The Insiders (20 page)

“Dad,” Flan said, “Zed is at Vassar.”

“We can still talk about him, can't we?” Frederick asked. And suddenly all of the Floods looked confused.
How was Zed doing?

“Let's call,” Fiona said. “Who has his number?”

Just then the family dog, Fido, came running in. She'd been up in Greenwich. She was a big dog, a retriever mixed with a St. Bernard—floppy and excited. Patch dropped onto the floor to play with her while the family discussed calling their eldest son.

“Has anyone walked Fido?” Patch asked.

Nobody responded. Flan was hitting herself on the helmet with her riding crop. February was leaned so far back in her chair that it looked as if she were about to pass out. From his vantage point on the floor, Patch could see her fingering a cigarette. Frederick rubbed the sleeve of his orange cashmere sweater against his cleanshaven cheek.

“Perhaps we ought to drive up to Boston and see him?” Frederick said.

“Dad!” the two girls said.

“I know, I know, Vassar's in Washington,” Frederick said. The family laughed, if not heartily.

“Let's go, girl,” Patch said. He slipped a white leather leash onto Fido's collar. The dog licked Patch's
ears. On the way out, Patch grabbed a jacket off the coat tree by the front door. It happened to be his father's four-thousand-dollar Paul Stuart shearling coat, but Patch didn't notice. He only thought, this feels soft.

Outside, the day was beautiful and cool. Patch began to walk Fido downtown. He didn't know where he was going. Then he did.
Graca
.

“Wake up,” Jonathan said. Arno opened one eye and looked straight up into Jonathan's frowning face.

Arno was in bed with Kelli, legs intertwined under a sheet. Kelli instantly stood up and went to the bathroom. Four boys' heads swiveled and watched her go as she dragged the sheet off a very naked Arno.

“Put your shorts on, hotstuff,” Jonathan said. “We've got a plane to catch.”

“You go,” Arno said, and fell back against the pillows. On the couch, Mickey began to stir. Somehow, during the night, everyone had switched places. David was over by the windows, calmly explaining to his mother why she hadn't been able to reach him at Jonathan's house.

“There's no bigger explanation, Mom,” David said. “I'd tell you if there was, I swear. No, not with Jonathan. I promise. I slept in a chair.”

“Dude,” Mickey sputtered as he sat up, “David's mom thinks you want to sleep with David.”

Jonathan didn't seem to notice. He said, “I called Ezra. He's psyched about the Vespa, we're going to eat at Bubby's, and then he'll help us get my cousin out of town.”

“What are you talking about?” Arno said, and quickly sat up and looked around. The room was a mess. There were clothes and glasses everywhere.

“She's leaving, that's what I'm talking about.”

Arno stood up and went into the bathroom, where Kelli was. She looked up at him. She was on her phone. He stood in front of her.

“Yes, I promise to see you at practice tomorrow,” Kelli said.

She smiled at Arno and kissed his cheek. Arno tried to smile, but he was so confused that his face sort of bent, and he looked as if someone had just slapped him. Kelli ended the call.

“Take a shower with me,” she said.

“Do I have to wait in line?” Arno asked. They glared at each other like a couple who had been going out for all of freshman and sophomore and into junior year.

“We're ready when you two are,” Jonathan yelled through the door. “Brunch is on me.”

“Don't go,” Arno said to Kelli.

“Oh, don't start,” Kelli said.

Everyone got themselves together and they walked
the few blocks over to Bubby's. They got a table for five against the back wall, where it was cool and bright and the sun shone through special skylights that filtered out the UV rays. Jonathan ordered a pitcher of mimosas.

“This is nice,” Kelli said. Then she immediately stood up and went over to a table populated by several male actors and introduced herself.

“There's something about her, I'd do anything for her,” Arno said as he watched her. From a dozen feet away, they could hear her saying, “You're going to direct? How cool—I'm thinking of getting into acting.”

“Ezra's coming here in half an hour,” David said. “We slam down some eggs Benedict and the mimosas and then we're out of here.”

“I told my mom to pack Kelli's bags,” Jonathan said. “And send them with her mom. Look, Arno, it's nice that you hooked up with her, but we have absolutely got to get this girl out of town.”

While they watched, several men at the other table made room for Kelli and she settled in between them. She immediately starting drinking one guy's Bloody Mary through a straw.

“I don't know if we should wait for our food,” David said.

“Why?” Arno asked.

Just then a waitress arrived. She was short and her
hair was piled high on her head.

“Hey, Chloe,” Arno said.

The waitress smiled.

“I'm sorry I haven't called you,” Arno said. “If you weren't on shift, when I got my French toast we could do stuff to each other with the maple syrup.”

“If you really want to know how good that'd feel,” she said, “ask that one.”

She gestured at David, who'd been looking at his knees. When it grew quiet, David looked up.

“Oh, hey,” David said. “We met on Friday night.”

The other guys at the table stared at David.

“I'm just glad you're back with Amanda,” Arno said, once the waitress had left. “I sure as hell wouldn't want to compete for girls with you.”

“Thanks,” David said. “Hey, look who it is. How are you, man?”

The four boys turned around and Flan Flood was standing at their table. She was wearing her riding outfit and there was somebody next to her. Adam Rickenbacher.

“I'm good,” Adam said, and smiled.

“No,” Jonathan said. He reached for his glass but missed it. And then he was just staring up at Flan and Adam. They were holding hands.

“Ouch,” Arno said.

“We're looking for Patch,” Flan said to everyone at the table but Jonathan, who she cut with her eyes in a way that would serve her well in high school. “He took Fido for a walk this morning and didn't come back. Have you guys seen him?”

