by Zoey Dean
Anna sat behind the wheel for a moment, Sam's words about Eduardo in Paris echoing in her head. Ben supposedly had been a bit of a player in high school. Had he changed, really? She eyed the front door anxiously. What about Blythe? What about other girls whose names Anna didn't even know? Could she really expect a guy as hot as Ben to live like a monk because he was pining for the high-school girl back home? She didn't know what Blythe looked like, but she imagined
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her to be the anti-Anna in looks as well as attitude. Hmm . Flaming red hair down to her ass, with eyes a few shades darker than her hair. Maybe five-foot-four, with a voluptuous body and large breasts that didn't need a bra, the kind of lips most girls only got via injections of some kind of filler, that practically begged to be kissed...
Anna inhaled deeply to settle her nerves. Thinking like that was crazy. It wasn't her. She was never this insecure. Well, hardly ever.
She looked at the front door again.
"Blythe who?" she said aloud to steel her confidence, then stepped down the new stone path to the door. When she pressed the recessed doorbell, she heard chimes go off in the grand foyer. The door opened a few moments later.
It wasn't Ben. It was a girl Anna had never seen before. Oh God . She was clad in nothing but a white silk robe that showed off the curves of her lush body, and she had a towel wrapped around her hair. Obviously, she'd just stepped out of the shower. Anna had to look up at her eyes--she was easily five-nine or ten. Damp, thick waves of inky dark hair fell, Rapunzel-like, well past her shoulders. She had very pale skin, with a splash of freckles across the bridge of her nose. By Hollywood standards she was a long way from thin, but the whole thing definitely worked.
She really was the anti-Anna.
Blythe. It had to be Blythe. Anna felt blood rush to her head; so much so that she actually felt woozy.
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Meanwhile, the espresso she'd had at Insomia welled up uncomfortably in her stomach. How could Ben do this to her? She'd thought she was just being paranoid, letting Sam's anxiety get to her. But no, this was real. This girl was really here. Yet Anna had been raised according to the This Is How We Do Things Big Book, (East Coast WASP edition). Rule number seven: control at all times.
"Is Ben here?" she asked, her voice even.
"Oh, sure," the girl replied breezily, casually ruffling her wet hair with the towel. Then she smiled. "I hope you don't mind waiting. He's still in the shower."
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A Biiig ShockerAnna followed the girl into the grand foyer, feeling numb.
Bitch slap.The term flew into her mind. Anna, who only ever cursed mentally because she'd been raised by a mother who wouldn't say "damn" if her right foot got caught in a paper shredder. She wasn't even exactly sure what a bitch slap was, but wanted to bitch-slap Blythe anyway. Or maybe she should reserve the bitch slap for herself. Why, why, why hadn't she spelled it out for Ben: If you don't end your relationship with Blythe, we're through? She was filled with remorse, because she knew exactly why she hadn't done it. There was a whole chapter in the apocryphal Big Book that drew distinctions between what was couth and uncouth to talk about. Couth: skiing in Gstaad, the best Parisian hotels, arts and culture, clothes, charities, and four-star restaurants. Uncouth: white shoes after Labor Day, ice cubes in wine, the Lower East Side of Manhattan, spelling out to on-again-off-again-on-again boyfriends that they had to dump anyone else they were seeing.
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Anna felt her throat tighten, but she lifted her well-sculpted chin with new resolve. As much as she wanted Ben, if he was going to be a first-class dick , she was not about to shrivel up like a dead aspidistra.
They took seats in the living room. Just like the exterior, this room had been remodeled since Anna had been in it, in a Southwestern theme with charcoal-sketched cowboy art and classic rodeo posters. Low-slung buff leather couches held Indian-print blankets while a hand-woven Navajo rug adorned the hardwood, rough-beam floor. Anna was on one of the leather couches, the girl on the other.
She calmly cleared her throat. "I'm Anna Percy. I imagine you must be Blythe."
The girl looked puzzled. " Who? "
" Blythe :'
"My name isn't Blythe."
Her name wasn't...
Wait a petit moment . If this wasn't Blythe, it made things even worse. Ben was cheating on both of them.
"Would you mind telling me who you are?"
