The Showroom was called the Showroom because it was the only level of school parking located outside. Which meant your car
was on display. And if your car was on display, then you were too. Which probably meant you liked to be looked at. More importantly,
people liked to look at you, which could only mean one thing. You were popular.
Popularity at Winston was easy to spot. There were obvious clues, like beauty, confidence, and style. And then more subtle
ones.
Par example,
popular girls tend to attach their keys to purple squiggle bracelets. And they almost always have small, white wads of gum
between their perfect, smiling teeth. And they call each other chica, bitch, and slut — and then they hug, squealing like
they’ve won some kind of award.
Which, in a way, they have.
Popular guys were easier. Popular guys were just guys popular girls happen to like.
There were exceptions, of course. Some kids were popular because they were impossibly talented. Or impossibly funny. Or impossibly
cool.
But not impossibly dumb,
Janie thought as her brother pulled into one of the coveted Showroom spots. She sank deep into her seat, willing herself
to disappear. He couldn’t possibly mean to park here for real, right? Jake turned the engine off, unbuckling his seat belt.
He’s worse than impossibly dumb,
she realized as he opened the door.
He’s clinically insane.
Janie watched in stunned disbelief as Jake got out of the car. Of course, stunned disbelief was nothing compared to the spine-numbing
paralysis she felt next. When he lifted his hand and waved. And Charlotte Beverwil, leaning on the hood of her mint condition
1969 cream-colored Jaguar, waved back. And
smiled.
That’s when she realized: her brother wasn’t dumb. He wasn’t insane.
Somehow, when Janie wasn’t looking, Jake had become popular.
The Girl: Charlotte Beverwil
The Getup: Silk Blumarine dress with grapevine pattern, yellow Marni headband, plum-colored Marc Jacobs knit leggings, black
patent-leather Chanel flats
With her winter cream skin, unruly espresso-dark hair and almond shaped pool green eyes, Charlotte Sidonie Beverwil most closely
resembled the “Tiffany” supermodel Shalom Harlow. Except while Shalom Harlow measured in at six feet, Charlotte stood a full
foot shorter. Fortunately Charlotte had long legs that, she argued, gave her the “illusion of height.” It was true, in a way.
She
did
seem a lot taller than she was. But it had nothing to do with her legs. She looked a lot taller than she was because she
said
she looked a lot taller than she was.
And you didn’t argue with Charlotte Beverwil.
For the first day of school, she chose a feminine dress to wear over knit leggings and ballet flats. She hoped the dress,
which she’d embroidered with an intricate pattern of interlocking grapevines, would remind Jake of their summer together.
Jake and Charlotte had gone to school together for over a year, but they hadn’t really met — that is Charlotte hadn’t
cared
to meet — until that August.
Charlotte was supposed to have spent the entire month of August in Bruges, a quaint little port town in Belgium. There, amid
crumbling buildings and murky canals, she would perfect her sewing in an exclusive embroidery class taught by Belgian nuns.
But after just four days of pinpricked fingers and a nine o’clock curfew, Charlotte couldn’t take it anymore. She called her
dad and — after a thirty-minute begathon — arranged her escape. She laughed every time she remembered the nuns rushing outside
as Daddy’s Augusta 109 luxury helicopter descended upon the roof of a neighboring brewery. The whirring blades whipped the
pristine garden into a frenzy — uprooted their precious petunias, exploded their prim white roses. As Charlotte ran toward
the aircraft, the blizzard of petals whirled like confetti, toasting her newfound freedom. The nuns stood by and watched in
shock, clutching their habits and their hearts.
As the Augusta lifted into the air, Charlotte sank into one of the supple leather chairs and sucked sweetly on a Bloody Mary.
She was on her way to Northern California, Napa Valley to be exact, where her father was starring, directing, and producing
the film adaptation of
Dead on the Vine,
the Pulitzer Prize–winning Depression epic by the famous recluse author Benjamin Nugent. Everyone said it was “unadaptable.”
Daddy was out to prove them wrong.
When she arrived, her father took her on a brief tour of the vineyard, kissed her on the forehead, and told her to “stay in
trouble.” After dabbing the kiss off her forehead with a Bioré wipe, Charlotte took a moment to look around. The vineyard
surrounded a beautiful ranch house with a wraparound porch and a hammock. She instantly declared the hammock her spot, perching
inside like a dainty spider in her web. (No wonder the cute production assistants hovered around like gnats.) Hundreds of
scenery actors, called extras, dotted the hills like cattle. They were there to mime the harvest. While the extras practiced
looking starved and dejected, prop guys went around with clusters of phony grapes, hanging them from the vines. Charlotte
let her hand drop from the edge of the hammock to the Spanish tile floor. If only it really was 1931. How
romantic
would that be? Sure, a lot of people were poor — but not movie stars. People always went to the movies, no matter how hard
things got. Charlotte nestled into her web and sighed. The Beverwils would have been just fine.
