Art Girls Are Easy Page 9

  “Indy!” Eleanor, wearing a crotch-length gold spangly minidress that could’ve passed as a leotard at a certain angle, approached Indigo with an extra martini glass full of whatever it was she was drinking in her other hand.

  “Shh, don’t tell,” Eleanor said. “But I snuck some Campari into this.”

  She held up her glass, smiling like they were best friends.

  “Guess it can’t hurt,” Indy said, looking around at the room full of nervous teenagers. She took the glass Eleanor handed her.

  “To nonvirgin drinks for virgins. Or, you know, not.” Eleanor cheers’ed Indigo loudly, as though she was performing for both sides of the room. She must have been buzzed already—she was acting out and being almost nice to people. But Eleanor had a point—maybe these socials would be a lot more tolerable if alcohol was actually served.

  The guys on the other side of the room kept glancing over at Eleanor and Indy. They were in the middle of the space and making more of a scene than the rest of the Silver Springs girls, who clung to their stools and stared at Lillian, who was doing bartender duty that night. She wore an old-timey scrunchy thing on the white shirtsleeve of her left arm and a tilted derby hat. Cute look, Lillian, Indy thought. Only the opposite.

  Indigo sipped her mock—er, cocktail—slowly, and tried to assess the guys as inconspicuously as she could. Right away she noticed Jay Stegbrandt, who she’d hoped wouldn’t be at Kinnetonka this year. He was, of course, alongside his bunk mate/best friend, Andrew Cook, who actually looked really hot in his crisp suit and skinny tie. Jay and Andrew had both gotten taller since the year before, and some of the baby fat had disappeared from Jay’s doughy face, but he was still sort of soft-looking in a way that made Indy kind of nauseated. His leather corded necklace with a bead in the middle of it wasn’t doing him any favors, either. Was it some kind of unwritten law that every affluent artistic Jewish person had to go through a hippie phase?

  “Indigo Hamlisch! Just the person I was hoping to see.…” It was too late—Jay had seen Indy looking at him and approached her and Eleanor, who was eating Andrew Cook alive with her eyes. Eleanor took a huge swig of her drink, and Indy followed suit. This was going to be painful.

  “Hello, Jay,” Indy said, forcing a smile.

  “Last time I saw you, you weren’t sure if you’d be coming back to camp this year.” His tone seemed to suggest they were much closer than they really were. Indy cringed.

  “Yeah, well, I wasn’t sure. But I did, so I’m here now.”

  She’d completely blocked the last time she’d seen Jay Stegbrandt from her memory. It was about five months ago, and Indy’s parents had dragged her along to some random charity benefit on the Upper East Side. That event was not Indy’s scene—lots of middle-aged couples milling around, drinking wine and boasting about their new vacation homes in Gstaad, at an event that cost a couple of hundred dollars a ticket for a charity they knew virtually nothing about.

  Jay’s parents had brought him, too, and they were pretty much the only teenagers there. Indy didn’t really want to hang out with him, but there was no other option. So she’d spent the entire evening with Jay, people-watching and shooting the shit, while he periodically stared down the front of her low-cut teal cocktail dress (chosen by Yoshiko). They’d stolen a half-empty bottle of champagne and snuck up onto the roof to look at the city lights, even though it was freezing cold outside. And there they talked about camp, and parents, and making art, and Indy’s temporary doubts about coming back to Silver Springs. It was actually sort of fun.

  But then Jay tried to kiss her—and stick his tongue down her throat. Indy had dodged his adolescent, stubble-free face, and the whole thing turned incredibly awkward. She hadn’t talked to him since, despite his continued efforts to contact her.

  To be completely fair, he wasn’t so horrible. But Jay Stegbrandt still represented so many things she couldn’t stand about guys her age. He was so yearning to please, so malleable, so polite. There was no sign of a backbone, until the tongue move, which suddenly made him seem like a pervy lizard. His move on the rooftop had been abrupt—he’d never lean her back and make out with her artfully, as Nick would, based on an inspired scene Indy fantasized about last night before falling asleep.

