Ten minutes later Julian was once again by her side, all sweat and smiles, his usual post-performance glow heightened by the excitement. He kissed her and gave her a look that said, I can’t wait to talk about this with you, and tightly clutched her hand as he worked the room, receiving the congratulations and backslaps with a good-natured laugh.
They weren’t alone for a single second until almost one in the morning, when Samara and Leo said good night and headed to their hotel rooms (Leo accompanied by a new friend he’d met at the party, of course). The instant the door closed behind them, Julian turned to her and said, ‘Do you believe Layla Lawson jumped onstage with me?’
‘If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I would never believe it. I’m still not sure I do.’ Brooke kicked off her boots and collapsed on the bed.
‘Layla fucking Lawson. It’s surreal. What on earth was she doing there?’
‘I have no idea, but let me tell you, that girl can move. Did you see the way she was dancing next to you, sort of shimmying and hip-switching? It was mesmerizing. It’s like the instant someone puts a microphone in her hands, she just can’t help it.’
There was a knock at the door.
Julian looked at Brooke, who shrugged. He walked over to answer it, and Leo barreled in without an invite. Brooke almost laughed out loud: his shirt was unbuttoned to his navel, and he had a smear of what looked suspiciously like lipstick on the inside collar.
‘Hey, listen,’ he said to Julian without so much as a hello or an apology for the interruption. ‘I know this is last-minute, but Samara just told me that she’s set up a bunch of stuff for you tomorrow in L.A. That Layla scene was fucking genius, and people are freaking out about it. We’ll leave for the airport at nine, okay?’
‘Tomorrow?’ Julian managed to say, looking as surprised as Brooke felt.
‘Nine sharp, in the lobby. We’ve got the flights all taken care of. Probably get you back to New York in three, four days. Great job tonight, dude. See you in the morning,’ he said, and hightailed it out. Brooke sent out a silent thank-you to whichever girl was waiting in his bed that night.
‘Well,’ Brooke said when the door slammed behind Leo.
‘Well. Guess I’m going to L.A. tomorrow.’
‘Okay,’ Brooke said, because she didn’t know what else to say. She’d have to cancel the dinner plans they had the following night with college friends of Julian’s who were in from out of town. And he wouldn’t be able to come with her to the museum party Nola had invited them to, the one where she was on the junior committee and the tickets had cost them a small fortune.
There was another knock on the door.
Brooke groaned. ‘What now?’
It was Samara this time, and she was as animated as Brooke had ever seen her. She, too, marched right in without a hello, looked down at her leather-bound notebook, and said, ‘So, the Lawson photo op worked even better than I’d hoped – absolutely everyone has picked it up. Everyone.’
Both Julian and Brooke just stared at her.
‘I’ve already gotten a hundred calls asking for interviews and photos. Brooke, I’m considering a story request for a feature on you, something like a “Who Is Mrs. Julian Alter?” so stay tuned on that one. Julian, we’ll keep you pretty much booked solid for the next week. This is great news, just absolutely terrific results, and I’ll tell you now: everyone at Sony is thrilled.’
‘Wow,’ Julian said.
‘Great,’ Brooke added weakly.
‘The paparazzi are actually already staking out the lobby, so be ready to face them in the morning. I can make some recommendations on people you can consult for privacy and security needs, all really terrific.’
‘Oh, I don’t think that will be necessary,’ Brooke said.
‘Uh-huh. You let me know. In the meantime, I suggest you both start checking into hotels under different names and being very careful about what you put in e-mails to anyone.’
‘Um, is that really—’
Samara cut Julian off and clapped her notebook closed. Meeting officially adjourned.
‘Brooke, Julian’ – she said both their names slowly and with the sort of smile that gave Brooke chills – ‘welcome to the party.’
Six
He Could Have Been a Doctah
‘You want me to put these behind the existing shades or take the other ones down first?’ the installation man asked, motioning behind him, toward Brooke and Julian’s bedroom.
It wasn’t a particularly important decision, but Brooke resented having to make it herself. Julian was somewhere in the Pacific Northwest – she had a hard time keeping track these days – and wasn’t much help lately with anything domestic.
