The Mistaken Masterpiece (4 page)

Dad comes into my room just as I’m turning my phone off.

“Wait a minute. Is that a smile I see?”

I hold my thumb and index finger a mere millimeter apart. “It’s Leigh Ann. She just left me a funny message. Oww. Smiling hurts.”

“Into bed,” Dad orders. When I’m safely under the covers, he asks, “Now tell me. What did your friend say to cause you so much pain?”

“They’re filming a movie in the park tomorrow—you know that
No Reflections
book I’ve been babbling about for the past few weeks?”

“Ah, oui. Avec Monsieur Nathaniel Etan, n’est-ce pas?”

“How did
you
know that?” I say, a little too loudly for my own good. “Owwww.”

“He was in the restaurant last night—”

“He
what
?” My head is spinning now. The combination of the morning’s full-contact swimming workout and my dad’s oh-so-casual mention that he was in the presence of
Nate Etan
less than twelve hours earlier is
just too much for me. I mean, some of Nate Etan’s molecules could be in the very air I’m breathing.

“This Monsieur Etan—he is someone you, how do you say, have a crash with?”

“It’s a
crush
, which you have
on
someone, and, uh,
yeah
!” I shout, pointing to the bulletin board above my desk.

“Ah, oui,”
says Dad as he sees the sixty-three pictures of Nate Etan adorning it. “I’m sorry—I should have asked for an autograph for you.”

“You
talked
to him?”

He shrugs apologetically. “He came in with a bunch of … big shots, I think you call them. Movie people. After dinner, they asked to talk to the chef. What can I do?
C’est moi
. I’m sorry,
mon petit chou-chou
. I didn’t know. He seemed … very nice.”

“Ohhhh,” I groan. “Life is so unfair. I’m going to sleep. When I wake up, all this is going to be a bad dream. My nose didn’t get smushed beyond recognition and my
father
definitely did
not
meet the most awesome guy in the galaxy.”

“Or
forget
to ask him for an autograph for his beautiful but tragically disfigured daughter,” adds my betrayer, who then bolts, laughing, from my room before I have a chance to hit him with a pillow.

Or something much, much heavier.

I sleep away the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon, too. When I finally open my eyes and look at the clock, I am thoroughly confused, thinking it is three-thirty in the morning. And then I reach up to touch my face and it all comes back to me. The bandage is still there. It wasn’t a dream.

Dragging myself to the bathroom, I check myself out in the mirror again. The swelling around my eyes has gone down quite a bit, but now the circles are darker. It’s official: I am a raccoon.

I crawl back into my bed to pout some more about the general unfairness of life. A few moments later, Dad knocks on the door.

“I have to leave for the restaurant,” he says, “but your friends are here to keep you company. They’re helping themselves to some cookies in the kitchen—I wasn’t sure if you were ready for visitors.”

“They’re going to see me sooner or later,” I say. “Might as well get the abuse over with now.”

“Oh, and this came for you.” He sets a box on my bed.

“What is it?”

“It is a box.”

“Thanks, Dad. Where did it come from?” There’s no return address, just my name and apartment number.

“The lobby. The doorman—”

“No! I mean—oh, you know what I mean.” I peel the tape off one end and open it. Inside, wrapped loosely in newspaper, is a shallow brass bowl, about a foot across and only a couple of inches deep. It definitely falls into the “used” category; it has its share of dings and dents and is badly in need of polishing. It’s no thing of beauty.

“Huh,” Dad says. “Let me see.”

I dig through the newspaper again, looking for a card or a note, but find nothing. “I don’t get it. Why would someone send me an old bowl?”

“This is maybe a good question for your friends. Do you need anything before I go?”

“Nope. All set. But, Dad?”

“Yes?”

“If Nate Etan comes in …”

“I know. Autograph. Picture.”

“Riiiight.”

Margaret, Becca, and Leigh Ann stick their heads into my room, and I can’t help laughing at their different reactions as they see me in my damaged state.

Becca is her usual brutally honest self. “Holy crap, Soph. You look
terrible
.”

“You should see the other girl,” I say.

“Yeah, I hear Livvy’s hand is really beat up,” she says.

Leigh Ann, trying to be nice, lies to me, which I appreciate. “No, really, it’s not that bad. The way Margaret described it, I was expecting worse. It
does
look like it hurts, though.”

Margaret sees the glass as half full, or in this case, the nose as only half broken. “It looks a
lot
better than it did this morning. How does it feel?”

It?
Not me, just my nose. Like it’s a separate entity, with a life force of its own.

“Eh,
comme çi, comme ça
. Better. It kinda aches. And I really need to blow it, but I’m afraid to.”

“Ye-ouch,” Leigh Ann says, cringing at the thought.

“Oh, go on,” Becca encourages. “No pain, no gain.”

“What’s the story with this bowl?” Margaret asks, holding it up and examining it.

“Oh, that,” I say. “I was hoping you could tell me. It showed up here today in this box, with no card, no nothing.”

Becca turns her nose up at it. “Dude, it’s ugly. Looks like a used birdbath. Now come on, get your butt out of bed. We’ve got stuff to do.”

“We do?”

“Didn’t you get my message?” Leigh Ann asks. “We have to go over to the park. Nate Etan could be there right now.”

“Well, you guys won’t believe this, but my dad met him last night.”

“What! Where?” Leigh Ann exclaims. “Did he get his autograph? A picture?”

“He came into the restaurant with a bunch of other people. And no, Dad just
talked
to him. He didn’t know I liked him.”

