Lauren Weisberger 5-Book Collection: The Devil Wears Prada, Revenge Wears Prada, Everyone Worth Knowing, Chasing Harry Winston, Last Night at Chateau Marmont. Lauren Weisberger
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or you screaming, or anything else!’ I shouted back, collapsing backward on the bed. Lily laughed.
‘Relax,’ she said in a very un-Lily-like way. ‘They’re just happy you’re home, and I, for one, am happy to be here. Besides, it’s only a couple more months, and we’ve got each other. It’s really not so bad.’
‘A couple more months? It’s only been one so far, and I’m ready to put a bullet in my head.’ I yanked my nightshirt over my head – one of Alex’s old workout ones – and put on a sweatshirt. The same jeans I’d been wearing every day for the past few weeks lay rumpled in a ball near my closet; when I pulled them over my hips, I noticed that were feeling snugger. Now that I no longer had to resort to gulping down a bowl of soup or subsisting on cigarettes and Starbucks alone, my body had adjusted itself accordingly and gained back the ten pounds I’d lost while working at Runway. And it didn’t even make me cringe; I believed it when Lily and my parents told me I looked healthy, not fat.
Lily slipped on a pair of sweatpants over the boxers she’d slept in and tied a bandana over her frizzed-out curls. With her hair pulled off her face, the angry red marks where her forehead had met shards of the windshield were more noticeable, but the stitches had already come out and the doctor promised that there’d be minimal, if any, scarring. ‘Come on,’ she said, grabbing the crutches that were propped against the wall everywhere she went. ‘They’re all leaving today, so maybe we’ll get a decent night’s sleep tonight.’
‘She’s not going to stop screaming until we go down there, is she?’ I mumbled, holding her elbow to help her to her feet. The cast around her right ankle had been signed by my entire family, and Kyle had even drawn annoying little messages from Isaac all over it.
‘Not a chance.’
My sister appeared in the doorway, cradling the baby, who currently had drool halfway down his chubby chin but was now giggling contentedly. ‘Look who I have,’ she cooed in baby talk, bouncing the happy boy up and down in her arms. ‘Isaac, tell your auntie Andy not to be such a tremendous bitch, since we’re all leaving real, real soon. Can you do that for mommy, honey? Can you?’
Isaac sneezed a very cute baby sneeze in response, and Jill looked as though he’d just risen up from her arms a full-grown man and recited a few Shakespearean sonnets. ‘Did you see that, Andy? Did you hear that? Oh, my little guy is just the cutest thing ever!’
‘Good morning,’ I said, kissing her on the cheek. ‘You know I don’t want you to leave, right? And Isaac’s welcome to stay as long as he can figure out how to sleep between the hours of midnight and ten A.M. Hell, even Kyle can stick around if he promises not to talk. See? We’re easy here.’
Lily had managed to hobble down the stairs and greet my parents, who were both dressed for work and saying their good-byes to Kyle.
I made my bed and tucked Lily’s back underneath, making sure to fluff her pillow before sticking it in my closet for the day. She’d come out of the coma before I even got off the plane from Paris, and after Alex I was the first one to see her awake. They ran a million tests on every conceivable body part, but with the exception of some stitches on her face, neck, and chest, and the broken ankle, she was perfectly healthy. Looked like hell, of course – exactly what you’d expect for someone who’d danced with an oncoming vehicle – but she was moving around just fine and even seemed almost annoyingly upbeat for someone who’d just lived through what she did.
It was my dad’s idea that we sublet our apartment for November and December and move in with them. Although the idea had been less than appealing to me, my zero-sum salary left me with few arguments. And besides, Lily seemed to welcome the chance to get out of the city for a little while and leave behind all the questions and gossip that she’d have to face as soon as she saw anyone she knew again. We’d listed the place on craigslist.org as a perfect ‘holiday rental’ to enjoy all the sights of New York, and to both our shock and amazement, an older Swedish couple whose children were all living in the city paid our full asking price – six hundred dollars more per month than we ourselves paid. The three hundred bucks a month was more than enough for each of us to live on, especially considering my parents comped us food, laundry, and the use of a beat-up Camry. The Swedes were leaving the week after New Year’s, just in time for Lily to start her semester over again and for me to, well, do something.
Emily had been the one who officially fired me. Not that I’d had any lingering doubts as to my employment status after my little foul-mouthed temper tantrum, but I suppose Miranda had been livid enough to drive home one last dig. The whole thing had taken only three or four minutes and had unfolded with the ruthless Runway efficiency that I loved so much.
I’d just managed to hail a cab and pry the left boot from my pulsating foot when the phone rang. Of course my heart instinctively lurched forward, but when I remembered that I’d just told Miranda what she could do with her You remind me of myself when I was your age, I realized it couldn’t be her. I did a quick tabulation of the minutes that had passed: one for Miranda to shut her gaping mouth and recover her cool for all the Clackers who were watching, another for her to locate her cell phone and call Emily at home, a third to convey the sordid details of my unprecedented outburst, and a final one for Emily to reassure Miranda that she herself would ‘see to it that everything was taken care of.’ Yes, although the caller ID simply said ‘unavailable’ on international phone calls, there wasn’t a doubt in the world who was ringing.
‘Hi, Em, how are you?’ I practically sang while rubbing my bare foot and trying not to let it touch the filthy taxi floor.
She seemed to be caught off-guard by my downright chipper tone. ‘Andrea?’
‘Hey, it’s me, I’m right here. What’s up? I’m kind of in a hurry, so …’ I thought about asking her directly if she’d called to fire me but decided to give her a break for once. I braced myself for the verbal tirade she was sure to let loose on me – how could you let her down, me down, Runway down, the wide world of fashion, blah, blah, blah – but it never came.
‘Oh yeah, of course. So, I just spoke to Miranda …’ Her voice trailed off as though she was hoping I’d continue and explain that the whole thing had been a big mistake and not to worry because I’d managed to fix it in the last four minutes.
‘And you heard what happened, I’m assuming?’
‘Um, yeah! Andy, what’s going on?’
‘I should probably be asking you that, right?’
There was silence.
‘Listen, Em, I have a feeling that you called to fire me. It’s OK if you did; I know it’s not your decision. So, did she tell you to call and get rid of me?’ Even though I felt lighter than I had in many months, I still found myself holding my breath, wondering if maybe, through some dumb stroke of luck or misfortune, Miranda had respected my telling her to fuck off instead of been appalled by it.
‘Yes. She asked me to let you know that you have been terminated, effective immediately, and she would like you to be checked out of the Ritz before she returns from the show.’ She said this softly and with a trace of regret. Perhaps it was for the many hours and days and weeks she was now facing of finding and training someone all over again, but there sounded like there might be something even more behind it.
‘You’re going to miss me, aren’t you, Em? Go on, say it. It’s OK, I won’t tell anyone. As far as I’m concerned, this conversation never happened. You don’t want me to go, do you?’
Miracle of miracles, she laughed. ‘What did you say to her? She just kept repeating that you were crass and unlady-like. I couldn’t get anything more specific out of her than that.’
‘Oh, that’s probably because I told her to fuck herself.’
‘You did not!’
‘You’re calling to fire me. I assure you, I did.’
‘Oh my god.’
‘Yeah, well,