Beautiful Stranger (21 page)

But as much as she’d had the perfect end to a memorable evening, the early part of her night wasn’t sitting well with her. She couldn’t deny feelings of unease about Yale. All from one stupid get-to-know-you event, with just a fraction of her incoming class. What was wrong with her?

She felt Cyn nudge a shoulder into her own. “Where the hell are you?”

“Here.” Anna smiled. “When’s the last time you and I went to see a play together?”

“Sophomore year. The millionth revival of
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at
Circle in the Square. Michael Flannery and I locked ourselves into the handicap john, smoked a bone, and made out for the entire second act.”

Anna laughed. “Michael Flannery. I remember him!” He’d been an exchange student from Ireland with curly black hair, smoldering blue eyes, a perpetual three-day growth of beard, and the shoulders of a rugby superstar. Cyn had bet Anna she could bag him before any of the zillion other girls who’d been after him. Of course, Cyn being Cyn, she’d succeeded.

“It’s so weird, isn’t it?” Anna asked. She realized this was her first time back home as an actual high school graduate. “To think that high school is really over?”

“Yeah.” Something flickered across Cyn’s face. She blew a meager bubble with her gum, then popped it. “Hey, you’ll come visit me in Paris, right? I promise I’ll cook you an amazing welcome dinner,” she added with a grin.

Anna nodded, but couldn’t help her head from spinning a bit at the thought. Cyn in France at cooking school—it seemed so bizarre, because as far as Anna knew, Cyn had never shown an interest in cooking and was supposed to be starting at Middlebury College in Vermont. She’d decided to defer only a few weeks ago, as she’d explained on the cab ride downtown. But she didn’t feel any ambivalence about it. Middlebury wasn’t going anywhere, Cyn explained.

“You’ll be too busy seducing every hot guy at your cooking school,” Anna teased, even as she swallowed down a little lump in her throat. It was one thing to be in L.A. while Cyn was in New York, but quite another to think about her best friend leaving to go abroad. She’d miss her a lot. Even after all these years, Cyn hadn’t changed much at all. She was the same outrageous hellion she’d been when they’d met in elementary school. Today she wore a white lace pinafore she’d found at Threads—their favorite East Village thrift store—over tattered Chip & Pepper jeans, and red-and-white polka-dot Marc Jacobs platform heels. Anna wore khakis and a pink Armani T-shirt that was cool in this hot weather.

“Just the guys?” Cyn cracked. “Do you think I’m slipping?”

“Not at all.”

“Because I’m not. But there is more to life than seducing everyone around you just to prove you can. Which I can. At least that’s what I’ve heard.” Her eyes flicked to the back of the theater, and she groaned. “Oh gawd. Tabitha is back there.”

Anna craned around and saw the skinny girl with the close-cropped hair that she remembered. Tabitha was dressed entirely in black, which was the only color she’d worn for as long as Anna had known her. She had shoulder-length thick dark hair, kohl-rimmed eyes, and the same pale skin that Anna remembered.

“Katie Prescott told me she comes to every performance and mouths the words with the actors, but I didn’t believe her. Too bad we’re not on her aisle to check it out. Anyway, she’ll see us and you’ll have to say something nice afterwards.”

“And you won’t?” Anna asked, arching a honey-blond eyebrow.

Cyn guffawed. “Please, this is me we’re talking about. I don’t give a shit. Besides, that’s what I’ve got you for,” she added.

“Thanks,” Anna replied dryly. “Besides, you gave a shit enough to come when she asked you to,” she pointed out.

“Because she has a cousin in Paris by the name of Pierre, a junior at the Sorbonne. I checked him out on Facebook. All I can say is, well worth checking out. I am so on Air France.”

Anna laughed. Suddenly the houselights dimmed and the audience hushed. A moment later, when the stage lights came up, the play began with a party sequence that had the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Suck My Kiss” blasting from the sound system. The six actors looked like they were in high school, though Anna was certain they were actually older.

The lead actress, a gaunt girl with platinum blond hair and enormous eyes, had bandages around both wrists. Anna soon learned that this was because she was recovering from her latest suicide attempt. It was the last party of the season at her parents’ summer house in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts. The girl had an unrequited crush on her father’s best friend, a middle-aged, raging alcoholic who was only attracted to very young girls. The party went on and on, and thirty minutes in, Anna was bored out of her mind.
I Climb the Stairs
, she finally figured out, was a metaphor—although the main character, Charity, literally climbed the stairs onstage whenever she was going to have sex with the middle-aged guy. The final time, though, she kicked the guy in the testicles and ran away.

