11:32 A.M., PST
Anna washed her face, brushed her teeth, and threw on some jeans, a T-shirt, and an ancient gray cashmere sweater with moth holes in the sleeves. She ran a brush through her hair and pulled it into a ponytail. Then she stuck last night’s evening bag into her larger Coach handbag and hurried back downstairs.
A rumble in her stomach reminded her that she hadn’t really eaten since the previous afternoon’s sandwich with her dad, so she made a quick pit stop in the kitchen, where she found a scrawled note from her father on the kitchen counter.
Anna,
Hope you slept well. Needed to let you know that there’s a snag with the internship thing. Still hope to work it out. Let’s talk later.
—Jonathan
A snag with the internship thing?? Couldn’t her father follow through on anything, ever? If it fell through, she was going to kill him; it was that simple.
She yanked the refrigerator door open angrily and found it nearly empty, except for the last of the crème brûlée cookies—so much for the help keeping the larder stocked. She grabbed a lemon yogurt, stuck it and a teaspoon in her purse, and went out to Monty’s SUV.
“Impressive,” Monty said, starting the engine. He looked at his wristwatch. “Six minutes and thirty seconds.” He looked at the yogurt in her hand and laughed.
“What?” Anna asked.
“Look behind you.”
Anna craned around to see that the entire back of the SUV was filled with food: giant plastic bags of croissants and dinner rolls, huge aluminum foil trays covered in plastic wrap, filled with steak and chicken and a rack of lamb. There was a massive tray of hors d’oeuvres—mini–spinach soufflés, bite-size Reuben sandwiches, and a massive bowl of guacamole.
“I’ve been picking up leftovers from various New Year’s Eve bashes for the past two hours,” Monty explained. “Those homeless are gonna eat like kings today.”
“It’s great that it’s not going to waste,” Anna said.
Monty started the SUV. “Kinda makes you want to chuck the yogurt, huh?”
“That food’s a little rich for breakfast.” Anna spooned lemon yogurt into her mouth while Monty told her about Beverly Hills High. Not that she’d asked. Not that she cared, except in the sense that she was thrilled not to be going there.
Traffic was light for once—most people were probably still hung over from New Year’s Eve, Anna figured—and they made it to Venice in twenty minutes. It wasn’t even hard to find a parking spot close to the beach.
Monty opened the hatchback of the SUV and unloaded a cart, which he began heaping with trays of food. “So, my brother said he met you last night at Sam’s dad’s wedding. Parker Pinelli?”
“We sat at the same table. Were you there?”
“Had to bow out. My mom was a little under the weather, so I stayed home with her.” He reached for a massive tray of pistachio-encrusted salmon that looked suspiciously like leftovers from the Jackson & Poppy nuptials. “So, you wanna hear about Venice while I work like a dog?”
“I’ve been here before.” Anna began helping Monty unload the food. “There are canals that were built to look like Venice, Italy. I must have read that somewhere once.”
“Jim Morrison lived in a house on the canal in the sixties; did you know that?”
“No.” Anna reached for the chilled bowl of guacamole and balanced it on top of the salmon.
“Of course, back then the houses on the canals were funky. That’s gone the way of vinyl records. Gotta have the megabucks to live in one of those cribs now.” He lifted an immense vat of pâté on top of everything else on the luggage cart, then wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his arm. The SUV was empty. “You didn’t have to help, you know.”
“I was supposed to just stand here and let you do all the work?”
“That’s how it usually goes. Anyway, thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
“All righty. Time to go party with the unfortunates!”
Monty carefully rolled the food toward the beach with Anna trotting alongside, watching for fallout. He seemed like such a nice, cheerful guy. She couldn’t understand why he was surprised that she’d help him and why no one else was.
“It’s about time!” Sam called, waving them over as they rounded the corner.
Wearing oversized sunglasses, with her hair tied up in an artfully messy bun, Sam was standing by a long banquet table covered with a pristine white tablecloth. Plastic cutlery, napkins, and paper plates were stacked at one end. Unfortunately, from Anna’s point of view, at the other end stood Dee and Cammie.
Anna was monumentally confused. It was one thing to underestimate Sam’s desire to do charity work. Dee she really didn’t know at all, other than that she didn’t seem that bright. But Cammie the Bitch? Up and at ’em on New Year’s Day to do charity work? Something just did not compute. Anna could see from the looks on Cammie and Dee’s faces that they were as surprised to see her as she was to see them.
