The Carlyles

by Cecily von Ziegesar

  your e-mail

  Dear Gossip Girl,

  I saw A getting totally friendly with that weirdo with the tattoos at the Constance assembly. Do you think they’re together? Like, together together?

  —2GIRLTROUBLE

  Dear 2,

  Why, are you jealous?

  —GG

  Dear GG,

  Ur column sux. U are some lame-assed poser and IM totally going to find out who u R.

  —REALUESGIRL

  Dear REALUESGIRL,

  You (U?) seem to have a lot of misplaced hostility. I will let you know that I am as Upper East Side as they come—and I’m not shaking in my Christian Louboutin eel-skin boots over a badly spelled text message. If you can’t handle the truth, maybe you would be better off living somewhere else. Like Weehawken. But let’s not fight!

  —GG

  Now that the first day is over, we can turn our attention to more important matters. Like, who’s going to host the first party of the year? All bets are on J. Although I’ve never been the betting type. . . .

  You know you love me,

  gossip girl

  Campaign Strategies 101

  Tuesday morning before school, Avery slipped out of the Carlyle apartment, pleased that Baby wasn’t even awake.

  “Miss Carlyle.” The gray-uniformed doorman nodded briskly to her, and Avery couldn’t help smiling. The air smelled fresh, birds chirped noisily, and the sidewalks were glittering with water, even though Avery hadn’t remembered a rainstorm. That was what it was like in New York City—each day was a fresh start, the previous day washed away.

  And today was definitely a new day. Last night she’d locked herself in her room, putting together invitations to her tea party. She’d written all the invitations by hand on elegant Tiffany & Co. cardstock, and tied each card to the eggshell-thin handle of a teacup. She’d thought it would be fun and unique but now, carrying two huge lavender Bergdorf bags filled with bubble-wrapped china, she wasn’t sure. She felt like she was bringing something in for show-and-tell.

  Avery approached the corner of Ninetieth Street and spotted a group of junior girls she vaguely recognized from assembly gathered on the steps of a random town house, the preferred smoke-and-gossip hangout of Constance Billard’s upper school. The girls were already sucking furiously on their Merit Ultra Lights, even though the first bell wouldn’t ring for another half hour. Avery felt a flutter of butterflies in the pit of her stomach, but grinned broadly.

  “Hey, Jiffy,” she greeted the junior with the smudgy charcoal-lined eyes. Jiffy glanced up from her W magazine, which she was furiously marking up with a purple pen. Avery smiled warmly. She knew Jiffy hung out with Jack Laurent, but with her brown bangs hanging straight above her eyebrows and her wide brown eyes, she seemed like the friendliest girl out of all of them.

  “Oh, hi.” Jiffy pushed her bangs out of her eyes and gave the other girls perched on the stoop a look that Avery knew, from years of giving her own looks, meant, What the fuck?

  Avery steeled herself and pulled the first invite out of the bag. “I’m having a party after school today. Just some girls, so I can meet everyone and talk about the upcoming school year.” Avery cringed. She sounded so ridiculously peppy. “And just hang out,” she amended.

  Can we bring our teddy bears?

  “Ohhh-kaaaay,” Jiffy said slowly. Avery handed a teacup to Jiffy and pulled out another one. “Oh, fun!” Jiffy exclaimed as she examined the delicate piece of china and spotted the invite tied to its handle. “Look at this, it’s adorable,” she said, passing the teacup to the girl sitting next to her, who had eyebrows so blond they disappeared into her forehead.

  “I’m glad you like them!” Avery set her bag down on the cracked concrete steps, ready to dole out the rest. Already, a small crowd had formed around her. The Constance girls were loving the invites! She felt like somehow, somewhere, her grandmother was smiling down on her.

  “What are those?” Avery heard a voice behind her and whirled around to see Sydney, the weird girl she had been forced to sit next to at assembly yesterday. She was wearing a brown T-shirt that read YOUR RETARDED under her Constance Billard blazer.

  “Hi,” Avery greeted her awkwardly, still trying to hold the attention of the rest of the girls. “I’m just having a get-together. For the student liaison to the board of overseers thing. Not sure if you’d be interested.” She shrugged, hoping the answer would be no.

