The Edge of Falling

by Rebecca Serle

  Max? she mouths to me.

  I roll my eyes:

  No big deal. Who knows. Claire.

  “Ten!” she calls after us.

  The elevator delivers us downstairs and Claire puts up her hand to hail a cab. “No train?” I ask, half kidding. Claire never takes the subway.

  “Not in heels,” she says.

  A yellow cab slows and she ushers me inside. “Grand and Roebling,” she says. “Williamsburg.”

  Claire starts prattling about how DJs are the new chefs, or something, and I lean back on the black plastic of the cab. I love the drive from Manhattan to Brooklyn, when the city is behind you, and you can appreciate it as this singular thing, this unit: Manhattan. It’s pretty astounding. Even for someone like me, who’s lived here her whole life. I know people joke that New York is the center of the world, but sometimes, on the bridge, it feels true. Like everything and anything of significance takes place right here in my hometown.

  The entrance to the bar is hidden. It’s sandwiched between a nail salon and a deli, and the door is plain wood, unmarked. Claire opens it and we walk down a hallway and then a small flight of stairs. It’s not until we’re on the stairs that I begin to hear the music—or maybe not so much hear as feel. The ground hums and vibrates below us like there’s a locked dragon who is growing restless in his dungeon.

  The bouncer eyes us and we flash our driver’s licenses.

  They’re fake, but we’ve had them for two years and they work pretty well. We rarely get turned away, which I think has more to do with Claire’s connections—and legs—than the quality of our IDs. I bought them in Rhode Island when we went with Peter to look at Brown years ago. All I remember from that trip is that the three of us went to Start, this crazy dance party, and that we came home with these.

  Whether it’s Claire’s legs or the IDs’ appearance of validity I don’t know, but they work again tonight. The bouncer nods us through.

  When we get inside, it’s dark and loud, but not loud enough that you have to scream to talk. It’s still early. Max is onstage already, but Claire wants to get a drink. We slide our way to the bar. It’s funny, I’ve had a fake ID since I was fifteen, but I’ve never used it for anything besides getting into places. Drinking really isn’t my thing. I got drunk with Claire once, last summer at the beach house. Everyone was away and it was just the two of us. Trevor was supposed to come up, but he got stuck babysitting his little brother. My sister was in the city with my mom, Peter was on some postgrad safari, and my dad was probably away on business, I don’t remember. Anyway, we got bombed. We drank champagne straight from the bottle. We had like one each, I think. At a certain point it got a little fuzzy. I woke up on the sofa in the morning and my head felt like it had been hammered with an iron rod.

  I could barely even see.

  “Why did we do that?” I remember asking Claire. She just shrugged. “Because we did.”

  Claire doesn’t spend too much time considering consequences, but this quality isn’t incongruent with the rest of her. She’s all angles—sharp elbows, cheekbones, and the point where adventure meets danger—like two walls of the same room. Nothing is cloudy with her. Nothing is round. Nothing needs too much time to decide. She’s like a dart shot right through the bull’s eye—if she’s playing, it’s all or nothing.

  “Orange juice.” Claire hands me a cup and takes a sip of hers—cranberry vodka, her usual drink.

  She starts bobbing to the music. “They’re pretty good, right?” she says to me.

  I smile to say yes, but the truth is I don’t know. I have no idea what makes good music. My iTunes collection is embarrassingly dated—some classics and Top 40 stuff. Whatever I end up stumbling into on Pandora and whatever Trevor introduced me to. The indie music scene is totally above my head. I just don’t have the sensitivity for it. Or the ear. Most of it sounds the same to me. Claire and Trevor are always saying things like music is poetry—you’re not supposed to dissect its meaning; you’re just supposed to feel it—but that’s my problem: I can’t feel it. Or if I do, I’m never sure I’m having the right reaction.

  “You’re oblivious,” Claire says to me.

  I roll my eyes.

  She repeats it, so close I can feel the words traveling down my ear canal, bouncing around on the walls.

  I mock glare at her. “Just because I don’t appreciate these hipsters the same way you do . . .”

