Great (3 page)

“Hi,” she said, clasping her hands in front of her ample chest. “I'm Misti, and I'll be your server tonight.” Her Long Island accent was pretty thick, and I thought I saw Jeff's mouth twitch at the way she pronounced “SIR-vah.”

“Hello, Misti,” Mrs. Fairweather said with a warm smile.

“Hi, Misti,” said my mother.

“Misti,” Delilah piped up. “Is that with a ‘y'?”

“I'm sure it doesn't matter,” Teddy said heartily. “Let's order!”

Delilah looked at him, and there was a steeliness in her gaze that I'd never seen before. He seemed to shrink into himself.

“It's an ‘i,'” Misti said nervously, twisting her hands together.

“Of course it is,” Delilah said, smiling very slowly.

“That's lovely,” Mrs. Fairweather said with the same expression she'd worn when assessing my clothing.

“Anyone in the mood for some drinks?” Misti asked quickly.

“God, yes,” said Teddy.

“Now, Theodore,” Mrs. Fairweather said mock-sternly, “you know that I cannot in good conscience allow you to order a drink.”

“I'm more interested in your bad conscience,” he said, winking.

I looked at Jeff. He mouthed,
I know
.

We ordered drinks (wine for the mothers, soda for us), and my mother demonstrated some actual social niceties by drawing Jeff into the conversation. I learned that he was on Trumbo Academy's golf team and was, according to Teddy, good enough to make Stanford's team.

“That's where Tiger Woods played, Naomi,” Teddy said, addressing me directly for the first time since we'd been introduced.

“Ah,” I said. “Well.”

I learned that Teddy was on Manhattan's only private school football team and would be the captain heading into his senior year, just as Jeff would be the captain of the golf team.

“What about you, Naomi?” Mrs. Fairweather asked. “What do you like to do at school?”

“Naomi gets straight A's,” my mother interjected with what I think was pride, or maybe she'd already had too much wine. (“Your mother's always been a lightweight,” my dad would say. “I mean that literally, and with the booze.”)

“Whoa,” Jeff said. “You're, like, a genius.” I looked for sarcasm in his expression and couldn't find any.

“Seriously,” he continued. “I'm good for A's in English and humanities, but you get A's in math and science and everything else? Pretty impressive, Naomi.” I liked the way he said my name.

“It is
very
impressive,” Mrs. Fairweather agreed. “Do you play any sports, do any clubs?”

“I'm in the LGBT-Straight Alliance,” I said. It was true. Skags made me join because she said if I didn't, it meant I was homophobic. And, anyway, she needed my vote for president. It ended up that no one else ran against her, so she automatically won. But I'm still glad I joined. It's like the only fun club at our school.

“And what is that?” Mrs. Fairweather asked. My mother looked less than delighted.

“It's the lesbian-gay-bisexual-transgender-straight alliance,” I said. “We march in the Gay Pride Parade every year in Boystown, and we make ‘It Gets Better' videos and stuff.”

“How nice,” Mrs. Fairweather said dryly.

When we ordered appetizers and our entrées, Delilah made Teddy order for her, whispering into his ear. It creeped me out only slightly more than his flirting with her mother did.

Misti brought out our food, carefully balancing the plates of lobster and sautéed scallops and fried oysters and popcorn shrimp and, for the mothers and Delilah, three undressed arugula salads.

“You all get started without me,” Teddy said abruptly, rising from the table. Delilah didn't look up from the arugula she was halfheartedly pushing around her plate.

“Guess I drank that soda a little too fast,” he added offhandedly, and headed in the direction of the bathroom.

Suddenly all I could think about was all the bottles of water I'd drunk on the plane, and on the SUV ride to the Downtown Manhattan heliport, plus a Coke at Baxley's, and how it was all kind of straining my bladder. I tried to sit still and listen to Mrs. Fairweather talk about Senator Fairweather's diplomatic trip to Canada, but I honestly couldn't concentrate. My mother had drilled into me at a young age that it's customary for only one guest to excuse him or herself to the bathroom at a time, “because more than one guest missing interrupts the flow of conversation.” I knew that rule as well as I knew her other etiquette lessons, like the one about leaving your napkin folded on your chair when you went to the bathroom, and of course, the classic no-elbows-on-the-table rule. But my need to pee was rapidly approaching emergency status, and there was no sign of Teddy returning.

