Love and Chaos: A Brooklyn Girls Novel

by Burgess, Gemma

  The day before my twenty-third birthday.

  Reality really does bite.

  No matter how you cut it, this is rock bottom. After we finish our coffee, we exchange numbers and air-kisses, and I head for the subway.

  On the way, I automatically take out my phone to call Sam. Weird, right? In just a few weeks he’s gone from being an annoying boat boy to being my go-to phone call after I get fired.… But I don’t want to hear about how the date with Julia went or how much he likes her. I just … I don’t want to hear it. It shouldn’t bug me, but it does.

  Then, as I’m sitting on the subway back to Brooklyn, it hits me.

  I’m not going to make it in this city. I’ll be chewed up and spit out like every other loser who tries to create a life here and doesn’t have what it takes. It’s obvious. It’s so obvious, I can’t believe I didn’t see it before now.

  So why waste any more time?

  Next thing you know, I’ll be in my late twenties, and then I’ll be fucking thirty. Thirty!

  I don’t know what else is out there in the world, but I know it’s got to be better than getting fired from the Gap and living in Brooklyn where everyone I know is happy, in love, and going somewhere with their lives.

  Tonight, I’ll see Gabriel, just so I can get out of Rookhaven and avoid everyone for one more night.

  And to celebrate my birthday tomorrow, I’ll book a flight to L.A. I know people there from college; I can crash with them until I get a job. They have the Gap there, right? (That’s a joke.) (Kind of.)

  And I know what you’re thinking. But I’m not running away.

  I’m moving on.

  CHAPTER 30

  “See? Best hot dog in the city,” I say. “It’s a New York classic.”

  Gabriel takes a tiny bite of his hot dog and chews like it might have thorns.

  “This is not good.” He looks around for a napkin, spits his half-chewed hot dog into it. “Not. Good.”

  We’re at Gray’s Papaya, a legendary hot dog joint, on the corner of Sixth Avenue and Eighth Street in Manhattan. You can’t really sit down here, which means that when we finish our hot dogs in about five bites, this will have been the fastest date in the history of dates. I think that might be a good thing. Gabriel is not quite the guy I remember, and tonight might not be the easy killing-time exercise I thought it would. Gabriel is acting all sorts of precious. He could barely contain his horror when he saw where we were eating and keeps grabbing paper napkins to wipe everything down before he touches it. I mean … grow a pair.

  Worse? Outside there is torrential rain. Not April showers, but dude-where’s-my-ark rain. The kind of rain that makes you want to hide in a dark bar and drink wine and eat cheese and then have crazy dreams all night. But I’m not on a red-wine-and-cheese budget. I’m on a hot-dog-and-papaya-juice budget. So here we are.

  And I’m just here for the food. I made it clear to Gabriel this wouldn’t be the start of anything romantic or sexual or whatever, plus I’m wearing flats, so it’s clearly not a date-date. I’m obviously not capable of having a functional relationship, just like I’m not capable of having a functional career. Fuck. What am I going to do with my life?

  “What’s the deal with the papaya juice?” says Gabriel. He pronounces it “pappa-yah.”

  “Pa-PIE-ya,” I correct him. “It’s traditional to have it with hot dogs. I don’t know why.” I take another bite. God, I love hot dogs. “You didn’t put mustard on it,” I say. “That’s your problem.”

  “The mustard is not my problem,” says Gabriel. “The hot dog is my problem.” He looks so serious that I crack up.

  Gabriel waits for me to stop giggling, pouting slightly. He doesn’t have much of a sense of humor.

  “Sorry,” I say finally. “Sorry. I know. The mustard is not your problem.”

  “Okay, that’s enough,” says Gabriel, throwing his hot dog-filled napkin down. “I take charge now. We go to Minetta Tavern.”

  “You don’t like the dog?”

  “I don’t like the dog.” How to piss off a European dude: don’t take dinner seriously. “I want wine and steak and a chair on which to sit. Sí?”

  “Sí, señor.”

  “You, stay here.”

  Gabriel pulls out a mammoth black umbrella and goes to hail a taxi while I wait inside. I think he might be a control freak. He tucked a napkin into his shirt to protect it from ketchup, and then tried to get me to do the same. Um, no. I’m pretty good at not getting food on my clothes since I stopped being able to afford dry-cleaning.

