Claudia Silver to the Rescue (9780547985602) (11 page)

“ . . . I guess.”

“You must never, never,
never
get your teeth fixed.”

“Okay.”

That was easy,
they both thought.

“And you are how old?”

“Sixteen.”

“And you will be seventeen when?”

Through the glass walls of Paolo's office, Phoebe glanced at the framed
Seventeen
magazine covers lining the corridor, and wondered if you had to be that age to get that job, and whether it was a mistake that she hadn't already lied. “Next August,” she answered, truthfully.

“Eight months,” Paolo calculated, with some concern. He knew from experience that much could happen to a young girl in eight months, and did not want to delay for a moment. “So do you have working papers?”

“Not really.”

“In this business, Phoebe, there are not so many yes or no questions, but this is one of them.”

“Then . . . no.”

“Ah. Well, you must get them right away. That is the law, so that is the
first
first thing.” In a swift movement, Paolo produced a bureaucratic form from a desk drawer. “You are with Mother and Dad?”

“No.”

“I don't mean right now, Phoebe. I mean this is where you live, yes?”

“Um . . .”

“Dad, he is not in the picture?”

As Phoebe pulled the long strands of her legs into a tight knot and wondered how Paolo could tell, he silently praised himself for the insight that had gotten him out of the
quartieri dormitorio,
and eventually the down payment on his Spring Street loft. “And so you live with mom.”

Phoebe paused. Then: “Pretty much.”

“So you must have Mother sign,” Paolo declared. Phoebe quickly pictured herself forging Edith's signature in the elevator and returning to Paolo's office first thing tomorrow morning. “Well, not just sign. She must come into the office in person and then we will also discuss how you get paid, the range of assignments, where to send the checks and such. And we will sign your contract. This will not be a problem, yes?” Phoebe dropped her chin into her hands. Once again, she resolved that a thing was only a problem if you called it that.

“It shouldn't be,” she said.

 

On that very same Tuesday in late December, a gleaming midtown atrium thrummed with workaday traffic. Those who had not fled to Nevis or Aspen were working a short week. While the cavernous lobby was the portal to a major record label and the world headquarters of the conglomerate that owned several pet care brands, the interior lobby of Golden Fenwick Tate Stein and Lowe, with its curved mahogany staircase lined in Audubon prints and symmetrical flower arrangements tucked into ginger jars, had the thickly carpeted hush of a patrician funeral chapel. Claudia removed her lumpy fur cube of a hat and lowered her voice respectfully as she announced herself to the receptionist. She'd barely settled herself in a club chair when a young woman approached on a bright wave of pert energy, her coppery bob swinging and her arm extended.

“You must be Claudia,” she declared. “We met on the phone.” Claudia rose to meet the hale handshake, picturing the girl pirouetting through the foyer of her efficiency apartment at the Barbizon Hotel, circa 1963, without spilling a drop of her sherry. “I'm Kelly Welch, one of Paul's para­legals.” The Cartier bangle spun on one freckled wrist. High on her forearm, in the working girl's version of a serpentine garter that cinched her sleeve at the shoulder, Kelly wore a stretchy plastic spiral from which a lone key dangled. “Paul's stuck in a staff meeting, so what else is new, but he knows you're here. He'll come get you as soon as they spring him.”

Claudia followed Kelly to her office. She had never before been mesmerized by another woman's backside, and yet with Kelly, packed into her straight wool skirt and emanating a soap-and-water sex appeal that deserved a bossa nova soundtrack, she couldn't help it.

“Please, make yourself comfortable,” Kelly urged Claudia, plucking her coat from the chair of the unoccupied second desk. “Can I get you anything? Coffee? Does your dog need some water?” Kelly nodded at Claudia's fur hat with an acceptable giggle. “So you're Paul's daughter's roommate, is that right?”

“C'est moi,”
Claudia replied. Kelly swept aside the small pile of bills she'd been paying at her desk. Claudia noted the personalized labels printed with a horsey motif and the Scarsdale return address.

“Career advice?” Kelly guessed.

“Okay.” Claudia was certainly willing.

“I mean is that what Paul's going to give you?”

“Oh,” Claudia realized. “Um . . . I don't think so. He's helping me with some legal research, I guess. A thing with my family.”

