Searching for Grace Kelly (24 page)

“Penny for your thoughts,” came a voice as Box leaned down and kissed her. He was in a henley and blue jeans, accented by a tight black leather jacket. It made him look like a college student dressing up as Marlon Brando in
The Wild One
.

“This is a new look.”

He smiled, stepped back. “What do you think? I'm trying to branch out of the whole New York–to-Newport axis.”

“I'm reserving judgment. Where're we going? I'm guessing neither the opera nor the Plaza.”

“We,” he said, sliding his arm around her, “are going to my apartment. I have a surprise for you.”

She felt a sudden unease. “Who else is going to be there?”

He laughed. “Is my company not entertaining enough for you?”

“I just . . . I've never been to your apartment.”

“Because I've never made you dinner before. I guess there goes the surprise. But I feel it's time I share my exceptional culinary skills, so you can see there is more to love about me than just my amazing hair and my employee discount at Barnes & Foster.”

They stood by the exit, Oscar the doorman looking at them through the glass expectantly, again trying to gauge whether to swing open the door because they were going to walk out or whether he was about to witness the start of a fight between a girl and her boyfriend, played out in the lobby for all to see. Some of the Barbizon brawls—crying girls, boys standing palms up, baffled—were legendary. Even Agnes Ford had engaged in one.

Laura and Box had kissed, of course, often passionately—in a carriage clip-clopping through the city, in the mezzanine of the Imperial Theatre—and she had allowed things once or twice to progress to “second base,” Box's fingers and hands dexterous and warm on her breasts, causing sensations she had only read about. But it was precisely this expertise of his that was causing her so much distress in this moment: After four months and a romantic dinner in his apartment, a dinner he had made himself, what would he expect then? And was she prepared to give it to him?

“You know how I know you're a writer?” he asked, devilment sparkling in his eyes as poor Oscar still lingered outside, waiting for a sign.

Something in his eyes put her at ease. He had that ability. “No. Tell me.”

“Because I can read you like a book,” he said. He leaned over, brushing his lips on her temple. “You worry too much,” he whispered. “I wasn't planning on serving the dinner in the bedroom. There'll be time enough for that in the future.”

And with that he put his arm around her waist as the front door of the Barbizon swung open, Oscar smiling broadly as Box Barnes and his lovely girlfriend Laura Dixon stepped out into the crisp autumn evening.

 

His apartment, in a whitewashed slate building on the Upper East Side, was more masculine than she'd imagined, though intellectually she knew that made little sense. For some reason, she had always pictured him living in Gene Tierney's apartment in
Laura
, replete with crystal chandelier and an imposing self-portrait in oil hung above the fireplace.

Instead she found an attractive, spartan, open space of gleaming oak hardwood floors and beige throw rugs, with long windowpanes framed in black metal and accented with plain white shades with pull cords, each of which covered precisely half the window. Facing the fireplace in the living room was a long sofa with a rounded back covered in forest-green velvet, along with a glass coffee table stacked with art books and a black Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Barcelona chair. Built-in mahogany bookshelves on either side of the windows held an eclectic assortment of novels, war histories, biographies, and essays, along with what looked like several scrapbooks and photo albums. A pewter Hans Arne Jacobsen pendant lamp hung above the rectangular dining room table, which like the bookshelves was mahogany and burnished to a shine.

Laura sauntered into the tiny galley kitchen, sipping her chilled glass of wine as Box stirred creamy white sauce on the stovetop, a large pot of spaghetti bubbling on the opposite burner. “That does not look like something Agnes Ford would eat,” she said casually.

He turned to look at her, his expression flat. “Why would you mention
her
?”

She eyed him quizzically. “Because she's a famous model and very skinny and she happens to live in my building and periodically appear in the magazine I work for,” she answered.

He muttered, “Oh,” then returned to his stirring. “Fettuccine carbonara,” he remarked, a bit too eager to return to the subject of the cooking. “I want you to know I only make this for very special guests.”