Sam, on the other hand, found herself ridiculously happy to see Anna. At the same time, seeing Anna looking serene and slender in her simple jeans and sweater made Sam adjust the bottom of her Asian-inspired, mandarin-collared pink Roberto Cavalli shirt to make sure it covered her loathed hips. Anna had no hips. Sam would have been happy to loan her about six inches’ worth. She wondered what it would be like to look like Anna. No, that was a little too Single White Female for her.
Dee scurried over to Sam. “What is she doing here?”
“Anna? I invited her.”
“But why?”
“Because she’s my new best friend,” Sam said.
Dee got wide-eyed. “Really? After all the years we’ve been best friends?”
“Kidding, Dee.”
“Oh. So then …?”
Sam went for the easiest lie she could think of. “I invited her because I thought we could pump her about what she did last night. With Ben. You know.”
Dee furrowed the perfect blond brows that she had groomed once a month at Valerie’s. “Why do you care what she did last night?”
“For Cammie,” Sam hastily added.
“Right. For Cammie.” Dee looked at Cammie over her shoulder. “But Cammie is right there. She can do it herself.”
“Not without looking desperate.”
Dee nodded. “Yeah, I see your point. You’re a really good friend.”
“I try.” Sam beamed in Anna’s direction as she and Monty approached with the luggage cart full of food. “Glad you could make it.”
“Me too,” Anna said, squinting into the sun. She pulled her sunglasses out of her purse and put them on. It was a gloriously perfect, no-smog day; the sun reflecting off the sandy beach was blinding, the Santa Monica Mountains were visible in the distance.
Anna helped the group set the food out on the long buffet table. She hadn’t been down to funky Venice Beach in years, but the carnival atmosphere hadn’t changed as far as she could see. Ocean Front Walk, which ran parallel to the beach, was still lined with an eclectic variety of street performers and vendors pushing their wares. People of all ages zigged and zagged on skates or skateboards along the bike path. Tourists strolled along, taking photos of the local color.
A crowd began to gather around the buffet table, shouting questions at them. Who were they, how much was the food, who was the food for?
“For everyone,” Sam replied. “People!” she yelled to the growing crowd. “This food is free for all those who are hungry. Please form a line starting right here.”
“But only if you’re, like, poor and homeless and stuff,” Dee added. “We just want to do good deeds.”
Cammie checked her watch. “Where the hell is Parker?”
“He probably stopped to have new publicity shots taken,” Sam cracked.
“He’s got my Mercedes,” Cammie snapped. “If he stops anyplace besides Breckner’s, he’s dead.”
“Hey, when do we start eating?” someone in the crowd yelled.
“You’ve got a five-thousand-dollar Nikon around your neck!” Sam yelled back. “Get out of the line, bozo!”
“The natives are way restless,” Dee muttered.
Anna looked over the line as it snaked down the board-walk. There was a toothless man so filthy it was impossible to discern the color of his shirt, who wore a weathered cardboard sign around his neck that read, THE WORLD’S GREATEST WINO. Right behind were some upscale yuppies in designer beachwear eager for a free meal. A couple who looked to be in their sixties, completely covered in tattoos, held hands, waiting patiently.
“People, welcome to Venice!” a man on inline skates, guitar in hand, called out to the crowd. His dreadlocks were piled into a turban, and he wore purple harem pants. “I’m Ace Pace, world’s most famous street performer! I’m here to make your day!” He skated around the board-walk in large circle formations and played old Beatles songs on his electric guitar, his amp strapped to his arm.
“I think he was in White Men Can’t Jump!” one of the tourists exclaimed, and everyone began snapping Ace’s photo.
This was all very entertaining, but Anna was desperate for about four more hours of sleep, and she wasn’t clear on what the program was supposed to be. “What are we waiting for, exactly?” she asked Sam.
“We’re waiting for Mrs. Breckner, our project adviser.”
Anna was confused. “Sorry?”
“At Beverly Hills High, you have to do community service first semester every year. The report has to be turned in by the first day back after winter vacation, which is day after tomorrow.”
The truth was slowly beginning to dawn on Anna. “So this was the last day you—all of you—could do it.”
Sam nibbled on a stalk of marinated asparagus. “Can I help it if we have busy social lives? Parker went to pick up Breckner in Van Nuys like an hour ago. She has to be here before we start to sign off on it.”
Anna felt slightly ill. “You feed the homeless every New Year’s Day for school credit. Because it’s the last chance you’ve got to do it.”
Sam shrugged. “If you want to get technical about it.”
“So why the hell did you invite me?”
Sam looked wounded. “Excuse me for including you!”
“You weren’t exactly honest with me.”