“I'm sorry,” I blurted out finally in the middle of Mrs. Fairweather's criticism of the Canadian health-care system. “I just—uh, I really need to excuse myself for a minute.”

My mother waved me away dismissively, never breaking eye contact with Mrs. Fairweather. Relieved, I got up from the table and fairly dashed to the ladies' room. I inherited my tiny bladder and my tiny boobs from my mom—although she got the latter surgically enhanced the first time her catering business turned a profit.

Here's another thing I got from my mom: a terrible sense of direction. It's the only thing that explains why I took a left out of the bathroom instead of a right. Baxley's is in a big old Victorian house, so it's got some twists and turns to it. Anyway, I took a wrong turn out of the bathroom and ended up in the wrong dining room, so I just kept going and ended up in the wrong corridor, which concluded with the wrong glass door, which looked out at the back of the restaurant, and with my luck it was the exact wrong moment because there was Teddy Barrington shoving Misti hard against the wall. She staggered a little.

And I swear to God, at the exact freaking second I realized what was going on, Misti-with-an-i looked up and locked eyes with me. I immediately spun around and started walking away, but I heard the door crash open behind me and felt a big paw on my shoulder. I jumped and spun around to look at Teddy. He looked panicked, but he seemed to relax when he saw how afraid I was of him.

“I'm not—I didn't—” I tried to get the words out. “I didn't mean to spy. I just got lost coming back from the bathroom.” I saw Misti the waitress behind him, looking terrified. Half her face was a little red.

“It's okay,” Teddy said soothingly, putting his other hand on my other shoulder. He turned his head to Misti. “Why don't you get back to work.” It wasn't a suggestion. It was an order. Misti obediently scurried past us, shooting me a nervous glance.

I was trapped.

“I'm sorry you had to see that,” Teddy said, frowning. “The last thing I want to do is put you in an uncomfortable position.”

I didn't know what to say, so I kept my mouth shut. This seemed to please him.

“Look, Naomi,” Teddy said, staring so deeply into my eyes I felt really exposed and uncomfortable. “Delilah and I are going through a rough patch. We've talked about being in an open relationship, and I think that's really what she wants. But it isn't official yet, and Misti's upset because, well, she wants to be with me. But Delilah tends to get depressed, and I really think it would be unhealthy for her to hear about this. It could really cause some serious problems for her. With her health. Do you know what I mean?”

I just wanted to get the hell out of there, so I nodded vigorously and said, “I won't say anything. It's none of my business.”

“No, it really isn't,” Teddy agreed. Then he flashed his big white smile at me and patted me on the head. “You remind me of my sister,” he said.

“Oh.” I wasn't sure how I was supposed to respond to that.

“She's dead,” he said.

“Oh.” I
really
wasn't sure how I was supposed to respond to that. “I'm . . . I'm so sorry.”

“Yeah, it's really sad, but it was a long time ago,” he replied. “Thanks for understanding about this whole thing, Naomi. How 'bout I head back to the table first, and you wait a minute and then follow?” I was about to protest that I didn't know the way back to the table, but he was already gone. I waited the Teddy-prescribed minute and then found a busboy who pointed me in the right direction.

I sank down at the table between Jeff and my mother. Teddy, who had his arm around Delilah, was too busy teasing Mrs. Fairweather to look up. Delilah was actually giggling, as was my mother.

“What happened?” Jeff asked quietly. “You look really pale.”

“I am really pale,” I said.

“Yeah, but something freaked you out.”

“How do you know? We just met two hours ago.”

“I can tell.” He lowered his voice even further. “Let me guess—it had something to do with Teddy being gone so long.”

I sipped my water quickly.

“You saw him with her, right?”

I almost spit my water out, like they do in movies.

“Shh!” I hissed, glancing nervously at the other part of the table. “They'll hear you.”

