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“What happened?” I ask, just because I’m nosey.
She shakes her head and shrugs her shoulders, and I reckon I see a tiny bit of genuine sadness creep in there and it scares me, so I nod my chin at her.
“Tell me about this dress, then — who are we wearing today?”
She stands a bit taller, eyes go bright how they always do about clothes.
“Take a guess.”
I tilt my head, taking the opportunity to check her out. She’s unreasonably beautiful. Always has been but when she wears light colours she goes browner. I love her in white. She’s been wearing so much black lately, bit unlike her. She is the personification of colour and light, so that’s all she should be wearing.
“Gucci?” I take a guess after picking up the hem of her dress in my fingers.
She shakes her head. “Cotton-blend lace-trimmed stretch-jersey mini dress by… Miu Miu.”
“Ah.” I nod once. “Should have guessed that. Coat?”
“Gabriela Hearst—” Points to her boots. “Chloé.” Points to her headband. “Jennifer Behr.” Flashes me her bag.
“—Saint Laurent,” I jump in because I’m not an idiot.
Magnolia’s eyes flicker over to the other side of the room where Julian is. Think their eyes must catch because she looks away quickly and back down at the hem of her dress that I’m still holding.
Jordan notices. Stares at the material between my fingers, looks over her shoulder at Julian, then back at Magnolia. Looks at her.
“How’s Julian?” she asks as I finally let go of Parks’ dress.
Magnolia and my eyes catch and she gives Jordan a delicate smile. “We are no longer,” she uses quotation marks, “‘involved.’”
“Oh,” Jordan frowns a bit. Can’t totally place the frown. It’s not empathetic. It’s not sorry for herself either. It’s inconvenienced, maybe? “Sorry.”
Magnolia shakes her head. “No, it’s—” She swallows. “Fine.”
This is it, I tell myself. I’m going to do it now.
“Hey, Jords—” I nod my head towards the offices. “Can we have a—”
And then this happens so quickly. Jordan’s staring at me, so I know she heard me, but after she clocks what I said she looks back at Magnolia.
“We’re going to Italy next week,” Jordan says brightly, linking her arm with mine.
I go still. Shit. Why?
“Oh.” Magnolia blinks a few times and looks instantly wounded.
“Yeah!” Jordan beams, eying her down a tiny bit. “For his birthday. It’s going to be so good. Just the two of us at this—”
She keeps talking but I’m not listening. I’m trying to tell Parks with my blinks that Jordan’s wrong, we aren’t, that I’m going to end it in a minute, but Parks isn’t looking at me. She’s powered down, eyes gone glassy, gone inside herself how she does when I hurt her.
I feel unreasonably angry at Jords for this one. I don’t know why she did it, why she said it. Didn’t even feel like she was doing it to be territorial of me as much as she was just trying to get a rise out of Parks. Where was this initiative a month ago when we were sitting at brunch with Parks and Julian with his hand up her fucking skirt? Where was this gumption on New Year’s when Jules was kissing Parks’ neck right in front of me? It decides to rear its fucking head now? Now that Magnolia’s done with him, now that me and Parks are on a good foot? Now Jordan decides to deliver Parks with some casually devastating blows?
And I know we haven’t had those conversations yet so I know then that I am technically still Jordan’s, but still, I’m not. In every quiet whisper, every subtle and nuanced thread in the fabric of time, all the tiny ripples in the universe will tell you, that I’m actually just Parks’.
I need her to know, wish she’d just look at my fucking face right now so she could see it, but she’s not. Her eyes don’t come off her champagne glass.
And then there’s a scuffle.
Over at the boys’ table, Julian’s on his feet and he’s — I do a double take with this — he’s shoving Carmelo Bambrilla.
