The Carlyles Read online

  Baby giggled, remembering Mr. Smith’s potent BO. She even missed that. Tom felt so far away. She wanted him close to her so badly it hurt.

  She heard a rustle in the background. “I want the phone!” a girl’s voice whined impatiently. It was Kendra, one of the peripheral hangers-on whom Baby had known since kinder-garten. They used to be friends, but ever since Kendra had become a raging stoner, her interests were now exclusively pot and the college guys who came to Nantucket to work at the restaurants for the summer and never left. “Hey, Ba-ay-bee.” Kendra drew out Baby’s name into three syllables, and Baby knew she must be pretty baked. “So, is there crazy shit going on down there? What’s it like living in New York?”

  “Yeah, um, it’s fine,” Baby lied. “I’ll probably be back next weekend for the beach party, though.” Make that definitely, Baby silently amended as she saw a girl yelling at the driver of a sleek town car that had pulled up in front of the school.

  “So soon? I’m sure there are much better parties in New York, right?” Kendra drawled lazily.

  “Hey, can you put Tom back on?” Baby said shortly. She wasn’t in the mood for one of Kendra’s pot-induced hypothetical conversations.

  “Sure,” Kendra agreed. “But don’t worry if something comes up. We’ll get by without you.” Baby heard laughing in the background. They were probably already piling into Tom’s car by now. Baby kicked at the stone step with her heel in frustration and jealousy.

  “So, you think you really might be able to come on Friday? Don’t you have to go to a cotillion or an opera or something?” Tom asked in his sleepy-stoner voice.

  “It’s New York, not the Deep South!” Baby smiled. She loved Tom’s utter lack of pretension.

  And regional knowledge?

  “Of course I’ll come. I can’t miss the first beach party of the school year.” Baby was counting down the hours. She couldn’t wait to sleep with Tom outside in her hammock, only a few steps from the ocean.

  “Cool.” Baby could almost imagine him nodding in agreement. “Anyway, we’re all heading down to the dock, so I better get going. I miss you,” he finished.

  “I miss you too,” Baby echoed, and hung up the phone.

  She stood up and crossed the street, unsure of what to do with herself for the rest of the afternoon. She considered waiting for Avery, but her sister seemed to be intentionally ignoring her, so Baby decided to intentionally ignore her right back. She determinedly stepped off the curb.

  “Watch where you’re going, baby!” a bike messenger yelled as he took a tight turn onto Madison and almost ran into her. Hearing her name yelled in a voice so angry and hard instead of warm and soft, Baby felt a red-hot surge of rage—at her mother, at her new school, at all of New York City—shoot up through her tiny frame.

  “Fuck you!” she yelled angrily. A group of elderly ladies standing by the bus stop began whispering among themselves. Baby seethed. She hated New York. Everyone was the same. Those ladies were exactly like Jack Laurent and her bitch crowd, except two hundred years older.

  Mad at herself for even caring what they thought, she ducked into a nearby Starbucks and bought an iced chai from the over-caffeinated barista who shouted out every single order. As soon as she took a sip, she wanted to spit out the ultra-sweet liquid. Back in Nantucket, they would have already had her chai waiting for her by the time she walked down to The Bean, her favorite coffee shop. Chains like Starbucks had been banned on her beloved island.

  Hello, they also don’t have Barneys. Or pretty much anything else anyone who’s anyone cares about.

  As she pushed open the door to Starbucks and reemerged in the bright sun, she saw a huge yellow labradoodle pulling on its Gucci leash and dragging its owner, who was also trying to manage two small puggles in matching red and blue Marc Jacobs coats. She shook her head, feeling bad for the dogs, who looked as uncomfortable in their outfits as she was. Their owner was a nice-looking teenage boy with closely cut brown hair, brown eyes, and broad shoulders. Baby zeroed in on his shorts. The claylike color was Nantucket red—something no one, not even Islanders, would ever wear. No one normal, anyway.

  As she watched, the labradoodle deliberately arched its back and unleashed a large brown coil of poop on the guy’s leather sandal. It was almost like he was doing it for Baby’s viewing pleasure.

