Revenge Wears Prada (26 page)

Miranda cinched her trench around her microscopic waist and strode out of the office. The camera swiveled to the desk of the junior assistant, whose face registered the same shock it would have if she’d been struck. Before the girl’s huge, sweet eyes could dissolve into tears, Andy shook her head and clicked off the TV. She had seen enough.

Andy laughed as Emily white-knuckled the chair’s armrests and gingerly lowered herself into the front-row, courtside seat.

Emily shot her a look. “I don’t know what you’re laughing at. At least I’m only injured, not huge.”

Andy looked down at her belly, now solidly rounded and unquestioningly obvious at five months along, and nodded, smiling. “I’m huge.”

“These seats are like Jay-Z style,” Emily said, looking around. Max and Miles were sitting courtside on the player’s bench watching warm-ups, in guy heaven. Their heads turned as each seven-foot-something player ran, shot, dribbled, and dunked. “Every now and then, Miles actually comes through with something good.”

“I wish I cared the least bit about the Knicks or basketball in general,” Andy said, rubbing her belly. “I feel like we don’t really appreciate it.”

The crowd behind them roared when Carmelo Anthony ran onto the court for his warm-up.

“Please,” Emily said, rolling her eyes. “I’m here for the front-row VIP experience, and you’re here for the food. So long as we’re clear on that, it’s fine.”

Andy shoved a forkful of truffled mac and cheese into her mouth. “You should really have some of this . . .”

Emily blanched.

“What? Doctor’s orders to gain thirty pounds . . .”

“Isn’t that for the whole nine months and not just the first half?” Emily asked, looking at Andy’s piled-high plate in disgust. “I mean, I’m no pregnancy expert, but you look clear on your way to pulling a Jessica Simpson.”

Andy smiled. She’d been enjoying the occasional extra cupcake and slice of pizza now that the nausea had subsided, yes. It definitely wasn’t only her belly that was looking bigger either—both her face and her butt had filled and rounded out—but she knew it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. Only when she was talking to Emily, who still referred to pregnant women as “fat” or “really packing it on,” did she even think about it. Andy had come to accept that her only real pleasure these days came from food and that no one ever looked at a pregnant woman and thought she was large or small, fat or thin, even tall or short; she was just pregnant.

The guys turned around and waved; Emily winced as she waved back and touched her abdomen. “Christ, this hurts. And no decent painkillers! A few losers go and get themselves hooked on Oxy, and it means a lifetime of Advil for the rest of us.”

“I told you it was crazy to come tonight. Who goes to Madison Square Garden the week they discharge you from the hospital?”

“What was I supposed to do?” Emily asked, genuinely puzzled.
“Sit home in my pajamas and watch a Lifetime movie when you’re all here? Besides”—she nodded toward the front row across the court—“I wouldn’t see Bradley Cooper at home.”

“And he wouldn’t be able to admire your golden tan,” Andy said.

Emily ran her fingertips across her cheekbones. “Exactly.”

The New Year’s trip to the island of Vieques with Emily and Miles had been nothing short of fabulous: a gorgeous beachside villa with two master bedroom suites, a private pool, a bartender who seemed to specialize in fruity rum drinks, and plenty of swimming, tennis, and lazy beach time. Not only did they never once get dressed up to go anywhere, but some nights they didn’t even bother changing out of their bathing suits and cover-ups for dinner. Andy and Emily had agreed not to discuss the Elias-Clark offer or any business on vacation, and with the exception of one dinner mention about investing in beach property post-payout, they’d kept that pact. Andy knew they were delaying the inevitable, and they had a conference call with Stanley scheduled for the first Monday back. But for the duration of the week? They slept late, drank heavily (Andy allowed herself the occasional glass of champagne and then plenty of calorie-laden virgin piña coladas; being pregnant, she finally realized what it felt like for Max, who even now, after all these years, never had a single drink), read trashy magazines, and sunned themselves eight hours a day. It was the most relaxing vacation Andy could remember, right up until Emily had gotten appendicitis.

“I’m sure it’s just food poisoning,” she’d announced their eighth morning, when she showed up at the breakfast table looking pale, sweaty, and traumatized. “And don’t for one single second think I’m pregnant, because I am not.”

