Upper East Side #1 Read online

  “Bye,” snarled tough Carmen Fortier, one of the few scholarship girls in the junior class. Carmen was headed to the Art of Floral Design Club, although she told her friends in her Bronx neighborhood that she took karate. Wow. Her hair is so not extensions. It’s totally real.

  Suddenly the hallway was empty. Chanel opened her locker, pulled her Burberry coat off the hook, and put it on. Then she slammed her locker shut and trotted downstairs and out the school doors, turning left down 93rdStreet toward Central Park. There was a box of orange Tic Tacs in her pocket with only one left. Chanel fished a Tic Tac out and put it on her tongue, but she was so worried about her future, she could barely taste it.

  She crossed Fifth Avenue, walking along the sidewalk that bordered the park, fallen leaves scattering the pavement. She thought about entering the park at 89th and sitting down for a while to kill time before the play rehearsal. But alone? What would she do, people-watch? She had always been one of those people everyone else watches. So she went home.

  Home was 994 Fifth Avenue, a ritzy, white-glove building next to the Stanhope Hotel and directly across the street from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Crenshaws owned half of the top floor. Their apartment had fourteen rooms, including five bedrooms with private bathrooms, a maid’s apartment, a ballroom-sized living room, and two seriously cool lounges with wet bars and huge entertainment systems.

  When Chanel got home the enormous apartment was empty. Her parents were rarely home. Her father ran the same Dutch shipping firm his great-great-grandfather had founded in the early 1900s. Both her parents were on the boards of all the big charities and arts organizations in the city and always had meetings or lunches or fundraisers to go to. Deidre, the maid, was out shopping, but the place was spotless and there were vases of fresh cut flowers in every room, including the bathrooms.

  Chanel slid open the door to the smaller of the lounges and flopped down on her favorite blue velvet armchair. She picked up the remote control and pressed the buttons to open the TV cabinet and turn on the flat-screen. She flipped through the channels impatiently, unable to focus on anything she saw, finally settling on VH1, even though she thought Love & Hip Hop was the most annoying show on Earth. She hadn’t even been watching much TV lately. At boarding school, her dormmates would make popcorn and hot chocolate and watch Martin or Fresh Prince in their pajamas, but Chanel preferred to slip away to drink peach schnapps and smoke cigars with the boys in the chapel basement.

  But what bothered her most now was not Love & Hip Hop or even the fact that she was sitting alone in her house with nothing to do, but the thought that she might spend the rest of her life doing just that―watching TV alone in her parents’ apartment―if she didn’t get her act together and get into college! Why was she so stupid? Everyone else seemed to have their shit together. Had she missed the all-important “it’s time to get your shit together” talk? Why hadn’t anyone warned her?

  Well, there was no point in freaking out. She still had time. And she could still have fun. She didn’t have to become a nun just because she was joining the Interschool Drama Club, or whatever.

  Chanel clicked the TV off and wandered into the kitchen. The Crenshaws’ kitchen was massive. Glass cabinets lined the walls above gleaming, stainless-steel counter tops. There were two restaurant stoves and three Sub-Zero refrigerators. An enormous butcher-block table stood in the center of the kitchen, and on the table was today’s pile of mail.

  Chanel picked up the mail and sifted through it. Mostly, there were invitations for her parents―white square envelopes printed with old-fashioned typefaces―to balls, benefit dinners, fundraisers, and auctions. Then there were the art openings―postcards with a picture of the artist’s work on one side and the details of the opening on the back. One of these caught Chanel’s eye. It had obviously been lost in the mail for a little while, because it looked beaten up, and the opening it announced was beginning at 4 P.M. on Wednesday, which was...right now .

  Chanel flipped the card over and looked at the picture of the artist’s work. It looked like a close-up, black-and-white photograph of an eye, tinted with pink. The title of the work was Rihanna and the name of the show was “Behind the Scene.” Chanel squinted at the picture. There was something innocent and beautiful about it, and at the same time it was a little gross. Maybe it wasn’t an eye. Actually she wasn’t sure what it was. It was definitely cool, though.

