Modern Lovers (25 page)

D
r. Amelia had both Zoe and Jane keep journals about their feelings. It was worse than the food journal Jane had kept in culinary school, a brag book that was intended to shame anyone else who happened to open it (
Lunch—seared foie gras with poached egg and frisée salad
). Jane didn't know what to write down, so she wrote down everything—when Zoe kissed her on the cheek in the morning (about half the time), when Zoe farted (often, but so did she), when Zoe said something dismissive (sometimes), when Bingo paid more attention to Zoe (always). Jane felt like it was probably stupid, but she was doing it anyway. If Zoe wanted her to do homework, she was going to do homework.

There wasn't very much to do about Hyacinth—the patio was under construction. The replacement tables and chairs were on order, as was the glass that had been broken. A special cleanup crew was working on the ceiling and the wall. Jane was on the phone with her suppliers every few days—squash blossoms, tomatoes, a new cheese, beautiful pork chops—she wanted to order it all, but they were at least a month away. During the day she took the Q to the Grand Army Plaza farmers' market, buying things for the house. She always saw other chefs there, and she'd kiss them hello. Everyone knew about the fire, everyone was sympathetic, and they all furrowed their brows
before turning their attention back to the hen-of-the-woods mushrooms or the fairy tale eggplants. Jane wandered, putting her hands on everything. She was going to grill some steaks, or maybe make some scallops, and throw some asparagus on, too, let them roll around on the fire until they were striped with beautiful grill marks, both firm and tender. Maybe a chimichurri—Zoe loved her chimichurri. Jane picked up three big handfuls of parsley. There were enormous peaches, practically already dripping, and Jane's mouth began to water. She'd make dessert, too.

When Jane got home, her shoulders weighed down by tote bags, Ruby was on the floor. She was leaning against the couch, watching television. “Help me,” Jane said, and Ruby peeled herself up like Gumby. Together they unpacked the bags, lining everything up along the counter.

“What are we making?” Ruby asked. “I just got so hungry.”

There was nothing Jane liked to hear more. “Well,” she said, and immediately snapped to action. She pointed at cabinets, and Ruby took down whatever she needed—the mandoline, the immersion blender, cutting boards. It was Ruby's job to peel garlic, to be the sous. They worked silently—Jane was the captain of the ship, and she knew just what had to be done. That was what she liked most about being in kitchens—people thought cooking was about making things taste good, and it was, but it was more like being a conductor, or a choreographer—there were a thousand moving parts, and you had to be aware of them all. An allergy, a birthday, how long it took mussels to open in their buttery little bath. All the information was inside her, organized and constantly recalibrating.

“Avocado,” Jane said, and Ruby cut one open the way she'd been taught, letting the knife rest on the seed and rolling the fruit around in her hand. She handed it to her mother, and Jane made a quick mash. She tore off a hunk of bread, slathered the avocado on top just as an egg began to crack and sizzle in a pan.
“Bon appétit,”
she said,
sliding the egg out of the pan and onto the bread, drops of olive oil polka-dotting the plate.

“Thank God,” Ruby said. “I thought I was actually going to die.” She didn't leave the kitchen, the way she usually did, squirreling her food upstairs like someone was going to steal it from her—instead she ate standing up, hunched over the counter. Jane put the rest of the groceries away and then leaned on the counter next to Ruby and ate the other half of the avocado with a spoon. When she was a baby, Ruby would eat a whole avocado every day—she'd try to eat the peel if they let her. For a few months, it seemed like her skin might actually be permanently stained green, along with most of her clothes. Zoe had loved it—she would throw her head back and laugh, so entranced by their daughter's gusto. Jane leaned over and kissed Ruby on the cheek. “Love you, honey,” she said.

“Jeez, Mom,” Ruby said. “I already said thank you.” Some crumbs fell onto her shirt. Jane pinched Ruby on the nose and went upstairs to write more notes for Dr. Amelia.

H
arry was happy that Ruby had brought Iggy Pop home—Iggy was a good cat, and his mother was waltzing him around the house like they were in a Disney cartoon—but her story was weird. She said that she was just sitting on the stoop, and then Iggy crawled out of the bushes and onto her lap. Iggy was a lover, and he would have crawled onto her lap, sure, but if he'd gotten as far as the Kahn-Bennetts', then why wouldn't he have just come home? Cats weren't idiots. And neither was Harry. He knew that Ruby hadn't been hiding the cat—he'd been in her room a hundred times, and even with all the piles of clothing everywhere, he still would have noticed his own pet. There was only one likely candidate—otherwise Ruby's story about finding the cat would have made sense.

