American Girls(44)

“You ready to see how the other half lives?” he said, smiling like he knew something that I didn’t.

A faint beeping noise droned from inside Olivia’s house, and when Jeremy opened the door, a catatonic-eyed Pomeranian clawed halfway up my leg like it had lost its actual mind. The beeping was much louder and shriller inside. After flipping the switch on a light that wouldn’t turn on, Jeremy punched the keypad on her security system until the alarm stopped. The dog hobbled down two steps before peeing in a puddle between its legs. Who knew how long he’d been holding it.

“Jesus,” Jeremy said, picking the dog up and rubbing its head. “She forgot Mr. Peabody. Poor bastard.”

The inside of Olivia’s house was dark, and after three more useless attempts to find a working light, Jeremy opened the wall of curtains in the living room, letting in enough sun to show that Olivia had probably left in a hurry. Once my eyes adjusted, I could see that the downhill went far and fast. White furniture, black floors, black fireplace, white chandelier. It was like someone got all their decorating ideas from staring at a checkerboard. And then, along the sides of the house, boxes and bags, bags and boxes. Olivia Taylor was a high-end hoarder. I recognized the shopping bag from our excursion, tossed atop a pile of the same that led into the kitchen. Box upon box of Chinese takeout containers littered the counters. This was the picture the paparazzi needed. Piles of unpacked clothes cluttered the sofas, a dog-gnawed piece of pepperoni pizza sat abandoned on the floor, and the air smelled like animal piss and vinegar. For a hot star, she’d left an even hotter mess.

I didn’t know what to say, or what I was supposed to do, so I asked Jeremy if we should clean up.

“No,” he said. He pushed a stack of cotton-candy pink and baby-blue leotards onto the floor, sat on the sofa, and stared at the pizza box on the coffee table. Then he let out the kind of sigh that parents make when they’re so disappointed, they’ve actually given up, the kind of soul-gutted exhale that was a million times worse than any kind of mad. “It’s her mess. But someone needs to clue her in that she left the dog and her electricity is off. I should have known this place would have gone to shit. She always said that Vegas was for washed-up reality stars and ex-groupies. Guess she’ll fit right in.”

I thought about sitting down next to him and putting my hand on his leg, attempting the kind of “It’s okay!” gesture that beautiful girlfriends make in the movies before their boyfriends kiss them tenderly and wordlessly express their thanks and understanding. But I wasn’t his girlfriend. Still, we were in an empty house together, and even though it was trashed, there was something that made me feel like that had to mean something. I pretended he was the much older version of Birch and sat next to him and said, “I’m sorry. It’s really nice of you to look after her.”

He shook his head.

“Maybe that’s how it seems,” he said. “I used to think so. It would be nice it if helped, but it doesn’t. But then there’s the dog.” The dog was standing over the pizza and licking the pepperoni. Every few minutes he let out a rancid fart. People food wasn’t doing him any favors, but the poor bastard was practically dry-humping a piece of stale crust now that he’d had a chance to pee. Jeremy shook his head and took the pizza away from him.

“I wonder if she even owns dog food,” he said. I was sitting close enough to smell that he had probably washed his hair that morning, close enough that I could have reached over and traced the three freckles lined along his jaw like a wide triangle. He stopped staring at the mess and put his hand on my shoulder, and I thought for a minute that he might kiss me. I really did, and then it seemed like he’d awakened from a trance, and instead he stood up and kicked the pizza box off the table, kicked it so hard and far that it landed next to the shopping bags lined against the windows.

“Fuck,” he said. “She’s still my f*cking sister.”

“Careful,” I said before I could help myself. “You don’t want her thinking we came and trashed the place.” For a minute Jeremy didn’t say anything, and then he started to laugh. Even more than the thought of kissing him, his laughter felt like a gift. Like I registered, and I mattered.

“We couldn’t have that, now could we?”

He wouldn’t have believed me, but I knew exactly what he meant about Olivia. And then, like someone had written it into the script, the iguana bolted from Olivia’s bedroom across the floor, its feet and long green tail slapping the floor like a toddler playing the drums. I couldn’t help it, I was cracking up.

“Iggy!” Jeremy chased him to the corner. “Iggy, if this were not so completely depressing, it would be hilarious. You realize that, don’t you?” Iggy wriggled out of Jeremy’s hands and ran back into the bedroom. Jeremy closed the door behind him. “Who am I kidding? It’s a comedy of sad.”

The dog had burrowed into Olivia’s clothes and rested his head on a pair of her bikini underwear. Jeremy talked to him like he was the dog’s therapist. “And you,” he said, “you actually miss her. You might want to think about your choices, little dude.”

Then it seemed like as fast as the whole thing had become funny, it wasn’t anymore. The dog rolled over and let Jeremy rub his belly.

“You mind doing me a favor, Anna? Could you hold your breath and dig through the kitchen closet and see if there’s anything in the way of kibble that we could feed this animal? I’m going to give Olivia a call and see if she even knows that she left Mr. Peabody.”