  She shakes her head and grabs my shoulders, turning me fifteen degrees to the left.

  “What?” I ask.

  She rolls her eyes and points to a guy at the end of the bar. He’s leaning against the counter, like he’s having a conversation with the bartender, but it’s obvious he’s looking at us. He raises his glass and eyebrows at the same time when we look over.

  “Gross,” I say. “He’s old.”

  It’s not true; he’s probably no older than twenty. In fact, he might even be our age, but he’s got that air. I know it. A lot of guys at Kensington have it. It’s what happens when you spend your childhood being raised by a nanny, taking a car service by yourself at eight. It’s what happens when your parents let you wander the city alone at ten, send you on a plane to visit your grandmother in the South of France or your father in Italy. You grow up faster. Not maturitywise, not at all, but something in the way you move. Those experiences age you.

  Seeing things, even bad things—especially bad things—that ages you.

  Claire bites her lip and tosses her shoulders back. I grab her arm. “What are you doing?”

  I’ve been the victim of Claire’s flirtations before, and it’s never something I wind up loving. One particular incident in Cabo comes to mind. We were on vacation with her parents in the spring of our sophomore year. After a night at our hotel, we ended up back at the villa of these two college guys. University of Wisconsin, classic frat boys. Popped collars, crew cuts, the whole bit. I hadn’t wanted to go, but Claire had begged me, and as soon as we got there, she disappeared with one, the one she had been flirting with all night. I was stuck out on some lawn chairs with the other one. He was nice—I was lucky; he didn’t even try to kiss me—but I was still so angry at Claire. I was with Trevor at the time, and I was so pissed at her for putting me in that position that I didn’t talk to her the entire rest of the trip. It was only when we were headed home, on the plane, that she turned to me, these pink sparkly sunglasses on. They were bedazzled, and across the top were the words “I LOVE CAGGIE.” It was an impressive feat, for being in Mexico, and I couldn’t help myself—I popped them off her face and onto mine.

  “We’re here for Band Boy, remember?” I say to her.

  “This isn’t for me; it’s for you,” she says, still smiling at the bar guy.

  “I doubt he’s going to come over for me,” I say. “You’re practically giving him a lap dance from across the room.”

  Claire’s head snaps around to look at me. “I’ve had it,” she says.

  “What?”

  “This.” She contorts her face, sticking her bottom lip out and making her eyes big like puppies.

  “I don’t know what you’re referring to.”

  She slings her arm over my shoulder. “Come on, Caggs, it’s time to move on. Trevor was great, and totally adorable in that clueless kind of way”—she tilts her head to the side, like she’s pulling up his image in her mind’s eye—“but he’s old news. Kaput. Finito. Extravaganza. You dig me?”

  “I dig you.”

  “So flirt a little,” she says, giving me a push toward Bar Man. “What’s the worst that could happen?” Great question. So I step forward. It only takes one step for Mr. Bar Man to come toward me. As he gets closer, I see that I’m right: He’s about my age, maybe a little bit older. He’s dressed well—tailored shirt, black pants—and he’s got dark, dark hair and eyes. Even inside, in this poorly lit music hall, it’s easy to spot that they’re so brown they’re almost black.

  “Well,” he says when we’re within speaking distance.


  “This is a surprise. Nice to see you.” I frown. “Excuse me?”

  He doesn’t answer, just keeps looking at me. It makes the back of my neck feel hot.

  “Do we know each other?” I ask.

  I cross my arms. He runs his tongue over his top lip. “We used to.”

  I feel my heartbeat quicken. I hadn’t actually expected him to say yes. I thought he meant that he was surprised I came over. Or that I wasn’t Claire.

  “You look perturbed,” he says.

  I shake my head. “I don’t think we do.”

  He takes a sip of his drink. Sets it down. Exhales. “We do.”

  “Well, I have no idea who you are. No offense or

  anything.”

  He smiles. “I wouldn’t expect you to. It was a long time ago. You’re Mcalister, right?”

  More heart pounding. “Yes.”

  “Of the Caulfields?”

  Ah. Yes. “Do you know me, or have you just heard of me?”

