Younger (19 page)

Across the table, she felt Pierre and Marina’s eyes boring into her. “No, of course she won’t,” Marina said firmly. “Nothing to do with Tanya, thank goodness. What a shrew!”

Anna was still distressed when she got home. Her first thoughts when she’d calmed down weren’t kind. First, how typical it was of George to apologize to one of the
men
at the table for Jan’s having attacked
her
. Second, her old school friend’s filler was more disastrous than Allie had implied. She looked like a lumpy dried-apple doll. But even more shocking was Jan’s venom. Did she deserve the loathing Jan felt?

Sitting over a cup of herbal tea in the living room, cold sober now, she thought back to college when she and Jan first became friends. She’d tried so hard to be sophisticated, to be someone other than the granddaughter of a Polish laundress. Had it been at the cost of her humanity? She didn’t think so. Maybe she had been a snob, but she hadn’t been unkind to Jan.

And in later years? She and Jan didn’t see each other for at least a decade before Anna relocated to California. Jan had trodden a different path—marrying George, becoming a mother, hanging out with other moms.

She’d always thought of herself and Jan as having grown apart, as happens with some college pals. It was different with Allie. She and Allie connected on many levels, intellectually, politically, career-wise, as feminists. The only thing she and Jan shared on their “girls’ nights out” were long rounds of “remember when?” Still, it had never occurred to her that Jan might hate her.

No, she wasn’t responsible. The problem was Jan’s opinion of Jan, not her opinion of Anna. If George wanted to dump her, she’d be better off without him. Whatever happened, it wasn’t Anna’s problem—and after tonight’s display, Jan was never again going to be Anna’s friend, either.

Before going to bed, she texted David to request going to a cinema in Kensington instead of Leicester Square. As long as the Bergers were in the West End, she would go elsewhere. The last thing she needed was David watching some hyaluronic acid-engorged harpy screeching through her pumped-up trout mouth that Tanya Avery was Anna Wallingham.

And she needed to suppress her all-too-distinctive laugh in the future. It could lead to having nothing whatsoever to laugh about.

“I hope you don’t mind my asking to meet here instead,” she told David after they’d found a table at the pub he’d suggested, The Builder’s Arms, which was bustling with Saturday shoppers taking a break.

“Not at all. Now, what would you like to drink? My shout.”

“A half of cider would be super, thank you.”

“Sounds good.
Moi, aussi
.”

She grinned. So he still did that! They used to do it with each other all the time, adding a stupid little ironic tag in French. She watched him walk to the bar. He was still much the same: tall and slim, with a long upper lip quick to lift in a smile and little frown lines, deeper now, between his eyebrows. He was the same age as she was and looked good for it—other than some gray hairs and glasses, he hadn’t changed.

Just like me,
she thought wryly.

They spoke about episodes David had directed for a current series, the storyboarding he’d be doing for a new one, about how London had changed. In the last instance, Anna sat back and pretended she hadn’t been coming here for longer than Tanya would have been alive; it was easy, because she loved watching and listening to him talk.

He’d brought a newspaper, and the film they decided on was just what she’d hoped for, funny and not especially romantic. Afterward, he led her to Kensington Church Street, saying, “I’ve booked us at one of my favorite restaurants. Traditional English food and modern French wines. Good combo.”

At the table, she quickly looked up from the menu. “Fish and chips for me. Yummy.”

“And I’ll have the fish cakes.” He scanned the wines on a blackboard. “How about the Whispering Angel rosé from Provence?”

“Divine. But
ooh la la
, not cheap.”

“We’re saving by choosing comfort food over haute cuisine. And it’s still my treat. You get to choose the place and pay for our next dinner. Deal?”

“Ah,
monsieur
, you like ze, how you say, Big Mac?”

It was like the old days. They spoke about inconsequential things, from books recently read to favorite cities. It was as if a quarter of a century had been weeks, except now Anna had to be careful not to reach across the table and take David’s hand. Or to laugh, of course.

She was relaxed being with him as Tanya in a way she hadn’t been as Anna, at least not at the end. She wasn’t fretting that he didn’t consider her talented enough or connected enough or interesting enough. Suddenly, she was no longer so sure about what she had assumed for so long: that David had been the one responsible for making her feel unimportant.