‘I don’t know, what do most people do?’
The guy shrugged. His expression said, I couldn’t care less either way, just pick one so I can get the hell out of here and enjoy my Saturday. Brooke knew exactly how he felt.
‘Um, I guess put them behind the other shades? Those are probably nicer-looking anyway.’
He grunted and disappeared, Walter following disloyally at his heels. Brooke turned back to her book but was relieved when the phone rang.
‘Hey, Dad, what’s up?’ It felt like they hadn’t talked in ages, and when they did, he only wanted to talk about Julian.
‘Oh, Brooke? Hi, it’s Cynthia.’
‘Hey, Cynthia! I saw Dad’s number on the caller ID. How are you? Any chance you guys are coming to New York?’
Cynthia attempted a laugh. ‘Probably not so soon. Last time was … tiring. You’re always welcome here, you know.’
‘Yeah, I do know.’ It came out sounding ruder than she’d intended, although it was a little galling to receive an invitation to visit her own father in her own childhood home. Cynthia must have heard this because she quickly apologized, causing Brooke to feel immediate guilt for being unnecessarily bitchy.
‘I’m sorry too,’ Brooke said with a sigh. ‘Things are just a little crazy around here right now.’
‘I can’t even imagine! Listen, I know it’s probably not possible, but I figure I had to ask. It’s for a good cause, you know?’
Brooke inhaled and held her breath. Here it came, the wholly unanticipated aspect of being close to someone newly famous – he was famous now, wasn’t he? – the part no one ever seemed to warn you about.
‘I don’t know if you know or not, but I’m one of the co-presidents of the Women’s Board at Temple Beth Shalom.’
Brooke waited but Cynthia didn’t continue.
‘Uh-huh, I think I knew that,’ Brooke said, trying to convey as little enthusiasm as possible.
‘Well, we have our annual Speaker’s Lunch fund-raiser coming up in a few weeks and our scheduled speaker just canceled on us. That woman who writes the kosher cookbooks? Actually, I don’t think they’re strictly kosher per se, just kosher style. She has one for Passover, one for Hanukkah, another just for kids.’
‘Mmm.’
‘Well, anyway, it turns out that she supposedly needs to have some sort of bunion surgery next week and won’t be able to walk for a while, although if you ask me it’s probably lipo.’
Brooke willed herself to be patient. Cynthia was a good woman and she was only trying to raise money for the less fortunate. She took a deep, slow breath, careful not to let Cynthia hear.
‘Maybe it really is for a bunion. Or maybe she just doesn’t feel like traveling from Shaker Heights to Philly, I don’t know. Besides, who am I to judge? If someone came along and offered me a free tummy tuck right now, I’d probably sacrifice my own mother.’ Pause. ‘God, that sounded horrible, didn’t it?’
Brooke wanted to rip her own hair out. Instead she forced a laugh. ‘I’m sure you’re not alone there, but you don’t need it. You look great.’
‘Oh, you’re too sweet!’
Brooke waited a few seconds for Cynthia to remember why she called. ‘Oh! So anyway, I know he’s probably so insanely busy these days, but if there’s any way Julian c
ould make an appearance at our luncheon, it would be so great.’
‘An appearance?’
‘Yeah, well, an appearance or a performance, really whatever he wanted to do. Maybe sing that song he’s famous for? The brunch starts at eleven with a silent auction in the auditorium and some light deli appetizers, and then we all move into the main hall where Gladys and I will talk about the work the Women’s Board has done so far this year, the general state of membership at Beth Shalom, give some dates of upcoming—’
‘Got it, okay. So you’d want him to … perform? At a ladies’ luncheon? You know the song is about his dead brother, right? Do you, uh, do you think everyone will like that?’
Thankfully Cynthia didn’t take offense to this. ‘Like that? Oh, Brooke, I think they’d just love it.’
