Everyone Worth Knowing (22 page)

looked better in denim. Standing outside Sanctuary among the thin

and beautiful people, I felt like I belonged. It had been worth it.

"Hi there," I said, hugging Penelope's tiny frame. "Do you like

it? It's my 'I've never been remotely cool but I'm trying real hard to

be so now' look. What do you think?"

"I think you look hot," she said, forever the good friend. "Is

someone planning on seeing a certain English deity this evening?"

"Hardly. I don't think Philip Weston calls girls who don't immediately

fall into his bed with their legs spread. Actually, I don't

think he calls girls who do, either. Whatever. He's beautiful, but he

was unbelievably arrogant and full of himself."

"And no one likes that, of course," Penelope said with mock

seriousness.

"Of course not," I replied. "Come on, everyone else is inside

and it's freezing. Let's go in."

"Have you seen this line? What's going on here tonight? You'd

think they were handing out free lap dances or something."

"I don't know too much except that it opened last night and is

supposed to be the ultimate exclusive place, sort of a VIP room on

steroids. Kelly wanted us to check it out in case it actually does

live up to the hype. If it becomes the new place, we'll already have

it booked for the
Playboy
party."

Kelly
&
Company had been commissioned by
Playboy
over a

year ago to put on the Manhattan portion of their never-ending

Fiftieth Anniversary celebration, which would start in Chicago in

January and eventually end in a blowout at the mansion in Los Angeles

in March, making stops in Vegas, Miami, and New York along

the way. It was going to be a massive undertaking—definitely our

biggest project to date, and it pretty much dominated every workday.

Kelly had gathered us around the day before to change the

number on the countdown board to 164 and then asked for updates.

The List Girls were already running simultaneous searches

on all A- and B-list celebs, preparing to construct a final winning

group. Meanwhile, the rest of us spent half of each day fielding

calls from every imaginable person in every sector of the city looking

to wrangle invitations and request invites for themselves, or

clients, or both. Combine all the anticipation with Hefs paranoid

insistence that all details (including—but not limited to—location,

date, time, and attendees) be kept lockbox-quiet, and we had the

recipe for total chaos.

"I looked it up on Citysearch today. They quoted the manager

as saying they expected the clientele to be 'upscale creative,' which

I sort of thought applied more to menus than people, but what do

I know?" Penelope sighed.

I'd recently begun to understand that the concept of exclusivity

was an organizing principle of life in Manhattan. Part of this was

undoubtedly due to the sheer concentration of people on such a

tiny island. New Yorkers instinctively compete for everything from

taxis at rush hour to seats on the subway to Hermes Birkin bags to

Knicks season tickets. Impenetrable co-op boards take years to

navigate. Icy hostesses at the city's most desirable restaurants

haughtily demand reservations six months in advance. "If they let

you in without a hassle," people say, "it's probably not worth

going." Since the days of Studio 54, and probably long before (if

there even were nightclubs before then), club-goers have made

getting into trendy nightclubs a competitive sport. And at the

chicest places, like tonight, there are levels of access. Getting in the

front door is just the beginning—any NYU sophomore in a tube

top can manage that. "The main bar?" I'd heard someone say in

reference to Sanctuary. "I'd rather be at TGI Friday's in Hoboken."

Elisa had provided explicit instructions to make our way directly to

the VIP lounge, apparently the only place to find some "real action."

Jagger and Bowie partied in Studio 54's legendary private

rooms. Today Leo, Colin, and Lindsay hold court, unmolested by

prying eyes. And everyone else clamors to get in.

I'd grown accustomed to being a non-VIP quite some time

ago—it hadn't occurred to me that VIP was even a possibility for

me. It had taken the opening of a VIP room outside of the confines

of the nightclub arena to really stir my righteous indignation. In

what I could only interpret as the first sign of the apocalypse, my

dentist, Dr. Quinn, had opened a VIP waiting room in his office.

"So the doctor's high-profile, important clients will have a place

where they feel comfortable," the assistant had explained. "You can

have a seat in our regular lounge." I sat in Dr. Powell's very uncool

and very public waiting room, thumbing through a two-year-old

issue of
Redbook
and silently willing the overweight gentleman

next to me to cease cracking his gum. I gazed longingly at the

door marked VIP and fantasized about the plush dental wonderland

that surely lay beyond. I resigned myself to the fact that I would always

be one of those people on the outside looking in. But there I

was, a mere few months later, standing outside Sanctuary in my

cool new clothes with a gaggle of fabulous friends waiting inside.

It felt like my luck was changing.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a girl who looked exactly

like Abby kiss the bouncer and make her way into the lounge, but

I couldn't positively identify her from where I stood. "Hey, you'll

never guess who I saw the other night. I can't believe I forgot to

tell you! Abby was at Bungalow that night you left after dinner."