“Sounds private,” Kelly observed, slipping into her coat. There was an urgency behind the girl's chitchat that Claudia sensed but couldn't pinpoint. “I thought maybe he was going to have you apply for the paralegal job.” She indicated the empty second desk. “I lost my roommate. Big promotion.”

Claudia didn't know a single person who'd gone to work for a big company like this one, or even attended a recruitment fair. Had there even
been
a recruitment fair at the college? Of course, there must have been, for the football players, but her friends had all been slated for entry-level jobs in glamour fields, ski-bum stints in Telluride, or Fulbrights. “Promoted to what?”

“Married,” Kelly sighed enviously. “At the Pierre. All the trimmings.” Kelly's rump positively switched as she crossed the room to close the door, then pivoted neatly. “Senior Partner, Litigation,” she continued admiringly. “Bad news? Now she's the twenty-five-year-old stepmother and the kids hate her guts. Good news? The last one leaves for Groton in the fall, and then she's going to
completely
redecorate in the city
and
get a place in Bucks County.” Kelly gave Claudia a pragmatic once-over. “This is the best job in New York City for girls like us and you should totally apply for it. Get transferred to Intellectual Property or Entertainment as soon as you can and give it two years, tops.” She arrived at Claudia's pointy black toes. “You won't be able to wear those, though, without getting the stink-eye from some biddy in H.R.”

Girls like us?
Kelly didn't seem to be kidding. “I'm not really the legal type,” Claudia admitted.

There was a brief knock on the door. “Who is?” Kelly laughed. “Half the attorneys in this place aren't legal types. They're
making a good living
types. They're
little blue box
types.” She opened the door to a young man in a cashmere coat and a Lawrenceville baseball hat whom Claudia immediately recognized from Christmas Eve at the Tates'.

“Let's go, m'lady. Time to feed the beast,” said Carter Kemp, his gaze landing on Claudia indifferently. He made no move to press the flesh.

“Mr. Carter James Kemp,” Kelly announced.

“Yes, we've met,” Claudia pointed out.

Carter frowned. “We have?” His doubt at having crossed paths with Claudia rendered him instantly dead to her. Still, she hoped dearly that he'd spontaneously combust.

“She's thinking about applying for the paralegal job.” Kelly winked at Claudia as she pulled on slim, green leather gloves. Carter drifted from the doorway. “We'll have a blast. And don't let silly Carter Kemp give you the wrong impression,” Kelly added brightly. “I promise you. There are much,
much
bigger fish at Golden Fenwick.”

Moments later, Claudia was standing unseeingly in front of Kelly's large framed Seurat poster. She wondered vaguely whether it had come from the firm's decorating coffers or Kelly's former dorm room at Colgate, when she turned at the sound of Paul Tate's voice.

“Hi. Sorry.” Bronwyn's father had been a rakish young man on Christmas Eve, but he had clearly aged since that night. In his velvet-collared charcoal wool greatcoat he dominated the doorway of Kelly's office, exuding barely contained impatience. “Look. I hope you don't have a problem with going out,” Paul said, curtly. “There's turkey meatloaf and filet of sole in the partner's dining room. The former is hell to digest and the latter makes me feel like my grandmother.”

“Sure,” Claudia replied.

“Good. I made a reservation at Pippi
.
” Claudia looked at Paul blankly. “The new Marcus Samuelsson over on Washington? I suppose you haven't heard if it's any good?”

Indeed, Claudia most certainly had not.

A town car waited outside, and Paul held the door as Claudia slid in. The interior was a soundproofed leather parlor, immaculately kept, with fresh magazines and the Modern Jazz Quartet playing quietly. No conversation was required with the driver. “I know we have important things to talk about,” Paul said as they settled, “but they have to wait.”

Soon the car was traveling south along the wintry Hudson River. Claudia was troubled by the silence and expected herself to fill it. She busied herself with sucking in her belly. She didn't know how long Paul expected her to wait, or whether she was waiting for him to speak next, and in the meantime, who she was to him now, a mentee, an acquaintance, a curiosity, or an obligation. It helped to fix her gaze on the Circle Line as she caught it keeping pace among tumbling whitecaps. Claudia could make out the miniature tourists gathered on deck despite the cold.

“I have to confess to you, Claudia,” Paul eventually said. She caught Paul in profile and felt a rush of tenderness for the lines around his eyes that made her hand want to reach out and touch his cheek. “My chief personality flaw. It's gotten me in more trouble over the years than I care to recount.”