“Yo.”
Charlotte fluttered her green eyes open and frowned, annoyed. Who said “yo” in 1931?
“Would you, um . . . like an ice-blended cappuccino?” A dark-haired guy around her age extended a trayful of Dixie cup–sized
beverages and cleared his throat. She frowned again. As far as historical accuracy, “ice-blended” was almost as bad as “yo.”
“Thanks.” Charlotte nodded, accepting the offer. Historical accuracy be damned. She loved ice-blendeds even more than she
loved the Depression. She took a long sip and — maybe it was the caffeine — it instantly hit her.
Cappuccino Boy was remarkably handsome.
“I’m Charlotte.” She extended her tiny hand.
“I know.” Cappuccino Boy grinned, slapping her hand high-five style. “We go to the same school?”
“What?” Charlotte squinted into the sun. “Oh my god,
Jake Farrish
?”
He smiled — and why wouldn’t he?
Charlotte Beverwil knew his name.
“Yo,” he said again.
“You look . . . ,” she began, struggling to sit up. But her hand slipped through the netting and hit the floor. Charlotte
started to slide. She was not a natural klutz, but she knew when to pretend otherwise. As the hammock threatened to flip,
she let out a little gasp. Jake put down his tray and rushed to assist her.
Just as she knew he would.
“There.” He righted the hammock and held Charlotte’s hand as she stepped to the floor. She leaned into him in an effort to
steady herself. As she looked up into his dark chocolate eyes, her heart surged toward her throat.
“You look . . . ,” she began again.
Jake shrugged, endlessly proud of himself. “I kinda grew this summer.”
But it wasn’t only that. His face, which used to look like a bad case of diaper rash, was perfect — smooth and luminous and
slightly flushed at the cheeks. And his
hair.
Last year, he went around with a shamelessly long and ratty ponytail. But now his brownish-black locks were cut short and
cutely mussed. No doubt about it. Jake Farrish had gone from metal head to
drop dead.
As in
gorgeous.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, fingering the delicate chain around her neck.
“I’m helping my dad. He’s in craft service.”
“Oh?” Craft service is basically catering for the movie industry, which meant Jake’s dad spent his days preparing mass quantities
of coffee, BBQ chicken breasts, and pinwheel veggie platters. “What do you do there?”
“Slave to the blender, baby,” he smirked. “Iced mochas, iced cappuccinos, iced nonfat sugar-free vanilla cappa-schnappa-rhinos.
. . .”
“Margaritas?” she asked.
Jake grinned. “Those too.”
So Charlotte followed him to the opposite end of the set, where the craft service truck was parked. She sat on the edge of
the tailgate, kicking her feet like a five-year-old while Jake crushed ice by the sandwich bar. When it comes down to it,
movie sets operate under the same hierarchy as the
Titanic:
first class, second class, craft service. Charlotte flushed with excitement. This meant she was like Kate Winslet’s character,
Rose, and Jake was like Leonardo’s Jack!
Plus romantique et tu meurs!
Charlotte hardly left that tailgate for three weeks. And then, after the last night of shooting, she and Jake took a long
walk through the vineyard. It was one in the morning, and the moon was bright and full. The grapevines were bathed in a silvery
light and the churned soil was warm beneath their feet. And she could smell it: the grapes, the soil. She could even smell
the moon.
“Charlotte . . . ,” Jake said. He plucked a leaf from a vine. Even in the dark, it was green.
“Yes?” Charlotte breathed.
He stepped toward her. The wind moved a piece of her hair across the bridge of her nose. She stared at the ground. If she
could pretend to be a klutz, then she could also pretend to be shy.
Jake reached for her hand. The sound of crickets filled the dark, their chirps evenly measured, as if to mark the seconds
of a countdown.
“Here,” he said, handing her the leaf. He looked her in her eyes. “This is for you.”
And then that was it.
But Charlotte made a vow: it wouldn’t be for long.
Charlotte heard Jake’s car door click, swing open, and close. As she would not allow herself to look directly (way too obvious),
she closed her eyes. Maybe she could trick her brain into thinking she was blind and develop supersonic hearing. Then she
could just
listen
to his hotness.
“Charlotte,” he beckoned. She opened her pool green eyes at the sound of his voice, fluttering all five million of her ink-black
lashes.
Too bad she was wearing sunglasses.
“Hey,” Charlotte replied (like she’d only just noticed him). Jake walked toward her, a silhouette haloed by sun.
A perfect eclipse,
she thought, proud of her analogy. Plus, it reminded her — she could really use some gum.
“Qu’est ce qui se passe?”
she asked, crushing a tiny white square between a flawless row of pearly teeth.
“No, I . . . no spare change,” he apologized, pretending to search his pockets. “Sorry.”
Charlotte laughed. “
Qu’est ce qui se passe
means ‘what’s up.’”
