UPPER EAST SIDE Read online

  UPPER EAST SIDE

  ASHLEY VALENTINE

  Copyright © 2016 by Ashley Valentine

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

  may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

  without the express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Based on the Gossip Girl series by Cecil von Ziegesar.

  Table of Contents

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  Author's Note

  February is like the girl at that party I threw when my parents took a “second honeymoon” in Cabo last week (I know: sad). You remember—the girl who puked all over the marble floor in the guest bathroom and then refused to leave? We had to throw her Dior saddlebag and embroidered sheepskin coat into the elevator before she finally got the message.

  Unlike most places in the world, though, New York refuses to fall into a February-induced depression and become a cold, gray, dismal wasteland. At least, my New York does. Here on the Upper East Side we all know the cure for the drearies: one of Jedediah Angel’s crazy-sexy party dresses, a pair of black satin Manolos, that new red lipstick you can only get at Bendel’s, a good Brazilian bikini wax, and a generous slathering of self-tanner, in case your St. Barts tan left over from Christmas break has finally faded. Most of us are second semester seniors—at last. Our college applications are in and our schedules are light, with a double free period every day during which we can catch a Fashion Week runway show or head back to a friend’s penthouse apartment to drink skinny lattes, smoke cigarettes, and help pick out the evening’s screw-homework party outfit.

  Another redeeming thing about February is my all-time favorite should-be-a-national-no-school-holiday, Valentine’s Day. If you already have a sweetheart, lucky you. If you don’t, now’s the chance to put the moves on that hottie you’ve been drooling over all winter. Who knows? You might find true love, or at least true lust, and soon every day will feel like Valentine’s Day. Either that or you can just sit at home IMing sad, anonymous notes to people and eating heart-shaped chocolates until you can’t fit into your favorite pair of jeans anymore. It’s up to you...

  1

  “Just a few fries and some ketchup, please,” Bree Hargrove told Irene, the one-hundred-year-old lunch lady behind the counter in the basement cafeteria of the Emma Willard School for Girls. “Just a few,” Bree repeated. Today was the first day of peer group, and Bree didn’t want her senior peer group leaders to think she was a total pig.

  Peer group was a new program the school was trying out. Every Monday at lunchtime the freshman girls were to meet in groups of five with two senior girls to discuss peer pressure, body image, boys, sex, drugs, alcohol, and any other issues that might be bothering the freshman girls or that the two senior peer group leaders deemed important enough to talk about. The idea was that if the older girls shared their experiences with the younger girls and started a sympathetic dialogue, the younger girls would make informed decisions instead of stupid high-school-career-damaging mistakes that might embarrass their parents or the school.

  With its beamed ceiling, mirrored walls, and birchwood modernist tables and chairs, the Willard cafeteria looked more like a hot new restaurant than an institutional dining room. The dingy old cafeteria had been redone last summer because so many students had been going out for lunch or bringing their own that the school had been losing money on wasted food. The new cafeteria had won an architectural prize for its appealing design and high-tech kitchen, and it was now the students’ favorite in-school hangout, despite the fact that Irene and her mean, stingy, old cronies were still the ones serving the food from the cafeteria’s updated menu.

  Bree wove her way through the clusters of girls in pleated navy blue, gray, or maroon wool uniform skirts, picking at their wasabi-smoked tuna burgers and chatting about the parties they’d been to this past weekend. She slid her stainless steel tray onto the empty round table that had been reserved for peer group A and sat down with her back to the mirrored wall so she wouldn’t have to look at herself while she ate. She couldn’t wait to find out who her senior peer group leaders were going to be. Supposedly the competition had been fierce, since being a leader was a relatively painless way of showing colleges that you were still involved in school activities even though your applications were already in. It was like getting extra credit for eating fries and talking about sex for fifty minutes.

  Who wouldn’t want to do that?

  “Hello, Bree.” Porsha Sinclaire, the bitchiest, vainest girl in the entire senior class, or maybe the entire world, slid her tray into the place across from Bree and sat down. She tucked a lock of thick, shoulder-length hair behind her ear and muttered at her reflection in the wall of mirrors. “I can’t wait for my haircut.” She glanced at Bree, picked up her fork, and raked it through the dollop of whipped cream on top of her chocolate cake. “I’m one of the leaders for peer group A. Are you in group A?”

  Bree nodded, clutching the seat of her chair as she stared gloomily down at her plate of cold, greasy fries. She couldn’t believe her bad luck. Not only was Porsha Sinclaire the most intimidating senior in the school, she was also Kaliq Braxton's ex-girlfriend. Porsha and Kaliq had always been the perfect couple; the ones destined to stay together forever and ever. Then, strange as it might have seemed, Kaliq had actually dumped Porsha for Bree after meeting Bree in the park and sharing a joint with her.

  It had been Bree’s first joint, and Kaliq had been her first love. She’d never dreamed of having an older boyfriend, let alone one as gorgeous and cool as Kaliq. But after a couple of too-good-to-be-true months, Kaliq had gotten bored with Bree and had proceeded to break her heart in the cruelest way by ditching her on New Year’s Eve. So now she and Porsha Sinclaire actually had something in common—they’d both been dumped by the same boy. Not that that made any difference. Bree was pretty sure that Porsha still hated her guts.

