clamped between her ear and the tray table’s plastic surface.

  After I finished Death Comes at the End, an Agatha Christie book I’d found at the hotel gift shop, I was left with nothing to do but crack open my English textbook, Fictional Impressions. In addition to the stories we were supposed to write, Mr. Bunting had told us to read what the book identified as the ninth-best story in history: “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” by J. D. Salinger. I was shocked by how good it was. Possibly even worthy of top-five status.

  Our landing was choppy enough to rouse my fellow travelers. While we waited for the pilot’s go-ahead to disembark, Becca’s dad scrolled through his new BlackBerry messages. “Excellent,” he said, and whistled; then I overheard him whisper to his father, “About time.”

  “Good, then,” said Becca’s grandfather. “I’ve always liked my steak well done.”

  It didn’t take Hercule Poirot to figure this one out. They were talking about the Soyle family. Probably some payback for the attempted break-in on Thursday night. Could it be related to the Soyles’ topless steakhouse venture Becca had told me about?

  “Here, boy.” Becca’s dad passed the BlackBerry to Andy, who was standing up two rows ahead of me. Somehow we caught each other’s eye. I smiled softly. He smiled back, turning my insides to mush.

  As we walked through the airport, Becca and I trailed behind everyone else, giving them a chance to talk among themselves.

  “What’s everyone so excited about?” I asked Becca.

  “Same old story,” she replied sullenly. “Another retaliation.”

  “For the English farm break-in the other night?”

  “Yup.” She sniffed. “It turns out more happened than just an intruder. My cousin Frank and some of his boarding school friends had snuck out for the night and they were partying there. Frank’s in the hospital. Somebody beat him up pretty bad.”

  Whoa. In my household, a scratch on Henry’s knee constituted a thrilling emergency.

  “Is he all right?” I asked.

  “Oh, I’m sure he’s fine. I don’t even know if he needed to go to the hospital. He’s always been such a little prince. It’s just a black eye.”

  “Still, that’s awful.” I tried to touch Becca’s shoulder, but she pulled away.

  “That’s okay,” she mumbled, then looked down at her feet. “But here’s the really messed-up part: there was a small fire at the steakhouse last night. Nothing too serious, but I guess twenty thousand dollars’ worth of meat was doused in fire extinguisher fluid.”

  “And so soon after the incident in England. What a coincidence.” I widened my eyes, pretending to be shocked.

  “Yeah right. If there’s one principle you’ll learn from my family, it’s that one bad thing tends to lead to another. And another.” A fearful expression crossed Becca’s face and then, as if she thought better of it, she focused ahead and strutted forward.

  When we stepped outside, it was freezing, and all the airport employees were wearing face masks. “Bundle up, gang,” Becca’s dad ordered. “You too, Claire.”

  I couldn’t have been happier to comply. My parents were always too busy teasing me about wearing Kiki’s hand-me-downs to think to tell me to dress warmly enough.

  Becca’s dad had us wait by the taxi line while he walked up and down the platform, searching for the cars that he’d ordered to pick us up.

  “There they are. Hurry up,” he snapped at us, and we all scurried over to the two black town cars with SHUTTLEWORTH signs in the windshields. The grown-ups slipped into the first car in the lineup, and as Becca’s mom was pulling the door closed, I yelled out an insufficient thank-you for the weekend. “I had a wond—!” I called out as the door slammed shut.

  “Where to?” our driver asked us.

  “Good question,” Becca said, looking at her brother. “Should we drop you off at your dorm first?”

  “No, go to Mom and Dad’s first,” Andy said. “I have to get Claire that DVD I was talking about, before I forget.”

  “Oh yeah,” I said. “That’s so nice of you.”

  Now was probably not the time to tell him I didn’t have the foggiest idea what he meant.

  We all scooted into the car and Becca told the driver the address.

  “Those are the worst fingernails I’ve ever seen,” Andy pointed out as the car pulled away from the airport. “Are they tasty?”

  He reached for my wrist and I flinched. I was terrified Becca was going to suspect something was up between her brother and her best friend. If she did, though, she deserved an Academy Award for her own cover-up job. Becca was acting as natural as an organic peanut, frowning as she checked her cell phone messages.

  “So, that was a pretty good trip, wouldn’t you say?” she said when she was off the phone. We were crossing the Queensboro Bridge, and the city was lit up like a birthday cake.

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” Andy answered. “It was too short.”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Becca said, sounding distracted.

  “And what about you?” Andy elbowed me. “Were you ready to come home? I know you’re not an Olympic skier, but don’t you wish we had one last night to hang out, to swim some more in the outdoor pool?”

  Did I hear that right?