The girl grinned. "I got it. You think I'm Ben's girlfriend."
Anna brushed some hair behind her right ear. "Actually, I assumed I was Ben's girlfriend until about two minutes ago, when you opened the door in your robe."
The girl, whoever she was, cracked up. "That is sooo funny!"
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"I fail to see the humor."
"Okay, okay, okay." The girl waved a hand as if to fan herself into the end of her laughing fit. "I'm sorry. Really. Seriously. Really really. My name is Madeleine, but you can call me Maddy. Everyone does whether I like it or not, so I've convinced myself that I like it, even if I don't."
Anna wasn't sure what to feel. Shock? Embarrassment that she'd leaped to such a hasty judgment? Anger at herself, for not having the confidence in Ben that she knew she should have? She felt all these things and more.
"You're not a friend of Ben's from Princeton?"
Maddy shook her head. "I wish. I'm not a brainiac like Ben .'" The emphasis in the sentence was on the word Ben , with reverence. "He's totally super smart-- brilliant, really--don't you think? I'm a junior at Pacific Palisades High School and I'm living here. And you've got to be Anna. Ben told me all about you. You are so lucky to be with him. Does it make sense now?"
Only marginally, Anna thought, though she could feel her muscles begin to unclench.
"Oh golly, I really messed this up," Maddy lamented. "See, I'm actually from Michigan--Pellston, ever been there? If you haven't, don't go, except in the summer, which is, like, two days in July, if we're lucky--and I came from there to live with my aunt and uncle in Pacific Palisades and go to school at PP high school. Do you know any kids who go there?"
"I don't think so." Anna let the four words linger,
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just so she could process what Maddy was saying. The girl was definitely not terse.
"Oh well, some of them are nice, but some of them are 5000 mean. Anyway, my uncle works for the State Department and he had to go to Singapore in March, which was bad, except that my aunt and uncle and the Birnbaums are friends, you know? So Mrs. Birnbaum said I could stay here through the end of the school year. And that's why I'm here. Whew." She drew the back of her hand dramatically across her forehead. "Glad that's out of the way. Hey, want to see what I used to look like?" She reached for a red photo album on the side table, flipped open the cover, and passed it to Anna. "Get ready for a biiig shocker--and I do mean big ."
Anna peered at the photograph on the open page closely. Same girl, hair, and face as across the living room. She was standing on a lakeshore on a bright summer day, wearing Bermuda shorts and a brown T-shirt that flowed over what Anna estimated to be approximately three hundred pounds of Maddy.
"This is really you?" Anna was astonished.
"A hundred and fifty-five pounds ago," Maddy hooted. "I love showing people that photo." She nodded toward the album. "It was taken the day before I came to Los Angeles. I had my stomach stapled last August, which was gross but not as gross as I thought it would be, even though they make you pee out of a tube for a while, did you know that? Anyway, big difference, huh?"
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"I'll say," Anna agreed as politely as she could, handing the photograph back to Maddy, who held it in both hands and stared at herself in wonder. Anna couldn't imagine what it would be like to walk around in a body that large. People could be cruel and ruthless. She thought of how Cammie Sheppard might have reacted to the "before" Maddy and shuddered. Maddy was lucky that she'd chosen Pacific Palisades High School.
"You're a brave
person," Anna told her admiringly.
Maddy shrugged. "I was fat my whole life. My whole family is fat. We could have a contest for fat, fatter, and fattest. Anyhoo, when I go back to Michigan for senior year, I'm going back totally skinny, which will be so cool and amazing, and all the guys who used to tease me will be, like, drooling, and I'll tell them to go screw themselves."
She bounced up and spun around like a fashion model on the runway, turning sideways and pulling her robe taut against her body--the lush, curvaceous body that was living in Ben's house.
"I'm losing twenty-five more pounds, and then-- watch out, world!" Maddy crowed. "Except I'm kind of inexperienced in the guy department. That worries me a little."
Anna smiled. "It'll come naturally to you; you'll see."
Maddy's face lit up. "You think? Because I really have to make up for lost time."
"Anna Percy."