  Porsha knew perfectly well that Bree was the balloon-boobed freshman whore who’d stolen her Kaliq away, but she also knew that Kaliq had dumped Bree flat on her ass after some extremely embarrassing pictures of her bare butt in a thong had been posted on the Web just before New Year’s Eve. Porsha figured Bree had already gotten her punishment, and she really couldn’t be bothered with hating her anymore.

  Bree looked up. “Who’s your coleader?” she asked timidly. She wished the other members of the group would hurry up and get there before Porsha tore her head off with her perfectly manicured fingernails.

  “Chanel’s coming.” Porsha rolled her eyes. “You know her. She’s always late.” She combed her fingers through her hair, envisioning the cut she was going to get when she went for her appointment during double free period. She was going to have them do a mahogany rinse to get rid of the copper-colored highlights, and then she wanted it cut short, in a modern, superstylish sort of way, like Dorothy Dandridge
in Carmen Jones.

  “Oh,” Bree replied, relieved. Chanel Crenshaw was Porsha’s best friend, but she wasn’t nearly as intimidating, because she was actually nice.

  “Hi, guys. Is this peer group A?” A gangly, freckled freshman girl named Elise Wells sat down next to Bree. She smelled like baby powder, and her strawlike hair was cut in a chin-length bob with thick bangs masking her forehead. “I’m just going to tell you now that I have a problem with eating,” Elise announced. “I can’t eat in public.”

  Porsha nodded and pushed her slice of chocolate cake away from her. In peer group leader training, the health teacher, Ms. Doherty, had told them to listen and try to be sensitive, putting themselves in the younger girls’ shoes. Ms. Doherty should talk. All she ever talked about in ninth-grade health class was the boyfriends she’d had and all the sexual positions she’d tried. Still, Ms. Doherty was one of the teachers Porsha had hit up for an extra recommendation to send to the Yale admissions office, and she really wanted to stand out as the best peer group leader in the senior class. She wanted her peer group freshmen to like her—no, adore her—and if one of them had a problem with eating in public, Porsha wasn’t going to sit there gorging herself on chocolate cake, especially not when she’d been planning to throw it up as soon as the bell rang anyway.

  Porsha pulled a pile of handouts out of her red Louis Vuitton bag. “Body image and self esteem are two of the issues we’ll be discussing today,” she told Elise and Bree, trying to sound professional. “If my coleader and the rest of our group ever decide to get here,” she added impatiently. Was it physically possible for Chanel to ever be on time?

  Apparently not.

  Just then, in a flurry of gray cashmere and shimmering silky hair, Chanel Crenshaw slid her shapely, tanned butt into the chair next to Porsha. The three other peer group A freshman girls were trailing her like baby ducklings. “Look what we suckered Irene into giving us!” Chanel crowed, slapping a heaping plate full of greasy onion rings down in the middle of the table. “I told her we were having a special meeting and we were starving.”

  Porsha glanced sympathetically at Elise, who was glowering at the plate of onion rings with thick-lashed eyes. “You’re late,” Porsha accused, passing out the handouts to Chanel and the other three freshmen. “I’m Porsha,” she told them. “And you are...?”

  “Mary Goldberg, Vicky Reinerson, and Cassie Inwirth,” the three girls responded in unison.

  Elise nudged Bree’s elbow. Mary, Vicky, and Cassie were the most annoyingly inseparable threesome in the freshman class. They were always brushing each other’s hair in the hallways, and they did everything together, including pee.

  Porsha glanced down at the handout and read aloud, “Body image: accepting and embracing who you are.” She looked up and smiled at the freshmen expectantly. “Do any of you have a particular body image issue you’d like to talk about?”

  Bree felt the blood creep into her neck and face as she boldly considered telling them about the breast-reduction consultation. But before she could get the words out, Chanel crammed an enormous onion ring into her delicate mouth and interjected, “Can I just say something first?”

  Porsha frowned at her best friend, but Mary, Vicky, and Cassie were nodding eagerly. Listening to anything Chanel Crenshaw had to say was so much more interesting than any stupid body image discussion.

  Chanel plunked her elbows down on top of the handout and rested her perfectly chiseled chin in her manicured hands, her enormous dark eyes gazing dreamily at her idyllic reflection in the mirrored wall. “I’m so in love,” she sighed.

  Porsha clutched her fork and dug into the piece of chocolate cake again, forgetting about her no-eating solidarity with Elise. Chanel was so goddamned insensitive. First of all, the guy she was apparently “so in love” with happened to be Porsha’s new hippie, guitar-playing, dreadhead stepbrother, Tahj Archibald, which was just so absurd. And second of all, even though Kaliq had dumped Porsha way back in November, Porsha was still not over Kaliq, and the mere mention of the word love made her want to blow chunks.

  “I think we’re supposed to get them to talk about their problems, not talk about ourselves,” she hissed at Chanel. Of course, if Chanel had actually bothered to show up for peer group training, she would have known that herself.