The lights dimmed. The audience erupted into thunderous applause as the cast took their curtain calls.

“Hated it,” Anna whispered to Cyn.

“How many ways can you spell ‘pretentious’? But Tabitha wrote it in high school, and Chilton Pennysworth at the
Times
gave it a rave, so she’s the new hot flavor of the season. Come on. Let’s suck up and then we’re out of here.”

The Westsider Theater was somewhat ramshackle, and by the time they reached Tabitha in the small lobby, a thick crowd surrounded her. Cyn tried to push their way inside, but the person now standing with Tabitha made Anna resist.

Scott Spencer, her first, achingly unrequited crush. With his Chad Michael Murray–esque good looks, and his easy, brainy insouciance, for years, seeing him had done things to Anna’s internal organs—they spontaneously rearranged themselves. In fact, the fact that Scott and Cyn had become a serious item at the time was one of the main reasons she’d left New York for L.A.

But her reaction now was neutral. Because when she’d really had a chance to get to know Scott, she’d been less than impressed. When he and Cyn had come to surprise Anna and her L.A. friends several months ago in Vegas, Anna had realized then that her crush had been on an
idea
rather than on the guy, whom she hadn’t really known at all. He wasn’t who she thought he was, and soon he and Cyn were history too.

“I guess I forgot to tell you about that.” Cyn’s eyes flitted from Anna to Scott and back to Anna again.

At that moment, Scott turned and his eyes met hers. It was the strangest thing. She didn’t blush. She didn’t even blink.

She was really and truly over him. When he went and put his arm around Tabitha, she even smiled.

“I’ll be back,” Cyn announced.

Anna’s waif-thin friend propelled herself through the crowd and jumped on Scott, hands around his neck, legs circling his waist. He didn’t seem to mind, though Tabitha was scowling. He laughed, gave her a kiss, and set her down. Then he said, “Anna!” and held his arms out to her.

Anna moved forward for a hug and noticed Tabitha’s scowl deepen. Then the playwright’s attention was taken by a middle-aged woman, with hair the color of burnt coffee, who passed the knot of people in the center of the lobby.

“Fabulous, just remarkable!” she called loudly.

“Thank you!” Tabitha called back, then turned her attention to Cyn and Anna. “So, you loved my play, right?”

“I’ve never seen anything quite like it before,” Cyn mused thoughtfully, taking a couple of steps away from Scott … but not so many that she couldn’t sling a friendly arm over his shoulder.

“Exactly what I was going to say,” Anna added, working very hard to keep a straight face.

Scott let Cyn’s arm stay around his neck, but snaked an arm around Tabitha’s black-cinched waist. “So, does my girl rock or what? She’s a fucking literary genius.”

“Oh, you,” Tabitha demurred, leaning into him. But Anna could see that in fact she agreed with Scott; she
did
think she was a literary genius.

“Where are you going to school this fall?” Anna asked politely.

“Columbia,” Tabitha replied matter-of-factly. “But I’m being offered a number of screenplay deals. TriStar, New Line, even Miramax. Every studio has sent a rep to see my play, and I just signed with Paradigm. It’s wild. How about you, Anna?”

“Yale.”

“Oh yeah, I remember you telling me that,” Scott recalled, looking past her. “Damn, there’s Fisher Stevens—heard he’s got some killer Thai stick. I’ll be right back.” He crossed the lobby to a short guy with a scraggly soul patch.

Tabitha smiled at Anna. Her lips were painted glossy red, the only color amid her pale skin and dark clothing. “What do you want to study? Do you know?”

“Creative writing,” Anna said instantly, without pausing to think. The words coming out of her mouth shocked her. She’d always said classic literature. Why had she
said
that? Was it Tabitha’s success? Was it being shunned by the Joyce Maynard crowd at the party? Was she, in fact, simply jealous of everyone?

“
You?
” Tabitha asked, sounding incredulous.

“I write.”

Tabitha cackled like the Wicked Witch of the West and ran her fingers through her short-cropped hair. “Oh, I guess it’s a hobby thing for you. That’s kind of cute.”

“It’s not
cute
.” Anna felt her fists start to clench, but willed herself to stop. “I really can write.”

“If you say so,” Tabitha chirped. “So how are the airheads on the West Coast? I heard you were out there.”

Before she could reply, Cyn jumped in.