  He whistles. “Impressive. Spunky. I like that. No, I went to school with your brother. Patrick?”

  “Peter.”

  “Right. Nice kid.”

  “You didn’t go to Kensington,” I say. My brother was only two grades ahead of me, and I knew everyone in his class, more or less.

  “Grammar school,” he says. “We’ve been in London for the last few years.”

  “Oh.” That makes sense. My brother went to Prep until the ninth grade, so we were in different schools. Prep is all boys, and a lot of them choose to go to middle school there instead of Wheatley. Prep doesn’t go all the way through,

  though, so they all transfer in.

  My shoulders start to drop a little. “You recognized me?” He tilts his head to the side. “I have a pretty good memory.” I feel his eyes loop my face. “You always used to come with your mom to pick your brother up. You haven’t changed very much.”

  I shake my head. “You have no idea.” “You want a drink?” he asks. I motion to the orange juice in my hand.

  “There’s no alcohol in there,” he says. “No?” I bring the cup to my lips.

  “No way,” he says. “You’re not a vodka girl.” He motions for the bartender. “Two whisky sours,” he says. To me: “You’ll like it. I promise.”

  “What do you promise?” I ask. I’m feeling just a little bit flirtatious. Maybe it’s all the vitamin C. More likely the fact that I can practically feel Claire’s eyes boring into me and her voice: Can’t you ever just pretend to have fun?

  “I don’t make contingency plans,” he says. “Just trust me.”

  He takes out a lighter and flicks the flame up. It startles me and I blink, taking a step backward.

  “You can’t smoke in here,” I say. Stupid. Childish. Like a little kid tattling. So much for the witty.

  He snaps the lighter closed. “I don’t smoke.”

  “What’s your name, anyway?” I ask, changing the subject.

  “Astor.”

  “Astor what?”

  He cocks his head to the side. “Did I stumble into a game of twenty questions?”

  I suddenly feel silly. I don’t even know why I’m talking to him. Because Claire pushed me over? “So London, huh?” I say, taking a gulp of OJ. “Did you just move back?”

  “Few months ago.”

  “You’re in college?” I ask.

  He looks at me, takes a swig of one of the drinks that have just been set down. “Not right now.”

  “Right. Because right now you’re here at this bar. I get it.”

  I shake my head.

  He laughs. “That’s not what I mean. I’m not going right now.”

  “Okay,” I say, bringing my glass up to my lips. He peers at me. “Surprised?”

  I shrug. “Not really. A little unusual, I guess, for someone like you.”

  A smile cracks along his face. Like a knife carving a pumpkin. “Someone like me?”

  “Come on,” I say. “You know what I mean.”

  He nods. “I do indeed.” He sets his drink down. “So you think I’m wild?”

  “No,” I say.

  “Adventurous?” he tries. He angles his body so it’s facing me, and flicks the straw out of my drink on the counter. For some reason it makes me self-conscious. I run my pinky down the side of my glass, scooping up a bead of condensation.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I don’t know you. But I get it, I think.”

  “Not many people do.” I look up at him. “I’m not most people.” He holds my gaze for a moment, and something passes between us. Something you can’t see, just feel. Then he laughs and the mood lightens. “Noted.”

  “So,” I say. “What are you doing now?”

  “Like tonight?” He winks at me and runs a hand through his hair. I can’t help but notice his fingers—long and lean, like him. He has a leather bracelet on his wrist, with a tiny silver clasp. “I get that college is what I’m supposed to be doing, but it’s not for me. Not now, anyway. I kind of have a different way of looking at the future.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  He smiles. “Yeah. Here.” He hands me my drink. I take it.

  “So what’s your take?” I ask.

  He turns and leans against the bar. “It’s just never seemed as certain to me as it has to other people.” He takes another sip. Stops. “Like these boxes people keep ticking. High school. College. Work. Marriage. Kids. How can you be so sure you’ll make it to the next one?”

  “I know what you mean.”

  He eyes me, like he’s trying to determine whether that’s true or not. “Yeah?”

  “Trust me,” I say. “Yes.”

