“How’d it go?” I asked. I was standing in the doorway of my brother’s old room. Kelli was packing a small bag and prancing around.
“How’d what go?”
“Your Barnard interview, stupid.”
“Oh.” Kelli turned around and smiled at me, in that kind of sickly sweet slutty way she had. She was chewing furiously on what smelled like Bubblicious. She blew a bubble at me. She was probably using three pieces.
“It was totally cool,” she said. “We talked about art, mostly.”
“Art?”
“Yeah, what’s happening on the scene here in the city. Who the hot young artists are, what we can expect in the future, that sort of thing.”
“No kidding.” I looked down the hall, searched for a hidden camera crew or something.
My mom was up at Canyon Ranch in the Berkshires with Kelli’s mom for Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday. So we were alone in the apartment.
“What do you know about art?” I asked.
“Not much,” she said. “But I’m a fast learner.”
She was packing some of her clothes into a leather Polo overnight bag that belonged to my brother.
“Listen, I’m flying down to South Beach in a couple of hours with Randall Oddy. Would you cover for me if my mom calls? Tell her my cell died and I’m in the bathtub so I can’t take the call ’cause I don’t want to get electrocuted.”
I realized that was my mouth was open, so I shut it.
“You think that’s not a good excuse?” she asked. “Tell her I’ve fallen in love with a mad talented young artist and I’ve decided to throw away my future in order to become his muse.”
“Wait, didn’t Arno invite you down there?” I asked.
“Yeah, he’ll be there, too. I might stay with him. He doesn’t know it yet, but he’ll do anything for me.” She was putting on bracelets, what seemed like a lot of them, and then she checked her shirt, and looked as if she wanted to change it. I didn’t move. She shrugged and slipped off her shirt, so she was wearing only a tiny black lace bra. She said, “Don’t be creepy. We’re cousins. Anyway, sometimes when I meet people, they just fall for me instantly; it’s a thing I have.”
I turned around and looked at some boring photograph of lightning we had in our hall, in order to not totally check Kelli out.
“I doubt he’d do anything for you,” I said. “And he didn’t fall for you the moment he saw you. Half an hour after he met you, he was making out in a bathroom with Amanda Harrison Deutschmann.”
“Really,” Kelli said. “So he’s the kind of guy who fools around with his buddy’s girlfriend. That’s interesting to know.”
“I was kidding,” I said quickly. “You’re right. He’ll do anything for you.”
Kelli turned around and smiled at me.
“Yeah, right,” she said.
“Kelli, don’t tell anybody what I just said. I didn’t mean to say it.”
“Oh, you can trust me. Now could you get out of here? I need to overhaul my outfit so I’ll look kick-ass for this trip.”
“Damn,” I said. And shook my head. “The devil really can take any form.” I backed out the door and shut it. I walked slowly backward down the corridor and got myself into the relative safety of my own room. When I closed the door, my cell was ringing, thank God.
“I’m bored,” Liza said.
“Me, too. There’s absolutely nothing going on.”
“Yeah, right. You want to go to Other Music and buy CDs?”
“Does this mean we’re cool again?”
“Forget the other night,” Liza said. “I’m over you. And I’m supposed to read Madame Bovary in French and I’m not really up for that right now, so come out and meet me.”
I wasn’t sure I believed Liza, but I went downstairs to see her anyway, without saying goodbye to my cousin, who was on the phone to someone, saying something about how much she loved the power of mixing film and art. Man. Next thing she’d be directing features and hanging out with Sofia Coppola.
“Any good gossip?” Liza asked, once we’d reached Broadway and been swept up in the crowd of NYU students and tourists.
We went into Other Music and started flipping through the “IN” section. Sometimes I looked through the “OUT” section, which could be much, much cooler than the “IN” section, because it was filled with stuff nobody was going to know about for another three months, but I just didn’t have the energy right then. I was also kind of afraid I’d find some CD with Kelli’s picture on the front.
“How do you know when someone’s a really bad person?” I asked. They were playing the new Flaming Lips, and I hummed along.
Liza smiled. She was going through everything by Cat Power. Chan Marshall was her favorite person, and Cat Power was her favorite band.
“Since arriving in high school, I’ve asked myself that many times,” she said.
“And what’ve you come up with?”
“If they lie to you, they’re not very genuine. Everything else is splitting hairs.”
We leaned against the “French Decadence” section and watched a ninth grader in a black leather jacket shoplift the new Interpol CD. He was a far-too-cool kid named Adam Rickenbacher, and he went to school with David. I’d seen him hanging around the Flood house once or twice and I wasn’t into him. He palmed an old Sonic Youth CD and took that, too.
“So what do you do?” I asked. “If someone lies?”
I nodded at Adam Rickenbacher and he nodded back. Hey yourself, you little bastard.
“Try to trust a few people at a time,” Liza said. “And keep your fingers crossed.”
“I wish my cousin would go back to St. Louis,” I said. “She’s freaking me out.”
“I wish she would, too,” Liza said. “Anyway, do we have to talk about her?”
“What else should we talk about?” I asked. I looked at her and then it was obvious. She wanted to talk about us, and I had nothing to say.
“I heard that David broke up with Amanda,” she said.
“Oh yeah?”
“So I was thinking that I’d go out with David. The reason I called you is I was wondering, would you care?”
Not unless you were Flan, I thought. And then I felt suddenly sure about Flan, who I’d promised myself I wouldn’t go near, and really bad about Liza, who seemed to be able to tell from my face that she didn’t want to hear my response. I was kind of shocked at my own feelings, so I looked at my hands, which didn’t help. They were trembling.
Then, WOOOwooWOOOwoo—the alarm at the door went off and several of the balding/shaved-head Other Music employees went running after Adam Rickenbacher.
“That kid’s got something going for him,” Liza said.
“Give me a break,” I said.
“I guess I will, from now on.”
“You’re not going to go out with David, are you?”
“Nah,” Liza said. “He’s too sweet for my taste.”
Liza and I ambled out of there.