  Based on his look (thick, wavy, chin-length hair and a button-down shirt made out of hemp over cargo capris and sandals), Jay was trying to go for “the artistic type.” It worked—he was absolutely catnip to the Silver Springs girls who liked “creatives” who played guitar and came from wealthy entertainment parents. Jay’s dad was a famous film director and habitually adapted his schlocky eighties comedies for the Great White Way for easy royalties. His biggest success had been She’s a Robot: The Musical, and the profits from it were enough to keep Jay’s hairy toes in expensive Birkenstocks all summer at the priciest boys’ camp on the East Coast. But he was so far away from being a real artist that Indy was literally baffled when she first met him and he referred to the derivative, thirty-second instrumental songs he composed on his Gibson acoustic guitar as “his art.” What did Jay know about putting in the work needed to funnel that first flicker of inspiration into a full-blown masterpiece?

  “So, I have a new CD, in case you want a copy,” Jay said to Indy as he tucked a lock of his hair behind his ear.

  “Oh, really?” Indigo replied, scanning the room for somebody—anybody—to save her from this conversation. Thank goodness for Puja, who approached them both, just in time.

  “Yeah,” Jay continued, oblivious to losing his audience. “It’s all instrumental tracks I put down at my dad’s recording studio. There are four of them. Some songs are even a minute long.”

  Jay produced a disc from one of the giant pockets of his shorts. There was a tree on the cover. “The booklet inside also has some poetry that I’ve been working on. I haven’t really figured out yet how to convert the poems into lyrics, so right now the music and the words are separate. Hope you like it.”

  “Thanks, Jay. But actually, I don’t have a bag with me, so I don’t know how I’d really carry it back.…”

  “Oh, I’ll hold on to it!” Puja chimed in, suddenly wedged between Indigo and Jay, and smiling with every muscle of her pretty face, like a nervous beauty pageant contestant. Indy noticed that Puja had put in her contact lenses and was wearing a lot of cherry-blossom essential-oil perfume.

  “Hi,” Puja said to Jay, amped up and going for it. “I’m Puja Nair. I’ve met you a few times in the past, but. Anyway, I’m a fan.”

  Of course, Indy thought.

  Puja wasn’t interjecting to save her from Jay—she was totally into him, just like every other Silver Springs girl who went all gooey-kneed around the sight of any guy who wasn’t a total lacrosse stick–slinging, gay slur–spouting, white baseball cap–wearing bully.

  “Pardon me,” Indigo said, excusing herself so Puja could flirt with Jay. Across the room, Eleanor’s eyes were locked like headlights on Andrew Cook’s.

  “Hey,” Indy whispered into her ear. “Can you top me off?” The last few minutes talking to Jay had caused her to suck down her drink way faster than she intended. Indigo couldn’t help but notice a relieved expression on Andrew Cook’s sharp-featured, tan face as she interrupted their conversation. Eleanor shot Indy a homicidal look, then transitioned at once into her phony shark smile.

  “Oh, In-di-go!” Eleanor grinned behind bared teeth. “You remember Andy Cook, obviously?” Eleanor tried flipping her hair back, forgetting for a second that it was tightly shellacked into pin curls. She just looked like she had a tic or a mini-seizure instead. Andrew’s jaw tightened in a full-on grimace.

  “Yes, of course,” Indigo said. “The mini–Patrick Bateman–cum–entertainment law prodigy?”

  “Don’t say ‘cum,’ dear,” Andrew said. “It makes you look cheaper than you are.” Eleanor laughed way too loudly, touching Andrew’s arm as she did. He flinched.

  “Listen,” Indy whispered in Eleanor’s ear. “I really would love
some more booze. If I’m going to make it through this social, I’m going to need something stronger than a Shirley Temple.”

  “Here, here. Go. Thanks. Bye.” Eleanor smuggled the remainder of the bottle into Indy’s empty glass while maintaining aggressive eye contact with Andrew, who did share the same predatory animal-like facial features and affinity for hair gel that she did. Maybe they really were a match made in hell.

  As Indigo stood off to the corner alone, giving room to Jay and Puja and Andrew and Eleanor, she noticed Yvonne and her twin brother, Dean Bremis, sitting on bar stools and making fun of the crowd together, like junior roastmasters. It was sort of cute.

  “Look at that gargoyle over there. The one with thighs you could fit through a pencil sharpener?” Indy heard Dean lisp through his braces.

  “Eleanor?” Yvonne said. “What about her?”