  “Angie!” shouts Gabriel. “I have one!”

  He runs back with his umbrella to escort me to the taxi.

  “Man, it is insane out there!” I say, looking out over the street. The water is running up the gutters and over the sidewalk, and coming down so hard that you can hardly see out the front window.

  “Helluva rainstorm,” says the driver. “This storm is hitting the whole Eastern Seaboard. They’re predicting serious flooding all over the city. We’ve had three inches of rain in the last two hours.”

  Gabriel’s phone rings. “My sister,” he says apologetically. “Lucia? Qué pasa?”

  I wish I’d paid more attention to Spanish in school. My French is pretty good. Well, my dirty French is pretty good. To kill time, I check my phone. I’ve been texting some of my friends in L.A., hoping one of them has a place I can crash until I get on my feet.

  But it’s a text from Sam. It’s the first time I’ve heard from him since Saturday night.

  The text reads: So are we talking yet or what?

  What the hell is that supposed to mean? I reply: Why wouldn’t we be talking?

  He replies: Aren’t you pissed at me about Julia?

  Wow, that’s direct. How does he know how I’m feeling? I reply: Dude, I’m the one who set it up. I’m delighted it went so well.

  He replies: Uh, have you spoken to Julia?

  I reply: I’ve been working.

  He replies: The night was a total bust.

  I reply: I saw you kissing in the bar. Didn’t look like a bust.

  Sam replies: Put the crack pipe down. That did not happen.

  Why the fuck is he lying to me? I reply: Sam, you don’t have to lie. I saw it.

  Sam replies: Angie, we didn’t kiss. She whispered in my ear at one point—telling me that guy Ethan is a dick. But we did not kiss. Pinkie swear.

  I frown. Why would he lie about something like that? But I didn’t imagine it. Did I?

  He sends another text: Talk to Julia. Total fiasco. We have nothing in common. I figured you were giving me the silent treatment because she was pissed about what a bad night she had.

  The strangest, sweetest feeling of relief floods through me, and I look out the window at the rainstorm, smiling so hard I think my face might crack.

  Sam doesn’t like Julia. He didn’t ditch me. He can still be my friend exclusively. Totally immature, I know, but hey, that’s me.

  “Angie, we are here.” Gabriel nudges me, bringing me back to reality.

  Yes! Dinner! Totally!

  I shake my head to clear it of thoughts and put my phone back into my bag, just as we pull up to a corner on MacDougal Street.

  Gabriel gets out first and walks around the cab to hold up the umbrella for me, though the wind-rain combination means I’m covered in an icy spray in seconds anyway.

  Then he pulls open a heavy door and I push past a curtain, into the Minetta Tavern.

  CHAPTER 31

  “Now this is a New York classic,” says Gabriel.

  It’s true. The Minetta Tavern is how Hollywood would imagine classic New York décor: a long bar, black-and-white-checkerboard floors, dark red leather booths, hundreds of frames on the wall, and the sort of yellowy sepia lighting that makes all the beautiful people glow just a little more beautifully. This is one of my dad’s favorite places when he’s in New York. He took me here back in January.

  And hasn’t called since.

  Wha
tever.

  Even though it’s not yet 7:00 P.M., Minetta Tavern is packed with patrons talking, eating, drinking: all with the kind of animated, joyful gusto that you only see in people who have made a success of their lives. The place is throbbing with self-satisfaction. I don’t belong here.

  But I want to be successful. I want to get a job. I want to stay in New York. And I want Sam—

  Stop! Where did that little voice come from? No, I don’t. I want to leave. I want to start fresh in California. I want to get a job in a place that doesn’t chew up and spit out its young. I want to go somewhere where I don’t feel completely worthless, useless, and restless. Where my life isn’t just me, always by myself, ricocheting off everything around me like a tiny pinball trying to hit the jackpot. And Sam has nothing to do with anything.

  “Angie!” a voice calls from across the bar, as we’re following the maître d’ to our table. “Yoo-hoo!”

  Only one person I know says yoo-hoo.… I turn around and see Cornelia, my old sort-of employer, standing at the bar, glass of champagne in hand.

  “Cornie!” I immediately assume my perfect fake Upper East Side face.

