Claude gets invited to a party at J’Ayme Brenner’s house. The celebrity realtor says she has more gossip that could turn into news for Claude. The house is a wood-shingle mansion with an infinity pool. The kitchen is a rich person’s idea of a pioneer cabin. J’Ayme makes Claude a plate of cheese and olives and watches him eat it. His boss is out by the pool, surrounded by leggy women who are all laughing. A man in white linen comes up and shakes Claude’s hand, saying he liked Claude’s article on the new iced-coffee cart downtown. J’Ayme nudges him.
Claude is feeling pretty good.
He guesses J’Ayme is in her late forties. She dresses much younger. Her hair is long and tiger-striped. Her nails, coppery. Shoes too.
J’Ayme asks him about Louise. Claude tells her everything, he can’t help himself. They go to her computer, and Claude shows J’Ayme some of Louise’s craziest emails. There are too many to read. He replays some of Louise’s voicemails, and J’Ayme’s eyebrows raise at the swearing and crying. He tells himself it is okay to share his frustrations with someone. It’s not like Louise is keeping her complaints to herself.
He turns circles in J’Ayme’s computer chair. “I’m no hero. I’m helping her as much as I can.”
“Sounds like she wants you to have no life because hers is gone, too,” J’Ayme says.
“Well, I wouldn’t say it’s gone—” Claude says. “I just don’t want to feel like the bad guy anymore.”
J’Ayme stands behind Claude with her hands on his shoulders. “You have to look out for yourself,” she says.
Claude thinks about kissing J’Ayme. He knows that he could. But he wants to continue feeling like someone doing the right thing. He wants to keep conducting himself in a way that is superior to Louise. She could be handling things a little better, he thinks.
J’Ayme wheels him around to face her.