Break Every Rule (8 page)

“I will,” I said as I went back into the kitchen.

But a funny thing happened, as I stood there crushing limes and sugar for the next round of drinks. I heard two people whispering urgently in the hall. And one of them was Flan. She was saying:

“Are you here with Mimi Rathbone and her friends?”

“Um, yeah, but it's really not what it looks like….”

“Because there's something I have to tell you….”

She sounded almost angry. Before I could stop myself, I said, “Flan!?” and peeped around the corner.

There she was, looking surprised. And guilty. David was standing next to her.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“Nothing,” Flan said. Then the buzzer went off, and she said, “I think that's Patch. He just called. I better go get it,” and disappeared.

David and I stared at each other awkwardly for a minute. What kind of secret would Flan share with David? And why did she look so guilty when she saw me?

“Well, uh, I think we're going soon,” David said lamely.

I couldn't believe he got to go to Ginger and hang out with Danny Abraham and probably meet celebrities and get photographed and written about. And then I realized that if David was cooler than I was now, maybe Flan would like him more than me. There was just something not right about that little scene, them whispering out in the hall.

David interrupted my jealous train of thought by saying, “But, um, thanks for the party. I mean, you never actually told me about it, but… Anyway, it seems like a while since we've—”

“Yeah, whatever,” I said, thrusting the caipirinha I'd been carrying into his hand. I wasn't sure exactly what was going on, but it made me all sick-feeling inside. “You better drink this up, and then get out of my apartment as fast as you can.”

This was supposed to be It, and David knew that.

He, Arno, Rob, and the It Girls glided on down the Avenue (Tenth, he was pretty sure), past the line of people yelling and scrambling and, worst of all, waiting behind the velvet rope. They walked right on past them and into where the lights were low and the girls were flashy and the music was loud.

Really, really loud. (Pumping? Was he supposed to say that the music was “pumping”? Or was that word over already?)

Their group pushed into the crowd, which caused a ripple of excitement through the club. David had never been to this one before, but Arno had said it was called Ginger and that it was crucial for them to hit this spot because he had made a personal promise to the owner or something. Everyone was shouting hello to Arno and congratulating him, and it seemed like a lot of the girls were trying to touch him. A chant of “HPSB” came up from the dance floor, and the people on the mezzanine
all stopped what they were doing and looked down on Arno and his guys.

They were It, and they were cruising with It Girls. But David could hardly think straight, the music was so loud. He sort of wished they could turn it down a little bit.

And David probably would have benefited from some straight thinking right then, because he was confused about many things. For instance, it was weird that everybody already knew about this Hottest Private School Boy thing. David lived a life pretty circumscribed by basketball and didn't have much time for extracurricular reading, but still, the issue had come out that
morning.
How did all these people already know that Arno was HPSB? He was also confused about why a drink in this kind of place cost precisely twice what it cost anywhere else. (Not that that was such a big concern; nobody had asked them to pay at the door, and it was looking like no one was going to ask them to pay for anything else, either.)

David was also confused about what had just happened at Jonathan's apartment. What had Flan wanted to tell him? And why had Jonathan been so short with him?

The hostess led them to the VIP area and sat them in a booth. She was pretty, in the same way the It Girls
were pretty. She had long, straight blond hair with shiny skin two shades darker than her hair. It was beginning to seem a little bit strange to David that all the girls in his life now seemed so plastic and identical. He wasn't even sure how anyone kept the It Girls' names straight. He had already confused them twice that night. Plus, David couldn't help comparing every girl to the one he'd met at the MoMA, the one who could have been Modigliani's muse. She was so …
different.
He couldn't help looking to see if she was at the club, even though he knew he was supposed to be into the blonde who was sitting next to him.

“This is
so
embarrassing… but would you sign my issue?” the hostess asked Arno, handing the magazine to him. He gave her a little nod of acknowledgment, and scrawled his name on the cover. She hugged it to herself like a teddy bear. “Thanks so much. Danny said everything's on the house tonight, so drink up!”