  “Tonight?”

  “Yeah,” Avery said as she handed an invitation to Genevieve, the large-chested girl who was friends with Jack.

  “Thanks.” Genevieve took a teacup and shoved it into her orange Longchamps bag, not bothering to look at the attached invite. She threw her cigarette on the ground, dangerously close to Avery’s black Morgane Le Fay ankle boots.

  “Can I have one?” Sydney asked expectantly, stomping on the remains of Genevieve’s cigarette with her vintage Doc Martens.

  “Sure,” Avery handed a teacup to her, not wanting to be rude. Sydney was a Constance junior, after all, and who was she to judge? She just hoped that if Sydney did turn up, she’d change into slightly more feminine shoes.

  With a little less steel in the toe?

  “Thanks!” Sydney took the teacup and pretended to sip from it with one pinky raised.

  “See you all tonight!” Avery waved to the group of girls, still smiling, and turned to go. She quickly made her way down the street to the blue doors of Constance, wanting to make sure she gave out all the invitations before first period. By lunch, it would be all anyone was talking about.

  Sure, they’ll be talking about it, but what will they be saying?

  B Makes Some Furry Friends

  Baby yawned loudly in Mr. Beckham’s last-period film class, causing other girls to titter. She rolled her large brown eyes at them. Whatever. It was the last period of the day, and frankly, Baby couldn’t care less about Woody Allen’s Manhattan. Hearing Mr. Beckham enthuse about how New York City was an integral character in the film just made her want to stand up and start screaming swear words.

  And it wouldn’t be the first time.

  The movie was so stupid, anyway. She had watched it once with her mother and hadn’t been able to stop wondering why someone young and cute like Mariel Hemingway would ever go for a geeky old loser like Woody Allen.

  “Do you have something to add to our discussion about the film, Miss Carlyle?” Mr. Beckham asked. He perched on top of her desk like an overgrown bird and grinned lecherously.

  Seems like the film gave someone some ideas.

  The bell rang. Baby practically pushed Mr. Beckham’s skinny butt off the top of her desk, threw her notebook into her lime green Brooklyn Industries messenger bag, and bolted out the door.

  She was supposed to begin her Constance Billard punishment by helping Irene, the seventy-three-year-old lunch lady, go through the cafeteria suggestion box. Baby paused for a second and stared into the gorgeous all-mirrors-and-blond-wood cafeteria, tempting herself to see if at the last minute she would cave and try to be a good girl. No way. She turned on her heel and strode down the hallway and toward the big blue doors that led to freedom.

  Strike two!

  She paused to stare at the bulletin board hanging in the main hall, reading the announcements for different clubs and activities.

  PRE-PRE-LAW SOCIETY. No.

  FLOWER ARRANGING CLUB. Nope.

  BASKET WEAVING CLUB. Yeah, right.

  What, no Disillusioned and Missing My Boyfriend Club? Maybe she should be socially responsible like her sister and start one.

  “Are you joining anything?” Avery sidled up to her and placed a large lavender shopping bag on the floor. She tucked her blond hair behind her tiny ears and patted her vintage diamond studs.

  “Nothing’s really my thing.” Baby shrugged her tiny shoulders and looked at her sister. Avery was flushed and looked happy. Even her little diamond camellia earrings sparkled a little brighter. “How was your day?”r />
  “So good!” Avery enthused. “I’m having a little get-together tonight at Grandmother’s house.”

  “Does Mom know?” Baby narrowed her eyes. How come Avery hadn’t told her about it last night? When she had gotten home, Avery had been in her room, and hadn’t even come out when Owen announced he was ordering his first authentic New York City pizza.

  “Yeah, it’s fine,” Avery said quickly. “Anyway, these are the invitations.” She pulled a china teacup out of the Bergdorf bag, and Baby instantly recognized the pattern. She had broken one when she was four.

  “Thanks. I don’t need a teacup.” Baby practically pushed it away.

  “So you’re going to come?” Avery’s brow creased.

  “Sure.” Baby nodded slowly.