During the school year, it was easy to find Dust and Nico and the rest of their friends—they were always across the street from Whitman, skidding along the edge of the lowest church step on their skateboards or wrestling each other to the ground in a way that looked both playful and dangerous. That was what the girls liked about them: at Whitman, parents were everywhere—in the halls, in the audience at plays, standing along the edges of the gym during basketball games, visibly willing shots to go in—which meant that all the kids were bubble boys and girls, with no broken limbs or bruised egos. But the
church-step kids had no parents. They were like kids from the 1970s, self-sufficient, with bruises and scars. Sometimes Harry was envious of them, the way their lives seemed full of empty days instead of extracurricular activities designed to boost their chances of getting into college. But most of the time, he understood that he had it better than they did, even if they probably had more fun.

Nico's house was the first logical stop—mostly because Harry knew where it was. He waited until afternoon and then walked over, going around the block so that he didn't have to walk by Ruby's house, just on the off chance that she was looking out the window and might see which direction he was going and follow him. It was paranoid, but Harry was feeling paranoid, and so what? He got to Nico's house and rang the bell. No one answered, and he rang again. Five minutes later, he was about to leave, when he finally heard some rustling around on the inside. The door slipped open a crack.

“It's fucking early,” Nico said. He had a sheet wrapped around his shoulder like a marathon runner at the finish line.

“Not really,” Harry said. “It's almost one.” They'd barely met when Harry came over for Nico's party, and he couldn't tell if Nico recognized him. Harry got the feeling that Nico would let anyone into his house, though, as long as the person was under thirty and looked like they might buy weed from him someday.

Nico squinted. “Okay,” he said. “You coming in?”

“Well, actually, I was just looking for Dust. Do you know where I could find him?” Harry peeked over Nico's shoulder and into the living room. There were other sheet-covered lumps moving around on the floor.

Nico turned around and pointed to the couch. “Yup. I'm going back to bed now.” He propped the door open with an elbow and gestured for Harry to come in. Harry took a few sideways steps into the foyer, his eyes adjusting to the relative dark of the room.

Dust was prone on the couch, his face turned to the side like a
sleeping baby's. He was wearing only a pair of jeans, which looked neither comfortable nor cool—the room was hot, and Dust's cheek was pink. There was a small tattoo just below his shoulder blade, a muddy-looking drawing of a lightning bolt. “Can I help you, bodyguard?”

Harry startled. “Oh, sorry, I thought you were sleeping.”

Dust rolled over and pushed himself up. There was hair on his chest, not a lot, but more than the four that Harry had. He rubbed his face with his hands. “Not anymore.” He opened his eyes wide and then felt around on the floor by his feet until he found a T-shirt. “What can I do for you? You need some tips on how to make Ruby come?” He smirked.

“Actually,” Harry said, trying to maintain his composure, “I was wondering about how exactly Ruby came to acquire my cat.”

“She told you? Man, I thought she was going to take all that glory for herself for sure. That girl loves to be the center of attention. She ever tell you how we met? She was outside school, and I was on my board, and she lay down on the sidewalk and told me that she'd only go out with me if I could jump over her. So I did.”

“No, I didn't know that,” Harry said, sorry to have learned it. “But what about the cat? Did you have it?”

“Relax, man, I didn't steal your stupid cat. I found it on the street, I don't know. But I saw the posters. I can read. I was just trying to do the right thing.” Dust patted his jeans until he found his cigarettes. He held out the pack, and Harry shook his head. “Oh, right,” he said.

“Ruby's with me now, you know,” Harry said. He didn't mean to sound possessive. He knew that Ruby belonged to no one but herself. And he didn't even know for sure if he
was
with her, really, or if he was just in the right place at the right time, filling a bored spell. He hadn't even meant to bring up Ruby. He'd come about Iggy. Truth be told, he hadn't thought any further than knocking on Nico's door, and the rest was a bit of a surprise.

“Is she? I hadn't heard.” Dust took a long drag and blew it out, smiling. “I'm just fucking with you, man. You gotta relax. Ruby Tuesday needs some head space.”

“Whatever,” Harry said. “Ruby knows what she needs. And I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't steal any more pets.”

“I'll think about it,” Dust said. “Now I think I need to go back to sleep. Tell Ruby I say hello. And tell the cat I say meow.”

“His name is Iggy Pop.”

“Who is?”

“The cat.”

“I thought it was a girl.” Dust shrugged. “I was calling her Whiskers.”

“I thought you didn't have her. Him.”

“Does anyone really have anything?” Dust closed his eyes, his cigarette still in his mouth. “See you later, bodyguard.” Two of the other lumps on the floor began to stir. One of them grabbed Harry's ankle, and he let out a very small yelp before hustling out the front door.