  “Nemo!” the guy cried, looking down in disbelief. Just then, the dog broke free and took off, bumping into a woman’s stroller and excitedly weaving through streams of pedestrians on the sidewalk.

  Without thinking, Baby abandoned her chai on the sidewalk and dashed down the street, desperate to catch up with the puppy before it got run over by an MTA bus or an errant town car.

  “Get a leash!” Baby heard a woman cry behind her.

  Finally she caught up with the dog just as it was about to bound into oncoming traffic on Fifth. It blinked dolefully at her with its warm brown eyes.

  “You’re okay,” Baby whispered to the dog and firmly clasped its collar. She picked up its leash, reminded of the scene in Annie where orphan Annie befriends Sandy, the cute stray dog who becomes her best friend and follows her everywhere.

  At least she’s made one friend.

  “I know you wanted to get away from him, but I have to bring you back to your owner, okay?” She pulled the dog around the corner to Starbucks. Standing outside was the dog’s owner, hopelessly trying to scrape the crap from the top of his foot with a black plastic bag. The puggles had wrapped their leashes around his legs and were sniffing the flower boxes outside the coffee shop.

  “Here’s your dog. Except I really don’t think you deserve him,” she said self-righteously as she handed over the leash.

  He blushed the same tomato red shade as his shorts. He would be cute, she thought, if she went for that handsome, privileged, Upper East Side spoiled type.

  And didn’t have a boyfriend?

  Nemo sat down next to his owner with his head cocked expectantly. The guy held out the hand that was holding the bag of dog poop, then thought better of it and pulled it back. “Sorry. Normally I would shake hands but . . .” He shrugged. “I’m J.P. Cashman. And these monsters”—he glanced down at the dogs, who were now sitting obediently in a neat row, blinking up at Baby and looking not at all monstrous—“are Nemo, Darwin, and Shackleton. I promised my mother I would take care of them for the next few weeks.”

  “I’m Baby.” She held out her small hand. She didn’t want to add to the general New York City rudeness.

  Clearly.

  “Baby,” he repeated, raising his eyebrows. Baby narrowed her eyes at him. Her name had been challenged enough today.

  “Better name than Shackleton,” she said, nodding at the puggle in the blue coat.

  “My dad’s really into explorers. Real and imaginary.”

  “Cute.” Baby petted the dog’s coffee-colored fur. It drooled in appreciation.

  “I think maybe we started off on the wrong foot.” J.P. looked down at his shit-encrusted toes and laughed, surprising Baby. She’d thought he would be more upset about his soiled mandals. Maybe Mr. Red Shorts wasn’t so uptight after all.

  Well, you know, shit happens.

  “So, you must go to Constance.” J.P.’s brown eyes flicked down to her skirt. Baby blushed and nodded, feeling like a walking advertisement for Upper East Side snobbery.

  “I go to Riverside Prep. On the West Side. I’m a junior.” J.P. glanced up expectantly.

  Darwin squirmed toward her. His eyes were bulging so much he looked like a cartoon dog silk-screened on the front of an Urban Outfitters T-shirt.

  “Hey, puppy, it was nice meeting you, too,” Baby patted the dog and gazed into his huge trusting eyes. If only people could be so simple. “Good luck,” she told the guy dubiously, and started to walk away.

  “Hey, wait!” J.P. yelled to her retreating back. “So, all the dogs really seem to like you, and I need some help. Our dog walker ran off with our gardener.”

  Baby stopped walkin
g. Was he kidding? She turned to face him again, curious.

  “No, seriously. It’s sort of sweet, actually. They got married last week and are on their honeymoon in Niagara Falls. So, anyway, now the dogs are my responsibility, but would you want to help out?”

  Baby opened her mouth, ready to say no. Talk about typical. He wanted her to do his dirty work?

  “We’d pay you, of course.” J.P. smiled broadly, as if that solved everything.

  Baby considered it. Okay, so this guy’s outfit was totally lame, but his dogs were adorable. Besides, it had to be better than moping around feeling sorry for herself.

  Or embarrassing her sister in front of their new classmates.

  “Sure,” Baby agreed. “But I don’t need your money. I’ll consider it charity work.”