“Well, yeah, I mean, how would he?” Becca asks, looking around the room. “His pictures only completely cover one wall. Maybe when you run out of space in here and have to start sticking them up out in the hallway …”

“What did he say?” Leigh Ann asks. “What was he like?”

“I don’t know,” I admit. “Dad said he seemed nice.”

“Nice? That’s it?” Becca says. “Man, your dad really is kind of clueless, isn’t he, Soph?”

“Tell me about it,” I say.

Mom puts the kibosh on any thoughts I have of going with them to the park. I’m just about to pull on my favorite denim jacket when she strolls in the door carrying her violin and a couple of bags of groceries.

She almost cries—again—when she sees my face. “Oh, sweetie. How are you feeling? Are you in any pain? What can I get you?” Then she realizes I have my jacket on. “Sophie, you’re not going out—not yet. You have to take it easy. You should be lying down.”

“I just got up!” I protest, but Mom steers me to the couch, pulling my jacket off on the way.

“That’s all right. It’s probably too late, anyway,” says Margaret. “By the time we get over there, it’ll be dark and we wouldn’t be able to see him.”

“Who is this
him
you want to see?” Mom asks. “Raf?”

“Nope, her
other
boyfriend,” Becca teases.

Mom raises an eyebrow at me. “Other boyfriend?”

“First of all, Raf is
not
my boyfriend. He’s my … he’s a … well, anyway, it’s not Raf. Nate Etan is filming a movie in the park. And Leigh Ann is just as obsessed as I am. Maybe more.”

“Well, at least that explains the crowd of girls,” Mom says.

“What crowd of girls?” Leigh Ann asks nervously. “Oh no. We’re too late.”

“I walked through the park on my way home, and they were lined up by the boathouse. Hundreds of them.”

“Well, it’s not like you could expect it to stay a secret,” Margaret says.

Leigh Ann sticks out her bottom lip. “A girl can
hope
, can’t she?”

Indeed she can.

I’m having my breakfast, totally engrossed in reading the back of a box of Lucky Charms and enjoying every sickeningly sweet, marshmallowy bite, when my dad sits down across from me.

“Hey, Dad,” I say, peeking around the cereal box. “Why are you up so early?”

He reaches over and pushes the box aside. Of course, he can’t do it without a disdainful French grunt at its contents. He slides a large envelope across the table to me without a word.

“What’s this?” I ask.

He shrugs as only a true Frenchman can. “Nothing big. You probably won’t like it.” He starts to pull it back.

I slap my hand down on the envelope, my mouth opening in disbelief. “You didn’t.”

Another shrug.

I peek inside the envelope. He did it. He really did it. “Ohmigosh. Dad. I
love
you.” I pull out a glossy eight-by-ten photo of Nate Etan—and it’s signed!

For Sophie—hope you’re feeling better! XOXO, Nate Etan
.

I jump up and hug my dad. “Thank you thank you thank you. You are the best. I’m sorry I ever doubted you.”

“What’s this all about?” Mom asks, walking in mid-hug.

“Your daughter has decided that I’m all right after all,” Dad says. “And she hasn’t even heard the good part yet.”

“There’s more?” I ask.

“
Oui
. Friday afternoon, you and your friends are going to spend the day with him.”

My knees give out on me and I sit down right there on the kitchen floor. “Whachewtalkin’boutDad?”

He looks to Mom for a translation.

“Trust me, she’s happy,” Mom says.

“How?” I manage to ask.

“Apparently the young man spent his summers in France with his father, who is a diplomat of some kind. And my
poulet au vinaigre
reminds him of his childhood—he came back last night and ordered it again.”

“And then you asked him for a picture?”

“In a way. First he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

“That sounds ominous,” Mom says. “What kind of offer?”

“He has to go on location to London for a week or two, and then he’s coming back to New York for a few days of filming. He wants me to be his personal chef while he’s in town. He offered me a ridiculous amount of money for the job, so I told him I would do it on one condition.”

“Which is?” I ask breathlessly.

“That you and your friends get to meet him and spend a day on the set. There’s no school on Friday, right? I checked your schedule and it’s some kind of teachers’ day or something. You four are going to be his guests for the whole day.”

It’s a good thing I’m already on the floor, because all the blood leaves my head.

“Sophie, are you all right?” Mom asks.

My head is spinning as I pull myself to my feet and
squeeze her and then Dad. The blood starts to return to my head, giving me a headache, and that’s when it hits me. Friday is only two days away.

“Ohhh nooooo!” I cry.

Poor Dad is
very
confused. “What’s wrong? I thought you were happy.”

“My nose,” I say, pointing at the mass of bandages holding my face together.

“What’s the matter? Does it hurt?”

“No! It’s fine. But he can’t see me looking like this!”

Mom, who, like Margaret, always sees the glass as half full, tries to convince me that, one, it doesn’t matter, that he’ll be happy to meet someone who’s obviously a real fan, regardless of how I look, and, two, by Friday I won’t be quite so hideous. Okay, so those aren’t her
exact
words, but they might as well be. I’m still going to have this stupid thing on my nose, but even if I take it off, everything under it and around my eyes is still going to be gnarly-looking.

“Livvy,” I mutter. “This is all her fault. God, it’s so humiliating.”

On the way to school, I wear a Yankees cap pulled down over my face as far as possible. I know I’ll be able to remain incognito in the cafeteria until the first-period bell rings, but sooner or later I’m going to have to walk past Sister Eugenia’s office. For somebody who, according to school legend, came to the New World on the
Santa Maria
, her eyesight is just fine, thank you very much; she can spot a uniform infraction from an ocean away. Make that two oceans.