Penelope's head snapped toward mine. She hated Abby more

than I did, if that was possible. She'd refused to acknowledge her

presence since Abby had cornered her in an empty classroom

sophomore year and told her not to take it personally that Penelope's

father was sleeping with his secretary, that it was certainly

no reflection on his love for her. Penelope had been so shocked

she'd merely asked, "How do you know?" and Abby had smirked

in return. "Are you serious?" she'd asked. "Who doesn't know?"

"You saw that midget and didn't tell me? What'd she have to

say for herself?"

"Her usual. She's now at the vortex of the media world, you'll

be happy to know. Goes by Abigail now, not Abby, so of course I

said 'Abby' as many times as I possibly could. Had her boobs done

and half her face rearranged, but she's still exactly the same."

"Girl would walk over her own mother in spike heels if it

helped her get ahead," Penelope mumbled.

"Sure would," I confirmed cheerfully. "And you just might have

the pleasure of seeing her here tonight. I think she just walked in."

"Great. That's just great. Lucky us."

I linked arms with Penelope and boldly walked to the front of

the line, hopefully projecting some level of confidence. A highly

manorexic black guy sporting a giant, fake Afro wig and a longsleeved

mesh T-shirt over hot pink Lycra tights peered at us

through sparkle-encrusted eyelashes.

"Are you on the list?" he asked in a voice that was surprisingly

gruff for someone who cross-dressed so expertly.

"Yep, sure are," I said casually. Silence. "Urn, yes, we are on

the list. We're here with Kelly & Company."

No response. He held the clipboard but didn't consult it, and I

decided he hadn't heard me.

"I spoke with the manager earlier today to arrange a visit?

We're actually here to check out the venue for a potential—"

"Name!" he barked, wholly disinterested in my explanation. But

as I spelled out my last name, four guys in seventies leisure suits

and a girl in something that looked an awful lot like a flapper outfit

walked directly in front of me.

"Romero, darling, move that silly rope aside so we can get out

of the cold," the girl ordered, placing a hand gingerly on the

bouncer's cheek.

"Of course, Sofia, come right in," he cooed deferentially, and I

realized that the flapper was Sofia Coppola. The entourage followed

her lead and nodded their respects to the bouncer, who was

glowing with pride and happiness. It took him a full three minutes

to regain his composure and another two to remember that we

were still there.

"Robinson," I said, sounding definitely more irritated. "R-OB-

I—"

"I can spell it," he snapped, apparently now in a full-fledged

snit. "Yes, fortunately for you, I have you on the list. Absolutely no

one is getting in tonight otherwise."

"Mmm" was about all I could manage in reply to this fascinating

piece of information.

He placed his hand on the velvet rope but didn't lift it. He

leaned over and addressed Penelope directly, and none too quietly:

"Just FYI for next time, girls: you're really a bit more casual

than we like to see here."

Penelope giggled, obviously unaware that our new transvestite

friend was
not
kidding.

"Hey, I'm just giving it to you straight," he continued, his voice

getting louder every second. A sort of silence had overtaken the

previously fidgety and excited crowd, and I could feel fifty pairs of

eyes staring at us from behind. "We prefer to see a little more style,

a little more effort."

My mind began to race, in search of a snappy retort, but of

course I managed to say nothing. Before I knew what was happening,

a girl so young, so tall, and with breasts so enormous they'd

only ever work in LA, came over and volunteered a brief but

highly informative lecture on the current fashion situation.

"We especially like to see forties looks lately." She smiled

warmly.

"Huh?" Penelope said, verbalizing exactly what I was thinking.

"Well, it's just one option, of course, but it's quite effective.

Black and white with bright red lipstick, you know? Perhaps some

vintage Prada heels or something even chunkier. It's all about distinguishing

yourself." I heard a few people laughing appreciatively

in the background.

It was at this point that I noticed that she looked like something

out of /
Want a Famous Face
gone horribly awry.

What did I say? What did I do? Absolutely nothing. Instead of

maintaining one iota, one tiny shred of self-respect, we proffered

our left hands for the obligatory stamp and sort of shuffled shamefully

past the velvet rope that had finally been lifted. The final indignity

came just as the door was shutting behind us, when the

cosmetically enhanced giraffe announced to the circus freak, "It

wouldn't be quite so bad if they just minded their labels."

"Did that just happen?" Penelope asked, looking as dumbfounded

as I felt.

"I think so. Just how pathetic were we? I'm almost afraid to

ask."

"There are actually no words for that level of pathetic-ness. It

was like watching
Jeopardy!
—I knew all the answers, just ten seconds