“Like Agnes Ford?” she said, and instantly regretted it.

His eyes glazed over. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“I . . . I don't know. You tell me. It's just when I mentioned her you seemed to jump. Do you know her?”

“Of course I know her. She's a model in New York. I run a department store.”

“That's not what I meant.”

“Then by all means, Laura, why don't you tell me what you mean? You know how I love your outspokenness.” He turned up the burner on the fettuccine, his eyes never leaving the stove.

Too far down the road to turn back now. “All right,” she said quietly, placing her wineglass on the kitchen counter. “Did you date her?”

“I thought you had already done all of your research on me.”

She winced. A few weeks into their relationship, she'd made the mistake of telling him that she'd spent the better part of an afternoon in the Street & Smith's library, scanning through whirring panels of old microfiche to read gossip column accounts of his many, many (many) dates. She thought it would show Hepburn spunk. Instead, he'd been livid, accusing her of succumbing to jealousy and the vacuous thirst for scandal that was a well-known trait of the Barbizon girls. Worse had been how he had
looked:
hurt and betrayed. They hadn't spoken for the following three days; it had taken her that long to realize he'd been right. She'd gift-wrapped a box of matches and dropped it at Barnes & Foster, with a note that said, “I used these to burn the microfiche. I'm sorry.” They'd never discussed it again.

“I'm not accusing you of anything. I'm simply asking if you dated her.”

He put down the spoon, turned to her. “Yes, I did. And for the record, she was the one who ended it. Though that doesn't really fit neatly into the ‘Box Barnes, noted womanizer' narrative that plays so well in the rags. Of which I too often forget you are a part.” He glanced back over at the simmering noodles. “Dinner'll be ready in a minute. I'll refill your wine.”

She took hold of his forearm as he tried to pass her to the icebox. “I'm sorry,” she whispered. “You have to be patient. This is all very new to me.”

“I've been patient, Laura. I've also made mistakes. The difference between us is yours aren't archived at the public library. Yes, I've dated a lot of girls. Yes, I've treated a fair number of them badly. I was young and stupid, and I couldn't handle all of the attention. That's not an excuse, merely an explanation. But I've tried to . . . change. You've been a big part of that. That night at the Stork, I was just so ashamed of the way I behaved. I knew you deserved better, and I wanted to
be
better, to deserve you. But it'll never work between us if you don't learn to trust me.”

“I'm trying. But you don't understand what it's like on the other side of this, to be the girl who's dating the guy every other girl wants.”

“That's not true. I'm—”

“It
is
true. You may not look at those girls at the Barbizon, or in the theaters, or in the restaurants, and that's to your credit. But I do. I can't help it. They're everywhere.”

“Including the San Remo?”

The blunt force of the sneak attack staggered her, and she felt her heart pounding. She was about to ask what he was talking about, but she knew what he was talking about and, furthermore,
he
knew that she knew what he was talking about. They'd crossed over the line of playful hide-and-seek.

“You've been spying on me?” She said it slowly, carefully, half accusation, half incredulousness.

“That's right, Laura, I've been in a trench coat and a fedora and dark glasses, shadowing your every move.” He shook his head, brushed past her to retrieve a quart of beer from the icebox. “Not all of my haunts require a tux, Laura. I have friends in low places, too.”

“And you never said anything.”

He poured the beer into a Pilsner glass. “No. Because it wasn't any of my business. We were dating. We didn't have any exclusive understanding. Which is why your jealousy is so irritating.”

“I am not jealous. I asked a simple question, that's all. And I'm not the one who was getting secret reports on
your
dating life.”

He took a hard swig of his beer. “Are you still seeing him?”

“Don't you know the answer?”

“Laura, please. To borrow your phrase, it's a simple question. Are you?”

She was inclined to sass, to tell him it was none of his business. But the truth was that it was, in fact, his business. Just as it had been Pete's. “No, I'm not. It ended weeks ago.”

There was silence for a good minute, the only sound the increasingly ferocious bubbling of the boiling water on the stove. Laura stepped over, flicked off the gas. “The spaghetti's going to be overcooked.”