“How do you know? If you’re puking, you’re probably—”

“If the pill on top of my IUD can’t prevent pregnancy, then I should go on the road as some sort of fertile freak show.” Emily doubled over and struggled to catch her breath. “I am
not
pregnant.”

Miles shot her a sympathetic look but didn’t stop shoveling French toast into his mouth. “I told you those mussels were bad news . . .”

“Yeah, but I shared them with her, and I feel fine,” Max pointed out, pouring himself and Andy cups of decaf coffee from a stainless carafe.

“All it takes is one,” Miles said, his eyes scanning the
Times
on his iPad.

Andy watched as Emily carefully stood up, held her abdomen, and walked as fast as she could back to her room. “I’m worried about her,” she said to the guys.

“She’ll be fine by tonight,” Miles said, not looking up. “You know how she gets.”

Max and Andy exchanged a look. “Why don’t you go check on her?” he said to Andy quietly. She nodded.

She found Emily writhing atop the covers, curled in a ball, her face twisted in pain. “I don’t think this is food poisoning,” Emily whispered.

Andy called the resort’s front desk to ask about a doctor, and they assured her they would send the on-staff nurse immediately. The woman took one look at Emily, pressed a few times on her belly, and declared it appendicitis. She texted something on her phone, and a few minutes later, a hotel van appeared to take Emily to the local clinic.

After allowing Emily to stretch out on the middle bench, they all piled in. They’d been in Vieques over a week, and with the exception of a quick jaunt to another hotel for lunch, not one of them had been off the resort grounds. The ride to the clinic was short but bumpy—only Emily’s whimpering punctuated the silence as they all gazed out the window. When they finally pulled into a parking lot, Max was the first to say what they were all thinking.

“This is the clinic?” he asked, staring at the dilapidated structure that appeared to be a cross between an unfinished grocery
store and military airplane hangar. The words
Centro de Salud de Familia
appeared in neon on the front, although more than half the letters were burned out.

“I’m not going in there,” Emily said, shaking her head. She looked like she might pass out from the effort.

“You don’t have a choice,” Miles said. He wrapped one of Emily’s arms over his shoulders and motioned for Max to do the same. “We need to get you some help.”

They half carried Emily through the front door and were greeted with a scene of total silence. With the exception of a lone teenager watching what appeared to be an episode of
General Hospital
from the early eighties on an overhead black-and-white television, the place was completely deserted.

Emily moaned. “Get me out of here. If I don’t die first, they’ll kill me.”

Miles rubbed her shoulders while Max and Andy went in search of help. The desk toward the back of the room was empty, but the nurse who’d accompanied them from the resort felt free to walk behind it, open a side door, and shout into it. A woman wearing scrubs and a surprised expression appeared.

“I have a young woman with probable appendicitis. I’ll need a blood test and an abdominal X-ray immediately,” she said authoritatively.

The woman in scrubs took one look at the nurse’s ID badge and nodded wearily. “Bring her back,” she said, and motioned for the group to follow her. “We can do the blood test, but the x-ray machine is down today.”

As they were led down the hallway, the lights flickered on and off at unpredictable intervals. Andy could hear Emily begin to cry and realized this was the first time in the decade she’d known Emily that she’d seen her lose her cool.

“It’s just a blood test,” Andy said as soothingly as she could.

The woman dropped their entire group in an exam room, left
a cotton gown of questionable cleanliness on the table, and walked out without a word.

“They will be back soon to draw your blood. There is no need to change your clothing,” the hotel nurse said.

“Well, that’s good, because there is no chance I was going to,” Emily said, clutching her abdomen.

Another woman in scrubs appeared and, staring at her clipboard, said, “You the Lyme disease?”

“No,” Miles said, looking concerned.

“Oh. Here, I’m going—”

The hotel nurse interrupted. “Suspected appendicitis. I just need a white blood cell count and an X-ray to confirm. Her name is Emily Charlton.”

After another five minutes where each of them double- and triple-checked to make sure the needle she was using was brand-new in sealed packaging, Emily proffered her left arm and winced as the woman took a sample. The hotel nurse then took her to another room for an X-ray, where the machine had supposedly just been fixed, and returned with the news: it was appendicitis, as she suspected, and it would require immediate surgery.