The girls all made little noises of approval, and Arno looked out at the scene like it was pretty everyday to him. Which was actually true.

When the hostess was gone, Mimi leaned into Arno and nibbled his ear. She said, “You know I
love
Ginger.”

“It's hot,” said Lizzie.

“Okay, I'm going to pee,” Mimi said. She looked at Arno and added: “Who's coming?”

“I'll go,” said Sadie.

“I'll stay,” said Lizzie. Mimi shot her a look. When the other girls were gone, Lizzie leaned in and nibbled Arno's other ear.

David stood up to look around for the Modigliani again. He got good range because he was so tall, but still, all he could see were girls with heavily made-up faces and newsboy caps. When he sat back down, he noticed that Arno and Lizzie were making out. Wasn't Arno just with the other one? David really
was
going crazy. A cocktail waitress brought them a bottle of Grey Goose and mixers. She asked Arno to sign her HPSB issue as well. Then Rob came and joined them; David hadn't even noticed that he was gone.

“Yeah, wild tonight!” Rob said loudly and to no one in particular as he slid into the booth. Lizzie moved away from Arno quickly, but Rob didn't seem to notice what had been going on. He poured them all drinks. “To cool girls and hot boys!” he said as he lifted his vodka cran. David was relieved when he noticed Arno cringe, just a little bit, at that.

They all focused on their drinks for a moment, and looked out at the crowd. The people were really packed in, and everyone was getting down, their drinks flowing over, and trying to shout over the music, which was futile. Rob told them all to look when P. Diddy came in,
with a herd of bodyguards surrounding him. Then Mimi and Sadie came back.

“We miss anything?” Mimi said, glaring at Lizzie.

“Not much,” said Lizzie.

“Fine. Let's dance, bitch,” said Mimi. The three of them went to the dance floor, and started dancing in a row. They were all really close, and they closed their eyes and appeared to be really feeling the music. David thought they looked like they knew what they were doing.

“Del
fuego
!” said Rob.

“Yeah, they're hot pieces,” Arno said, looking briefly around the club. People seemed to be looking at him, too.

Rob looked back at David and Arno. Gone was the stupid party face he wore virtually all the time. He looked serious. He looked like he had been thinking.

“I have something we must discuss,” he said. Then he looked up and saw the girls coming back from the dance floor. The goofy face reappeared. “But first…”

Mimi leaned over toward Arno in a way that seemed, to David, somewhat clumsy. But it occurred to him that it also might have been sexy. After all, they could all see down her shirt now.

“You guys weren't paying
any
attention to us,” she said, sticking her bottom lip out.

“You know how it is,” Arno said.

“Come on!” said Lizzie, beginning to shake to the new Jay-Z song that had just come on.

“Yeah, baby!” Rob yelled in a misguided Austin Powers accent. He stood up, and he and the girls headed for the dance floor, gesturing at Arno to follow.

Arno stood up, ready to follow them. But before he did, he leaned in and hissed at David: “There are three hot girls out there, and we are three hot guys. If you don't stop mooning, we're going to be three girls and two guys, and that's illegal in some states. So start acting normal. Got it?”

Arno was experiencing two different emotions at once.

Everywhere he went—on the street, at Pastis, and now at Ginger—people stared at him. Not the usual, “who is that good looking dude?” stare. It was a longer, more reverential kind of staring, equal parts awe and adoration. People kept giving him things, too, and most of it looked pricey. He felt like the sun. Or like the sun was shining on him. Or something.

But in spite of all this warmth, he felt tense, too. He felt like he had gone from coffee boy to CEO in one day, and the pressure was enormous. Trying to keep David and Rob in line, for instance. David was acting like a real downer recently.

Now that he was at the heart of the club, surrounded by people chanting his name, hearing the really cool, loud music, he was feeling mostly just good. And hot, of course.