  “Okay, well, I guess I’ll see you,” Avery continued uncertainly, as if they were strangers.

  Baby nodded and pretended to be engrossed in the red announce-ment flyers until Avery wandered off. Finally, she headed for Constance’s royal blue doors, shoving her hands in her pockets. She felt the corner of something hard and slid the ivory business card out of her pocket and examined it. Had that guy been serious about her walking dogs for him?

  And did she have anything better to do?

  Baby walked down Fifth until she came to the address on the card. She looked up at the gilt back-to-back C’s hanging over the glass doors of the building. Three-foot-high brass letters spelled out CASHMAN COMPLEXES. Baby wrinkled her nose. It was even tackier than she’d imagined.

  Seeing is believing.

  The doorman sat behind an imposing black-lacquered desk, wearing an elaborate blue uniform with gold tassels hanging from his shoulders and across his belly. He was older and looked like he’d been wearing the same uniform since he was sixteen.

  “I’m here for this guy.” Baby slid J.P.’s wrinkled card across the counter. She hadn’t gotten used to doormen yet. They seemed like one of the relics from a different era, like scrunchies or handlebar mustaches.

  Don’t be so sure about that last one.

  “Use the private elevator over on the far left.” The doorman smiled in a grandfatherly way, and Baby smiled back. She pushed the button for the penthouse and caught her breath as the elevator whooshed twenty-six flights up, to the top floor. The doors opened and she tumbled out into the apartment itself.

  J.P. was standing in the middle of a gold-tiled foyer, waiting. He wore khakis and a rumpled blue oxford, and his hair was messy under his Riverside Prep cap, like he had just gotten up from a nap. He smiled at her warmly, scooping up Darwin as the puggle scampered through the arched, gilded doorway. J.P. held up Darwin’s tiny paw and waved it at Baby.

  “You came,” he said warmly.

  “I came for this guy.” Baby scooped Darwin from J.P.’s large hands and kissed him on his wet black nose. Shackleton and Nemo came running from some faraway room, their nails clacking and sliding as they ran toward her. “How can you not love a face like that?” she cooed, feeling better than she had all day. She placed the puggle on the parquet floor next to his friends. They all looked up at her expectantly, wiggling their butts uncontrollably.

  “Have you recovered from the shitstorm?” Baby couldn’t resist asking, pleased when she saw J.P. blush. He was the type of clean-cut, high-maintenance guy Avery would swoon over. Baby had always preferred the scruffy, bad-boy types.

  Doesn’t she mean stoners?

  “Thanks for bringing that up,” J.P. replied sarcastically. Baby peeked past him and saw room after room, filled with ultramodern and antique furniture all thrown together. Did that door to the left lead to a basketball court? And was it . . . gold? Baby thought she saw a hoop.

  “’Ello!” A large blond woman entered the room from one of the many mirrored doors surrounding the large entryway. Her platinum highlighted hair was pulled up into an eighties supermodel–style updo. She strode across the floor in her electric blue Prada pumps and hugged Baby, practically suffocating her in a cloud of spicy perfume.

  “Welcome. Our house is your house,” she said grandly in a heavy Russian accent as she gestured to the rooms with her long, Chanel Vamp–lacquered nails.

  “This is my mother, Tatyana,” J.P. made the introduction. “Mom, this is Baby Carlyle. She’ll be walking the dogs.”

  “Yes, I am his mother, and he is my beautiful, beautiful son!” Tatyana cried, kissing J.P. and leaving a trail of Chanel Red Splendor lip imprints on his tan cheek.

  “Nice to meet you,” Baby said politely, resisting the urge to take a picture of Tatyana with her camera phone and send it to Tom. “You have beautiful dogs!” she added awkwardly.

  “I know! I love zem like zey are my babies. And they are so great because unlike zees boy, zey always need their mother!” She bent over to smother Nemo in a perfume hug, her round butt sticking up in the air.

  Baby sneaked a glance over at J.P. He smiled sheepishly and gave her a small shrug.

