‘Not really,’ I said, trying to synthesize everything she’d said while the sound of blood rushed through my ears. A duke? Gwyneth??
‘It’s so ironic,’ she mumbled to herself. ‘Every girl on the planet makes it her lifelong goal to have sex with Philip Weston and you go and do it without even knowing who he is? It’s almost too much.’
‘Have sex with him? What?’ If by ‘having sex’ you mean ‘listening as he fires the maid for gross neglect of $4,000 sheets,’ then yes, we had a mind-blowing night.
‘Bette! Give up the “I’m so innocent” routine. We all saw you last night!’
At that exact moment, it was impossible to comprehend anything other than the fact that the same man who used to have sex with Gwyneth Paltrow had not only seen me naked, but had also witnessed period underwear, unshaved legs, and a viciously overgrown bikini line.
‘Nothing happened,’ I muttered, wondering how quickly I could pack my bags, change my name, and move to Bhutan.
‘Riiiiight.’ She smiled lasciviously.
‘No, really. Granted, I woke up at his place, and granted, I was wearing his clothes, but absolutely nothing happened.’
She looked dumbfounded and disappointed. ‘How is that even possible? He’s much too gorgeous to resist.’
‘Did you sleep with him, Elisa?’ I asked teasingly.
She looked as though she’d been slapped. ‘No!’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to suggest … I was just kidding, I didn’t think you had—’
‘Way to rub it in, is all. I’ve only been lusting after him forever now, but he barely even glances in my direction. I see him out all the time, of course, and he, like, totally knows who I am, so maybe it’s just a matter of time. …’ Her voice once again took on a dreamy quality.
I coughed and she snapped back to attention. I was just about to be flattered by the fact that Philip had taken me home last night when he could have had Elisa instead, but I didn’t have a chance to revel.
‘I mean, the boy will sleep with any decent-looking girl he can get his hands on, so I just don’t understand what’s wrong with me,’ she said tonelessly.
‘Any girl?’ I asked, still determined to hold on to the illusion that I might be his one and only.
‘Well, pretty much any hot girl, which is why I can’t understand why he doesn’t respond to me. Maybe he just doesn’t like his women thin.’
Ouch. Unintentional, but painful. I waited while she continued with her stock-taking.
‘Let’s see. Skye dated him, but that was years ago, way before he became who he is now. So did one of the List Girls – the pretty one – and that girl who was on the cover of Marie Claire last month, and a solid handful of the hottest girls at Condé Nast.’ She continued to tick off names of beautiful and social girls, some that I recognized from years of idly reading the gossip columns and party pages, but I could barely hear her. Luckily, she only hit about a dozen before Kelly bounded from her office and called for me to enter her animal-print hell – the whole room was done in a hallucinogenic mixture of zebra, leopard, and tiger fabrics, replete with oversized furry pillows and a giant, spotted shag rug.
‘Hey there, Bette. How is everything?’ she said happily, closing the door and motioning for me to take a seat on a chair covered in what felt like actual skin and hair.
‘Uh, great. It’s been a great first week so far.’
‘I’m so glad! I think so, too!’ Biggest smile yet.
‘Uh, yeah. Seriously, I’m so happy to be here, and I promise I’ll get all this stuff down as quickly as possible so I can start actually contributing instead of just watching,’ I said with what sounded to me like a reasonable level of sobriety and coherence.
‘Uh-huh, that’s nice. So tell me about last night!’ She clasped her hands together and leaned forward.
‘Oh, right, last night. Yeah, I went to dinner with Elisa and Skye and Leo and a couple others and we had such a nice night. It’s a really great group of people you have here. Of course, I won’t always let them keep me out so late. …’ I laughed, trying to sound casual, since I wasn’t exactly used to discussing nights out with my boss. Aaron most certainly hadn’t been my go-to morning-after confidant, but Kelly seemed eager for it.
‘You mean, you won’t let them keep you out until the next morning …’ She grinned and let her words trail off.
Ahem. I suspected we were toeing the line between personal and professional, and I wasn’t about to cross it. ‘It was a great dinner! I just love everyone who works here.’ A slightly inane non sequitur, but it was the only thing that came to mind.
She leaned forward, brushing her side-swept bangs even more to the left, and placed her elbows on the rough-hewn wooden desk. ‘Bette, dear, you can’t expect to, ah, spend the night with Philip Weston and not have the entire world know about it. Here, look.’ She thrust a piece of computer paper across the table. My hands shook as I took it.
I recognized it immediately as that day’s edition of the column that Abby and Elisa had been talking about the night before, New York Scoop. It had been printed from the Scoop’s website and the headline read: MYSTERY GIRL CHECKS INTO WESTON’S HOTEL. The story went on to detail how Philip had been ‘accosted’ at Bungalow 8 the previous evening by a ‘pretty young thing’ who some sources ‘have fingered as a new hire at Kelly & Company. Keep it tuned right here to see if she resurfaces anytime soon …’ The byline at the bottom of the piece read ‘Ellie Insider.’ That’s a stupid name, I thought.
Despite the ‘pretty young thing’ semi-compliment that was undoubtedly supplied to fill space, my stomach dropped and I looked at Kelly in horror.
‘I’m working feverishly alongside half of Manhattan trying to figure out who Ellie Insider is. It’s fucking brilliant. Do you believe how quickly they get things posted? I suppose that’s the benefit of having it online, although I still can’t help feeling that these, these, blogs are just little diaries for people who can’t actually get published.’
‘Kelly, it’s so not what it looks like. I can explain. It’s just that after dinner, we—’
‘Bette, I know exactly what happened. And I’m thrilled!’
‘You are?’ I was certain this was just her convoluted way of firing me.
‘Of course! Look, this is an ideal scenario. Philip Weston, Bungalow 8, a mention for the office. The only thing I ask is that next time you make sure the real Page Six is watching, too. This is a solid mention, but the column’s still pretty new, and not completely up to par yet with its circ numbers.’
I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. She didn’t seem to notice, though.
‘He’s amazing, isn’t he? Just between you and me, I’ve always had a thing for him.’
‘You have? For Philip?’
‘Ohmigod, girl, who hasn’t? He’s splendid. Not only is he all boldfaced mentions all the time, he also happens to look amazing without a shirt.’
Her face had taken on the same hazy expression as Elisa’s had earlier. ‘Did you date him?’ I asked, praying with all my energy that the answer was no.
‘Good