With the word
surgery,
Emily swooned and nearly toppled over onto the table from her sitting position. “No fucking way. Not happening.”

Max turned to the hotel nurse. “Is there a hospital on the island? Perhaps somewhere . . . a little more modern?”

The nurse shook her head. “This is only a clinic. They are not equipped for surgery, and I wouldn’t recommend it even if they were.”

Emily started to cry harder; Miles looked like he might faint, too.

“Well I’m sure other guests of the resort have needed minor surgeries before, right? What’s our next step?”

“We would need to have her transferred to San Juan by helicopter.”

“Okay. How quickly can we do that? Is that what your other guests have done?”

“No, I’m afraid not. We had a woman go into early labor once, and another with a horrible case of kidney stones. Oh, and there was that elderly gentleman who had a minor heart attack, but no, none of them went to San Juan. They always fly to Miami.”

“How long before she needs surgery?” Max asked.

“Depends. Sooner is better, of course. You want to avoid the appendix rupturing. But considering she hasn’t had pain for very long and her white blood cells aren’t through the roof, I’d say you could possibly make it.”

That was all Andy needed to hear before she kicked into planning mode
Runway
-style. Working her phone and Max’s simultaneously, shouting out commands to Miles, Andy managed to charter a small prop plane in under an hour—all the while driving the bumpy roads to the airport. She organized an ambulance to meet their plane at Miami International, and called a general surgeon at Mount Sinai in Miami—one of Alex’s old friends from college—to arrange for someone to operate on Emily immediately. Andy and Max would see off Miles and Emily and then return to the hotel to pack up everyone’s belongings before jumping on the first commercial flight to Miami they could find.

Andy was saying her good-byes on the plane when Max said, “You’re incredible. You’re like a professional fixer. I’ve never seen anything like that.”

“That’s my girl,” Emily said with a weak smile. “I trained her myself.”

“Yeah, well, as much of a crazy bitch as you are, you still don’t hold a candle to Miranda,” Andy said, gently tapping Emily’s forehead. “Next time challenge me.”

The surgery had gone smoothly, all things considered. Since Emily’s appendix did partially rupture, the doctors kept her in
the hospital for nearly a week, but there were no major complications. Andy and Max stayed for a day or two, long enough to witness the outrageous arrangement of flowers with a note that merely read “From the office of Miranda Priestly.” Emily’s convalescence meant rescheduling their call again, date TBD. Andy happily went back to the business of editing
The Plunge
without the specter of another Elias-Clark conversation for an entire blissful week. She browsed a few baby boutiques in her neighborhood, test-drove some strollers, and chose the perfect gender-neutral bedding in the sweetest lime green and white elephant pattern. When Emily called Andy two minutes after landing at JFK and announced Miles had gotten them “sick tickets” to the Knicks game that night, Andy could only shake her head. Who else would walk off a flight—looking absolutely fabulous, by the way—and directly to a basketball game mere days after having an organ removed?

They watched the team warm up a little while longer and then, at Andy’s insistence, visited the private club room for some reinforcements. Andy piled her plate high with shrimp and cocktail sauce, crab legs and butter, barbecued chicken, corn on the cob, and enough salty, flaky biscuits to feed four people. She dropped all the food on a corner table before leaving again to retrieve a huge cup of Coke (oh, it wouldn’t hurt anything just this once!) and a heaping piece of chocolate mousse cake.

“You’re really going for gold, huh?” Emily asked as she nibbled from her tiny plate of crudités.

“I’m five months pregnant and on my way to being the size of a house. I’m going to live a little,” Andy said, and bit off the end of a shrimp.

Emily was too intent on trying to spot celebrities in the intimate VIP lounge to really pay much attention. Her eyes moved slowly, subtly, around the room as she investigated every face, every bag, every pair of shoes until Andy saw her eyes widen.

Andy followed Emily’s gaze and inhaled so sharply, the piece of shrimp became lodged in her throat. She could still breathe, but all her coughing was failing to move it either up or down.