T
he yoga classes required a certain flexibility that Ruby didn't possess in spades, and so she'd been spending most of her snooping time in the upstairs bedrooms. At first she assumed that the whole thing was just a cover for a whorehouse—a hippie escort-service kind of thing—but by her third visit, she reluctantly admitted that it didn't seem to be the case. Everyone at the house was earnest and open, like they'd had their senses of humor taken out and run through a car wash, which wasn't the least bit sexy. If anything illegal was happening, it certainly wasn't that. It occurred to Ruby that Andrew might just be getting into shape, the way people did when they realized they were going to die someday. It really didn't seem like a major problem. Lena was nice, though, and Ruby found that she actually liked spending time with her. It was the complete opposite of how she spent time with her friends at school, where she was never sure if they were being sarcastic or not. Lena retained eye contact for a scary long time and made Ruby tea with special little sticks and twigs that were supposed to balance her qi.

They were sitting on some pillows in the upstairs lounge, which had formerly been the attic. The ceilings weren't quite tall enough to stand under at full height, but you could sit up comfortably against the wall or just flop over onto the floor. It was kind of like being
in the ball pit at a Chuck E. Cheese, only no one wore deodorant. Lena had been living at EVOLVEment for a month. She was from Rhode Island and thinking about doing her reiki training, but she wasn't sure.

“Want to practice on me?” Ruby wasn't sure how it worked, but most of the special treatments at EVOLVEment looked like napping with another person watching, more or less, which didn't seem hard.

“Sure,” Lena said.

Ruby scooted down so that her head was near Lena's lap and crossed her arms over her chest and shut her eyes tight.

“You look like a vampire,” Lena said.

“Maybe I am,” said Ruby. She opened one eye. “You've been warned.”

“No, seriously,” Lena said. “Lie down, arms at your sides, and try to relax. I'm just going to concentrate on your energy.”

Ruby closed her eyes again. “Okay,” she said. “Are you doing it yet? How do I know when it's working?”

“Be quiet,” Lena said. “And it'll work.”

Ruby tried to settle down. “How does this place make money? Is that a rude question?” She opened an eye again. “I'm sorry.”

“It's okay,” Lena said. She didn't seem annoyed. “I'll practice my acupressure instead.” She gently placed her thumbs on Ruby's wrists and pressed down. “Dave is just that kind of guy, you know? Charismatic. People give donations. Some people give their time, like me, and some people give money. It's a really good ecosystem, actually.”

“Like, rent money?” Ruby felt a twinge in her shoulder and jerked involuntarily.

“Ooh, I hit something, let's spend some more time there,” Lena said. She moved both of her hands to Ruby's arms and poked around until she found what she wanted and dug in. “Some people pay rent, but then there are some big investors. You know, like big money. Like
to buy a house.” She moved one finger to the left, and Ruby jerked again.

“I wonder what you have to do to convince people to give you money,” Ruby said. “I want that skill.”

Lena laughed. “He used to be an actor. Dave. When he was a kid, like. Or a teenager, I guess. You'd recognize him if you saw him without his beard. He had a stage name—I don't remember what it was. But I think that's why. He just gets right in there with people and knows what they need to hear. It's really an amazing talent. It's like, if you love animals, Dave will tell you about how he wants to organize a retreat to the rain forest to look at frogs or whatever. And then you'll give him the money to do it, and it'll happen. Or it won't, exactly, but maybe he brings some frogs here, you know?”

“Huh,” Ruby said. She jerked again. Whatever Lena was doing was definitely going to leave a bruise. She needed way more practice than Ruby was going to give her. Ruby wondered what kind of training was actually happening at EVOLVEment, if any of them truly knew what they were doing or if they were all taking turns being the emperor with no clothes.

“It's really his most special talent. It's almost like being a therapist, you know? Or like a spiritual guide. He helps people.”

“Like, helps people part with their money.”

“No, it's not like that, it's really different,” Lena said. “He helps people realize their potential. And if it serves EVOLVEment, even better.”

“I get it,” Ruby said. It was weird to think about other people's parents—about your boyfriend's parents—as dupes. It was like seeing them clip their toenails or have diarrhea. Some things you just weren't supposed to see. Ruby had always thought of Andrew as the good kind of dad, the kind of dad she would have wanted, if she'd been forced to choose. He was sort of reserved, which Zoe said was because
he grew up with too much money. He was masculine without being macho, and he looked good in a T-shirt, which wasn't as easy as it sounded. Andrew wasn't as bad as it came—one of her classmates' fathers had gotten caught texting dick pics to the babysitter—but Ruby felt slightly nauseous thinking about Andrew as an actual human being. A human being who was going to be really embarrassed really soon, probably.

“And you guys all know? I mean, like, who's giving lots of money for Dave's projects?”

“Well, no, not everyone,” Lena said. “But I'm sleeping with him.”

“I see,” Ruby said.

“He's a very open guy,” Lena said. “You should meet him.”

“I think I'm okay,” Ruby said. She rolled over to one side, squinting with pain. “I should probably go.”

Lena held her hands in a prayer position. “
Namaste.
Call me if you change your mind.”

“I will,” Ruby said, and crawled over to the stairs on her hands and knees.