  “I’m okay!” I said nervously. “I can use the pool at the NYU gym.” Considering how obsessed Andy was supposed to be with Rye, he did an awfully good job of forgetting about her when she wasn’t around. Maybe this had to do with the learning disabilities Becca had mentioned—could attention deficit disorder make you forget you’re going out with someone except when they’re standing in front of you?

  I looked out the window, desperate for something else to talk about. “Don’t you guys just love the Empire State Building?” I said, like an imbecile. “Look at how all the lights are orange.”

  “For Thanksgiving,” Becca said. “They coordinate the colors with the holidays.�
� Andy was now wiggling his fingers against my hip. What was with him? Wasn’t this intimate ground for two people who hadn’t even kissed to be treading? And what was with me for liking it so much? I asked Becca whether she had received any interesting messages on her phone. It was all I could do to keep from laughing or screaming.

  “You mean in addition to the fifteen hang-ups?” She cast me a wary look. I tried to respond, but she picked up in her typical unruffled tone and kept going. “Just a few friends from boarding school. Everyone’s getting ready for Thanksgiving weekend. My friend Gillian invited me to go to her house in New Jersey and my friend Kim wants to organize a house party with me at our place.”

  “What are you going to do?” I asked her.

  “Probably not the party.” Fine. She didn’t feel like talking about her threats. “We had one last year,” she went on, “and my parents invited a hundred Shuttleworths and turned it into a family reunion.”

  “I remember that,” Andy said. “All your friends went to the East Side Lounge and you were stuck playing cards with some long-lost cousins.”

  “Emphasis on lost,” Becca said. “I had no idea who half those people were.”

  We pulled off the FDR Drive and were riding through the Upper East Side, the neighborhood the Shuttleworths call home, along with every other socialite and captain of industry. When the town car rolled up outside their building, an oversized limestone town house just off Fifth Avenue, Andy jumped out. “I’ll be right back.” He sounded a little nervous.

  “Bye, C,” Becca said to me. “See you in hell tomorrow.”

  I hugged her tight, partly wishing I didn’t have to let her go. I was worried, and not only because I didn’t like the sound of the hang-ups. If what I thought was about to happen actually did happen—that is to say, if Andy and I kissed, for real—things would definitely get more complicated.

  “Are you going to take it or are you just going to sit there?”

  Andy’s words startled me. I’d been spacing out, watching an old man in slippers and a silk bathrobe pick up after his dog, and now Andy was back, holding a box out to me.

  “Ric Burns’s New York documentary,” he said. “It’s possible there’s a better way to spend sixteen hours than watching this, but I have no idea what it would be.”

  “Thanks,” I said. I was scared to make eye contact with him, and instead examined the DVD cover. It featured a picture of a group of baby-faced construction workers sitting on top of a beam suspended over the city, decked out in newsboy caps. “I can’t believe how long it took them to invent the hard hat,” I said, finally looking up at him. His eyelashes were casting shadows on his cheeks and there was a faint curl to his mouth.

  “Maybe people’s heads were harder back then.” He reached into the car to knock the crown of my head. “They’ve definitely become squishier.”

  Everything inside me went limp.

  “That would explain it,” I said, trying to sound wise and sardonic. “So, I guess I’ll see you later?”

  “I’ll drop you off.” He crawled in and shut the door behind him. I smiled uncomfortably. From the car I could see Becca’s room, her Hermès orange walls and A HISTORY OF THE WORLD IN SHOES poster. The closet door had been flung open, and I imagined her putting away her sweaters while she talked on the phone to one of her old friends.

  The car started up and I folded my hands in my lap, trying to calm myself down by imagining Andy was somebody else, somebody I could act normal around.

  “It’s not like I’m in any rush to go back to my dorm,” Andy went on. “They have three of us bunking in one room.”

  “Not that you’re ever there,” I told him. “Your roommates must love you.”

  “For the record, I go to all my classes.”

  “Me too. Unfortunately.”

  He sighed. “Yeah, I heard Hudson sucks.”

  “Maximally.”

  The car glided through Central Park. Silence fell between us, and then he sidled right on over next to me.

  “Hi,” I heard myself say. I must have sounded scared, because he backed away and apologized.

  “You must think I’m a creep.”

  That was the last thing I was thinking.

  “No,” I told him. “I had a feeling you were N.S.I.T.”

  He looked confused.

  “It’s an old saying of Kiki’s. Not Safe in Taxis.”

  He nodded appreciatively. “I like that.”

  “Me too.” I looked at him, straight on. “I mean,” I paused, “I like that you’re N.S.I.T.” I was suddenly feeling bold.

  “You’re funny. Not all girls are, you know.”

  He didn’t have to say names. We both knew he was talking about Rye.

