Page 34 of State of Ruin

Entering Alchemy feels like stepping into a hyperbaric oxygen chamber after the evening I’ve had. The air is clear and Elyse, surely, is here. I know for a fact that she works Thursdays. I give the main floor a wide berth and head straight for Katrin’s office. I know what I want, and I know the fastest way to get it.

The way Elyse’s eyes go wide when she sees me in my custom Tom Ford is by far the most gratifying moment of my week so far.

“Wow,” she says, leaning back to shut the door of Katrin’s office without taking her eyes off me.

I take her in. Simple black pants and heels and a black silky camisole edged with lace. I bet the entire outfit cost under two hundred bucks, but she looks better than every single attendee at the gala tonight—and that thing was crawling with supermodels.

“I could say the same,” I say, sliding my hands into my pockets.

She shakes her head and gives a little laugh. “Nope. Don’t think so.”

“I do.” I stand very still as she approaches, an incredible sensation of calm washing over me. I’m alone in a room with her, and the relief of it is physical.

“Katrin said you wanted to see me?”

“Yeah.” I gesture toward one of the two chairs in front of Katrin’s desk. “Take a seat.”

She drops elegantly down and crosses her legs. Her hair is tied back today in a sleek knot.

She is perfect.

I try not to think about how it felt to see her face blown up on that screen last week, try to blot out the shock of it, the salacious horror. But she’s here now, and so am I, and that’s all that matters.

I reach up to tug the end of my bow tie, pulling it loose before making quick work of the top two buttons of my shirt. I’m decompressing, but I’m also hoping for a reaction—and that’s exactly what she’s giving me.

Her eyes latch on to the triangle of skin I’ve exposed. “What was the occasion?”

“I was at the Fall Fashion Gala. But I escaped, thank fuck.”

Her face brightens in pure delight. “Oh! That’s amazing!”

I’m surprised by such a genuinely enthusiastic reaction. The endless trappings and obligations of my social status are things I take for granted, for sure. But even the most lavish experiences grow tired when you attend them, year after year, driven by nothing but obligation. I imagine attending this evening’s gala with Elyse on your arm would be a whole other experience in myriad ways.

“You know it?”

“I always look at the red carpet reels,” she confesses with girlish glee. “And I watch the performances on YouTube, obviously. The costumes are always so incredible. It was Rodarte this year, right?”

“That’s right.” Each year, a different designer is invited to collaborate with the New York City Ballet on the costumes for these exclusive performances. It is objectively an impressive visual experience—I only wish it was a regular theatrical event with auditorium-style seating and absolutely no talking permitted. An evening sitting in the dark in total silence while a great sensory experience unfolds onstage is more my jam. “Are you a dancer?” I ask, because I’m still curious about this. “You move like a ballerina.”

She laughs. “No. Definitely not. I did it for a few years and it wasn’t my thing. My mom was a ballerina, though. She danced professionally before she became a teacher.”

The casual way she offers up this precious gift, this kernel of context about her, has a warmth spreading through my chest. “Oh yeah? That makes sense. You got her genes for sure.”

Her smile is wistful. “I’m not sure about that. She was an amazing dancer. Moved to New York from Paris when she was twenty to chase her dreams—but it didn’t happen for her. So she met my dad and became a ballet teacher instead.”

Vanessa’s words last week echo around my head. She’s even half French. I’m still trying to assimilate all these contexts—the Elyse I’ve fucked; the Elyse I can’t get out of my head and whose singular face still somehow eludes my mind’s eye in the darkest hours of the night; the Elyse whose unique allure Vanessa likened to that of a young Kate Moss; and now the Elyse whose French mother danced and chased impossible dreams that led her daughter to my doorstep.

“I bet you were a lot better than you give yourself credit for,” is all I can find to say, but I give her a smile I hope reflects how grateful I am that she’s shared a piece of herself with me. In some ways, that’s more intimate than the filthy liberties she’s allowed me upstairs.

She wrinkles her nose. “Not really. So how was the gala? Was it amazing? Did you see SJP? Who else was there?”

I find myself torn—torn between dismissing it, which seems a spectacularly arrogant thing to do to someone like Elyse who would kill for an invitation, and boasting about it, which is equally unthinkable. “It was beautiful,” I say instead. “Very well put together, as always. The performances were exceptional, and SJP was her usual, gracious self. I just… I don’t love the social side of these things, you know? They can be hard work.”

She shakes her head in what looks like amused disbelief. “Some people. So ungrateful.”

“You’ve got me.”

“So what you’re saying is that you were a total waste of a ticket?”