The voice was male and deep, but it didn't belong to Ben. It wasn't Ben. Anna turned to see a college-age guy
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in an oversize blue bowling shirt, jeans, and white Converse All Star high-tops. He was tall and skinny, with gelled rust-colored hair that stood straight up. Old-fashioned black tortoiseshell glasses framed his dark eyes. There was an insouciant smile stretched across his quirky-cute face. Anna rose automatically, thinking what a strange few minutes these had been-- how people she didn't know kept appearing, while Ben was still nowhere in sight. At least this guy, whoever he was, wasn't female and dripping wet from a shower.
No way she'd mistake him for Blythe.
"Hi," she responded, grinning at her own thought. "You're right, I'm Anna. And you are...?"
"I'm Jack. Jack Walker. Think Jack Daniels meets Johnny Walker and you'll remember my name; friend of Ben's from Princeton." He winked at her. "You're Ben's lady?"
Anna had lived in New York City long enough to be able to pick out Jack's accent. New Jersey. More specifically, northern Jersey. Not one of the affluent suburbs like Tenafly or Alpine, either. More like Jersey City or Union City. She realized that if this guy had gotten into Princeton, it wasn't because his grandparents had donated a building or because his father was a member of the Federal Reserve Bank board of governors. He had to be smart. Independently smart. She wouldn't be surprised if he'd earned a full ride to Princeton.
"Lady?" Anna responded wryly. "I'll go with girlfriend ."
Jack laughed. "Me too. Sorry for the Jerseyism.
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Anyway. I'm out here for the summer. Got a killer internship at Fox TV in the reality-programming department. Living in this exec's guesthouse in Santa Monica, drivin' his second car, which just happens to be a Beemer. Sweet."
"Hey, wow, maybe the four of us could go on a double date," Maddy interjected. "Well, I mean, not really a date date, but just, you know, hang out?"
She sounded so needy; Anna wanted to reassure her. "We could do that, maybe. Right, Jack?"
"Who's with who?" Jack winked at Anna again. The winking thing was getting a wee bit repetitive.
"I'm with Ben, that's for sure," Maddy chirped.
Jack raised his eyebrows at her. At least he wasn't winking. "I don't think Ben would--"
"Joking!" Maddy added hastily, then grew solemn. "Anna, you are so, so, so, so lucky to have him as your boyfriend. I hope you know--"
"Hey. It's great to see you."
Anna's heart jumped at the sound of Ben's voice; it was finally really and truly him . She whirled, and there he was. Six feet tall, he'd let his short brown hair grow out longer than Anna had ever seen it; it gave him a sexy, shaggy look. He wore jeans and was just buttoning his plain white oxford shirt over his tanned, hard-body six-pack.
He walked over to her, a huge grin on his face. Those eyes of his, electric blue, had the same effect they'd had on her the very first time she'd seen him on the airplane; she couldn't look away.
"Hi," she breathed.
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"I took forever, sorry," Ben apologized. "I got a phone call."
"No problem," Anna forced herself to sound easy, though her mind was already running through the list of people who Ben might have been talking to. Damn Sam for talking about how jealous she was of Eduardo. It was contagious . "I was getting to know your friends."
"Hey, Maddy, go throw on some clothes and let's blow this pop stand," Jack suggested. "Leave these two to reunite."
He winked yet again, but Maddy didn't seem to mind. "Oh, sure!" she giggled, then threw her arms around Ben. "I just want to thank you again. For everything."
Ben gently extricated himself. "Thank my mom and dad. I didn't really do anything, Maddy."
"I'll wait for you in the Beemer," Jack told her.
"I'll just be a sec!" She practically flew out of the room. Meanwhile, Jack shook Anna's hand--this time without a wink--and told Ben he'd call him, making the sign of a phone with his hand.
Finally, they were alone.
Something was wrong; Anna could sense it immediately. He wasn't kissing her, he wasn't hugging her. She'd been through enough with Ben to know when--
"Anna," he whispered. Then she was in his arms, his lips on hers, and thankfully, her endlessly babbling inner voice finally shut the hell up.
"Took you long enough," Anna murmured into his neck when their lips parted.
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His only answer was to kiss her again.