They were drinking coffee when he suddenly stared off into space, then shook his head and turned back to her. “This is so weird. I keep forgetting you’re not Anna, the woman I thought you were when I first bumped into you.”

“Because I look like her?”

He studied her. “It’s not just that. It’s as if she’s been reincarnated. The way you hold your head. The way you pick up your glass. It’s haunting.”

“What happened between you, all those years ago?”

He laughed ruefully. “Beats me. I knew she was unhappy. But I thought it was something she had to sort out on her own. I mean, we all do. We all have disappointments and failures and . . .” He shrugged. “I flew back here for some meetings, and when I returned to New York two weeks later, she’d not only taken the things she kept at my apartment and left her key on the table, she’d also moved out of her own flat.”

“And that was it? Wham, bam, thank you, ma’am?”

“That was pretty much it. I got a letter that week saying she couldn’t do it anymore, that my lack of respect for her was devastating. I didn’t even recognize the man she was describing.” He shrugged. “She was right to some degree. I
was
too caught up in my own career; I
hadn’t
been thinking about the future, when my work in New York was over. But I’d never realized it had been eating away at her.

“She asked that I not try to find her or get in touch, so I didn’t. I wanted to, but I felt I had to respect her decision.”

“And then all this time . . . ?”

He sipped his coffee and shrugged. “All this time? Well, I haven’t been Mr. True Romance pining away. I carried on, as one does. I finished the job in the States, came back to London, worked, met women, got married, got divorced, got married, had a kid, got divorced again. I can’t even say I thought about Anna a lot. When I did, it was intense, but months—even years—went by without a thought. People fade in your memory when you haven’t seen them for so long; they grow to be more like fictional characters than flesh-and-blood people.

“And then I bumped into you on a street in the middle of London, and Anna became real to me again, as if she’d been there all along. And I’m—” He stopped, then smiled. “I’m boring even myself. I think that means it’s time to go.”

Outside, he hustled her into a taxi. “I’m in the mood for a bit of a walk,” he said. “And since I’ll be strolling through the past, I should do it on my own.” She leaned toward him, part of her desperately hoping he’d take her in his arms. But he just smiled down at her. “Don’t forget to let me know where you’re taking me for dinner. I’ll text you next week.”

Then he was gone, and she wasn’t Tanya Avery anymore. She was Anna Wallingham, heading south in a black cab. Alone. Very much alone.

Chapter 16

Sunday dawned cold and blustery, a phlegmy North Sea kind of day that made umbrellas useless against its windborne mists. Still, Anna forced herself to get out of the house, having no desire to stay home alone with her thoughts. She’d called Lorrayne on the off chance she was free, but the voice at the other end of the phone sounded more like someone who’d been taking recreational drugs than selling pharmaceuticals. “Can’t move, Tanya. Got a headache big as a Routemaster bus and a drunken hulk sleeping next to me.” Then she giggled. “Uh-oh. I woke the sleeping tiger. Gotta go.”

She’d forgotten what it had been like being in her twenties, separated from Monty, out with a different guy every night, dancing in Village clubs, drinking screwdrivers until her stomach burned, rarely turning down the occasional line of cocaine. If she had a breakup, she simply partied harder.

After she’d split from David, she’d been older and too depressed for debauchery. It was as if she’d had to exact a penance for lacking a thriving career, verifiable talent, a man who loved her. Through a roommate agency, she found a dreary woman who worked as an editorial assistant and pined for a married, unavailable boss. Weekends, the roommate either went to stay with her religious mother in the Bronx for endless rounds of mass or camped out in the bedroom of the small apartment without changing out of the filmy peignoir set she’d undoubtedly bought with hopes of luring the editor into her bed. Anna, who slept on a studio couch in the living room, would wander the streets of Manhattan, yearning for David, alternately thinking she’d been a fool and raging silently at him for having let her down.