Sam put one hand on her hip and gave Anna a jaded look. “I told you we were feeding the homeless, and we are. I’m sorry if my motives aren’t pure enough for you.”
Anna just shook her head. It was like she and Sam weren’t even speaking the same language. “I’m going for a walk,” she announced to Sam, interrupting her own thoughts. “I’ve got a phone call to make.”
Without waiting for Sam’s response, Anna took off down the board-walk. When she was far enough away so that Ace’s rendition of “Hey Jude” was only a distant refrain, she pulled out her cell phone. She had to make contact with someone real. Someone she cared about, who cared about her.
For a moment, though, she was struck by the glory of a perfect Los Angeles afternoon. The sky was a crystal-clear aquamarine, the temperature midsixties. Anna could smell the sand and the surf, almost taste the ocean salt on her tongue. The only visible pollution was that of the human variety.
At that moment Anna wished—so much!—that her sister were there with her. She took out her phone and pressed in a speed-dial number.
“Hazelden,” answered a disembodied voice. “May I help you?”
“Good morning. May I speak to Susan Percy, please?”
“Please hold. I’ll see if she’s available.”
Anna waited. And waited. Then she heard a tentative voice.
“Hello?”
“Susan? It’s Anna! Happy New Year!”
“Anna.”
There was silence after that. Had they changed her sister’s meds? Was she mad at her? What?
“Sooz? You there?”
“Yeah. It’s just … well, congratulations on being the only member of our family who’s bothered to call me.”
So Susan wasn’t mad. She was hurt. God, how had their family gotten so screwed up? “They’ll call, Sooz,” Anna insisted, though she knew it wasn’t true.
“Bullshit. Mom is in Italy recuperating from the trauma of being our mother. And Dad never calls.”
Anna didn’t know what to say. “So, how are you?”
“Shitty.”
“It takes a while,” Anna reminded her.
“Please don’t start with the clichés.”
“But it’s true.”
“Goody. Something to look forward to.”
Anna decided to change the subject. “So, guess where I am?”
“Kansas?”
Anna laughed. “I’m in Los Angeles.”
“Good Lord, why?”
“I decided to spend some time here. With Dad.”
“And I repeat: Good Lord, why?”
“Lots of reasons. I don’t want to talk about me. I want to talk about—”
“Me. But there’s nothing to say, Anna. This place sucks. I stuff candy in my face and suck down cigarettes so I won’t crawl out of my skin. Meanwhile, my skin feels like it wants to crawl off of me.”
“Maybe when you get out, you can come out to L.A. and we can spend some time together,” Anna ventured.
“Maybe. But if I do, I’m not staying with Dad. I’ll stay at a hotel.”
“Okay. Whatever you want.”
“Maybe I’ll come soon.”
Anna didn’t like the way that sounded. “What do you mean?” she asked cautiously.
“I’m thinking of checking myself out.”
“Susan, you can’t do that.”
“Don’t tell me what the hell I can do!”
Anna winced. “I meant, you shouldn’t.”
“You don’t know what it’s like here.” Susan’s voice dropped to a conspiratorial tone. “This place could drive anyone to drink.”
“We’ll find you another place, then.”
“I don’t want another place. I want my life back.”
Anna grasped the phone so hard that her knuckles turned white. “You just think that because you haven’t had a drink or any drugs in a while and—”
“No shit, Sherlock.”
“I just meant—”
“I know exactly what you meant.” Susan’s voice was softer now. “I don’t mean to take my shit out on you, Anna. Ignore me. I suck.”
“I just … I want what’s best for you.”
“Maybe what’s best for me is some time with my baby sister in La La Land. The sharks out there will eat you alive, little sister.”
“I’m not so little anymore,” Anna reminded her. “I can take care of myself. Susan, if you’d just stay until you finish the program and then—”
“You don’t want me to come?”
“Of course I want you to come. It’s just—”
“Yadda, yadda, yadda. I know you mean well, Anna. But you can’t live my life for me. If I screw this up, it’s going to be my screwup. That’s just the way it is.”
Anna exhaled deeply. “Okay.”
“That’s my girl. So I’ll talk to you soon, ’kay?”
“All right. I love you, Sooz.”
“Me too, baby sis. Bye.”
“Bye.” Anna disconnected the call and put her phone away.
Was Susan really going to check herself out and come to Los Angeles? It would be wonderful to have an ally out here, and when Susan was sober, she was always Anna’s ally. But the question would always be, how long would she stay sober? How soon would Anna have to pick up the pieces? Well, whatever else her father insisted on dredging up when she saw him later, they were going to talk about Susan. And he was damn well going to call his older daughter and wish her a happy New Year.