Page 114 of Pick-Up
Surrender.
39 | The Fame GameKAITLIN
I’m losing sleep.
An idea is starting to form in my head. One that I don’t like at all. The days are ticking by, with no relief.
I’m with Ruby full-time while Ethan is away, which should fill more empty hours in my day. But I’m distracted, half there.
I think I catch sight of Sasha at Vanderbilt Playground, but it’s a different small honey-headed brunette. Her hips are too wide. Her jeans are too Gap.
I think I see her down the dairy aisle at the supermarket, shivering in front of the almond milk display, but she’s gone before I can confirm or deny.
I think I see her at the Italian meat market, but, when she turns around, it’s not her at all but an older woman, a neighborhood local, carrying aluminum tins of meatballs and chicken Parmesan. I am seeing her everywhere and nowhere. And it’s hard for me to think about anything else.
So, I am back online. Looking out for a single post.
Is she back in town or still away? Is she living it up somewhere while the rest of us stay mired in misery? Why does she have this divorced life so figured out?
Is she missing Halloween with her kids?
At one costume party when we were teenagers, back when I was still with Hugo, he and I were sitting in a banquette playing a game we called “being famous,” where we pretended that everyone around us wanted to look at us, be us. Because we were stars.
I loved that game. It was fun. It came with confidence. It changed the way I felt in the space.
“Why is that girl always bored?” Hugo asked, nodding toward Sasha. She was across the room, sitting on the arm of a quilted purple velvet couch and staring at the ceiling. Her friends were all beside her—convening, bopping, aping—but she seemed thoroughly disengaged. Actually, now that I think of it, she wasn’t dressed up in a costume then either.
“Who, Sasha?” I shrugged, pretending not to care. “Maybe she’s too cool. Or maybe she’s just dumb as dirt.”
Hugo shook his head beneath his Knicks cap, eyes glued to her. “I don’t think she’s dumb.”
Had he been watching Sasha? More than just tonight?
I laid my hand on his arm, bare beneath his oversize Danücht T-shirt. I scratched him affectionately with my long nails. “Anyway, who gives a shit? Why should we care? We’re famous.” I leaned my head on his shoulder, pursing my lips and feeling cool. Lifted and sipped my hot-pink cosmo.
“Yeah.” Hugo grinned, dragging on his cigarette. “She should be looking atus.”
I couldn’t have agreed more.
But, even as he said it, he kept his eyes trained on her. He couldn’t pull them away.
40 | Just DesertsSASHA
Because life is cruel, when I wake up at six the next morning, I am awash in spectacular sunlight.
The storm they expected to hit us has passed somewhere out in the ocean, upsetting only a few fish. And yet its hypothetical has sent irreparable reverberations through my life.
I have stressed out Celeste. Pissed off Ethan. Irritated Derek. Weirded out the others. Spent a sleepless night alone. The meteorologists only shrug and aim to nail it next time. Expectations of accuracy are low. Meanwhile, I am waiting for aftershocks.
Just in case, Peter and I still meet early and knock out the video footage, which turns out to be fortuitous. This last shoot is without a human subject. I have certainly had enough of the limelight. And, whether because of the storm or the predawn hour, the birds turn out in full force as the shadows lift. We capture footage of a brown pelican diving for fish, two green herons communing on a villa rooftop and a prehistoric beast that we decide, after copious googling, is a yellow-crowned night heron perched on a pool lounger like some kind of diva. It’s peaceful and kind of lovely, working just the two of us. At least in the moments when I can ignore the nagging shame of having brawled publicly with the guy I kind of work for and sometimes want to bone.
I finally can’t bear the stress of what’s circling in my head alone. I’ve got to give it oxygen.
“That was bad last night, huh?” I say to Peter as he is kneelingdown, packing up a camera in its armored black box. I am half hoping he won’t know what I mean.
He squints up at me, the sun behind my head bright. “It wasn’t great.”
Well, there you have it. I have not exaggerated the exchange. Even Peter was put off by it, and I thought he’d been busy reading. What else needs to be said?