“
Sure
it does.” He raised an eyebrow. Then folded his arms like Mr. Clean. Charlotte smiled.
Just the man to take on Miss Dirty.
“Jake!” Anna Santochi shrieked, emerging from the nearby locker jungle. “Omigod! Your
hair
!” But Jake barely lifted his hand to wave in response. He was too busy staring at Charlotte, who stood there, shaking her
gum like a maraca.
“Wanna piece?” she asked, once Anna turned and headed for the drinking fountain.
“Okay,” he replied. Charlotte decided she liked nothing more than to watch Jake chew. He had three small beauty marks along
his jaw and one above his eyebrow. She connected them like stars in a constellation, navigating his face like a sailor in
search of direction. Jake looked at her and smiled, disappearing a single star into the crease at his mouth. Charlotte sighed,
resigning herself. She was hopelessly adrift. She was doomed at sea.
“You know” — Jake pointed to his mouth — “this stuff has saccharine in it. Causes cancer in rats.”
“Do I look like a rat to you?” Charlotte smirked.
“That
would
explain the impulse to leap on your car and scream like a girl,” he remarked.
“Whattup, gorgeous!” Someone called in greeting. Probably Jason. Or Luke. Or . . . who cared? Whoever it was, Charlotte ignored
him.
“Maybe we should quit gum chewing and take up smoking,” she suggested, her eyes fixed on Jake.
“Excellent plan.”
Charlotte cupped her manicured hand to her mouth. (Anything can be feminine — even acts of expectoration.) When she was done,
the gum sat in the shell of her palm like a pearl in an oyster. After a moment’s hesitation, she leaned over, sticking the
minty wad firmly to Jake’s skinny-yet-toned arm.
“What” — he looked at his arm — “was that?”
“I’m putting you on the patch,” she explained solemnly. “For your saccharine addiction.”
“Awesome,” Jake responded with an amused grin. “I’m such a badass.”
Charlotte looked down, feeling proud. All around her, the Showroom rioted with noise: with first day
omigods and shutups
and
noways
and
youlookamazings
and
haveyouseenyouknowwhos
. Doors slammed, lockers rattled, hands slapped, girls shrieked, radios blared, hydraulics hissed, sub-woofers woofed, sidekicks
chirped, trunks kuh-klunked, sneakers squeaked, book bags jostled, keys jingled, engines rumbled, brakes squealed, and someone,
somewhere, bounced a basketball:
buh-boom, buh-boom, buh-boom, buh-boom
. . .
But it couldn’t compete with Charlotte’s beating heart.
Jake and Janie Farrish were “scholarship kids” — an anomaly at Winston. They were also “new kids” — another anomaly. For the
most part, Winston recruited students in kindergarten and kept them all the way through twelfth grade. Which isn’t to say
relationships began in kindergarten. Dr. Spencer, Bronwyn Spencer’s mother, had delivered fourteen of the sixty students in
the sophomore class
alone.
At one time their mothers had sat in her waiting room, probably even next to one another — perusing the same
People
s, sipping the same Evian, fingering the leaves of the same potted ficus. “Why shouldn’t our children attend the same school?”
they were fond of saying. “They were clusters of
cells
together!”
Some cliques start at birth. Winston’s start at conception.
Charlotte, however, was born in a hospital outside Paris. Her mother had wanted the privacy; that’s how famous she was. She
was “Georgina Malta” — you might remember her as that incredibly hot chick from that Chris Isaak video. Or was it that Meat
Loaf video? It hardly mattered. When it came down to it, she was famous for being Georgina Malta-
Beverwil.
Wife to Academy Award–winning actor, producer, and director William (aka “Bud”) Beverwil.
Triathlete Bud (aka “Bod”) Beverwil.
Avid Art Collector Bud (aka “Bid”) Beverwil.
Legendary Playboy Bud (aka “Bed”) Beverwil.
Okay, so her dad was a Hollywood icon. That hardly counted for glamour, not in Charlotte’s book. For one: her hayseed parents
were from
the Midwest,
thereby denying her the Parisian lineage she rightfully deserved. For
two
. . . well, there was no for two. For two you have to move past one.
And she would never move past one.
There was no way around it: Charlotte was a die-hard, hard-core, hard-hitting Francophile. She was Paris Bueller. She was
Frenchenstein. Everything she touched went the way of
oui:
her books (Colette, Voltaire), her drink (Orangina, Perrier), her music (Air, Phoenix, the pensive Eric Satie), her good
habits (bicycling,
aventure amoureuse
), her bad habits (cigarettes,
ennui).
And then, of course, there was fashion.
Charlotte liked to think of herself as the style child of Marie Antoinette and Jean-Luc Godard. Which is to say, she
adored
cigarette pants and pencil skirts, skinny belts and pearls.
Lived for
lace collars and tiny puffed sleeves, knotted silk scarves and ballerina flats. And, of course, she
absolutely worshipped
Chanel.