Danielle Ganek
Page 29
She twists the facts and puts words in people’s mouths, and when I complain, she says, “But it’s fiction.” She’s even more prone to hyperbole than ever now that she’s officially a writer. Plus, that’s roughly the same excuse—“Hey, man, it’s art,” he’d say—used by Biggs.
She left out a lot of the best parts. I had some really good lines last summer that she simply cut from her manuscript. If you ask me, that’s rude. And another thing: Miles says he truly didn’t plan the Gatsby theme party with me in mind. I’m totally willing to suspend my disbelief on that, so I don’t know what business my sister has constantly bringing it up. In fact, she’ll probably mention it this evening at the wedding.
Yes, this story ends with a wedding, as so many of the good ones do. She wanted to just leave you hanging there, in the smoke and fire at the end of last summer. What kind of an ending was that? She may have said she learned a few things about telling a story from me, but she never paid close enough attention. It’s not her fault; she has ADD. I’m sure I do too.
But this story can’t end with a fire. Comedies must end with a wedding. The kind where the bride and groom act like there’s never, ever been a wedding before, the kind where there are enormous tulle bows on the backs of the chairs and calligraphy on the invitations demanding that everyone wear white. And hats for the ladies, of course. Hamilton says that’s very British. Oh, and sugared almonds in little bags. Those were Hamilton’s idea too. It’s the kind of wedding where there is only the finest champagne and the best man is a dog wearing a bow tie.
Not Hamilton and Scotty’s wedding. Theirs took place on New Year’s Eve in Switzerland. None of us are sure it was actually legal, but it was mad beautiful in the snow with both grooms in white tie. The six of us did, in fact, spend Christmas in the mountains, exactly as I predicted we would. We ate fondue until I couldn’t even fit into my ski pants, but it didn’t matter because Miles and I didn’t spend much time on the slopes anyway.
We also spent Columbus Day weekend in Lausanne, where Finn was then designing a small museum for a client. Their life is all very glamorous and chaotic and involves a lot of air travel now as they’ve been dividing their time between Lausanne and New York, aka the greatest city in the world. Yes, Stella’s become one of those New Yorkers.
Miles’s house is still for sale—he couldn’t give the place away now—so we’re having the wedding there. Then I’m going to look into turning it into my version of Yaddo. Miles likes the idea. He says it’s good to give back. Since he’s lost almost all of his dough-remi, he’s had some firsthand experience with this.
Stella comes into my room now. She’s wearing the most fantastic dress, which I found for her. Vintage, of course, and there’s no tag, but I’m pretty sure it’s Geoffrey Beene. Or someone equally fabulous. You can’t even tell she’s two months pregnant.
“Here,” she says, holding out a tall cocktail on ice garnished with mint. “I brought you a dressing drink.”
I almost start to cry but I don’t want to muss my makeup. “You’re a very good sister.”
She smiles. “So are you.” She takes a sip. “You ready? They’re waiting for you.”
I fuss with my hat one more time, checking the mirror. It’s another Philip Treacy, quite absolutely fabulous, if I may say so. “Is Miles down there?”
“He’s a nervous wreck.” She takes my hand. “You are, without a doubt, the most outrageously stylish bride.”
Wait, you thought Stella was the bride? You think I was going to end with their wedding? God, no. For one thing, she still says she’s not getting married, even though she and Finn are disgustingly in love. Apparently it’s very chic and European to skip marriage and go straight to the babies. I, however, am a very American girl. And I’m not ashamed to admit I wanted a big wedding. Of course, it’s not comme il faut to throw big lavish theme parties anymore. So ours is a small affair. Just the six of us and Mum. And Trimalchio, of course.
a cognizant original v5 release october 08 2010
Acknowledgments
Acknowledgements in novels are problematic. When too short they appear terse and we read between the lines, seeing tension and ambiguity in the faint thanks. When too long, with endless lists of names and adjectives, they read like a high school yearbook page—look how popular I am! Some include celebrities—or, worse, famous writers who provided “inspiration”(!)—and sound horribly pretentious. Frankly, I wanted to skip the whole exercise. One, because I’ve been out of high school for a long time. Two, because I’m lazy and a procrastinator and just finishing the novel was hard enough. And three, because I’m terrified of offending anyone. Also, I don’t personally know any celebrities. But it would be rude and inaccurate not to express my extreme heart-felt (see? The adjectives immediately start to pile up in a way that seems cloying) gratitude to my editor, Kendra Harpster, and the other brilliant (yes, really) women at Viking: Clare Ferraro, Molly Stern, Nancy Sheppard, Tricia Conley, Veronica Windholz, Tory Klose, Rachel Burd, and Amanda Brower, who worked on this book with me. Thank you so much. I feel very lucky to adore my agent (sorry, do you think that sounds smug? I do), Leigh Feldman, and I have to tell her and the team at Darhansoff, Verill, Feldman how much all their efforts on my behalf have been appreciated. While my family and friends are all a little tired of this whole novelist thing, I want to thank them for their patience, especially my son Harry, who read Gatsby this year (or so he tells me), to whom this book is dedicated and my two younger children, Nick and Zoe, who were less than pleased to see their older brother singled out for attention. (Your turns will come, we hope.) And of course, I have to acknowledge and thank the man I’ve loved all of my adult life, my first, and presumably only, husband, David, who is not, I repeat, NOT, a character in this story and was most definitely not a mistake. (He has read Gatsby, though, or so he tells me).