Dreamology(28)

My dad wasn’t kidding when he said that Nan saved everything. We’re surrounded by clothing on three sides. And he wasn’t kidding about the color-coding either. It’s a ROYGBIV of textiles. The beautiful wool suits she wore in her older age, creams and fine tweeds and moss greens. And pieces she couldn’t have possibly worn in years, like silk strapless gowns and mod minidresses and heels she could never have managed after the age of eighty.

Celeste and I were getting ready in my room when she asked if she could borrow something “funky,” and I, too afraid to tell her I don’t own anything even remotely interesting, directed our attention here.

“What’s so great about Newbury Street?” I ask. I’d been there a few times since we moved, once to pick up some decent coffee at a French bistro when our grinder broke, and another time to buy a new pair of leather booties.

“It’s arguably the best vintage in the city,” Celeste says, getting up and rummaging through a vanity that’s built into the wall, with giant lightbulbs rimming the mirror like you’d see backstage at a Broadway theater. “By the way, this light makes your skin look flawless. Okay, what about these?” She whirls around from the mirror, waving her arm with a flourish, a series of chunky art deco bracelets extending up her arm.

“I love it!” I say, and take another bite of pizza. Whoever invented pizza, I’d like to kiss them on the mouth. “Take them.”

“Alice.” Celeste looks scandalized. “I will borrow them. I can’t take them! Don’t be ridiculous.”

I shrug. “It’s not like anyone’s going to claim them,” I say. “My mom’s not around.”

Celeste takes a seat across from me on the floor, tucking her legs underneath her body. “Is it okay to ask why?”

“She’s a primatologist,” I explain, just enough to hopefully skirt the issue. “She’s studying lemurs in Madagascar.”

But then Celeste asks the dreaded question, the question I hope most people will just let slide. “Well, when will she be back?”

“Um . . . she left ten years ago and hasn’t come home yet . . .” I shrug, then glance over at Celeste from the corner of my eye. But she doesn’t look uncomfortable at all.

“So your parents are divorced?” Celeste asks.

“Not really . . .” I say. I can’t believe I’m telling her all this. These are the kinds of things I only tell Sophie about. “They just sort of never dealt with it. Their marriage. But they definitely aren’t together.”

“So you have not seen your mother in ten years.”

I want to be annoyed at this statement, and at Celeste for pushing the issue, but oddly I’m not. There is judgment in her tone, but I can tell it’s not at me.

“I mean, I’ve seen her . . .” I stretch my legs out, knocking my feet together like a little kid who’s just been asked a tough question. “We Skype once in a while . . . but it’s usually too awkward. We do better in writing. I get a letter or postcard from her every couple of months, telling me about her latest adventure and any new exciting findings in her research.”

“And what do you tell her?” Celeste asks.

I pick up another slice of pizza. “She never really asks,” I explain. Then I take a huge bite so I don’t have to say any more. But Celeste doesn’t say anything, either, and I feel a need to fill the silence. “So the point is, the jewelry is up for grabs,” I say, waving my slice toward the vanity, my mouth still a bit full. “I mean, look at me—it’s not like I’m gonna wear it.” Currently I’m wearing a worn-in chambray shirt, black jeans, white Keds, and zero “funk.”

Celeste gazes at me, resting back on her hands with her head tilted to the side. “Actually,” she says, “you are going to wear it. And while we’re at it, you’re going to wear some eyeliner, too.”

I smile and wish I wasn’t growing fonder of Celeste by the second.

When Oliver told me he lived a few blocks from my house, I assumed he meant a house just like mine. Old and dusty, with so many stairs a real estate agent could advertise guaranteed glute definition in the listing. I did not assume what he actually meant was the penthouse apartment at the Taj Hotel, with suited doormen, a gracious concierge, and an elevator that moved so smoothly and soundlessly that at first I was afraid we’d gotten stuck.

When Celeste and I arrive, pushing our way through a lushly carpeted, crowded room of our schoolmates, we find Oliver alone on the balcony overlooking the Public Garden, a glass of something dark balanced perfectly in his left hand.

“Yes, that’s correct,” he says politely into his phone, as though making a dentist appointment. “I want thirty-six pizzas delivered to the Taj. Half cheese, half pepperoni and onion. Oliver Healey. You have my card on file. And what’s your name? Denise? Thank you ever so much, Denise. You’re an angel.”

Oliver hangs up the phone and turns around, his eyes lighting up at the sight of us. “Laaaadies!” he says, wrapping an arm around each of our shoulders. “Welcome to the Bat Cave. May I offer you a beverage?”

“It’s just that he’s so dreamy,” Leilani Mimoun gushes, and I can barely hear her. We—she, Celeste, and I—are wedged into a tiny corner of the kitchen counter as the party continues to grow around us, because apparently the whole world knows about it. “He knows everything. And oh my God. When he wore that Black Watch shirt and Levis on Tuesday? I thought I would faint.” Leilani fans herself with a stray oven mitt. “I love a man in good denim. I know he’s our teacher, but it’s not like he’s that much older, you know?”