Amelia THE GREAT UNKNOWN

NEW YORK WAS MY FAVORITE place. I couldn’t imagine how, why, and again, how I hadn’t realized how fabulous it was a long time ago. The restaurants, the theater, the people, the job… I mean, yes, going from managing editor to reporter had felt like a step backward. But I was only thirty-five, for heaven’s sake. I had plenty of time to prove myself at a new publication and work my way back up the ladder. I ignored the fact that doing so had taken me twelve years at Clematis.

I was sharing a small but bright two-bedroom with Martin, who had decided he needed a fresh start, too, and, in true BFF fashion, had joined me in my life change. My secret nest egg was funding the venture, but, even still, Martin was footing more than half of the bills. I had protested, but he had insisted. And, much to my surprise, I had given in. He was right. None of the places I could actually afford were suitable for our swanky new start.

As the captain of all things fabulous, Martin was connected to the coolest people. He was the reason I was having so much fun, the reason I didn’t feel lonely. And he was the reason I was going on this damn date tonight.

“Please, Amelia, please,” he had begged. “Do this for me. I promised Harris a smoking-hot date to the premiere.” Harris was Martin’s boss at the PR firm where he was now working, the sister company of his Palm Beach firm. The job was part of the reason that he knew all the fabulous people. The other part was that his soft hair and megawatt smile simply attracted everyone to him like moths to a flame. He was handsome and generous, and he had the best stories—which were at least thirty percent true.

Like the one he was telling now in the back of the car while Harris and I smiled shyly at each other. I thought it was sweet that Harris could smile shyly because he was forty-two, graying right around his temples, and a total fox in the most gorgeous custom suit I had ever seen. My heart actually started pounding when he stepped out of the car, took my hand, and introduced himself.

“And the craziest part about the entire thing,” Martin was saying, “is that after she confessed that she was pregnant with her lover’s baby, after he killed himself on their kitchen floor, her husband still wants her back.”

Harris smiled at me and said, “No!” I could tell he’d hired Martin ten percent because he was brilliant and ninety percent because he was the most damn entertaining person in the world.

“Yes! Can you believe it?”

Harris squeezed my elbow and said, “I can’t. Can you, Amelia?”

I grinned at him. Was he flirting with me? I liked it. I liked him. Right away. Martin had been right. “Why would he do that?” I asked.

“He wanted to keep his family together.”

It was the first time in an hour I had thought of Parker and the family—albeit the unconventional one—that we had almost had. It still stung. But it stung a little less as Harris took my hand and helped me out of the car in front of the Paris Theater. The producer of this advance screening was the firm’s client, and I was happy to be there to support him. I readjusted the fitted black dress I was wearing and was glad I had gone with the stiletto boots, because Harris was tall. Tall tall.

Inside the theater, we were handed Moscow mules and cute, retro boxes of popcorn. I put my hand inside the crook of Harris’s arm when he offered it to me. “I think you’re really going to like this film,” he whispered in my ear. Now I was positive he was flirting with me. Was this really so shocking? Was I that out of practice?

The movie wasn’t really my kind of thing. A sort of action-adventure film with a lot of boat racing and some stolen diamonds and some sex scenes that were, quite frankly, a little raunchy and very uncomfortable, especially while you were sitting beside a boy you kind of liked. Okay, yeah. I knew Harris wasn’t a boy. But when you’re in the movies and you can’t concentrate because you’re wondering if he might try to put his arm around you or hold your hand, he’s a boy and you’re a girl. In a lot of ways, life never moves beyond seventh grade.

I must not have understood the movie, because afterward Harris and Martin absolutely fell all over their producer client, plying him with compliments. Martin deemed it “a sure box-office hit” and Harris agreed that “fans are going to go crazy.”

But when we were in the privacy of the car again, Harris exhaled long and slow and said, “Well, we better start working on a strategy.”

Martin groaned. “How do we even begin to defend that? That piece of trash is going to bomb.”

“I don’t know,” I said hopefully. “Maybe you’re underestimating how base the American population has become?”

“Even Americans won’t go for that drivel,” Harris said.

I could feel Harris’s mood begin to shift from lighthearted and fun to agitated. And I got it. I really did. Nothing could sour my mood like a perfectly good project gone wrong. My mind turned to the notes from my frozen embryo story, still sitting in my desk drawer. I hadn’t been able to stomach them, for obvious reasons.

But I was super bummed about what the shift meant for my night. I was hoping for a nightcap, a kiss at the stoop, a promise of a second date. New York Amelia was fresh and fun and open to, if not love, at least a handsome man to escort her about town.

Martin cupped Harris on the shoulder and said, “I’ve got your back, man.” It was very reassuring and very… straight.

“You always do,” Harris said, as though they had been working together for decades, not months. “I’m just going to leave it all to you.”

I could tell he meant it because some of his stress seemed to dissipate in that moment. Not all of it, unfortunately. When we got back to our apartment, Martin took off down the sidewalk, claiming he needed to grab something from Duane Reade. I was still hoping that Harris might suggest a drink, but there was no question that his mind was somewhere else.

He took my hand, kissed my cheek, and said, “May I call you some time? Take you out on a proper date that doesn’t involve a movie high school boys will be streaming on repeat soon?”

When I said, “Please do. I would really like that,” Harris squeezed my hand.

Then he turned, got back in the car, and, with a final glance, was gone. It made me feel wistful and wanton. And I was confident that he felt the same. He would call tomorrow. He wouldn’t be able to wait. I just knew it.

Only, after three days of silence, I was beginning to feel like he either hadn’t been interested or I hadn’t laid my cards on the table obviously enough.