“I lose sight of Patch for one second,” Jonathan said to Flan, “and you're standing there with another guy.”

“I hope there isn't a problem,” Adam said.

“No, it's cool,” Mickey said. “Why don't you two scoot along. We know where Patch is.”

Jonathan made a gurgling sound in his throat. Adam and Flan walked out of the restaurant. But then Flan came running back and bent down over Jonathan, who was looking shocked and still hadn't said anything.

“I waited and waited, but you wouldn't make a move,” she said. And then she ran out again.

None of the other guys said anything. Jonathan really did look sick, like he'd messed up a good thing.

“That's for the best,” Arno said. “Anyway, it's nearly eleven.”

Outside, Ezra pulled up in the Escalade.

Arno looked over at the other table. Kelli was doing something that looked like acting for the would-be director. He was taking her picture with a digital camera and she was roaring like a big cat. She pushed aside the bread basket and some plates of eggs and climbed
up on the table.

“Let's go,” Mickey said.

“But we haven't even eaten,” Arno said. His jaw had gone slack and he was staring at Kelli.

“RRRrr,” Kelli growled from the other table.

“Let's go before someone gets really hurt,” Jonathan said. He stood up and slowly his guys followed his example. They went over to the actors' table and picked up Kelli, who was now lying down and purring for the camera.

“Sorry, boys,” Arno said. “If I can't have her, only a quarterback in St. Louis can.”

Arno and David and Mickey and Jonathan each took one of Kelli's limbs and carried her out of the restaurant. Though they did get some stares, Kelli wasn't recognizably famous, so everyone assumed she was drunk or something.

“She just got blown away by the city and she wouldn't stop,” Jonathan said, in explanation to Ezra, who held the door to the Escalade open as they put Kelli inside.

“Shut up,” Kelli said. “I'm coming back here and you can't stop me.”

“Be nice to Jonathan,” Arno said. “He just got completely and unexpectedly played.”

“To LaGuardia Airport,” Jonathan said. “And hurry.”

“It wasn't any one thing about Kelli,” I said to Fernanda.

“I don't get it,” Fernanda said. “What was the problem?”

“She was like, desperate for attention.”

“Aren't we all?”

“Yeah, but we don't double-cross everyone we meet to get it.”

We walked quietly for a moment. We were on Fifth Avenue and Sixteenth Street, in front of the Paul Smith men's store. Out of habit, I stopped and stared in the window. I'm not normally partial to Paul Smith, because the clothes tend toward the frilly, but I kept looking, just to see if they'd changed or anything. There was a pair of reddish velvet loafers that very, very few men could have pulled off. They did have a nice cut to them, though, very long and angular. Not
a JM Weston or a Crockett and Jones shoe cut, not that nice, but nice. And when I looked down—and I must've been staring at those shoes for a full minute—I was holding Fernanda's hand.

“Let's walk over to Otto and get some pizza and ice cream,” I said suddenly.

“You don't want to go in here and try stuff on?”

“No, I don't think so.”

Fernanda smiled at me. We kept walking on Fifth. It was nearly seven on Tuesday evening and the street was quiet and kind of cool, in a really good end-of-October way.

“The thing is,” I said, “I've got these friends I have to take care of, and when I do a lousy job and forget one of them, they disappear.”

“You know that's crazy, right?” Fernanda said.

“Yeah, it is,” I said. “But I lost track of Patch again and now no one knows where he is.”

“What do you mean? He's living with Graca. His parents are annoyed, but he's going to school and just sort of hanging with her. The whole family was driving him crazy. All those
F
names. It was too much. We all know that.”

“Sure, we know that. But …”

I looked over at Fernanda. Since we'd been basically inseparable for the last couple of days, there was definitely a way to think of her as my girlfriend, if I wanted to be comfortable with that, which I'm pretty sure I did want.

And further, I was happy that Flan had hooked up with that Rickenbacher kid, whom I still didn't much like. I mean, good for her. And good for Liza for also being totally over me.

But about Flan … she wouldn't speak to me. Wouldn't even return my calls. And I didn't necessarily think that was a bad thing. Not that I thought we should ever go out or anything. I didn't. But it was nice to know she wasn't treating me like a big brother. And I figured I'd call her again, just to see if she wanted to hang out sometime or something. Because, I figured, we still should be able to be friends. And I missed her.

“Are you thinking of that kid, Flan?”

“No,” I said quickly.

We kept walking, down toward Otto. A guy and a girl on a bright red Vespa went hurtling by. They were laughing and weaving, and the girl had a long red scarf that made a whistling noise in the wind. It was Mickey and Philippa. They
were still in love.

“Right now, I don't want to keep track of anybody but you,” I said to Fernanda. I held up her hand and kissed it.

Don't miss the next instalment of
The Insiders
…

Rumors are spreading fast about Jonathan and his friends.

Who will hook up?

Who will get dumped?

And what happens when the guys betray each other?

While you wait for the next book, check out what's new with the Insiders at
www.insidersbook.com
.

Copyright © 2004 by J. Minter and 17th Street Productions,
an Alloy company

The moral right of the author has been asserted

All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce, or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

First published in Great Britain in 2004 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc,
50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP

Electronic edition published in June 2012

www.bloomsburyteens.com

Produced by 17th Street Productions, an Alloy company

151 West 26th Street

New York, NY 10001

A CIP catalogue record of this book is available from the
British Library

ISBN 978-1-59990-991-2 (e-book)