  “I wouldn’t screw her with Lillian’s penis.”

  They both laughed.

  At the end of the bar was Evan Zander, the hazel-eyed tennis star who recently had the opportunity to study the art of TV show–running alongside Breaking Bad’s Vince Gilligan in his villa on the south of France. He was chatting with Tiffany Melissa Portman, who was playing the part of a femme fatale–looking seductress as she leaned in to seem interested in whatever Evan was saying. She was a good actress, after all.

  Lillian, who grinned as she wiped down the bar, lifted her eyes to meet Indigo’s. Indy turned away in paranoia that her tipsiness would be visible, but Lillian didn’t notice—she used her hands to approximate a drum roll on the surface of the bar.

  “Attention, ladies and gentlemen!” Lillian bellowed.

  The music in the background faded out completely. In the ensuing silence, the campers looked up at Lillian, who cupped her hands on either side of her mouth.

  “If you would kindly retire to the screening room, we can begin the main event of the evening! Tonight, we’re showing all of this year’s best foreign animated shorts Oscar nominees! And a special thanks is due to Jay Stegbrandt, whose father generously provided his screeners for the occasion.”

  The campers clapped, and Puja beamed at Jay.

  Oh, Jesus, thought Indy. She almost forgot about the movie portion of these bizarre socials. When lights went down, it was either snoozeville or make-out city, depending on which kind of awful you were up for on that particular evening.

  Debra stood at the entrance of the screening room wearing a red-and-white checkered apron while campers trudged in, alone and in pairs. “Enjoy the show!” she said, handing out single-serving paper bags of organic popcorn. “No coming attractions!”

  Indigo took a seat in the middle of the last row and checked her cell for any texts from Lucy. Zero. She must be having a great time at that concert. With Nick. Indy finished the last of her drink and caught a quick glance down at her body in those clothes. She could see her tummy rolls when she looked beyond her huge boobs in that tight top, and her exposed thighs rolled out and stuck to the red leather seats. She crossed her arms over her body, concealing it from her own critical gaze, and put her glass in the cup holder on the seat next to hers.

  Eleanor walked down the aisle leading Andrew by the hand like a dog on a leash, and settled next to Indy on her right. Eleanor didn’t even look up to say hi, as she was locked into focus on the creep she was courting. Who would be the one to tell Eleanor that Andrew was obviously gay? And that he wasn’t, like, the fun kind of gay guy, like Harry Glibbe or Rashid “Jazz Hands” Beatts.

  The lights began to dim, and just in time, as Indy was beginning to notice out of the corner of her eye that Eleanor’s hands were migrating down to Andrew’s zipper. As soon as the screening room became totally dark, Indy’s body twitched with the presence of a new body that pulled up next to hers, and the scent of dirty feet, Aveda shampoo, and clove cigarettes that wafted in along with it.

  “Hey you,” Jay said, leaning in very close to her.

  Oh, God. Poor Puja would be crying into her journal that night, fueling Jay’s rejection of her into some new play.

  “Shh,” Indy shushed him. “The movie is starting.”

  As the screen flickered with abstract animation of amoebas transforming into Rubik’s Cubes, jazz played under German narration that filled the tiny screening room. And as the intermittent moans of her bunk mates joined the chorus of things Indigo would rather not be listening to, she also realized three different things, at exactly the same time.

  1. She was much drunker than she thought she was moments ago, when she was standing on her feet—in those horrible shoes. 2. Jay Stegbrandt had his hand on her bare thigh. And 3. he was gliding it up toward her crotch slowly and deliberately, and all of it was horrifyingly in time with the jazz soundtrack of the movie.

  Indigo closed her eyes, hoping the wave of nausea she suddenly felt—which could have been indicative of any of the things she’d just realized—would pass.

  And it did, which was nice. But then the music changed into an electronic “beep-beep-boop” kind of thing, which accompanied a new short with no narration, only subtitles. She took a deep breath. Jay, confident from the fact that Indy wasn’t actively rejecting his massage moves, finally leaned in for a kiss. And to her surprise, Indigo found herself, flush from the warmth of the booze and the recentness of all her latest sexual fantasies about Nick, open to his mouth on hers. Why the hell not?