“So he hasn’t said a single thing about me?” I prodded Martin, yet again, as he shook martinis. Our apartment might have been shoebox tiny, but Martin—and my mother—had made sure it was fabulous. The entire thing had a very Hollywood Regency vibe. It wasn’t the comfortable, classic look I normally went for, but this was a new life, a fresh start. I needed something different than normal. And this high-glam vibe was perfect. Plus, the egregious number of mirrors made the space feel slightly bigger.

While my mother had made sure the apartment was decorated to the nines with furniture she had stashed in the attic from Aunt Tilley’s first apartment decades ago, she had also made sure to tell me how cramped the apartment was. She asked if it’d be nice to go back to Palm Beach. Or maybe come home? I had quipped, “Why, Mom? One family member in the attic just not enough for you?”

I found myself very amusing. She found me less so.

Now, Martin said, “Liabelle, what do you want me to do? The man is my boss.”

Now I was suspicious. In classic Martin fashion, he hadn’t directly answered my question. “But has he said anything about me?”

Martin shrugged coyly, and I reached for the martini he was delivering to our chic slipper couch, which was covered in a high-shine, low-pile velvet the exact color of a pink Akoya pearl, and gave him the evil eye.

He sighed, dramatically folding himself into one of the beautiful Lucite creations, trimmed in gold, that Mom and Aunt Tilley had procured from a thrift store in—where else?—Palm Beach in the ’70s.

Every thought of Palm Beach was a reminder of Parker, of that spark I felt and, maybe most of all, of the way in which I had failed him. The Summer Splash was coming up, and, normally, I would have been excited to go home for days of parties and croquet and tennis and, obviously, fishing. But this year I had told Mom I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t face Parker. I couldn’t be reminded of all the pain I had caused.

“I just told him that you hadn’t done much getting back on the horse since Thad, and that I didn’t know if it would be that easy to convince you.”

I was aghast. “Martin! I liked him. You knew that. I at least wanted to go on a proper date before I wrote him off.”

He looked shocked. “Well, that’s not what you’ve been saying for the past five months.”

He wasn’t wrong. “Well,” I sputtered. “You’re my best friend. You should be able to read my mind.”

He smiled at me wickedly, and, as though he had conjured it, the doorbell rang. I figured it was a new neighbor dropping off a casserole. I had obviously forgotten momentarily that I was no longer in the South, where casseroles were social currency.

I looked at Martin. “I thought I was living with a man so he could protect me in situations when unexpected strangers ring the doorbell.” He crossed one leg over the other and sipped his martini. I was on my own.

I got up and crossed the room, noting that I did feel impossibly glamorous in my mirrored apartment, holding my martini. Martin had even insisted I get a blowout today to lift my spirits. I wasn’t exactly financially secure at the moment and hadn’t wanted to part with the money, but it had been worth every penny.

I opened the door to an unspeakably devastating Harris, in a tux, holding two dozen red roses and a bottle of champagne. He grinned. “Martin suggested that a text might not win me another date.”

I laughed, even more grateful my hair wasn’t in a messy bun. “Come in, come in.”

Now Martin stood up, taking the flowers and the champagne. “Well played, boss. Well played.” Then he paused. “Oh God. There isn’t some heinous limo waiting downstairs, is there?”

Harris laughed, the kind of laugh that took over his entire body. Everything about the way he moved seemed effortless. Even for a girl who had sworn off men, it was intoxicating. “Just the town car.”

“Um,” I said. “If we’re going somewhere fancy, I’m not sure I’m black-tie-ready.”

“Check your bed,” Martin said coyly.

I put my hand on my heart. “I retract my previous statement. You can read my mind.”

I gasped when I saw it, recognizing the dress right off the bat: a vintage straight sheath Chanel gown in a vivid emerald green. I had seen it on Martin’s grandmother in the photo of her on our end table, and it was effortlessly stunning. I’d had no idea he even had it. It was very me. Well, me if I had ever been able to afford Chanel. Which I could not. I slipped it on, Martin zipped, and it was official: I felt like a princess.

“So, where are we going, exactly?” I asked Harris.

“That’s for me to know.”

“Do you think I’m safe with him?” I mock-whispered to Martin, realizing the martini had made this all quite a bit more fun.

“Don’t worry,” he whispered back. “I put a dime in your purse in case you have to call me from a pay phone.” He winked.

We made our way down Fifth Avenue, and stopped in front of the Viceroy. For a moment, I was nervous that he was taking me to a hotel room, which would be about the seediest thing that could happen. But when the elevator opened, he pushed the button that would take us to the Roof, which was, in my very limited opinion, New York’s best rooftop bar. Martin must have filled him in on that.

As Harris opened a door, I could already picture how crowded it would be, but, instead of the throngs of people I was expecting, the Roof was completely empty, save one table, two chairs, and a ton of candles.

“Am I on The Bachelor?”

Harris took my hand. “It’s a new concept. A cross between Survivor and Bachelor Pad.”

“Harris, honestly, this is a hair extravagant.”

He nodded. “Oh, I know. Next date is pizza and boxed wine.” He grinned as he popped the cork of a bottle of Veuve.

I didn’t think of myself as a girl who was swept up in romance. In fact, I could hear myself speaking with disdain about this very thing. But I couldn’t help but be. Here I was with this man I really liked, on a stunning rooftop with a peerless view of Manhattan, in a vintage gown, holding a glass of champagne.

Harris raised his glass and said, “Here’s to diving headfirst into the great unknown.” He paused and added, “Again.”

We both laughed and clinked glasses. And I had to hope that my second foray into the great unknown this year would turn out a little bit better than my first.