“Aren’t you going to be late?” I asked. I was sitting at the dinner table in my apartment and I was seriously itching to leave. But I couldn’t. My mom was at the head of the table, sitting next to her nearly identical sister, Kelli’s mom. And Kelli was next to me. It was nearly eight. My mom and Kelli’s mom were going to see La Boheme at Lincoln Center. And Kelli and I had been gathered up for a family dinner delivered by a special chef from Tomoe Sushi. I actually sort of knew the chef, who was hanging around in the kitchen, playing with our knives. Mickey used to buy pot from him.
“Probably,” my mom said. “But the first half hour is nothing special.”
“Actually the whole first act is nothing terrific,” her sister said. Both women laughed.
“And we’ve got Andy downstairs. He can get us there in ten minutes.” The sisters were drinking huge goblets of red wine. Kelli and I were drinking wine, too, and we were seriously glaring at each other. Then my Blackberry went off. Arno: Ten minutes. I didn’t know where everybody was but I did know that if I didn’t get out of my house in less than that ten minutes my head would probably spin off my shoulders.
My mom and her sister were deep into their own conversation, which seemed to center around other people’s divorces. They’d run into several of their friends at Canyon Ranch, and now they were picking them apart, one by one.
I watched Kelli. I kept shaking my head at her. She had rocked my little group awfully hard since she’d arrived. And I felt a little played by her. More than a little. Her phone rang and she checked the name, rolled her eyes, and let it go to voice mail. Now she had two phones and a pager, all given to her by different people who wanted to be able to reach her. At this rate, Kelli was going to have knapsack full of communication devices that she’d have to drag around so she could hear from all her suitors. It was nuts. And what was even more nuts was that her mom seemed to be pretending not to notice. Kelli was wearing a black velvet blazer and a ripped pink T-shirt underneath that said Lick Me. Subtle.
“What are you doing tonight?” I asked. Her eyeliner was smudged and she looked deathly pale. I wasn’t sure if the look was intentional.
“Nothing,” she said.
“Yeah, right.”
“There’s a party in Chinatown,” she said. “But it’s a much older crowd. I probably won’t see you there.”
“Wow, in the four or five years you’ve been here you’ve really gotten to know the scene,” I said.
“Shut up,” Kelli said simply. “Some people were born to drive this town wild, and I’m one of them.”
“You’re crazy,” I said.
“You’re jealous.”
“You’re leaving tomorrow.”
“We’ll just see about that.”
Kelli’s other phone rang. This was a Treo handheld computer about the size of a deck of cards. It looked like it cost a thousand dollars and it probably had enough power to direct air traffic. She took the call.
“Yeah? … Mr. Chow’s? No, I haven’t eaten dinner, not at all. Send a car for me, can’t you?” Kelli stood up and walked out of the room. Neither of our mothers looked up.
“Um,” I said. I pushed my hair out of my eyes. “How was Canyon Ranch?”
“It was extremely relaxing,” my mom said as she speared a piece of yellowtail so fresh it was practically shivering and slipped it into her mouth. “Four days there and I can hardly remember why I felt all the nerves that forced me to go there in the first place, you know?”
“That’s so well put,” my aunt said. “I’d been concerned about Kelli and college, but now I can see that’s ridiculous. She’ll go wherever she wants to go.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” I muttered.
“I’m out,” Kelli called. The door slammed before anyone could say anything.
“You know,” my mom said to her sister, “originally I was concerned about you two staying here. I was afraid of being overrun, so I booked a room at the Tribeca Grand for the two of you, in case we got into a spat. But I feel like we’re girls again and we’ve totally abandoned our responsibilities. Isn’t it fun?”
“Next time, I’ll take the room,” I said. Both women giggled at me. They were eating off of everyone’s plates and clearly having the best time. I doubted they’d even make it to the opera.
My Blackberry went off again. Arno: Time to go.
“See you,” I said, and left them to their sisterliness.