Two months earlier Brooke wouldn’t have believed it if someone told her she’d be having this conversation; now, having already been approached by the principal at Huntley, one of Brooke’s old high school classmates, an ex-coworker, and not one but two cousins – all wanting Julian to sing or sign or send something – Brooke wasn’t surprised by anything. All that said, this was probably the best one yet. She tried to picture Julian singing an acoustic version of ‘For the Lost’ on the bimah of Temple Beth Shalom to a group of five hundred Jewish mothers and grandmothers, after receiving a kvelling introduction by the rabbi and the president of the board. Afterward, all the women would turn to one another and say things like, ‘Well he’s no doctor, but at least he makes a living at it,’ and ‘I heard he was premed but never pursued it. Such a shame.’ Then they’d swarm him and, noticing his wedding ring, want to know everything about his wife. Was she a nice Jewish girl too? Did they have children? No, why not? And more importantly, when do they plan to start trying? They’d cluck that he’d surely be a much better fit with their daughter or niece or friend’s daughter. Despite the fact that they lived on the Main Line in Philly and Julian grew up in Manhattan, at least a dozen of the women present would find a connection to Julian’s parents or grandparents or both. Julian would return home that evening shell-shocked, a veteran of a war only a few understood, and there would be nothing Brooke could say or do to comfort him.
‘Well, let me talk to him. I know he’ll be so honored you thought of him and I’m sure he’d just love to do it, but I’m pretty sure he’s completely booked the next few weeks.’
‘Well if you really think he’d love to do it, I could talk to the other board members about possibly moving the date. Maybe we could—’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t want you to do that,’ Brooke said as quickly as she could. She’d never seen this side of Cynthia before and wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. ‘He’s incredibly unpredictable these days. Always committing and then having to cancel. He hates it, but his time just isn’t his own anymore, you know?’
‘Of course,’ Cynthia murmured, and Brooke tried not to think how ironic it was that she was using the same excuse on Cynthia that Julian now used on her.
Somewhere in the background the doorbell rang, Cynthia begged off, and Brooke sent Cynthia’s visitor a telepathic thank-you. She read another two chapters of her book, a nonfiction account of the Etan Patz kidnapping that had her convinced every creepy-looking guy on the street was a potential pedophile, and followed the shade-installer-slash-paparazzi-blocker out the door when he was finished.
She was starting to grow more accustomed to being alone. With Julian gone so much, Brooke often joked that it felt like her old single days, just a whole lot less social. Now she weaved down Ninth Avenue, and when she passed the Italian bakery at the corner, with its hand-painted PASTICCERIA sign and its homemade curtains, there was no way to keep herself from walking in. It was an adorable place with a European-style coffee bar, where people ordered cappuccinos in the morning and espressos the rest of the day and drank them standing.
She surveyed the massive case of baked goods and could practically taste the butter cookies and jam-filled croissants and cheese tarts topped with berries. Of course there was no question that, if forced to choose only one, she’d have to go with a deliciously overstuffed cannoli in its sinful fried shell. First she’d lick the cream from the top, and then, following a palate-cleansing sip of coffee, she’d allow herself a full bite from either end, stopping to savor—
‘Dimmi!’ the Italian mother said, breaking Brooke’s food fantasy.
‘A large decaf skim latte, please, and one of those,’ Brooke said with a sigh, pointing to the un-iced, unstuffed, and otherwise unadorned biscotti resting sadly on a tray near the register. She knew the almond biscotti would be fresh and tasty and just the right amount crunchy, but it was a poor substitute for a cannoli. There wasn’t much choice, though. She’d gained four pounds after their weekend in Austin and the mere thought of it made her want to scream. Her couple extra pounds of pudge would have been barely noticeable on the average woman, but on her – not just a nutritionist anymore, but a nutritionist married to someone famous – it was downright unacceptable. After returning from Austin, she’d immediately begun a food diary and accompanied it with a strict 1,300-calorie-per-day diet. Neither was having an impressive effect yet, but she was determined.
Brooke paid for her purchase and was hovering near the coffee bar when she heard her name.
‘Brooke! Hey, over here.’
