Despite how mad she was, Natalya couldn’t help being curious. How could tomorrow’s paper and the Internet have anything to do with why Colin had chosen Alison over her?
Colin took a deep breath. “Last weekend, when they were at their country house and you and I were…together, Alison’s parents told her that her father was being investigated by the federal government—the Securities and Exchange Commission. And this morning, he was arrested by the FBI.”
Natalya gasped. “What?”
“He’s been…well, I don’t actually understand all the details, but he’s been fudging numbers, misleading investors in his hedge fund, and he lost a lot of money and covered it up.”
“I don’t…I don’t understand.” Natalya’s voice was a whisper. “She’s having that big party tonight.”
“She was having a big party tonight. This morning she had to call everyone to cancel it. Her parents didn’t expect the story to break so soon; they thought they had more time before the arrest. I guess his lawyers were trying to work out some kind of deal, and then yesterday it all fell apart.”
Suddenly, Natalya remembered Alison crying to Jordan in the bathroom, It just doesn’t make any sense. She pictured her quiet demeanor when they talked about the party, and Jordan’s frantic excitement, like she was a cheerleader trying to encourage a despondent team. No wonder Alison hadn’t been looking forward to her party—it was a huge lie she was being asked to participate in.
“Oh my god,” Natalya whispered. She tried to imagine the humiliation Alison had to be feeling, the fear of what would come next. Had Alison’s mother known what her husband was doing? Were Alison’s parents going to get divorced?
Colin was still talking. “I’m not trying to excuse what I did, Natalya. And I’m so, so sorry for hurting you. But I couldn’t…I couldn’t respond to her telling me the news about her dad by telling her I was breaking up with her. I just couldn’t do that to someone. And I couldn’t tell you what she told me, because it just would have been another betrayal.”
In spite of herself, Natalya found herself feeling for Colin’s predicament. As if he could sense her wavering, Colin said, “Please. Please, Natalya. Put yourself in my shoes.”
“I…” Natalya began, but she couldn’t finish her sentence.
Colin spoke quickly. “Look, I know you’re at that art opening with your friends. I know you have to go. And I know you probably think I’m the world’s biggest jerk. And I know I deserve that. But I want you to know that I think you’re the most amazing girl I’ve ever met. And maybe I can’t do anything about that right now, but my feelings for you aren’t going to go away.”
“I really like you,” whispered Natalya.
“Natalya, I need to see you,” Colin said.
Natalya imagined Alison sitting in her room, the list of people she’d just called to cancel her party on the desk in front of her. She remembered how Alison’s face had lit up at lunch when talk turned to Colin.
Natalya took a deep breath. “Alison’s my friend.”
“Please.”
What could she say?
“Natalya…” Colin’s voice was pleading.
She liked him so much. And he liked her. What did it matter if they didn’t act on their feelings? Wasn’t the betrayal having the feelings in the first place?
But she knew the answer. Maybe she had no control over how she felt. But she did have control over what she did.
“I can’t, Colin. I’m sorry, but I can’t.” She took the phone from her ear and pressed end call. As she watched his name disappear from her screen, she wondered if she would ever see it there again.
WHEN JANE AND Victoria finally found her, Natalya was sitting on the floor behind the coatrack, her phone pressed against her chest.
“Oh my god!” cried Victoria. “Nat, what happened?”
Natalya told them. By the time she’d finished, both Jane and Victoria had sunk down to sit beside her on the floor.
“Wow,” said Jane.
“Double wow,” agreed Victoria.
They were all silent for a long minute.
“Wait!” Natalya cried. She turned to Victoria, suddenly remembering. “What happened with you and Jack?”
Jane waved away the question. “Oh, they love each other; it was all a big misunderstanding; we’ll get the wedding announcements in the mail.”
Natalya’s eyes popped open. “Seriously?”
Victoria laughed happily. “Not the wedding announcement part.” But then she grew serious. “Nat, what…what are you going to do?”
Before Natalya could answer, the bartender appeared around the corner. If he thought it was weird to find three girls sitting on the floor in what was basically the coat closet, he didn’t say so. Perhaps that was one of the things they taught a person in bartending school.
He looked from each of the Darlings to the next, then asked, “Is one of your grandmothers the woman in the painting?”
Jane raised her hand slightly, like she was in school and he was her teacher, and he nodded briefly, as if she’d given just the answer he was hoping for. Then he ducked out of the room. A second later, he reappeared, carrying a tray with three frothy drinks.
The girls gasped.
“Wait, you said you didn’t have any piña colada mix,” Jane said. Her tone was accusatory, as if she’d caught him in a lie.
“A guy brought me a can of it. He said he got it at the bodega across the street.”
“A random guy?” asked Natalya suspiciously. She’d had her hand out, ready to accept a drink, but now she pulled it back.
“Well, I guess that all depends on how you look at it.” The bartender turned back to Jane. “Is your mother here with a ‘random’ date or a serious boyfriend?”
“Richard gave you the mix?” Jane’s eyes were huge with incredulity. “He went out and bought it?!” She remembered how he’d overheard her ordering the drinks and given her what she’d assumed was a condescending look.
The bartender handed each girl a napkin, followed by a glass. “Seemed like a nice guy.”
“Yeah,” said Jane weakly.
“Well, cheers!” And with that, the bartender was gone and the three girls were alone again.
“Richard,” said Natalya, shaking her head in amazement. “Who’d have guessed?”
