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door came at 7:45 A.M. from one of Monsieur Renaud’s junior concierges who was there personally to wake me up and see that I was dressed in time to attend the show with Miranda, who had herself decided she’d like my assistance just six minutes earlier. He had politely ignored my being quite obviously passed out on the still made bed and had even dimmed the lights, which had blazed all night. I had twenty-five minutes to shower, consult the fashion book, dress myself, and do my own makeup, since my woman was not scheduled to come this early.
I awoke with a minor champagne headache, but the real jolt of pain came when the previous night’s phone calls came flashing back. Lily! I needed to call Alex or my parents and see if anything had happened in the last couple hours – god, it seemed like a week ago – but now there was no time.
By the time the elevator had hit the first floor, I’d decided that I had to stay for one more day, just one lousy day to tend to this party, and then I’d be home with Lily. Maybe I’d even take a short leave of absence once Emily returned, to spend some time with Lil, help her recuperate and deal with some of the inevitable fallout from the accident. My parents and Alex would hold down the fort until I got there – it’s not as though she’s all alone, I told myself. And this was my life. My career, my entire future, was on the line here, and I didn’t see how two days either way made all that much difference to someone who wasn’t yet conscious. But to me – and certainly to Miranda – it made all the difference in the world.
Somehow I’d made it to the backseat of the limo before Miranda did, and even though her eyes were currently fixating on my chiffon skirt, she hadn’t yet commented on any one part of the outfit. I had just tucked the Smythson book into my Bottega Venetta bag when my new, international cell phone rang. It had never rung in Miranda’s presence before, I realized, so I scrambled quickly to turn off the ringer, but she ordered me to answer it.
‘Hello?’ I kept one eye on Miranda, who was paging through the day’s itinerary and pretending not to listen.
‘Andy, hi honey.’ Dad. ‘Just wanted to give you a quick update.’
‘OK.’ I was trying to say the bare minimum, since it seemed incredibly strange to be talking on the phone in front of Miranda.
‘The doctor just called and said that Lily is showing signs that indicate she may come out of it soon. Isn’t that great? I thought you’d want to know.’
‘That’s great. Definitely great.’
‘Have you decided if you’re coming home or not?’
‘Um, no, I haven’t decided. Miranda’s having a party tomorrow night and she definitely needs my help, so … Listen, Dad, I’m sorry, but now’s not a great time. Can I call you back?’
‘Sure, call anytime.’ He tried to sound neutral, but I could hear the disappointment in his voice.
‘Great. Thanks for calling. ’Bye.’
‘Who was that?’ Miranda asked, still peering at her itinerary. It had just begun raining and her voice was nearly drowned out by the sound of water hitting the limo.
‘Hmm? Oh, that was my father. From America.’ Where the hell did I come up with this stuff? From America?
‘And what did he want you to do that conflicted with your working at the party tomorrow night?’
I considered a million potential lies in the course of two seconds, but there wasn’t enough time to work out the details of any of them. Especially when she had turned her full attention to me now. I was left with no choice but to tell the truth.
‘Oh, it was nothing. A friend of mine was in an accident. She’s in the hospital. In a coma, actually. And he was just calling to tell me how she was doing and to see if I was coming home.’
She considered this, nodding slowly, and then picked up the copy of the paper the driver had thoughtfully provided. ‘I see.’ No ‘I’m sorry,’ or ‘Is your friend OK?,’ just an icy, vague statement and a look of extreme displeasure.
‘But I’m not, I’m definitely not going home. I understand how important it is that I’m at the party tomorrow, and I’ll be there. I’ve thought a lot about it, and I want you to know that I plan to honor the commitment I’ve made to you and to my job, so I’ll be staying.’
At first Miranda said nothing. But then she smiled slightly and said, ‘Ahn-dre-ah, I’m very pleased with your decision. It is absolutely the right thing to do, and I appreciate that you recognize that. Ahn-dre-ah, I have to say, I had my doubts about you from the start. Clearly, you know nothing about fashion and more than that, you don’t seem to care. And don’t think I’ve failed to notice all the rich and varied ways you convey to me your displeasure when I ask you to do something that you’d rather not. Your competency in the job has been adequate, but your attitude has been substandard at best.’
‘Oh, Miranda, please let me—’
‘I’m speaking! And I was going to say that I’ll be much more willing to help you get where you’d like to go now that you’ve demonstrated that you’re committed. You should be proud of yourself, Ahn-dre-ah.’ Just when I thought I’d faint from the length and depth and content of the soliloquy – whether from joy or from pain, I wasn’t sure – she took it one step further. In a move that was so fundamentally out of character for this woman on every level, she placed her hand on top of the one I had resting on the seat between us and said, ‘You remind me of myself when I was your age.’ And before I could conjure up a single appropriate syllable to utter, the driver screeched to a halt in front of the Carrousel du Louvre and leapt out to open the doors. I grabbed my bag and hers as well and wondered if this was the proudest or the most humiliating moment of my life.
My first Parisian fashion show was a blur. It was dark, that much I remember, and the music seemed much too loud for such understated elegance, but the only thing that stands out from that two-hour window into bizarreness was my own intense discomfort. The Chanel boots that Jocelyn had so lovingly selected to go with the outfit – a stretchy and therefore skintight cashmere sweater by Malo over a chiffon skirt – made my feet feel like confidential documents being fed through a shredder. My head ached from a combination of hangover and anxiety, causing my empty stomach to protest with threatening waves of nausea. I was standing in the very back of the room with assorted C-list reporters and others who didn’t rank high enough to warrant a seat, keeping one eye on Miranda and the other scoping out the least humiliating places to be sick if the need arose. You remind me of myself when I was your age. You remind me of myself when I was your age. You remind me of myself when I was your age. The words kept reverberating over and over, keeping tune to the steady and persistent pounding of my forehead.
Miranda managed not to address me for nearly an hour, but after that she was off and running. Even though I was standing in the same room she was, she called my cell phone to request a Pellegrino. From that moment on, the phone rang in ten- to twelve-minute increments, each request sending another shock of pain directly to my head. Brrring. ‘Get Mr Tomlinson on his air phone on the jet.’ (B-DAD didn’t answer on his air phone when I tried calling it sixteen times.) Brrring. ‘Remind all the Runway editors in Paris that just because they’re here does not mean they can neglect their responsibilities at home – I want everything in by original deadline!’ (The couple of Runway editors I had gotten in touch with at their various hotels in Paris had simply laughed at me and hung up.) Brrring. ‘Get me a regular American turkey sandwich immediately – I’m tiring of all this ham.’ (I walked more than two miles in painful boots and with an upset stomach, but there was no turkey to be found anywhere. I’m convinced she knew, since she’d never once before asked for a turkey sandwich while in America – even though, of course, they’re available on every street corner.) Brrring. ‘I expect dossiers prepared on the three best chefs you’ve found thus far to be waiting in my suite by the time we return from this show.’ (Emily hacked and whined and bitched but promised that she’d fax over whatever information she had on the candidates so far and I could make them into ‘dossiers.’) Brrring! Brrring! Brrring! You remind me