The Insiders (5 page)

“I can imagine how that's going.”

“Jonathan,” Liza said. She was staring straight forward, into the street. We were a normal distance apart, but I could feel how she wouldn't have minded being closer to me. So I did get closer, but I didn't put my arms around her. We hadn't fooled around in six months or something. And when we did fool around it had just felt too appropriate, like that was something everybody expected us to do. I knew I wasn't
excited enough to keep doing it. But I'd never said that. We'd just stopped fooling around, but we never stopped hanging out.

“What?” I asked. Maybe it's a double negative, when you know someone wants to say something, but you're too preoccupied with something else to deal with it. So you kind of … don't let them.

“Nothing,” she said. “I hope you find your cousin.”

I didn't like the sound of that, but it was too late to do anything, so I hugged Liza good-bye, told her I'd be in touch about tomorrow night, changed directions, and walked back to the Flood house to get Kelli.

“What'd Mickey call you?” Arno asked.

“Ooh,” Kelli said. “I guess he thought that was funny.”

There was a mirror above the mantel and Kelli looked at herself. She moved her white-blond hair around. Arno watched her do this, and then he checked out his own hair. “Like falling off a building for no reason is funny.”

Kelli laughed. They locked eyes in the mirror. Music was still playing in the Flood living room, some soft stuff by Idlewild, and Arno wondered if Kelli had put it on. There were maybe five kids left, and Arno didn't know any of them well enough to care what they thought of him.

“You know, this place is kind of amazing,” Kelli said.

“You should see my house,” Arno said. “People call it the asylum.”

“Why?”

“Because it's huge and crazy. My parents are art
dealers, so the public rooms are filled with lots of crazy art. Where are you from again? They probably help out with shows at the museum there.”

“St. Louis.”

“Oh yeah. I flew there with them. The stewardess was into me and so she took me to this special bathroom that only the staff uses. And that's when I joined the Mile High Club.”

“Bullshit.”

“For real,” Arno said, smiling. Kelli was definitely hot. For instance, she could curse and it came out sounding like she wasn't imitating people who really cursed. She picked up a white marble vase. He watched the movement of her arms.

“I'd like to see the asylum sometime,” Kelli said.

“I'd like that, too. Tomorrow night you'll come to the opening of a show I was involved in at my family's gallery. The artist is Randall Oddy; you might know his work. We'll start the evening there, and then if things go well, we'll end up at my house.” Arno stuck out his hand and ran it under Kelli's chin. She gave him a sort of half smile and licked her upper lip.

“You're nothing like your jittery cousin,” Arno said.

“I think I'm really going to like New York.”

Arno walked backward away from Kelli. She followed him. He wasn't sure where he was going, and
his interior map of the Flood house was not very good—not at nearly four in the morning, after a dozen beers. So he accidentally flipped over a couch. Kelli laughed so hard she nearly choked.

That's when the door opened and February Flood and her friends came in. Arno stood up.

“Arno, you idiot, what are you doing here?” February screamed out. “And who's this piece of trailer trash?” February wore dark eyeliner and darker clothes. Her short hair was in a bob, and her brown eyes were huge and glassy.

Kelli stopped laughing. February's friends crept around her and streamed up the stairs to her room.

“Where's my brother?” February asked.

“There's a question,” Arno said. “I definitely haven't seen him all night. Meanwhile, Mickey fell off your roof so everyone took him to the hospital. What've you been up to?”

“Cheetah. We rocked it.”

“Oh, did you?” Kelli said. She said “rocked it” under her breath, and shook her head.

“Listen, bitch,” February snapped, “this is my house. I don't know who you are, but I think it'd be a good idea if you got out, now.”

“Fine,” Kelli said, and headed for the door.

“February, give it a rest. She's Jonathan's cousin.
Kelli, stay.”

“Jonathan! Well, where the hell are you from, dressed like that?”

“St. Louis.”