  “I always need you.” A large, beefy man strode out of a room on the left as if on cue, playfully smacking Tatyana’s freakishly perky butt. She giggled. He was wearing a tiny-looking cowboy hat on his Pepto Bismol–colored bald head. He took one of Baby’s tiny hands in his pudgy one and aggressively pumped it up and down.

  “Dick Cashman,” he boomed. He gave Baby a once-over, looking at her dirty white flip-flops and the T-shirt she had worn under her blazer. She had picked it up at a flea market in Cape Cod. It featured a picture of an alligator eating a tiger. “I love that shirt! Great message there—don’t feed the alligators: if you do, they’ll just bite you in the ass!” Dick cried, grinning.

  “Hey, Dad, so this is Baby—” J.P. began.

  “Baby? Like, ‘Nobody puts Baby in a corner’? Maybe they wouldn’t have to if you actually dressed up!” Dick roared, slapping his knee.

  Baby smiled politely, even though she had heard that line fifty million times before, and she didn’t even like the movie Dirty Dancing.

  “You’ll be looking after the bitches, then?” he continued, patting Nemo furiously on top of the head.

  “Uh, yeah,” Baby said uncomfortably. She felt like she had stepped onto the set of some bad reality TV show.

  The Richest Loser?

  “I think Baby should probably get started,” J.P. said, handing her three matching, monogrammed Louis Vuitton leashes. “I just have something for you in the kitchen, and then I’ll see you out.” He smiled awkwardly at his parents.

  “Sorry about that,” J.P. whispered as he guided Baby through a bright labyrinthine hallway. The enamel-like walls were lined with paintings of green globs that looked suspiciously like boogers. When they reached the ultramodern kitchen, J.P. grabbed a cup emblazoned with the two C’s and handed it to her.

  “I noticed you left your drink when you chased after the dogs yesterday. It’s a chai,” he said almost shyly.

  “Thanks.” Baby smiled, touched. She took a sip. It tasted much better than Starbucks, and a little bit like home.

  “I actually don’t really know what that is, but I hope you like it,” J.P. added. “Raphael, our chef, made it.”

  “Oh,” Baby muttered, pulling the cup away from her lips. Of course his chef made it.

  And that’s supposed to be a bad thing?

  “I could come with you if you wanted,” J.P. offered, still standing in the kitchen door.

  Baby took a few steps back. “No, I’m fine on my own,” she said definitively. She let out a piercing whistle and the three dogs came running. “See you.” She quickly clipped their leashes to their collars and navigated her way back through the booger painting–lined corridor, into the gold foyer, and down the twenty-six flights.

  The doorman tipped his patent leather hat as she walked by. “See you again soon, Miss,” he called.

  And hopefully often!

  Papa Don’t Preach

  Jack sat in a low-slung booth at the Star Lounge in the trendy Tribeca Star Hotel. Even though it was only five o’clock and outside th
e cobblestone streets were filled with shoppers enjoying the warm afternoon, in here it was dark, with candlelight flickering off the rich oak walls. Jack loved lounges when they were empty; she sort of felt like Mata Hari or some other glamorous spy. She needed the escape from her life, where her father was ignoring her phone calls and it appeared more and more likely she’d have to apply for financial aid for college.

  Quelle horrible!

  She pulled out a compact and looked at herself critically. Last night, she had been forced to spend her first night in her new room in the garret. She’d slept in a tiny twin bed and had woken up in a pool of sweat because there was no air-conditioning, and the exhaustion showed. She’d liberally applied Crème de la Mer eye cream twice today, but she still had large bags gathering under her eyes.

  How very pre-guillotine Marie Antoinette.

  Jiffy, Sarah Jane, and Genevieve were supposed to meet her, but they had all gone home after school to change. Jack knew there was no way in hell she was actually going home for anything other than sleeping, so she had packed a simple, wrinkle-resistant Stella McCartney sheath dress in her giant royal blue Balenciaga city bag. The satchel also housed her dance clothes from her pointe class this morning, where she’d used her anger to absolutely nail her arabesques. She’d changed in the locker room at school, feeling like a total fucking nomad, and had just arrived at the bar determined to get very, very drunk.

  She nodded at the twentysomething waiter. His curly black hair fell over his eyes.