  “Okay, then, Mcalister Caulfield. Let’s toast.” He raises his glass, and I surprise myself by doing the same. Then he looks me square in the eye. There’s a lot in that look. It’s enticing, nerveracking. Like a roller coaster that you know is going to make your heart plummet down into your stomach, but it must be what you want, because you get on anyway. “To now,” he says.

  We clink; ice cubes rattle. Then I take a sip. The alcohol burns a trail down my throat. It feels good. Hot. Like a brushfire. Like it’s clearing something out.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “Why do you hate me so much?” my mother asks. We’re at Bergdorf ’s, browsing around the hat department. It’s on the ground floor, close to the doors. I like to stay near exits when I’m shopping with my mom. I’m also very inconsistently listening to Claire’s lunch date. Her dad made her go out with some aspiring photographer, one of his assistants, and she made me promise to come along - cellularly.

  “I don’t hate you,” I say. “I hate that hat.”

  My mom gives me a look that seems to say, Same difference. She has a tendency to overidentify.

  This is usually what shopping is like with her. She wants me to dress like Abigail or Constance or one of the other girls in my grade who take off ten thousand dollars’ worth of accessories and store them in their lockers when we have gym. It’s ridiculous. There are children starving in Africa, and my mother is concerned about a Chloé dress. You’d think that after my sister died, she would have gotten some perspective, that this stuff would have become far less important to her, but that’s not at all what happened. It was the opposite. She redecorated our house after eighteen months, same as always. She bought a whole new wardrobe. Sometimes I think she feels like the real world abandoned her, so she might as well stay here: in cotton and Lycra and linen.

  “I like this,” I offer. I pull up a summer scarf. It’s cream colored with big stitching.

  My mother ignores the gesture. “I spoke to your brother,” she says.

  “Peter?”

  “Any other siblings I should know about?”

  We both get a little quiet. She clears her throat. “He said he’s thinking of coming home next weekend.”

  I set the scarf back and in the process knock a bag off a mannequin. I reach down and fumble with picking it back up. “Already? He just got there.
”

  “Felicia,” my mother says.

  “Right.”

  “I don’t think she’s any good for him,” she says, sashaying over to the jewelry case.

  I trot behind. “No? I dunno. He loves her and all.”

  My mother looks at me sharply, like I’ve just sworn. “She’s a distraction,” she says.

  “From what? Other girls?”

  I put the phone up to my ear and hear Claire laugh. It’s genuine, so I know things are going fine. Plus I don’t think this is getting romantic. She’s still with Max, and it’s lunch.

  “Don’t be smart,” my mother says. She motions for the saleslady to let her see a ring. It’s blue. Sapphire. She barely even looks at it before she nods to wrap it up.

  “So look, Mom, I’m probably late to meet Claire.” That’s a lie, Claire—is obviously busy at the moment—but we’re getting increasingly farther away from the exit, which means I’m starting to sweat in here. And that’s a feat. It’s always freezing in Bergdorf ’s.

  “We’re having lunch,” she says. “Claire can come if she’d like.” She taps her finger on the glass counter.

  I pick up the phone again. “Demarchelier is my godfather, actually,” I hear Claire say. “You know Trevor came by again yesterday,” my mother says.

  Instantly my heart starts racing. I glance downward, toward the jewelry case. “Why?” I ask.

  “What do you mean, why?”

  “He must have had a reason. Why else would he come over?” I can feel my neck start to heat up. I keep my face pointed low.

  “He told me you wouldn’t speak to him,” she says, fingering a gold bracelet. “He said he didn’t have a choice.”

  “He came to talk to you?” For just a moment, my confusion eclipses my anxiety. This conversation is unusual for a few reasons. Lately my mom isn’t too aware of what’s going on in our house. Frankly, I wasn’t even sure she knew Trevor and I had broken up. Also, my mom and I have never had that mother-daughter relationship where we tell each other everything. It just isn’t our thing. She’s always just sort of let me live. I didn’t come to her when I was thinking of sleeping with Trevor. We don’t lie in bed together and talk about love. We’re not like that. If we ever were, we certainly aren’t now.