  J.P.’s face lit up. “I’ll find a way to make it up to you,” he continued, all business. “If you could meet me tomorrow at three at my house? I’m at Sixty-eighth and Fifth.” He pulled a thick ivory card out of his pocket and handed it to her.

  This guy had business cards? She glanced at it briefly, expecting some ridiculously fake-sounding title, but it simply listed his name and address in neat black block lettering. He lived in the penthouse of the Cashman Complexes. Of course his building would share his last name.

  But of course.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said crisply, turning on the heel of one flip-flop and stuffing the card into her seersucker skirt pocket. Behind her, one of the dogs let out a low-pitched whine.

  Sounds like someone’s got a case of puppy love.

  Sometimes You Need to Go into the Closet

  Avery didn’t bother looking for Baby after school. If Baby wanted to act like a freak, she could do it all by herself. Instead, Avery hailed a cab and immediately commanded the driver to bring her to her grandmother’s town house on Sixty-first and Park. The house was a four-story pale-peach Italianate-style building that looked more like it belonged in Charleston or San Francisco than on the Upper East Side. Avery loved how it stood out from the other redbrick buildings surrounding it, like a reminder of how unique and one-of-a-kind Avery Carlyle the First had actually been. Avery the Second hoped she had inherited some of that je ne sais quoi. She’d need it, especially after today’s rocky start.

  She pushed open the heavy iron door and groaned when she saw Karen, the mousy-looking paralegal with a penchant for mismatching Ann Taylor separates from the clearance rack. She had been sent by Meyers & Mooreland, the law firm that was handling the Carlyle estate, and had set up a makeshift office right in the middle of the front room to manage the cataloguing and appraisal of Grandmother Avery’s valuables. Avery hated the way the lawyers had taken over the house. When she’d first found out her family was moving, she’d begged her mother to let them live here, instead of the penthouse on Fifth, but the lawyers and Edie had agreed that it would be easiest and most efficient if the Carlyle family lived elsewhere until the house had been properly catalogued. No matter what, their present penthouse, with its vague smell of cat pee clinging to the bedroom and the tacky, impossible-to-remove Yale sticker on the inside of the medicine cabinet, didn’t feel like home the way Grandmother Avery’s house did—at least when Grandmother Avery’s house was devoid of lawyers. The first time she’d stopped by with her mother, Avery had rescued a dozen vintage French Vogues from the trash.

  A true Samaritan. Until she sells them on eBay in exchange for that vintage Hermès Birkin she’s been yearning for.

  “Hey!” Karen called cheerfully, not looking up from her laptop. Avery ignored her and tromped up the stairs and into her grandmother’s large bedroom suite. She headed straight into the expansive walk-in closet, breathing a sigh of relief as she turned on the muted lights. Row upon row of Chanel suits hung before her, lined up according to color and length. The eighties had been all about tight leather minis and silk halter tops by Valentino and Nina Ricci, but in her later years Grandmother Avery had never left the house in anything but a knee-length suit and Ferragamo pumps, her wrists and neck adorned with tasteful jewelry. Avery closed her eyes, wishing that when she opened them Grandmother Avery would be there. She’d always known what to say to make Avery feel better. But when she opened her eyes, all she saw was a closet full of lifeless clothing.

  “Can I borrow these when I grow up?” five-year-old Avery had asked once, holding up a handful of diamond-encrusted pendants and bangles that were a gift from the Count of Lichtenberg.

  “No,” her grandmother said as she firmly removed a particularly large diamond and ruby dinner ring from Avery’s finger. “Diamonds like that are only for women over thirty. And the only diamond that looks better than the one a man gives you is the one you purchase yourself.” With that, Grandmother Avery had brought young Avery on her first trip to Tiffany & Co., where she’d been allowed to hand over the platinum AmEx herself after picking out a simple rose drop pendant in a platinum setting.

  Avery touched the buttery linen of a pink suit and sighed. She wished Grandmother Avery were here so they could have a cup of tea and plan the best way for Avery to win the position at school. Ever since the assembly today, she knew she had to get elected as student liaison to the board of overseers. But the liaison would be chosen by the student body, and all the girls seemed completely biased against her. Not only that, but she had less than a week to win them over. “What should I do?” she whispered, running a finger down the sleeve of a powdery gray suit.