  We air-kiss three times, mwah-mwah-mwah, to show how Euro we are. Cornie is a SoHo transplant from the Upper East Side: skinny, blond, pale to the point of translucent, and overly groomed. She models herself on Gwyneth Paltrow, not that she’d ever admit it.

  “The notorious Angie!” she says, tilting her head slightly, showing her small white teeth in a tight little smile. “Up to no good, as usual?”

  “Moi? Straight and narrow, darling,” I reply.

  The man she’s with, a much older silver-fox-type gentleman, smiles at me. He has cold gray eyes and perfectly capped teeth. “I’m Roger Rutherford,” he says. “Clearly, Cornie won’t introduce us. She’s the jealous-in-advance type.”

  I give my best “how charming” smile and quickly introduce Gabriel.

  “Haven’t we met before?” says Cornelia, narrowing her eyes. “That fund-raiser at the Boathouse last year?”

  “Ah, yes,” says Gabriel politely. “We did. I go every year.”

  Cornelia, Gabriel, and Roger make small talk about the fund-raiser for a moment, while I replay Cornelia’s greeting in my brain. Up to no good? What’s that supposed to mean? I was never late to work for her. I was the model personal assistant. And she said she would call me when she got back to NYC from skiing!

  “So good to see you again, sweetie,” says Cornelia. She leans in to kiss me on the cheek, and whispers, “Well done on catching such a big fish! Clever girl!”

  So I smile and say all the right things and then follow Gabriel through to our table. Well done on catching such a big fish. Clever girl. I’m clever for dating a rich guy? If I were really clever, wouldn’t I be making my own money?

  We sit down at the table and look over the menu. Suddenly, I feel like an imposter. I would never come to the Minetta Tavern if I were the one paying. I can’t afford it.

  “I’m really not hungry,” I say.

  “I thought you were always hungry,” says Gabriel. “You must order something.”

  God, I hate being told what to do. But I don’t want to cause a scene, not with Cornie nearby.

  “Bone marrow,” I say. “Followed by the burger. Not the Black Label one, the normal one.”

  I had the burger here in January with my dad. Maybe I’ll just call him when I get to California. He’s obviously been too embarrassed to get in touch. And maybe I’ll call Annabel back, too. She’s been calling me at least three times a week. I know I need to do something about my relationship with my parents … I just don’t know what that something is.

  Gabriel is in a fantastic mood now that he’s gotten his own way. He starts waxing nostalgic about the first time he ever came to New York, about what he thinks about the American restaurant scene, about the restaurant his cousin owns in Madrid, about his favorite hotels in the world.

  He’s is a total name-dropper, but not in the star-fucker sense. He drops names of restaurants and hotels he’s been to as if he’s qualifying for a Rich Guy Experiences Championship. Per Se, Babbo, Cipriani Downtown, Daniel, Mr. Chow, Hotel Arts in Barcelona, Ushuaia in Ibiza, the Capri Palace in Capri, the Hôtel de Crillon in Paris, the Hôtel du Cap on the French Riviera, Le Club 55 in St. Tropez. Does he ever truly enjoy anything, or does he just do certain things because it’s the thing to do? A way to show the world that he’s made it?

  You know, now that I think about it, this aspect of his personality was evident from the start. He missed the salad from his favorite hotel in St. Barts, he had a private plane, an apartment overlooking Central Park … I just missed the signs. Or ignored them. Another self-involved rich guy. Well done, Angie.

  I glance at his watch. It’s a Patek Philippe, i.e., costs more than most people earn in a lifetime. He’s wearing a gold signet pinkie ring that I don’t remember noticing on the plane, and his clothes—a navy jacket, a white shirt, slim oatmeal jeans—have a casual Euro-fied pressed perfection, topped off by an Hermès belt. His cuticles are flawless, his hair is slicked back with studied nonchalance, his skin is suspiciously supple, even his eyebrows are freshly trimmed.

  Money, money, money.

  The real question is: why is Gabriel here with me? He never asks me anything about myself; he doesn’t know what I want to do with my life. I’ve never been funny or interesting or, hell, anything around him. He doesn’t know me. So why would he like me?