“Huh,” February said. “You know, you two make a good couple. Arno, you're a total slick salesman, and you, you're …” But February didn't bother to finish the sentence. She was noticing that the house was trashed. She didn't seem bothered by this; she was just appraising the damage.

“Have you seen Patch?” February asked.

“You already asked that,” Arno said. “We're going to hang out here for a while, okay?”

“These two can stay, but the rest of you get the hell out of here,” February said, suddenly turning on the few other kids left on the parlor floor. The stragglers stood quickly and shot out the door like mice. February nodded to herself and went up the grand staircase, leaving Kelli and Arno alone together. Kelli put her finger on Arno's nose and pressed.

“You're pretty cute,” she said.

“That's different from what you are. I would describe you as extremely hot.” He took her finger in his hand. He put it in his mouth and said, “Come home with me now.”

“You know, with Jonathan gone for who knows how
long, I would've done just that. But I don't think my mom'd appreciate it. Besides, he's at the door.”

The front door opened and there was Jonathan, fighting to catch his breath.

“Hey,” he said. “Kelli, we better get home.”

“I want you over at my house tomorrow night, early, for cocktails,” Arno said. He looked into Kelli's eyes.

“You're pushy,” Kelli said. “I like that.”

“We're—” But Arno caught himself before he said
meant for each other
. He was embarrassed that he'd thought it, because it sounded completely cliché unless you meant it, which he didn't. Of course, normally he didn't have to come up with smart lines. Normally, he just kept his mouth shut and got laid.

“Will you marry me?” Mickey asked.

“When I grow up, I can,” Philippa said. “In like a year.”

They dissolved into laughter. With his good arm, Mickey pulled her toward him. She'd shown up a little while earlier, in a white fleece jacket, Prada sneakers, and a Diane Von Furstenberg wrap dress. And once she was pretty sure Mickey was fine, she'd gotten up on his hospital bed and unwrapped.

Mickey had woken up a few hours earlier and stared out at the Saturday morning haze. He missed Philippa. He'd really broken some bones, too, but by the time she'd arrived and climbed on the bed, he figured out that they'd kept him overnight because they'd seen the psychotic episodes on his chart, not because of his arm.

Now Philippa, who had long, gangly legs and a moonface that didn't fit with them, big, pouty lips, and high, arched eyebrows, was sitting in the middle of his bed and playing a game with him. She kissed his nose
and he tried to move quick, so he'd get a kiss on the lips instead. Mickey had taken off his hospital smock. Neither of them cared that they couldn't lock the door.

“I heard from Liza that Jonathan brought some gross relative of his last night and everybody was trying to get her bombed so they could sleep with her,” Philippa said.

“It's your direct manner—that's what I love.”

“You didn't do that, though,” she said, and slowly pushed his broken arm back, above his head. She raised an eyebrow. Mickey held his breath. He knew that if she found out he cheated, she would break it again. Luckily, he hadn't.

“It hurts,” Mickey said. And she bent over and kissed him. “Forget school. I'm going to stay in this bed till you marry me.”

“I will marry you,” Philippa said. “I said I would. Tell me more about Kelli.”

“It's weird, I remember her as sexier than she actually is. Like somebody in a movie.”

They were kissing when Jonathan walked in with cups of strong black coffee and a mouth that was so wrinkled and downturned that he looked about twenty-five.

Mickey pretended not to hear Jonathan, and so did Philippa. So Jonathan went to the window and opened
one of the coffees. He got out his phone and called home.

“Hi, Mom. Did Kelli wake up? I just wanted to ask her something. No, don't bother. I'll be home later, probably. Yes, your dinner was wonderful and everybody was terrific and totally beautiful. Totally, yeah. Bye.”

“I think someone's here,” Philippa said, and laughed.

“Could you two not always be completely naked?” Jonathan asked.

“Don't look, then,” Philippa said.

“I wasn't.”

“That says a lot. Anyway, I've got to go to Sotheby's with my dad. He's bidding on a Lichtenstein against Arno's dad and he wants me to be there, to make sure I'm not spending time with this one.” She gestured at Mickey.