  There was no question about it. Chanel knew what she was doing for the next two hours. She flew into her bedroom, whipped off her maroon uniform, and pulled on her favorite pair of black leather jeans. Then she grabbed her coat and called the elevator.

  Within minutes she was stepping out of a taxi in front of the Whitehot Gallery downtown in Chelsea. The moment she got there, Chanel grabbed a free gin martini and signed the guest list. The gallery was full of twenty-something hipsters in cool clothes, drinking free martinis and admiring the photographs hanging on the walls. Each picture was similar to the one on the postcard, that same close-up black-and-white eye, blown up, all in different shapes and sizes and tinted with different colors. Under each one was a label, and on every label was the name of a celebrity: Rihanna, Drake, Zendaya, August, Nicki, Usher, Ariana. Pop music bubbled out of invisible speakers. The photo-artists themselves, the Remi brothers, identical twin sons of a French model and an English duke, were being interviewed and photographed for Art Forum, Vogue, W, Harper’s Bazaar, and the New York Times.

  Chanel studied each photograph carefully. They weren’t eyes, she decided, now that she was looking at them blown up. But what were they? Belly buttons?

  Suddenly Chanel felt an arm around her waist.

  “Hello, ma chèrie. Beautiful girl. What is your name?”

  It was one of the Remi brothers. He was twenty-six years old and five foot seven, the same height as Chanel. He had curly black hair and brilliant blue eyes and spoke with a French and British accent. He was dressed head to toe in navy blue, and his lips were dark red and curved foxily up at the corners. He was absolutely gorgeous, and so was his twin brother.

  Chanel didn’t resist when he pulled her into a photograph with him and his brother for the New York Times Sunday Styles section. One brother stood behind Chanel and kissed her neck while the other knelt in front of her and hugged her knees. Around them, people watched greedily, eager to catch a glimpse of the new “it” girl.

  Everyone in New York wants to be famous, or at least see someone who is so they could brag about it later.

  The New York Times society reporter recognized Chanel from social media and parties a year or so back, but he had to be sure it was her. “Chanel Crenshaw, right?” he asked, looking up from his notepad.

  Chanel blushed and nodded. She was used to being recognized.

  “You must model for us,” one of the Remi brothers gasped, kissing Chanel’s hand.

  “You must,” the other one agreed, feeding her an olive.

  Chanel laughed. “Sure,” she said. “Why not?” Although she had no idea what she was agreeing to.

  One of the Remi brothers pointed to a door marked Private across the gallery. “We’ll meet you in there,” he said. “Don’t be nervous. We’re both gay.”

  Chanel giggled and took a big gulp of her drink. Were they kidding?

  The other brother patted her on the bottom. “It’s all right darling. You’re absolutely stunning, so you’ve got nothing to worry about. Go on. We’ll be there in a minute.”

  Chanel hesitated, but only for a second. She could keep up with the likes of Rihanna and Ariana Grande. No problem. Chin up, she headed for the door marked Private.

  Just then, a guy from the Public Arts League and a woman from the New York Transit Authority came over to talk to the Remi brothers about a new innovative public art program. They wanted to put a Remi brothers’ photograph on the sides of buses, in subways, and in the advertising boxes on top of taxis all over town.

  “Yes, of course,” the Remis agreed. “If you can wa
it a moment, we’ll have a brand new one. We can give it to you exclusively!”

  “What’s this one called?” the woman asked eagerly.

  “Chanel,” the Remi boys said in unison.

  15

  “I found a printer who will do it by tomorrow afternoon and hand deliver each of the invitations so they get there by Friday morning,” Imani said, looking pleased with herself for being so efficient.

  “But look how expensive it is. If we use them, then we’re going to have to cut costs on other things. See how much Takashimaya is charging us for the flowers?”

  As soon as they were finished with their Wednesday afterschool activities, the Kiss on the Lips organizing committee―Porsha, Imani, and Alexis―had convened over French fries and hot chocolate in a booth at the 3 Guys Coffee Shop to deal with the last-minute preparations for the party.