She didn’t envy Lorrayne her youth or the young man in her bed now, but she would have then. She’d longed to feel interest in another man, but she was so shrouded in her unrequited love for David, she felt no sparks for several years. Her New York life was all work, and then she had dedicated her LA life to pursuing even more success. Had this been a sort of revenge, becoming the kind of woman David might want? Yet, the feelings he showed when discussing the Anna he had known didn’t seem connected to her being a success or failure, just her essence, and this belated knowledge made her feel a stab of remorse. She had misjudged him and, thinking she was salvaging her self-respect, had destroyed everything they shared.

Checking online, she found an early twentieth-century exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery. That would do for a Sunday outing. It meant going to the West End, but the risk of running into George and Jan at a museum was small. Once cultured, their artistic interests were now limited to hot buttons.
Picasso! Monet! Hockney!
Only artists who’d be billed above the title as if they were A-list actors counted.

At least she had accomplished what she had set out to do after calling it quits with David, she told herself as she headed out. She’d created a career out of nothing, channeled her dramatic flair into her advertising work. Still . . . for what? To end up in this sick charade?
C’est à rire
. It was laughable indeed.

The exhibit, crowded on a wet Sunday, was reassuring, like visiting old friends: the Woolfs, the Sitwells, Roger Fry. Anna wandered on afterward, through permanent collections of Victorians and Georgians, the posers and the poseurs.

She was making her way toward the exit when she paused for a second look at Lucian Freud’s searing self-portrait from the ’60s, unaware that someone had slipped up behind her until she heard a voice close to her ear. “He stripped a face down, didn’t he? Even his own. Down to its sinews, I’d say.”

“Mr. Kelm.” She flushed as if caught spraying graffiti. “You’re a portrait fan?”

“Of course. People are infinitely more interesting than fields or dead pheasants, aren’t they? And I’m a great fan of Freud’s—Lucian only, not his grandfather Sigmund. He’s the master of depicting how we’re betrayed by our flesh. And the aging of it,” he added, with a bright smile. He took Anna’s elbow. “Allow me to buy you a drink.” It wasn’t a question.

They took the lift up to the restaurant in silence with three other people.

At the bar, she ordered a glass of pricey Sancerre. Hang the expense; let MI6 spring for something from the top shelf. Spy Boy had a mineral water.

Today the meticulous Mr. Kelm sported a blue shirt, discreetly patterned tie, and clubby-looking blazer. He made a show of raising his glass of water. “In Italy, one isn’t allowed to clink glasses that don’t hold alcohol,” he noted.

“One more reason to drink, then. Ah, very nice wine, thank you.”

“Everything going all right?”

She nodded.

“Mr. Barton is pleased with your work,” he noted.

“Oh?” She wondered what details Barton reported but knew asking was of no use.

“As you probably figured out, much of what he asks is as a favor to us—how the age change affects you, your confidence in being accepted for whom you appear to be.”

She nodded. “I worked that out.”

“I appreciate your agreeing to stay on the project. I understand that you’re bored with the diary and perhaps even the impersonation you consider unnecessary. There’s a possibility we can cut your contract short by several months, so you could concentrate on the
YOU
NGER campaign and then go home sometime in the winter. Would that please you? You’d receive the same remuneration. Barton’s assured me of that.”

“Would it please me?” She was sure he had his own reasons for asking, which made her obstinate about giving him nothing. “It’s hard to think about the future. Right now, I am who I am, doing what I do today and tomorrow.”

“Yes, of course,” he said brusquely. “That’s the right attitude. And keep in mind that Barton Pharmaceuticals will ensure lifelong delivery of
YOU
NGER products to you. If you so desire, of course.”

“If I so desire?”

“Right now it behooves us that you continue to be Tanya, of course. But after this, you can be Anna at any age you choose. As long as you complete your work satisfactorily. You understand this?”

She stared at him. She had no doubt he was here because of her last diary entry. Somehow what he was saying sounded like a veiled threat, but she wasn’t sure why. Sitting here, having this conversation, made her feel threatened enough in itself. “I think so.”

They both gazed out the window, at the gray sky, almost palpable with unshed rain. He gestured. “Why I don’t like landscapes. Too bleak, so many of them.” Turning back to her, he said, “Mr. Barton worries you’re a bit obsessed with a woman who worked for him last year named Olga Novrosky.”