They lay on the couch, Anna nestled against Ben's chest. Somewhere amid their torrid kisses Ben had whispered that his parents were in Hawaii and weren't coming home until Sunday, but Anna had been in no hurry. Just when the kisses had started to turn into more, she'd asked Ben to find them something to eat. That gave her about two minutes to cool down before he showed up with a quart of Cherry Garcia ice cream and a single spoon. Immediately Anna thought about licking the ice cream off Ben, but she settled for actually swapping spoonfuls with him. They had the whole summer ahead. There was no reason to rush things. It was not just going to be about sex, either. They would finally have the chance to get to know each other in a way that they'd never been able to before.
"It's only May," Anna murmured. The prospect of the summer made her lightheaded with happiness.
Ben kissed her forehead. "Um-hmm."
"May, June, July, August," Anna ticked off the months on her fingers. "We'll have four months together, and no school."
"I have to work, though. I told you that on the phone, right?"
He had. "At the Riviera place?" He'd mentioned that he'd possibly be working in the pro shop at the Riviera Country Club.
"Got a better offer. Have you heard about this new club in Hollywood, Trieste?"
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Amused, Anna craned around to look at him. "This is me we're talking about."
Ben chuckled. "Right. You're club-challenged. Golf club and nightclub."
"I have, however, read all the classics," she teased. "In three languages."
He laughed again. "Let me fill you in, Miss Trilingual. Trieste is the hip place of the moment; fashionistas, young Hollywood wanna-be suck-ups, very Day of the Locust . Dad got me a job there." He paused. "Correction: Dad's skills in the OR in the form of an extremely successful tummy tuck got me a job there. Kind of a management-trainee thing. To see if I like the business."
Ben's father was the foremost plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, known to one and all as the "Plastic Surgeon to the Stars." He likely earned more in a week than many Americans earned in a decade. However, Dr. Birnbaum had recently joined a twelve-step program to deal with his gambling addiction, and Anna hoped that maybe while Ben was home, he and his dad would have a chance to repair their strained relationship. She knew all about parental estrangement; she'd lived with it her whole life.
"Maddy will want you to sneak her in," Anna joked.
"Believe me, she already asked." He shook his head. "Poor kid. She's this innocent girl with a new body; she doesn't know how to deal. Her mom and my mom are friends from high school; I've watched her grow up-- and out
. The kid suffered. It really sucked."
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"She showed me her 'before' picture."
"Pretty shocking, huh?" Ben kissed her forehead again. "I'd ask you to be nice to her, but I know you will be. Because that's just ... you."
"Yep, that's me. Anna of Sunnybrook Farm," she quipped.
"To the world maybe. But with me, alone ... definitely not."
He kissed her again--the kind of kiss that proved how well he knew her, the secret her who didn't overanalyze or worry or ... or anything. She adored it.
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The B-ListThe Bel Air Grand Hotel was located in a private wooded eucalyptus and palm grove just to the north of Sunset Boulevard, not far from UCLA. The exterior of the place was beautifully designed in the style of the Spanish and Italian Renaissance, with eight huge ivory columns sweeping up from the ground to support an arched entryway nearly fifty feet above the valet area.
"You're going to love this, Sam, I swear," Fee gushed as they sat in the front of Fee's cherry-red Audi, waiting for the valet to open their doors. Jazz sat in the backseat.
An Audi. Trust Fee to have a B-list car, too.
Sam had a plan: Let the weenies talk her into a tour of the prom site; play it cool so they thought there was no way that she and her A-list friends would attend the prom; then turn the tables on them so that she could not just make her documentary but also have some artistic control over the party. Once everything was set, she'd tell Cammie and the others. Loyalty counted for something in Hollywood--she was confident they'd participate.
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Who knew when they might need favors of their own? As for Anna, there was definitely a bit of a rift--Anna thought that the idea of The B-List was mean. Sam, though, knew Anna wanted to go to prom. Ultimately, the idea of a double date of her and Ben with Sam and Eduardo would certainly prove too enticing to pass up.
The obvious thing for her to do, of course, was just to tell the prom weenies that she would come and ask them to be in her movie. If she did that, though, Fee and Jazz would instantly be suspicious of her intentions. That was not the way the Beverly Hills High School elite operated.