“No, they won't,” Jeff said. “Giovanni always puts rum in Delilah's and Teddy's Cokes, so they're a little drunk. Your mom and Delilah's mom are each on their third glass of wine, so they're
definitely
drunk. No one is paying any attention to us. And besides, I know about the whole thing, anyway. Teddy's my best friend. Everybody in town knows, too. If Delilah doesn't know, she's an idiot.”

“If he's your best friend, then why are you talking to me about this?”

“Because it's interesting. It's an interesting turn of events, to have you drawn into it. This changes the game a little bit. It'll require a slightly altered strategy on his part.”

“Do you always talk about people's lives as if you're talking about a round of golf?”

“Usually,” he replied.

“Great,” I said.

“Misti's dating the bartender,” he said. “He's twenty-one. She's, like, nineteen. They're from up-island. Babylon, I think. Italian, if you couldn't tell. Their families own a bakery together. Immigrants. The American dream.” He chuckled to himself. I purposely turned away from him and pretended I was interested in Mrs. Fairweather's conversation.

“You know they love Delilah on the blogs,” she was saying to my mother.

“On
all
the blogs?” Teddy asked innocently.

“What's that one that writes about you—the one that called you the next big modeling sensation, the return of the supermodel?” Mrs. Fairweather asked Delilah, ignoring Teddy.

“The Wanted,”
Delilah said, and even looked a little proud.

“That's it,” Mrs. Fairweather said. “
The Wanted.
All the kids are just in love with it. Of course, it's all about
them
, so why wouldn't they be?” She laughed lightly.

“I've never heard of it,” I said. “Is it like
Perez Hilton
, or something?”

“Sort of,” Delilah said. “It's mostly a fashion and style blog, but it's about people who go to independent schools in Manhattan.” It's so funny how rich people have invented a less hoity-toity term for “private schools.” As if we normals don't know it's the same thing.

“But she does bigger stories, too,” Delilah continued. “She covers Fashion Week in New York, plus social events the rest of the year—parties and stuff like that. Sometimes she writes about models. I guess she thinks I'm good.” You could tell Delilah was underplaying it, because even she couldn't hide that she was kind of excited by the attention.

“All the girls at Trumbo are obsessed with
The Wanted
,” Jeff said. “If they get mentioned on it, it's like they won an Academy Award.”

“The girl who runs it will grab photos from Trumbo parties off Facebook and analyze what everyone's wearing,” Teddy added. “It's probably not even run by a chick. It's probably some thirty-year-old dude in his mom's basement.” He and Jeff snickered.

Delilah ignored them and looked at me. “It's a really pretty site. And the girl who runs it goes by Jacinta, even though no one knows if that's her real name. She takes a photo of what she's wearing each day, but you only ever see her from the neck down. She could be anybody.”

“It's me!” Teddy announced. “I'm Jacinta!”

“Oh, you are
so
not Jacinta,” Delilah said. “Jacinta has perfect taste.”

As if on cue, Misti showed up for the mothers and Teddy to sign their account cards. She murmured, “Thank you.” I saw her hand shake a little as she took away the cards. Our eyes met for a moment, and she flicked hers away.

“She's going to have to be more subtle than that,” Jeff whispered.

 

In the car on the way home, Teddy drove faster than was absolutely necessary.

“Teddy!” Mrs. Fairweather said, giggling. “Slow
down
.”

But he didn't, and we ended up at my mother's house rather quickly. Her house is lovely and expensive, but it's no mansion—“just” five bedrooms, and only three bathrooms (the shame of two bedrooms that aren't en suite!), a finished basement with a game room and home theater, a living room, dining room, big kitchen, and a spacious back deck. It has a nice view of the narrow, northern end of Georgica Pond, which laps the edge of the property. It's not the fancier, Steven Spielberg-y end of Georgica—it's nearer the highway, and the public landing where clammers and fishermen are allowed to enter, but you can make out the back of the Fairweathers' house across the water. The property is still considered desirable, though not as desirable as beachfront real estate—but, as Mom never tires of pointing out, some people even prefer the pond as more private and less touristy than the beach.