  Chanel had blown the training off so she could go to a movie with Tahj, and, like a gullible idiot, Porsha had covered for her. She’d told Ms. Doherty that Chanel had a migraine but that she would personally go over all the major points they covered in training when Chanel felt better. It was so typical. Whenever Porsha did anything nice for someone else, she usually regretted it.

  Which kind of explained why she was such a bitch most of the time.

  Chanel shrugged her perfect shoulders. “I think love is a much better topic than body image anyway. I mean, we all talked body image to death in ninth-grade health.” She glanced at the freshmen seated around the table. “Right?”

  “I just think we should follow the handout,” Porsha insisted stubbornly.

  “It’s up to you guys,” Chanel told the younger girls.

  Mary, Vicky, and Cassie waited, ears pricked, for the scoop on Chanel’s love life. Elise reached out and poked a greasy onion ring with a trembling, chewed-on fingernail and then snatched her hand away again as if she’d been burned. Bree licked her winter-chapped lips. “Since we’re supposed to talk about body image, I guess I have something to say,” she told the group, her voice wavering. She looked up to find Porsha nodding and smiling at her encouragingly.

  “Yes, Bree?”

  Bree looked down at the table again. Why was she even telling them this? Because I need to tell someone, she realized. She forced herself to keep talking despite the furious hot blush of embarrassment burning her face. “This weekend I almost had a consultation for a breast reduction.”

  Mary, Vicky, and Cassie scooted forward in their chairs to listen. Not only was peer group going to be the place to pick up the latest fashion trends from the two coolest girls in school, it was going to be a major resource for gossip!

  “I made the appointment,” Bree continued, “but then I didn’t go.” She pushed her plate away and took a sip of water, trying to ignore the curious stares of the other girls. The group was riveted, and stealing the spotlight from Porsha and Chanel was no easy feat.

  Elise picked up an onion ring, took a tiny bite, and dropped it on the plate again. “What made you change your mind?” she asked.

  “You don’t have to answer that,” Porsha interrupted, remembering something Ms. Doherty had said in their training session about not pushing the members of the group to open up before they were ready. She glanced at her coleader. Chanel was busy examining her split ends with a dreamy, faraway look, as if she hadn’t heard a word anyone had said. Porsha turned back to Bree and tried to think of something reassuring to say so Bree wouldn’t feel like she was the only one in the group with breast-size issues.

  “I always wanted bigger breasts. I’ve seriously considered getting implants.” It wasn’t a total lie. She was only a B cup and had always aspired to a C.

  Who hasn’t?

  “Really?” Chanel demanded, drifting back to earth. “Since when?”

  Porsha took another angry bite of cake. Was Chanel purposely trying to sabotage her leadership skills? “You don’t know everything about me,” she snapped.

  Cassie, Vicky, and Mary kicked each other under the table. This was so exciting! Chanel Crenshaw and Porsha Sinclaire were having a fight, and they were witnessing every word of it!

  Elise combed her chewed-on fingernails through her thick bob. “I think it was really, um, amazing of you to tell us about that, Bree.” She smiled shyly at Bree. “And I think it was brave of you not to do it.”

  Porsha scowled. Why hadn’t she said something about how brave Bree was instead of making that outrageous statement about wanting implants? Who knew what these stupid freshmen were going to say about her once the group brok
e up? Then she remembered something else Ms. Doherty had gone over in their training session.

  “Oops. I think we were supposed to say something about confidentiality before we started. You know, like, nothing we say here will be repeated outside the group, or whatever?”

  Too late. In a matter of minutes every girl in the school would be discussing Porsha Sinclaire's upcoming breast-implant job. I heard she’s waiting until the day after graduation...etc., etc.

  Bree shrugged. “It’s okay. I don’t care who you tell.” It wasn’t like she could hide her enormous boobs anyway. They were just there.

  Elise bent down and picked up her backpack. “Um, there are only eight minutes left before the bell rings. Is it all right if I go out and buy a yogurt now?” she asked.

  Chanel nudged the plate of onion rings towards Elise. “Have some more of these,” she offered generously.

  Elise shook her head, her freckled face flushed pink. “No, thanks. I don’t eat in public.”

  Chanel frowned. “Really? That’s weird.” She winced as Porsha elbowed her in the arm, hard. “Ow! God, what was that for?”

  “Maybe if you’d actually gone to peer group leader training, you’d get it,” Porsha growled under her breath.

  “Can I go now?” Elise asked again.

  It occurred to Porsha that the peer group freshmen would really love her if she let them all go early. She could use the extra eight minutes to get to the hair salon on time anyway. “You can all go,” she said, smiling sweetly, “unless you really want to stay and listen to Chanel talk about love for the rest of the period.”

  Chanel stretched her arms over her head and grinned up at the ceiling. “I could talk about love all day.”

  Bree stood up. Ever since Kaliq had ditched her, love was the last thing she wanted to talk about. Funny—she’d thought Porsha was going to be the peer group leader she couldn’t deal with, but it was turning out to be Chanel.