“I'm all ears,” she ventured.

“I forget to eat, and then I become pretty much an asshole.” Paul turned to face her in a rush of familiarity. Claudia suddenly knew who she could be between here and the restaurant. A wry, Hepburn-esque sidekick with empathetic womanly intuition beyond her years, intellectual bravado, and a smoldering core.

“And is that where we find ourselves?” she asked, congratulating herself on making him smile.

“Sadly, it is where we find ourselves.”

“And yet it must be a relief to unburden yourself to me.” Paul chuckled and shook his head. “Shall I amuse you with tales of my day,” Claudia asked, “until the waitress brings us warm rolls and butter?”

“I wish you would,” he said.

 

Phoebe strolled from the offices of Image Model Management into the cold, bright afternoon. Paolo had given her a plastic sleeve, into which he'd slipped two blank copies of the working papers, a brochure, his business card, and the business cards of the hairstylist and the photographer he planned to employ on Phoebe's behalf, “so that Mother, she can get comfortable before we all sit down.” Phoebe had slipped the sleeve into her Tibetan knapsack and walked west to Seventh Avenue. At the first working pay phone she found, she dug out a quarter and dialed Claudia at work.

“Georgica Films,” Gwen answered, with her gentle lisp.

“Can I speak to Claudia Silver, please?” Phoebe asked. “This is her sister.” Obviously, Claudia would have to be her fake mother for the meeting with Paolo. There was a long pause. “Hello?” Phoebe repeated.

“Yes,” said Gwen. “Could you hang on a second?” Gwen placed the call on hold. Phoebe watched the F.I.T. students swarm about the entrance to campus in their different costumes. Gwen, who did not like to be caught walking, rose from her creaky chair and lumbered across the office to Faye's desk. Faye's eyes instantly filled with tears at Gwen's report: it was Claudia Silver's sister on the phone, the sister Claudia hadn't heard from, the unfathomable mother, Claudia Silver who seemed long gone. Faye shushed the rest of the office and picked up the line.

“Hello, dear,” Faye greeted Phoebe, unnaturally. “You're calling for Claudia?”

“Um, yeah,” Phoebe replied, instantly aware of the worried strain in the strange woman's voice.

“Is this . . . Claudia's sister?”

Phoebe considered hanging up. In the street, truck drivers lay on their horns, yet Phoebe could hear the woman's breathing. “Yeah,” she finally answered. There was a long exhale on the other line.

Faye stumbled forward. “Darling, I'm sorry. But Claudia doesn't work here anymore. We had to let her go almost a month ago.”

“You mean, like,
fired?
” Phoebe asked.

Faye screwed her eyes shut. “Yes,” she confirmed. “But is there anything I can—”

Gently, Phoebe returned the receiver to its cradle. Why
wouldn't
Claudia turn out to be both more and less than Phoebe had expected and trusted her to be? No job. No job for
a while
now. Fired! Lying!
Of course.
Of course, Claudia had something fucked-up going on and,
of course,
it was hidden in plain sight and,
of course,
Phoebe had a sign on her back that said
SUCKAH
and whether it was Claudia who'd taped it there, or Edith, the fact was
this family was totally fucked.
She would forget it, Phoebe decided. Forget it and move on. That was just what you did. It was just a matter of figuring everything out. Phoebe stood on the sidewalk in a funnel of thick dust, and decided it would be best to wait for a minute, until she could see.

 

Pippi, the Scandinavian restaurant earning raves for its Ethiopian-inflected tapas, occupied a former photo studio on a secluded West Village corner. The coveted dining room murmured with an offhand, in-the-know afternoon crowd. “I'm uncomfortable with the idea of herring and yams,” Paul admitted, dropping into the limed-wood booth upholstered in kente cloth and dressed with white tulips. He'd checked his coat and loosened his tie. “But don't let that get out.” He pulled a pair of reading glasses from his jacket pocket. “I don't want to get dumped by the cool crowd.” The menus were heavy white cards printed in blue, and Claudia scanned hers rapidly for the cheapest combination, as Edith had instructed her always to do, arriving at a cup of peanut soup and a side of collard greens with lingonberries. Paul, nibbling an anise cracker, plucked the menu from Claudia's fingers and pushed it away, print-side down. “You relax, let me order a bunch of everything, and we can decide what's good.”