“You're so hot,” Mimi said. They had been dancing for almost an hour. She gave him a knowing little smile
out of the corner of her mouth. She looked almost miniature next to him. But hot, definitely hot.

But that was another thing. Sadie seemed to be acting like nothing had happened that morning, even though they'd fooled around pretty seriously, and Mimi seemed either not to know or not to care. Arno thought they were both hot, but he didn't want to get ambushed by angry girls later on down the road. He really needed David to help him out with this by distracting Sadie.

Arno looked up, and saw Danny Abraham, HPSB '04, in his mezzanine booth, and waved. Danny raised his glass to Arno, and then went back to the three blond girls surrounding him. It was like Arno had been anointed.

Then the new Kelis song came on, and the crowd lifted Mimi and a few other girls up and put them on the bar. They started dancing, and the crowd started screaming and cheering. Arno slipped back to the booth.

Rob was wiping the sweat off his forehead with a hand towel, and David was sitting next to him. He had obviously been sitting there for a while, and he looked a little glum.

Arno did an obligatory round of waving and “what's up” chin motioning to his admirers, and then leaned back in the booth. Rob poured him a drink, which was cold and good. Then Rob said, in a tone lower than he
had ever used before, “I have been discussing with Chino.”

“Who's Chino?” said Arno. He checked out the girls, who were still dancing on the bar.

“The doorman of Ginger, where we are,” said Rob. “You know, the one who let us in. And he no charge us. So nice!”

“Yeah, well his boss told him not to,” said Arno with a shrug.

“Yes, the boss very nice, too. But what we discuss is this: you know how much they charge for a door here?”

“They sell doors here?” David said. He had been staring glassily out at the crowd and was snapped back into the conversation by Rob's illogical statement.

“Davey, pay attention,” Arno said. He snapped his fingers, which was probably what his father would have done. “He's talking about the door charge. What's wrong with you?”

“Oh,” said David.

“Guess! Guess the door charge!” Rob said.

“Twenty?” said Arno.

“Twenty-five,” Rob said with satisfaction. Arno shrugged again. He was feeling very blasé about everything lately.

“That's a lot,” said David. He looked away quickly, like he knew that made him sound uncool.

“What's your point?” Arno said. The serious Rob was getting on his nerves.

“Are you thinking what I'm thinking?” Rob said.

Arno shifted in his seat. “That doesn't seem very likely.”

“Because what I am thinking,” said Rob, “is that this whole room adores you. This city adores you.”

Arno nodded. That did seem to be the case.

“If you are Hottest School Boy, why not have Hot School Boy party! And we can charge twenty dollars at the door.” Rob rubbed his palms together. Then he quickly added: “Because that is what it will take to throw a party hot enough for Arno.”

“That's an idea,” Arno said. He saw Mimi coming from the dance floor. Her skin had a sheen to it from the dancing, and she looked incredibly ripe and gorgeous. She was making the beckoning motion that women in beer commercials frequently make. “I'll consider it,” he said absentmindedly, standing up, and walking toward Mimi.

Then he had a thought. He turned back to Rob, who was obviously still thinking about his party planning, and David, who was obviously still not fun.

“In the meantime, would you do me a favor, Rob? Figure out what to do with this old man.”

When they got outside, it occurred to David that Rob had gone a record length of time without a cigarette. He was smoking now, though, and talking with Chino the doorman. He was making precise little motions with his hands like he was getting exact details. David waited for him against the wall, a little bit farther down the block.

Chino got busy with the door again, and Rob lit another cigarette and sauntered over to David.

“Those girls are crazy,” Rob said. David realized that he should probably teach Rob a few adjectives besides
wild, crazy,
and
hot.
At least, if he wanted to keep hanging out with Rob and not go insane he should. “They make Arno sandwich!”

Before Rob had escorted him out, Mimi, Lizzie, and Sadie had all started dancing with Arno in the middle of the dance floor. It had caused a lot of excitement in the club, but it wasn't really a sandwich, at least not David's definition of a sandwich.