“Maybe.”
“I’m not,” she repeats. “Just you. Promise.”
I let it sit there, the nonadmission. I am not certain I entirely believe her. But it strikes me then that I’m also not certain it matters. That knowing that she likely had similar relationships with Minnie and Delphine does not make me feel any different. No more sad or enraged or even disappointed. If anything, I feel numb. And for a moment I wonder if this is how it was for François with Élodie. The abilityto separate sex and attraction not from emotion, per se, but from something far more intense, profound, sacred. Is this the difference between limerence and love?
“Oh,” she says, popping up and moving toward the glass doors. “I completely forgot the menus. How do you feel about Vietnamese?”
XXXVIII.OCTOBER SURPRISE.
LOS ANGELES.
OCTOBER. 2016.
The first Friday of October, I commit to spending the day in my studio. The kids are at school and Fran is in ADR sessions on the lot. And Leelou’s absence feels greater than usual. So after a bike ride at the beach, I pack up my computer and headphones and head down to Palms to work on editing voice recordings and sorting through more images.
I spent four days in New York at the end of September photographing and interviewing a handful of friends. Their diverse faces rounding out my collection for the exhibit.
Audrey Fahrenkopf, my brilliant and beautiful half-Japanese, half-Jewish college roommate. Audrey’s mom, Yukiko Shibata Fahrenkopf, seventy-five, with a mane of silver and skin like porcelain. Natalia Addo, a Ghanaian writer, whom I’d met working forÉlanmagazine my first year out of college, with classic Ashanti features and a flawless ebony complexion. Pilar Anchorena, a fellow artist from Argentina—dark hair, soulful eyes, olive skin. Alex Locke, my closest friend from Hartsdale High, with her striking and unusual blend of German and Lebanese traits. Hooded eyes, sharp cheekbones, elongated limbs. And my cousins, Sylvie and Jane.
Sylvie was shocked when I’d asked her to sit for me. I believe she thought I was pulling her leg until she showed up at the rentedstudio. I’d hired a stylist each for hair, makeup, and clothes to make everything move faster. And two assistants and a studio manager, so that there was someone to change over lighting and backdrops while I conducted interviews in one of the dressing rooms. I’d never felt more like I was running a factory, but it worked.
I was making my final choices on portraits for the slideshow portion of the installation when the news came over NPR. An old clip from an entertainment-news show had somehow been unearthed featuring a presidential candidate sounding decidedly unpresidential. Sounding predatory, in fact. He was boasting (joking? Gloating?) about groping women. The things one could get away with under the cover of celebrity. And using shockingly coarse language to do so. It cut. Like jagged fingernails on freshly bathed skin. And it clung, like something dirty I could not wash off. And the fact that it was on every news station, at the top of every hour, playing on repeat, was oppressive. Triggering.
Eventually, I turned off the news. Shut down the computer. And went home.
XXXIX.AWAKENING.
CABO SAN LUCAS. 1996.
SATURDAY.
On Saturday, the final day of shooting for the di Varenna campaign, the group descended upon Playa Santa Maria, a picturesque inlet fifteen minutes down the coast from the team’s hotel. As usual, Cecilia and Marc had arrived before the talent to unload their equipment, while Maren’s crew set up base camp in the parking lot and a second staging area closer to the water. They had a later start time than usual, and the sun was rising by the time Kip and Stu had erected the canopies and a couple of folding tables and chairs just up from the shore.
Cecilia took a moment to drink it all in, their last full day in paradise. The pink crescent beach nestled between two large rock formations, the water a crystalline blue, the sun mounting in a violet sky. The detached villas of the Hotel Twin Dolphin dotted the adjacent hills, but the area was otherwise rugged and remote. Perfection.
“Not bad, huh?” Marc commented, smearing zinc oxide across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. “Can’t wait to dive in when this day is done.”
“The locations on this shoot have been amazing.”
“Yeah. Someone ought to raise a glass to Maren.” A smile crept slowly across his face, the white streaks spreading like war paint. “Too soon?”
Cecilia held up her bandaged hand, brandishing the waterproof cover she’d fashioned with a plastic bag and gaffer tape. “Too soon.”
In truth, she hadn’t given much thought to her injury, other than navigating in the shower that morning with one arm outside of the stall. The pain was minor, and the incident paled in comparison to what had occurred afterward in Anouk’s suite. That, she could not wipe from her mind. Mixed feelings of shame and guilt and pleasure that washed over her intermittently.
Slowly, the team rolled in, one after the other. Sandro and Emilio moving in slow motion, Pietro appearing hungover, Jean-Luc and Rafaella giggling like teenagers. And Maren keeping to herself beneath a wide-brimmed hat and Persol sunglasses, paging through her Smythson notebook. Cecilia wondered if she was actually working or just faking it so she would not have to engage with others after last night’s melee. She could not imagine the embarrassment.
“Allô, les filles, les garçons! Dernier jour,” Didier announced, chirping upon his arrival in the tent. He greeted the team warmly, and on the surface, all seemed well, but Cecilia knew better. The sparkle did not quite reach his eyes. There was tension there.
“How is your hand, Cecilia?”
“Functioning mostly.”
“Bon. We make Marc do the heavy lifting today, yes?” He took a deep breath then, taking in the expanse of the cove, the sun, the sky, the sea. “C’est pas mal, hein? C’est pas mal du tout.”
Cecilia agreed that, all things considered, it wasn’t bad at all.
At some point Anouk, Bas, and Elliot descended from the parking lot with Sarah, Beatriz, Santiago, and Paola in tow. It was a pared-down crew. With Jaya and Katrine wrapped, the other assistants had stayed back at the hotel, packing up and shipping out inventory, prepping for the flight home.