“Seriously,” agreed Victoria.
Out of nowhere, Victoria blurted out, “I should have listened to you, Jane.” Jane and Natalya both looked at her, and Victoria took Jane’s hand in hers. “When you told me to talk to Jack about wanting him to come to the opening.”
Jane smiled at her. “Of course you should have.”
“And I should have listened to you when you told me not to try to be friends with Colin. You knew that wasn’t really what I wanted,” Natalya told Jane.
“Naturally,” Jane agreed. “Because, as we can see from my track record, I know everything about love.” They all laughed. “Oh, and by the way,” she added, “I should have listened to you guys.”
“When?” asked Victoria.
“Yeah, when?” asked Natalya.
“Remember when you said it sounded like Simon was gay?” Jane asked Natalya.
“I said it sounded like Simon was gay?” asked Natalya, surprised. “How prescient.”
“At Act Two. When I first told you about our night together. Well, specifically I guess you asked me if I was saying Simon was gay. Which is, you know, kind of the same thing. And I should have listened to you.”
“I probably should have been more forceful,” Natalya said. “Next time I’ll just come right out and say it if I think your boyfriend sounds like he’s into guys.”
“I appreciate that,” said Jane dryly.
“You guys, I don’t think love sucks anymore,” Victoria announced.
“Oh, there’s a surprise,” said Jane.
“Seriously,” agreed Natalya.
Victoria put a hand on Natalya’s shoulder. “Nat, what are you going to do?”
she asked for the second time.
Natalya shook her head slowly back and forth. “I’m not going to see him again. I’m going to be a good friend to Alison.”
“That’s going to be hard,” Victoria said gently. “You and Colin really like each other.”
“Don’t remind me,” begged Natalya, dropping her head back against the wall.
“Oh my god!” Jane cried into the silence that Natalya’s admission created. “I just remembered something Nana once told me.”
“What?” asked Natalya and Victoria.
Jane gazed at the spot where her grandmother’s name was painted on the wall. She spoke slowly. “She said she didn’t regret any relationship she’d ever had.”
For a moment, the girls were silent, and then Natalya confessed, “I don’t know if I can say that. I kind of regret what happened with Colin.”
Jane looked disappointed. “You really didn’t get anything out of being with him?”
“Well…” Natalya hesitated, then said, “He taught me to waltz. I guess that’s a good thing to know how to do.”
Victoria smiled at Natalya. “It’s so cool that you know how to waltz. I wish I knew how to waltz.”
“Yeah, well, I wish the guy I liked didn’t have a girlfriend,” Natalya sighed.
“Oh, Nat,” said Victoria. She slipped her arm around Natalya, who turned to Jane. “Okay, what about you? Do you regret going out with Simon?”
“I don’t know,” Jane said. “Kind of.” But then she grew thoughtful. “Well, I guess…he got me back onstage. And acting opposite him definitely made me a better actress. And I’m glad I got to work with Mark.” Thinking about Mark made her remember their conversation after rehearsal, how he’d said she was a really great actress. She remembered something else, too: how it had seemed like he was on the verge of saying one more thing to her right before the cleaning guy walked in.
And suddenly she realized something.
“Guys, I don’t think Nana meant she didn’t regret anything about her relationships.” She leaned forward excitedly. “She just meant that she wouldn’t give up the experience of having had them. That she loved who she was, and she wouldn’t have been who she was without everything that had happened to her. The good and the bad.” Realizing what her grandmother must have meant by what she’d said made Jane feel closer to Nana than she had in a long time, like they really had somehow crossed the line between the living and the dead to speak to each other.
Victoria put down her drink and wrapped her free arm around Jane. “You guys, I love you so much.”
“We love you too!” Jane said, putting her head on Victoria’s shoulder.
“Talk about experiences making you who you are,” Natalya said. “I feel like I am who I am because of the two of you.”
“Oh, I feel that way too!” cried Victoria.
“Me three,” agreed Jane. She lifted her glass, and Victoria wiggled free so she could get hers. Then all three of them clinked their drinks together.
“To us!” said Jane. “To love!”
“To us!” echoed Natalya and Victoria.
And with that, they drank happily from their tall, elegant glasses.
They were the Darlings.
The Darlings in love.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The writer alone in a room of her own is a beautiful image, but it in no way captures my experience of writing The Darlings in Love. So a huge thank you to those who sat in the room with me (literally and figuratively): Rachel Cohn, Rebecca Friedman, Ben Gantcher, Jodi Kahn, Bernie Kaplan, E. Lockhart, and Helen Perelman. And my hat is off to the fabulous team at Hyperion—Deborah Bass, Ann Dye, Nellie Kurtzman, Andrew Sansone, Marci Senders, Laura Schreiber, and Dina Sherman. As always, it takes a village (for me) to write a book. Thanks for being my fellow citizens.
MELISSA KANTOR is the author of The Darlings Are Forever, a Junior Library Guild selection; the best-selling Confessions of a Not It Girl, a Booklist Best Romance Novel for Youth; If I Have a Wicked Stepmother, Where’s My Prince?, a YALSA Teens Top Ten Pick; The Breakup Bible, a YALSA Best Books for Young Adults nominee; and Girlfriend Material, a Texas Lone Star Reading List Pick. Melissa is a teacher in Brooklyn, New York, where she lives with her husband, the poet Benjamin Gantcher, and their three children. Visit her online at www.melissakantor.com.
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