  He doesn’t like me, is the answer. He just likes my shell. A nearly-twenty-three-year-old blond girl in a dress that you hopefully can’t tell that I made myself, and a face that looks okay when I’ve smeared black eyeliner over half of it.

  I can’t believe I’m in this situation again.

  Why did I think he was different from every other guy I’ve dated? Because he was nice to his sisters?

  I don’t want to be here.

  But I don’t want to cause a scene, either.

  So what do I do?

  My cocktail arrives—a vodka martini with four olives—and I take a massive slug.

  “Easy, tiger,” says Gabriel, laughing as though he just made the funniest joke in the world.

  My phone beeps again. I look quickly: it’s Pia.

  We need to talk. I’m moving to San Francisco.

  I look back up at Gabriel. “Would you excuse me?”

  I walk through the restaurant, to the tiny ladies room in the very back, and call Pia. There’s no answer: either she’s screening and she thinks I’ll be too upset to talk to right now, or she’s having sex (ew), or—most likely—she texted Julia at the same time and Jules called her first.

  I leave a quick message.

  “Ladybitch, call me. I think—I mean, I am—I’m leaving, too. I’m leaving New York. I guess that’s the end of Rookhaven.…” I feel a stab of sadness. No more Rookhaven? No more us? I clear my throat and force myself to keep talking. “Um, see you later? Maybe?”

  Then I get another text, from Sam.

  Being ignored makes Sam sad.

  I reply quickly. Not ignoring you I swear. Am on a date with a guy who I think might be a pompous fuckpuppet.

  Sam replies immediately.

  Name, vital stats?

  At that moment, Cornelia walks into the bathroom.

  “Angie, what a surprise,” she says archly, quickly looking around to make sure we’re alone. “Are you holding? Let’s be naughty.”

  “Am I—What? No. Sorry,” I say, quickly realizing she means cocaine.

  “Don’t worry. My guy is on the way. I need it to get through a night with the Rog.”

  “He seems nice,” I say. Considering he’s at least thirty years older than you.

  “He’ll do. He’s divorced, knows everyone, and is richer than God, so all those bitches from Spence will be impressed.” Cornelia shrugs, her gaze falling to my gold clutch. It’s the soft, perfect, hand-hugging one I made all those weeks ago from secondhand Art Deco scarves. �
��Love, love, love the clutch. Who is it?”

  “It’s, um, it’s me,” I say. “I made it.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “No bullshit. Look, no label. Uh, I need to get back to my date.”

  “Of course you must. Duty calls!”

  She turns her head. I’m dismissed again.

  I head back to our table, where great sticks of bone marrow are waiting for me. They really are bones, I realize, slightly belatedly. I sort of thought they’d scoop the marrow bits out of the bone for me and make them pretty. Apparently not. I’m supposed to do it myself.

  “Ah, Angie, you’re back,” says Gabriel, who ordered a very boring goat cheese salad. “Bon appétit.”

  I smile at Gabriel, take my fork, and look at the great sticks of yellowy bone stretching out in front of me on the plate. What animal is this again?

  I don’t want to eat it, but I don’t want to look like I didn’t know what I was getting myself into, either. I ordered it; I’m damn well going to eat every bite.

  Then I’m gonna get the fuck out of here, go back to Rookhaven, and start packing.

  So I dig out the marrow with my fork, smear it on my buttered bread, sprinkle some salt on it, and chow down. It’s a strange, strong, meaty taste. Sort of rich and fatty. I take a slug of martini to cleanse my palate.

  “Taste the wine.” Gabriel is way too bossy. Who cares? Just get through the meal and go home.

  So I take a sip of wine. It’s delicious, a pretty standard Châteauneuf-du-Pape. My dad knows a lot about French wine, and somehow, I picked it up. It dawns on me that practically everything I know came from my dad. Except for how to sew.

  “It’s great,” I say.

  “Can you taste the earth? The berries? There is a chocolaty edge in this particular year, I always wonder why, and I always order it when I come here.… I keep studying wine, and I love it. But I will never truly understand it.”

  Oh for fuck’s sake. Who says shit like that?

  At that moment, Gabriel reaches across the table and places his hand over mine. I stare at it, unsure whether to snatch my arm away or just let my fingers go limp in the hope he gets the picture.

  Then he starts talking.