  She tried hard to think about Nick while kissing Jay but found herself easily distracted by the sound of Andrew Cook to her right, slapping Eleanor’s hand away from his groin and refusing her advances repeatedly. The gross smell of Jay’s hair wasn’t helping, either. Indigo cringed as he sloppily pawed her boobs over her top, and recoiled at the sensation of Jay’s turgid tongue piled atop of hers. This was just so…wrong.

  She wasn’t having a good time, but what was she going to do—watch the movie instead? They were up to a point in the screening program where cartoon muffins were singing Russian ballads in a bakery window. Indy did not need to see how that story played out.

  So she let Jay paw her some more, and, in a way, enjoyed the closeness of a body pressed next to hers, even if it was the body of a poseur hippie who couldn’t tell you the difference between Ben & Jerry’s and Simon and Garfunkel. And as Jay grunted and breathed so loudly in her ear that she wondered if he was hyperventilating, Indy’s mind wandered to Nick at that concert with Lucy, and what it was that they could be doing that would make Lucy unavailable to check in on text. What if tonight, once Nick saw Lucy in the light of adulthood and peerdom and all the other bonding stuff that Indigo assumed took place over the course of a staff night out, he decided to make a move on her—to lean in for a kiss, as Jay did?

  Just then, at the peak of her distress, Jay, in a phenomenal display of his lack of intuition, decided to take Indigo’s hand and place it gingerly on the crotch of his pants. And like she was touching a flame by mistake, as soon as she grazed the revolting, upsetting territory that was Jay’s boner underneath his stupid cargo shorts, Indigo snapped her hand back like it had been burned badly.

  “I can’t do this. I’m sorry.”

  She made her way out of the row, bumping into Andrew and Eleanor as she did, muttering apologies as she clumsily darted out of the screening room. She ran, trying to shake off the shame of what had just happened, but slowed down once she hit the fresh air of the outside world. As she gingerly descended the steps to the path leading back to her bunk, it took a minute for Indigo to notice that her feet felt like they were in glass-box torture devices. She also realized she’d look a little conspicuous dashing around campus half drunk in hooker shoes. So Indy steadied herself on the banister and took a deep breath. Slow down, she told herself. Everything is fine.

  But then she had company. Lillian, who’d come running after Indy as soon as she saw her leave, joined her outside of the screening room.

  “Indigo! Indigo.”

  Shit. Indy turned around reluctantly to see what the camp director had to sa
y.

  “Are you okay?” Lillian asked. “Did anything happen in there that made you feel violated or unsafe in any way?”

  “Other than the dancing muffins? No, no. I’m fine.”

  “Are you sure? Because, you know, you can always come and talk to me. Or you can write a poem about it, if that kind of expression befits your state of mind, and slip it under my door, anytime.”

  “Thanks, Lillian.”

  “I understand if you want to return to your bunk early. Get some rest and let me know in the morning if you want to talk. My channels are always open, communicationally and emotionally.”

  “Okay.” She began descending the stairs again, hoping Lillian would get the hint and leave her alone.

  “Oh, and Indigo?”

  What now?

  “Jim Dybbs told me that you might be struggling a bit with your mission statement.”

  What? Where did Jim get off telling Lillian anything about her creative malaise—it had barely even begun.

  “I just want you to know,” Lillian continued, “that I believe in your abilities and your talent. It’s a question of your being able to circumnavigate the obstacles you create for yourself in your own head that could be your undoing. So please be mindful.”

  “Um, okay.” What was she even talking about? Was she giving her a compliment?

  “Good night, Indigo.”

  “Night.”

  She slipped off the demon shoes as soon as Lillian was out of sight and carefully stepped onto the path back to Ferlinghetti, barefoot, shining her cell phone’s light on the pebbles in front of her so she wouldn’t step on anything “hurt-y.” She couldn’t help but check it one last time for any updates from Lucy.

  Not a peep.

  Later, when Indy was tucked in bed, her makeup scoured off and the hairspray rinsed down the shower drain, Eleanor finally stumbled into their suite. She was gushing to Indigo about how “respectful” Andrew was to her. “He didn’t even try to kiss or touch me! And he comes from such a good family and knows every shoe designer by his first nameeezzzz.” Then she collapsed—makeup, gold dress, Campari breath, and all—into her pillow.