She turned around and saw Heather, one of the guidance counselors at Huntley. Their offices were just down the hall from each other and although they occasionally met to discuss a student they had in common, lately they’d been seeing each other more than usual due to Kaylie. It was Heather who first noticed Kaylie’s obsession with her weight and suggested she see Brooke; now both women were concerned about the girl. Yet as often as they’d been meeting at school the past couple months, they weren’t actually friends, and Brooke felt a twinge of awkwardness seeing her colleague at a café on a Saturday.
‘Hey!’ Brooke said, sliding into a little wooden chair next to Heather. ‘I didn’t even see you here. How are you?’
Heather smiled. ‘I’m good! Thrilled it’s the weekend, I’ll tell you that much. Can you believe we only have two more weeks of school before being off for three months?’
‘I know, I can’t wait,’ Brooke said, and decided not to mention that she would still be working full-time at the hospital.
Heather remembered anyway. ‘Yeah, I’ll be doing a lot of private tutoring this summer, but at least I can determine those hours. I don’t know if it was the horrible winter or I’m just getting burned out, but I can’t wait.’
‘I hear you,’ Brooke said, feeling a little bit awkward that they didn’t really have much else to talk about.
Heather seemed to read her mind. ‘It’s weird to see each other outside school, isn’t it?’
‘It is! I am constantly paranoid I’m going to run into some of the girls on the street or in a restaurant. Remember what it was like when we were kids and you’d run into your teacher at the mall, and there was this stunning realization that they had a life outside your classroom?’
Heather laughed. ‘It’s so true. Luckily we don’t tend to travel in the same circles.’
Brooke sighed. ‘It’s crazy, isn’t it?’ And then: ‘I had a really productive meeting with Kaylie at the end of last week. I still don’t feel comfortable allowing her to lose any weight, but I agreed that we could start her on a food journal to see where she could be eating healthier, more wholesome foods. She seemed pleased with that.’
‘I’m glad to hear it. I think we both know that weight isn’t her problem; it’s the very understandable feeling of not fitting in with classmates who are from another socioeconomic universe. We see it frequently with the scholarship students, unfortunately, but they almost always find their niche.’
Brooke disagreed to an extent – she’d worked with a fair number of teenage girls at this point, and in her opinion Kaylie was overly preoccupied with her weight – but she didn’t want to start that conversati
on now. Instead, she smiled and said, ‘Look at us, talking about work on a Saturday. Shame on us!’
Heather sipped her coffee. ‘I know, it’s all I can think about. I’m actually thinking of switching back to the lower schools in the next year or two. Just a better fit for me. What about you? Any thoughts on how long you’ll stay?’
Brooke searched Heather’s face for any sign that she was indirectly asking about Julian. Was the girl somehow implying that Brooke could quit now that Julian was making money as a musician? Had Brooke ever told her that was why she had accepted the job in the first place? She decided she was being way too paranoid, that if she didn’t talk about Julian in a regular, normal way, how could she expect anyone else to?
‘I don’t know, actually. Things are, uh, kind of up in the air right now.’
Heather looked at her sympathetically but was kind enough not to press. Brooke realized this was the very first time in three or four weeks that someone – anyone – had not immediately asked about Julian. She was grateful to Heather and eager to steer the conversation back to something less awkward. She glanced around, her mind searching for something to say, and then settled on, ‘So what are you up to today?’ She quickly took a bite of her biscotti so she wouldn’t have to talk for a few more seconds.
‘Not much, really. My boyfriend’s away with his family this weekend, so I’m on my own. Just hanging out, I guess.’
‘Nice. Love those weekends,’ Brooke lied. She managed to keep herself from announcing that she was quickly becoming the resident expert on how to best spend a weekend when your significant other is somewhere else. ‘What are you reading?’
‘Oh, this?’ Heather said, motioning toward the facedown magazine near her elbow without picking it up. ‘It’s nothing. Some dumb gossip rag. Nothing interesting.’
Brooke knew immediately it was that issue of Last Night. She wondered if Heather knew she was two weeks behind the ball.
‘Ahh,’ she said with forced cheer that she knew didn’t sound remotely believable. ‘The infamous photo.’