“I never realized what a patronizing little bitch you are, Tabitha. Also, your play sucks, so enjoy your abbreviated rocket ride while the public is delusional enough to provide the fuel.”

“Fuck you, jealous cow.” Tabitha snapped back.

“Oh,
that’s
fresh,” Cyn sneered. “And by the way, your boyfriend is horrible in bed. Of course, if you haven’t figured that out yet, you’re probably just as bad. Let’s go, Anna.”

“You can forget hooking up with Pierre in France, scag!” Tabitha yelled after them, her face scrunched as tightly as an artichoke heart.

They stepped out of the dim theater and hit the Chelsea sidewalk, where they were instantly assaulted by the heavy, humid night air. But Anna felt fantastic as they walked together toward Sixth Avenue, where they could easily catch a cab uptown. “You were amazing.” She beamed at Cyn.

“Always have been. No one gets away with dissing you in front of me.”

Anna felt a lump rise in her throat. She would never have another friend like Cyn, never. “I was just thinking … you’re more of a sister to me than my sister.”

“Oh gawd, you’re going to get all maudlin on me,” Cyn groaned. “Let’s go to the Pyramid Club and get loaded. You’ve been there—you have fond memories, right?”

Anna laughed. “This is
me
you’re talking to. I’ve never been there. And I don’t drink. Much.”

“Right. The I-don’t-get-loaded queen. Okay, we’ll just go flirt shamelessly, pick up a couple guys, and leave them wanting more. How’s that?”

Anna hadn’t told Cyn about what had happened at the Met with Logan, and she wasn’t sure why, unless being in New York had returned her to form. She was a private person in an age when living an unedited life on MySpace and YouTube was the thing to do. She couldn’t understand her friends who needed to broadcast everything about themselves to anyone who might possibly take an interest. Like the Big Book said, there were things that were public and there were things that were private. It made sense to know the difference. Of course, she’d tell Cyn eventually. Just not right now.

“I’m not really up for the Pyramid Club, either,” Anna admitted. “I think I’m going to head home.”

“You are so boring,” Cyn joked, but even as she said it something that looked like sadness flitted across her perfect brow. “Hey, we’ll always be best friends. Even when I’m tasting every vintage ever produced in France and you’re in the Yale ivory tower being boring. Right?”

They stopped at Sixth Avenue and waited for the light to change. This was a part of town Anna rarely came to—a mix of hardware stores, supply shops, and the occasional restaurant praying desperately for gentrification to arrive. There was little pedestrian traffic, save for a woman with matted gray hair wheeling a shopping cart of her worldly goods—which included an iBook—who swerved around them.

“Always,” Anna promised. “I’ll be back in New York in a week and a half, remember. I’ll see you before I leave for New Haven.” She hugged Cyn hard. “Best friends forever,” she whispered, feeling the whisper veer dangerously toward a choke.

“Forever,” Cyn whispered back. If she sounded like she was eight years old, Anna didn’t care. And she was pretty sure her best friend didn’t, either.

A cab pulled up, and she got in, leaving Cyn to go clubbing. When Anna got home, the place was empty. But she found a note from Sam on her desk. She and Eduardo had gone to dinner at Bouley and then to hear Keith Jarrett perform a solo concert at the Beacon Theater. Anna smiled to herself. She was glad they were spending the evening together, and she’d given Sam a key. Besides, it might be good for her to spend the rest of the night alone. So she shed her clothes, took a hot shower, then put on her old navy blue Trinity sweats and climbed into bed.

But she wasn’t tired. Something was niggling at her; she just couldn’t figure out what it was.

Oh, I guess writing is a hobby thing for you. That’s kind of cute
.

Tabitha’s condescending words rang in Anna’s ears. They made her think about when she had tried writing—when they’d been at Veronique’s Maison spa out in Palm Springs and Sam had asked her to write a script for a short film. That felt like a lifetime ago. Sam had said then that Anna had talent. Who the hell was Tabitha to patronize her, anyway?

She threw the covers back and went to her silver iBook. Wouldn’t it just kill Tabitha and Stevens MacCall and her new roommate if she wrote something not just good, but really good? Something that would prove all of them wrong?

No. That wasn’t a good reason to write. Thackeray didn’t write to prove that he was better than Dickens. Chekhov didn’t write to prove he was better than Tolstoy. Arthur Miller wasn’t driven to be better than Tennessee Williams. That was the wrong reason to tell a story, especially when there were so many right ones.