  We were heading west when the car stopped at a red light. Our driver waited for a group of girls who were around our age to scurry over the crosswalk. They all reminded me of Rye, with their skinny limbs and striped scarves, and it struck me as funny that for once I was the girl in a car with a boy.

  Andy turned to me, his face bathed in the traffic light’s red glow. “You okay?”

  I nodded. Never better.

  “Good.” He rubbed his palms over his knees. “Me too.”

  I turned away and let my eyes shut, trying to steady my nerves. He was about to kiss me. What was I doing facing away? I couldn’t hide forever. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. When I turned around again, I was prepared to see Andy staring adoringly at me, mustering the courage to do the one thing he’d been too scared to go ahead with until now. I was not expecting to see him leaning forward and panicking while one of the girls outside gawked at us with a cockeyed expression.

  “No way.” Andy reached clumsily for the door handle.

  How could I not have noticed that the girls didn’t just look like Rye—one of the girls was Rye? “I can’t believe this.” His voice cracked pathetically.

  The car started up again, and Andy lurched toward the driver.

  “Excuse me! Can you please stop the car? I need to jump out, but she’s still going to the Village.”

  His hand on the door handle, he looked back at me. “I really can’t believe this.” The door creaked open, and I didn’t watch as he climbed out of the car and slammed the door.

  My eyes blurred over, and even if I’d turned back to look, I wouldn’t have been able to see a thing.

  I took the building elevator up with Eamon Dagwick, a Celtic studies professor who was still mad at me for my detective days and never greeted me with more than a sniffle. Thanks to the state of my personal affairs, I could manage a sniffle back.

  When I stepped off and was assaulted by my hallway’s psychedelic kaleidoscope of orange, yellow, pink, and green, I felt a new rush of tears coming on. I slid down the wall by our door and prayed that the hallway would just stay still and empty, and nobody would come by to see me in this sorry state. The more tears streaked down my face, the emptier I felt inside.

  The crying finally slowed, and I opened my compact and wiped myself off. Horrible didn’t even begin to describe the way I looked. My eyes were salmon colored and my nose had inflated to roughly twice its original size.

  Still, I had no choice but to stagger through the door. The apartment was as messy as I’d ever seen it, with unfolded blankets and newspaper pages strewn about.

  “Hey,” Henry said. He was on the couch, with huge rings under his eyes and looking exceptionally dirty. Dad was next to him, eating food from a McDonald’s bag. The two were staring at an episode of E! True Hollywood Story.

  Wasn’t my brother the kid who didn’t watch TV unless it was a cartoon or science program? And was my dad not the same man who called fast food poison?

  “Um, what’s going on?” I asked.

  “Ma poupée.” Dad got up to pull me in for a tight hug. He didn’t seem to notice that I looked as pink and bloated as a puffer fish. “Thanks for your message yesterday. Was the rest of your trip good?”

  “Good enough,” I said, sti
ll harping on Andy. “Is everything okay here?”

  Dad let go. “It’s been a long day.”

  “How was Athens?” Henry asked absentmindedly.

  “Aspen. Fine.” I sat on the easy chair near them. “What happened here?”

  “Nothing.” Cheri-Lee flitted out of the kitchen, answering before Henry could. “Nothing, thank God, nothing.” She made a pssst noise and motioned for me to join her back in the kitchen.

  Even Cheri-Lee seemed different; she wasn’t smiling, and her glasses were all smudged.

  “I’ve been over since last night, when your dad called me. We had a bit of a stressful evening,” she said. “Henry went out on one of his walks and found Douglas camping out in Washington Square Park.”

  “Since when did Douglas take up camping?”

  “It was a fund-raising exercise he was doing for his homeless shelter.” Cheri-Lee shook her head and rolled her eyes. “So Henry decided to join them.” She paused. “And stay out past eleven. I know your mother always makes Henry come home by eight, and he’s only allowed to walk as far as the corner, but I guess his eight-year-old mind assumed with her being gone, those rules no longer applied.”

  Actually, I thought, he’s been known to nip out later than that. But I didn’t need to get into it with Cheri-Lee.

  “Why didn’t Douglas do anything?” I asked.

  “You can take that up with him. He claims he told Henry to go home, but said he was trying to get into the role, and since homeless people don’t have phones…”

  I poured myself a glass of orange juice. “Why are smart people so stupid?”

  “Mind-boggling, isn’t it? Listen, I’m going to help out all I can this week, but I need you to pitch in. I’m speaking at a poetry conference next weekend, and I’m weeks overdue in judging a contest for Poetry magazine. I’ll need you around as much as you can stand.”

  I peered into the main room, where the duo was staring, as if in a trance, at the overmascaraed actress on TV. “Of course,” I told her. Considering I’d just skipped off to a five-star getaway and left them high and dry, it was the least I could do.