When she turned back around he was directly in front of her, his arms around her, pulling her close. “I know I'm coming off as a jerk, and I don't mean to. I have a past, and it's only logical you'd be wary. But I know you feel it, Laura. I know you feel what's in my heart, and what I hope is in yours. So let's commit to it, right here. Right now. From here on out, nobody else. Just us. Because I think . . .” She could see how desperately he wanted to say the words but couldn't yet. She pressed her index finger to his lips, searched his eyes.

“Just us,” she whispered.

And then she kissed him, his mouth hungry on hers, until dinner was forgotten.

“Viv? Viv? Sweetie, you okay in there?” Barbara, one of the coat-check girls, was knocking gently on the door.

“I'm fine, fine. Sorry. Just some bad shrimp from last night, I'm afraid. Out in a jiffy.”

Still kneeling, she weakly pushed down the lever to flush the toilet, then fell back on her haunches, resting the back of her head against the stall door.
Good Christ
,
Vivian
, she admonished herself,
how did you get here?

The clock was ticking, ever louder, every day. Her telegram to England, sent before this latest terrible development, had gone unanswered. Her collect phone call last week, unaccepted. (“We don't take no collect calls in this house, especially from the likes of her,” her father had snapped to the overseas operator before abruptly hanging up.)

Oh, how foolish I've been. How utterly, totally, completely foolish
.

Because England was where her road had really diverted, she realized now. Back there, at the engagement party, where she'd decided just for devilment to see if Emma's fiancé would go a round with her if she worked him hard enough, just so she'd always have that for herself, the knowledge that she could have had him if she'd wanted him, that Emma—smart, educated, always-our-good-girl, always-better-than-Vivian Emma—had, for once, lost in a battle of the Dwerryhouse sisters. Every year growing up, she had watched her parents dote on Emma, praise Emma, nurture Emma, leaving her the prodigal daughter who just hadn't left home. Until she did.

If only Mary hadn't found them. What harm would have come of it? A knowing smile, a wink to herself in the years hence, a silent satisfaction that for once she had triumphed? But Mary
had
found them, out by the shed in the rose garden, and had of course done what Mary always did, run and tattle, and of course Aunt Maude had been close enough to see the two of them hurrying up the path, Devin's shirttail still untucked. They'd only kissed, maybe a bit of fondling, but the damage was done.

Emma had milked it for every ounce, canceling the wedding, shrieking that her life was over, that Vivian had always been jealous, always hateful, always there to trip her up when she had been nothing but kind and giving. Her parents' wrath had been swift, brutal, and, it now appeared, permanent.

And what had she cared? She had always planned on coming to America anyway. So she took the money they shoved at her to disappear and happily obliged. And things had been going good—or at least okay—until Nicky had showed up. Slick, pretty, possessive Nicky and his wad of bills, asking her to sing to him that night, filling so many of her nights afterward. She had been so casual, so sure she could discard him into the bin like a piece of used tissue, as she had done with the men who had come before. She'd stupidly hung on too long, clinging to the chance for the audition and succumbing to the dark pleasure of channeling Monroe.

And that's when the trouble had really started. He had begun popping up unexpectedly, checking on her. They'd have a down-and-out row—they'd just had another two nights ago—and she would think she was free of all of it, only to have him reappear three days later, yellow roses in hand, begging forgiveness and confessing to the sin of simply loving her too much. He'd become addicted to spontaneous, dangerous sex, which had left her no time to plan. Which is how she had ended up sick as a dog on the floor of the loo.

There was no money and no one to send passage. England was out. She knew no one outside of New York. And she had to get out of New York. Especially now. It was going to be extremely difficult to break it off under normal circumstances. If he found this out, he'd never let her go. Ever.

But suppose I do get out
.
Then what?
she wondered. Spend nine months in hiding? Give the little thing up, then saunter back into the Stork, pick up her cigarette tray, and start serving again?