  The crisis at hand was the fact that the party was only nine days away, and no one had received an invitation yet. The invitations had been ordered weeks ago, but due to a mix-up the location of the party had to be changed from The Park―a hot new restaurant in lower Chelsea―to the old Barneys building on 17thStreet and 7thAvenue, rendering the invitations useless. The girls were in a tight spot. They had to get a new set of invitations out, and fast, or there wasn’t going to be a party at all.

  “But Takashimaya is the only place to get flowers. And it really doesn’t cost much. Oh, come on, Porsh, think how cool they’ll be,” Alexis whined.

  “There are plenty of other places to get flowers,” Porsha insisted.

  “Well, maybe we can ask the peregrine falcon people to pitch in,” Imani suggested. She reached for a French fry, dunked it in ketchup, and popped it into her mouth. “They’ve barely done anything.”

  Porsha rolled her eyes, and blew into her hot chocolate. “That’s the whole point. We’re raising money for them. It’s a cause.”

  Alexis wound a lock of her 26-inch Malaysian extensions around her finger. “What is a peregrine falcon anyway?” she said. “Is it like a woodpecker?”

  “No, I think they’re bigger,” Imani said. “And they eat other animals, you know, like rabbits and mice and stuff.”

  “Gross,” Alexis shuddered.

  “They’re almost extinct,” Porsha added irritably. "Which is sort of the whole point." She thumbed through the list of people they were inviting to the party. There were three hundred and sixteen all together. All young people―no parents, thank God.

  Porsha’s eyes were automatically drawn to a name toward the bottom of the list: Chanel Crenshaw. The address given was her dorm room at Hanover Academy, in New Hampshire. Porsha put the list back down on the table without correcting Chanel’s address.

  “We’re going to have to spend the extra money on the printer and cut corners where we can,” she said quickly. “I can tell Takashimaya to use lilies instead of orchids and forget about the peacock feathers around the rims of the vases.”

  “I can do the invitations,” a small, clear voice said from behind them. “For free.”

  The three girls turned around to see who it was.

  Oh look, it’s that little Bria girl, Porsha thought. The ninth grader who did the calligraphy in our school hymnals.

  “I can do them all by hand tonight and put them in the mail. The materials are the only cost, but I know where to get good quality paper cheap,” Bree Hargrove said.

  “She did all our hymnals at school,” Alexis whispered to Imani. “They look really good.”

  “Yeah,” Imani agreed. “They’re nice.”

  Bree blushed and stared at the shiny linoleum floor of the coffee shop, waiting for Porsha to make up her mind. She knew Porsha was the one who mattered.

  “And you’ll do it all for free?” Porsha asked suspiciously.

  Bree raised her eyes. “I was kind of hoping that if I did the invites, maybe I could come to the party?”

  Porsha weighed the pros and cons in her mind. Pros: The invitations would be unique and best of all, free, so they wouldn’t have to skimp on the flowers. Cons: There really weren’t any, except that the little freshman’s boobs were going to take up a lot of space at the party.

  Porsha looked the Bree girl up and down. Their cute little ninth-grade helper with the huge chest. She was a total glutton for punishment, and she’d be totally out of place at the party. But who cared?

  “Sure, you can make yourself an invitation. Make one for one of your friends, too,” Porsha said, handing the guest list over to Bree.

  How generous.

  Porsha gave Bree all the necessary information, and Bree dashed out of the coffee shop breathlessly. The stores would be closing soon, and she didn’t have much time. The guest list was longer than she’d anticipated, and she’d have to stay up all night working on the invitations, but she was going to the party; that was all that mattered. Just wait until she told Mekhi. He was going to freak. And she was going to make him come with her to the party, whether he liked it or not.

  She hailed a cab, and told the cabbie to take her to Michaels, the huge crafts store on upper Broadway. The cab’s window was halfway down and the crisp late afternoon air had the distinct scent of New York in autumn—a mixture of smoking fireplaces, dried leaves, dog pee, and bus exhaust—a scent that to Bree seemed full of promise. She hugged herself. It was happening: She was going to Kiss On the Lips. She’d buy a cool new dress and wear the highest heels she could get away with. She’d straighten her hair—or at least try to—and curl her eyelashes. And at the party she was going to get kissed.

  On the lips?