Ah, the other reason for this meeting.
“Hardly obsessed. Wouldn’t you be curious if the person who had your office before you had died mysteriously?” She laughed dryly. “Well, I suppose
you
wouldn’t be, but you know what I mean.”

He ignored her joke. “We checked her out. No, no, not because she was involved in our product’s development—she wasn’t—but because we feared there might have been a relationship between her and Barton, something messy.”

“Messy relationship? You mean an affair?”

“It’s been known to happen. This Olga turned out to be exactly what she’d appeared to be: a young woman who wanted work experience in England and had been recommended by a friend of Mrs. Barton’s. No affair, no conspiracy, just a foreigner on her own. This can be a cold city. Not just the sky.”

“Yes, I know.”

“And you? You’ve made friends here? You aren’t lonely and depressed?”

“And likely to hurl myself under a train?” She snorted. “Look, I see this as a temporary work assignment. I could be introducing an American breakfast cereal in Slovakia or a shampoo brand in Spain. I like what I do, I like the people I’m working with, and I get out enough to not feel isolated. Just the other night, I had dinner with the Bartons, for instance.”

“Ah, yes? And how was that?”

She was sure Kelm already knew about Jan. “Fine,” she said firmly. “I can now attest to The Ivy’s shepherd’s pie being beyond any ordinary shepherd’s wildest dream.” She finished her wine.

Throwing a bill and some coins on top of the check, he stood. “Come, I’ll see you to the front door.”

“You’re staying?”

“I’d only just arrived when I noticed you. I have some time to kill before a meeting.” He pointed to himself with both hands. “This is not my usual weekend attire.”

As they exited the elevator, he smiled blandly. “Enjoy the rest of your Sunday, Miss Avery. And don’t worry so much.” His smile widened but still didn’t reach his eyes. “That’s an order.”

The sky opened up as she speed-walked to the Underground. By the time she’d reached her apartment, water was running down her neck and squelching in her shoes. Shivering, she stripped down, then took a hot shower. It was only mid-August and turning chilly already. She missed the LA weather. How did the British survive?

She’d left her iPhone at home—she often did, carrying only her “official” BarPharm BlackBerry in her bag. Now, swaddled in the thick terry robe that had come with the apartment, she checked it and saw that a text had come in from David:
I had a great time yesterday,
she read.
Still tied up, but hope we’re still on for September 2. Your treat!

Her heart soared as she texted back,
Details soon!
Obviously, this couldn’t go on, but she wasn’t prepared to give him up yet.
Just one more time,
she thought,
then I’ll cool it
.

The following week was like the best days of working on accounts in California, knee-deep in Madame X launch prep, busy but exhilarating. Barton wasn’t in the office, so she couldn’t ask him about her “chance” encounter with Kelm.

After work one day, she had a curry with Anezka and Lorrayne, feigning interest in their chatter about clubs and guys, going along with their teasing about Rob. Better they should think there might be a romance there so they wouldn’t expect her to go out dancing with them again. It had been fun once, but for a fifty-seven-year-old, once was precisely enough.

Barton remained out of the office so she didn’t see him until the following Tuesday; she’d been told by Eleanor the day before that Mr. Barton couldn’t see her until three, and she made sure she arrived on the dot, closing the door behind her.

“Nice work on the new materials,” he said. “I approved them all this morning and told Eleanor to coordinate with Becca on release dates.”

“Good.” She sat down across from the desk. “Hey, you’ll never guess who I bumped into last Sunday.”

He raised his eyebrows questioningly.

“Your friend Martin Kelm.”

“Martin Kelm?” His voice rose in surprise.

“At the National Portrait Gallery, of all places.”

“At the National Portrait Gallery?”

“You told him I’d asked you about Olga,” she said, which snapped him out of echo mode.

“Did I? I may have, but I certainly—well, it never occurred to me he’d speak to you about it. I might have mentioned that you had seemed a trifle worried.”

“I’m ‘a trifle worried’ that you’re taking the time to speak to Kelm about me on a weekend and that I’m being followed by MI6 when I go to a museum, Pierre.” The heat rose in her face. “I signed on to work on a skincare account, if you recall, not to be Mata-fucking-Hari.” Only as she bit off the words did she realize how angry she was.