  Throw a fabulous party! she practically heard the Chanel suit whisper back.

  Avery stepped away from the Chanel jacket and wandered into Grandmother Avery’s expansive dressing room. She picked up a Tiffany silver picture frame that housed a photo of Grandmother Avery when she was in her twenties, before her love affair with Chanel. She wore a boxy Yves Saint Laurent ensemble with Dior pumps. With her thick, long hair and wide eyes, she looked eerily familiar. Avery turned to the full-length antique mirror, trying to mimic the elder Avery’s confident I can get anything I want look. Not bad. She looked glamorous and competent—clearly the right person for the position.

  But is it the right look for making friends?

  Avery wandered back into the bedroom. Two stuffed bears sat at the small pink and white hand-painted table set up in the corner. A china tea set was displayed on the table’s surface. It was silly and sentimental, a fixture in the nursery that both Edie and the triplets had played in as children. When Grandmother Avery had become bedridden this past spring, she’d asked for the toy to be placed in her room as a reminder of her own tea parties. She regularly entertained Anne Hearst and Senga Mortimer and had won over all of New York’s best hostesses by out-hostessing them. Avery picked up a teacup. What better way to introduce students to her—and her past—than by holding an updated, totally cool and unique tea party?

  Practically skipping with glee, Avery ran down the stairs and into the dining room, flinging open the glass doors to Grandmother Avery’s china cabinet.

  “What are you doing?” Karen snapped, holding a handful of files and squinting her lopsided blue eyes at Avery. She was wearing Nine West pumps. Avery wanted to slap her.

  “I need these. Can you give me some packing materials?” Avery ordered, thrusting a bone-thin china cup at her.

  “I’m not sure. . . .” Karen hesitated.

  “My mother asked for them.” Avery felt like stomping her foot. After all, the teacups belonged to her family, not to Karen. “They’re ours,” she added insistently.

  “Okay.” Karen relented, scurrying off to find bubble wrap. Even though she knew it was childish and completely inappropriate, Avery stuck out her tongue at Karen’s retreating backside. The position at Constance was all about being a leader, not a follower, exactly like Grandmother Avery. When she was voted in, Grandma Avery, wherever she was, would be so very, very proud.

  When? Cocky much?

  The Poor Little Rich Girl Blues

  Jack leaned back against the steps of the Metropolitan Mus
eum of Art as she sucked down the Splenda-sweetened dregs of her iced coffee. Jiffy Bennett, Genevieve Coursy, and Sarah Jane Jenson were perched around her, smoking Merits and occasionally glancing down at the shirtless skater boys performing tricks on the steps below. This was where they always ended up hanging out when there was nowhere else to go, and even though it was kind of boring, Jack felt totally at home. This was her junior year, when she would get the lead in The Nutcracker, be the toast of New York City, maintain an A-plus average, and finally have sex with J.P. It was all too perfect, and it was all about to come true.

  “So what was up with that girl in French?” Jiffy asked as she turned her freckled face to the sun and exhaled a cloud of smoke in the direction of the skaters.

  “Baby Carlyle?” Sarah Jane looked over and readjusted her glasses. “I don’t know. My mom knew the Carlyles’ mom in school, though, and apparently she’s a total freak, too.” Sarah Jane had practically white eyelashes and eyebrows, giving her a permanently startled expression. “But their grandmother was the Avery Carlyle, so, you know, they can’t, like, ban Avery and Baby from Constance. . . .” She trailed off, sighing.

  “The Avery Carlyle? What does that mean?” Jack asked. Talking about the Carlyles was so boring. She’d rather talk about something interesting.

  Like herself, for instance?

  “You don’t know who Avery Carlyle is?” Sarah Jane looked even more surprised than usual. “She was, like, one of those old lady philanthropists. She hung out with Brooke Astor, Annette de la Renta . . . all them. One of my aunts was friends with her. Apparently, she had affairs with at least one royal in every European country. My aunt said it was her goal or something.” Sarah Jane nodded summarily.

  Thank you, Miss Town & Country.

  “Whatever,” Genevieve said loyally. She leaned back on her elbows so that her boobs stuck out for the viewing pleasure of the gaggle of Frisbee-toting St. Jude’s guys walking past.