  16

  Two martinis and three rolls of Remi brothers’ film later, Chanel jumped out of a cab in front of Willard and ran up the stairs to the auditorium, where the interschool play rehearsal had already begun. After having her photograph taken from every possible angle, she’d had a crisis of conscience, realizing that this sort of extracurricular activity wasn’t going to get her into college either. As always, she was half an hour late.

  Jaunty piano music drifted down the hallway. Chanel pushed open the auditorium door to find an old preschool acquaintance, Ralph Bottoms III, onstage rapping his lines with a completely straight face. He was dressed as Rhett Butler, complete with a faux mustache and brass buttons. He was holding hands with a stocky girl with curly hair and a heartshaped face―Scarlett O’Hara. She was rapping too, belting out the words in a thick Brooklyn accent.

  Chanel leaned against the wall to watch, with a mixture of horror and fascination. The scene at the art gallery hadn’t fazed her, but this―this was scary.

  The drama teacher, a sweaty, enthusiastic Englishwoman in clogs, finished the song with a prolonged piano chord. The rest of the Interschool Drama Club whistled and cheered. Then the drama teacher began to direct the next scene.

  “Put your hands on your hips, Scarlett,” she instructed. “Show me, show me. That’s it. Imagine you’re the Nicki Minaj of the Civil War South. You’re breaking all the rules!”

  Chanel turned to gaze out the window and saw three girls get out of a cab together on the corner of 93rdand Madison. She squinted, recognizing Porsha, Alexis, and Imani. Chanel hugged herself, warding off the strange feeling that had been stalking her since she’d come back to the city. For the first time in her entire life, she felt left out.

  Without a word to anyone in the drama club―Hello? Goodbye!―Chanel slipped out of the auditorium and into the hallway outside. The wall was littered with flyers and notices and she stopped to read them. One of the flyers advertised the tryout for Yasmine Richards' film: Natural Born Killers, a modern retelling of the violently romantic Oliver Stone classic. Try out for Mallory. Wednesday, sunset. Brooklyn Bridge.

  Knowing what little she did about Yasmine, the film was going to be very serious and obscure, but it was better than shouting goofy rap songs with Ralph Bottoms III. It was still light out. Hopefully the tryout wasn’t over. Once again, Chanel found herself running for a cab, headed downtown.

  �
��This is how I want you to do it,” Yasmine told Marjorie Jaffe, a sophomore at Emma Willard and the only girl who had shown up to try out for the role of Mallory Knox, the murderous teen bride in Yasmine's film. Marjorie was short and stocky, with dyed red hair, a little pug nose, and no neck. She chewed gum while she talked, had flabby arms that jiggled when she moved them, and was completely, nightmarishly wrong for the part.

  The sun was setting and the Brooklyn Bridge pedestrian footpath basked in a pretty pink glow. Ferries, container ships, barges, cruise ships, tugboats, yachts, small motor craft, and sailboats traversed the busy harbor. Cars zoomed back and forth over the bridge and helicopters policed the sky—all under the blandly imperious watch of the Statue of Liberty. The gusty sea air was fresh and cool, but tainted with the scent of New Jersey and the landfill on Staten Island. As always, the footpath was crawling with camera-toting tourists, eager to capture themselves in front of the most famous backdrop in the world.

  Mekhi leaned over the side of the bridge, waiting for the enormous orange Staten Island ferry to go off course and crash into Governor’s Island. A favorite haiku came to mind:

  A fishy smell—

  perch guts

  in the water weeds.

  Mekhi was dressed in his Mickey Knox costume, with the price tags tucked in so they wouldn’t show, and armed with the knife, a crowbar, and a baseball bat, all hanging from the black harness strapped over his shoulders and across his chest. Mekhi’s hollow cheeks and sunken eyes looked almost grotesque in the pinkish-gray twilight, and his ribs stuck out impossibly through the tight wifebeater. In him Yasmine thought she had created a very believable psychopath.

  “Watch,” Yasmine told Marjorie. She yanked the knife out of the leather sheath tied to the harness strapped to Mekhi’s chest, and pretended to cut open her own hand.

  “Is that a real knife?” Marjorie whined, chomping on her gum. “What if I cut myself for real?”