“Like one does,” Lilly agrees immediately, ignoring the chiding look Charlotte shoots her from across the patio.It’s fine, she wants to explain;Colin has never registered a snarky comment in all his days on this miraculous green planet. His own lack of self-awareness is thicker and more impenetrable than Major Fantastic’s nuclear shield.
Sure enough: “We got to chatting,” he continues, cheerful and oblivious. “I don’t know if you know this about me, but I’m a huge foodie.”
“You know, I might have guessed that.” Lilly turns to Charlotte. “It’s great that you came by, actually. I’m having a girl talk emergency.”
“You are?” Charlotte asks, looking at her a little oddly. “Right now?”
“Uh, yup,” Lilly says. “I just remembered. Sorry, Colin, do you mind if I borrow her for a minute?”
“Not at all,” Colin says magnanimously, pulling his phone out of his pocket. “Charlotte, I’m going to text Caitriona and get the name of that Korean barbecue place she was telling me about so you can check it out. She always knows all the best spots.”
Charlottealways knows all the best spots, actually, on account of being a highly regarded chef and restaurant owner, but she doesn’t tell that to Colin and somehow Lilly manages to resist pointing it out on her behalf. “I’d love that,” is all Charlotte says, then gets up and follows Lilly into the kitchen, Arthur heaving his furry little body up off the slate and trotting dutifully along. “What’s up?” she asks Lilly, once the door is safely shut behind them. “Did something happen at the premiere?”
“What? Oh no,” Lilly says, taking the bottle of wine out of the fridge and topping Charlotte’s glass off; then, on second thought, she pours one for herself, too. “Well, I guess so, kind of, but that’s not why I wanted you to come in here. I was just rescuing you.”
“Rescuing—what, from Colin?” Charlotte laughs. “He’s not actually that bad, you know.”
Lilly makes a face over the bowl of her wineglass. “Oh, please.”
“He’s not!” Charlotte insists. “I mean, he likes to talk, clearly, and he did just use the wordfoodie, but he’s really kind of sweet once you get to know him.”
“I’ve known him my entire life,” Lilly reminds her immediately, “and I can say with confidence I have not found that to be the case.”
“That’s... not really the same thing.”
Lilly shakes her head. “You’re losing your edge,” she accuses.
“I’m not like you,” Charlotte counters. “I don’t have an edge.”
Lilly isn’t sure what that means, exactly, but suddenly she’s too exhausted to parse even one more weird social interaction this fine evening. “Okay,” she concedes around a yawn, holding a hand up before draining her wine in two long gulps. “I’m going to bed. You’re on your own, old friend.”
“You know,” Charlotte promises with a grin, “I think I will somehow survive.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Lilly says, blowing her a kiss as Charlotte heads back outside onto the patio; still, she glances behind her one more time before she pads up the stairs to her room.
Chapter Fifteen
Will
As soon as the movie premieres Charlie has about ten thousand places he needs to be in rapid succession: New York and London and Tokyo and Beijing. Will gets back from set close to midnight and finds him packing a suitcase the size of a conversion van, listening to a guided meditation on his phone. “Shouldn’t you get an assistant to do this kind of thing for you?” Will asks, standing in his bedroom doorway eating a bowl of ice cream while Matthew McConaughey gently encourages them to imagine themselves as trees.
Charlie dumps an armful of socks into the bag. “I had one,” he says mournfully, “but then all my underwear started disappearing one pair at a time.”
“Fair enough.” Will stands there for another moment, shifting his weight uncomfortably. Caroline cornered him in the bathroom this morning, waving her phone in his face: “Literally every piece of press about this movie mentions June Benedetto in the first paragraph,” she seethed, sleek blond hair beginning to frizz a bit around her temples. “Every single article, William! You need to talk to him.”
“Ineed to talk to him?” Will spat a mouthful of toothpaste into the sink. “Why me?”
“You know why,” Caroline shot back immediately. “You’re his best friend. He trusts you. It sounds different when you say it.” She shrugged. “Also, he’s mad at me for sending those flowers to Anne Mulgrew and signing his name to the card.”
Will wiped her mouth with the back of his hand. “Can’t imagine why.”
“I’m serious!” Caroline wailed. “If there’s one thing those women know how to do, it’s bottom-feed. Her mother is already on the Sinclair doing that winking, purposely coy no-comment bullshit. It’s tacky. It makes Charlie look tacky.” She caught his gaze in the mirror then, lifted her sharp, elegant chin. “He’s better than that, don’t you think?”
Now Will grits his teeth, watching as Charlie packs his jeans and his running shoes, the expensive vintage watch he bought when he bookedMajor Fantasticand then ruined in the pool by mistake. He still wears it, the thing winking uselessly on his wrist in the pages ofPeopleandUs WeeklyandIn Touch. If he needs to know the time he checks his phone. “Look,” he begins, “about June.”
Right away, Charlie shakes his head. “Don’t,” he says, turning his attention to the half dozen bottles of cologne on the dresser. “Seriously, dude—”
“I’m not!” Will protests immediately. “I’m not. But if I was...” He thinks of Cinta Benedetto plotting her reality show comeback across the development. He thinks of Lilly’s face as she turned away from him at the premiere. He thinks of New York and ofHamlet, of letting himself want something—letting himself believe he could have it, even—only to realize the joke was on him the entire time. “It isn’t worth it, man.”