“Your dad's so cheap,” Mickey said. “Arno's dad is definitely going to win. You're around later?” He reached over to the steel stand next to the bed and grabbed a couple of pills and a cup of water. He took them, and his eyes fluttered.

“No, I've got to stick close to home tonight,” she said as she pulled down her dress and tied it. “Call me later though, and tell me you love me.”

And then she left.

“Let's go get lunch,” Jonathan said. “Seriously. Put your pants on and let's get out of here.”

Once they were outside and Jonathan had gotten Mickey to walk straight, they went over to the Corner Bistro and Bar, where the waiters knew them both because they'd been going there for after-school burgers since they were in sixth grade.

They settled into a booth in the back and ordered, and then looked around at all the hungover West Village fashion people, who were furiously chomping burgers.

“I'm looped on painkillers,” Mickey said. He swung his broken arm over his head in circles, like a helicopter propeller.

“So you met my cousin before you flipped off the roof?” Jonathan asked.

“I didn't fool around with her.”

“Well that's something. But you met her, right?”

“Ooh. Yeah …”

“Arno did.”

“Got with her? How do you know?”

“I don't know what they did. But I left her with him for over an hour.”

“Oh. Do you want to talk about how much I love Philippa? It's coming over me pretty hard.”

“It's just annoying, that's all.”

“Love?” Mickey asked. He bit into his burger. He sort of wished he could think of anything but Philippa. But he couldn't. Without her, what was he? He didn't know. He didn't always try to do crazy stuff … he just lost focus. He lifted his new cast up and down. Heavy.

“No, about Kelli. Arno always just fools around with everybody without any consideration for the consequences, or how it might make any of us feel. Did I even talk to you about what he did last night? He broke our code.”

“What code?” Mickey asked.

“Um,” Jonathan said. “Forget it.” Mickey was just staring, as if someone were phoning over to him from another cloud. He looked around, with his head at a little bit of an angle. He didn't seem aware of himself at all. A waiter dropped off a couple of mugs of beer and Jonathan slid Mickey's out of his reach.

“That girl, Ooh,” Mickey said, with his mouth full. “Hearing about her sort of flipped Philippa out.”

“She's leaving in a couple of days.”

“That's good. Philippa said that Liza wasn't that into her, and that's never a good sign.” Then Mickey smiled the happy smile of a guy with a broken arm who is both completely in love and totally high.

I went home at four, after Mickey and I got ourselves fed, and I called around and arranged for all of us to meet for dinner at Man Ray at 8:30. There would be about eight of us: me, Mickey, David, Arno, Liza, Amanda, probably my cousin Kelli, and maybe Patch, though I hadn't spoken to him in days. I wondered what he was up to. This was getting to be the longest amount of time I'd gone without talking to him, and I definitely missed him. He had a calming effect on us all.

After I'd made the dinner plans I got to feeling hyper. I was supposed to read some play by Eurypides but it was Saturday afternoon—not exactly homework time. So I called Flan, since I figured she'd be home from her riding lessons.

I live right by the Floods, in a big old apartment building on the corner of Fifth Avenue and Eleventh Street, with about a dozen rooms that lead around and into each other like some kind of
weird labyrinth, so when I'm feeling strange I just creep around with my eyes closed and try to figure out which room or corridor I'm in. And then I felt like that might be a game Flan would like. We could whistle and be blindfolded and bump into each other. And then I remembered I hadn't really had a chance to talk to her the night before.

“Let's go get ice cream,” she said when I got her on the phone.

I was into that, because I love ice cream. So I slipped out of my Westons and into some very casual blue and white Prada boat shoes, and I wandered over to Otto, this new Mario Batali restaurant on Eighth Street, where they make ice cream by hand using old-fashioned butter churns. There she was, waiting in a booth by the window. And she was cute.

“Can we not sit by the window?” I asked.

“Are you afraid to be seen with me?” Flan teased. And then she stood up and reached across the booth and kissed me on the cheek. Which felt really good, and really, really wrong.