Entry-Level Mistress - By Sabrina Darby Page 0,58
came over, pointed at Julian and then me with his eyebrows raised. Julian ordered a scotch and soda and a lemon drop martini. Then he looked questioningly at me.
“Just a bottle of water, thanks.”
“I’m buying.”
“I know. Just water.” I watched him place the order, but my thoughts were full of Daniel and my emotions were far from the joyous reveling of dancing. Julian turned back to me.
“I mean it, Emily. Daniel cares about you. I know he’s hurt.”
“Hurt? He’s hurt?” I stared at him, mouth open.
The bartender placed a glass in front of us, the wet bottom sliding on the wooden bar. Julian pulled his wallet out of his pocket, extracted two twenties from the leather folds.
“He isn’t a bad guy.”
“Right. He’s one of the good ones,” I mimicked. “Listen, I’m not an idiot. I get it. I do. Kid abandoned by parents. One by suicide, the other via pharmaceuticals, and that may as well have been suicide. Revenge is easier than grief.”
Julian looked surprised.
“What, I’m wrong?” I demanded.
“No. I think you’re right.”
The fact that Julian didn’t deny that Daniel had sought revenge pulled at me painfully. I’d thought I was numb already. I set my jaw against the unwanted emotion.
“Yeah, so I get it. But that doesn’t mean he can go around hurting people for the rest of his life. It doesn’t mean he can hurt me.”
“No. It doesn’t. But revenge is also easier than love.”
What was this? Armchair psychology day? As much as once I’d wanted to believe that Daniel loved me, now it was the last thing I needed to hear. He’d had his chance when I came to the office.
Another glass in front of Julian, this time the martini-shaped one with its sugared rim. The bartender slammed a cold bottle of water down as well.
“Love has nothing to do with this,” I said, lifting the wet bottle, propelling myself away from the bar. “Thanks for the water. Now I’m going to go dance.”
I didn’t know if Julian would tell Daniel that he’d seen me, but if he did, I wanted the story to be that Emily was doing just fine on her own.
• • •
Two days later, with nearly everything I owned in storage, I accompanied Leanna to Manhattan and helped her settle into her new apartment. In those few days I also rekindled my friendship with Lila, who commandeered our nights in such a way that, except for brief moments in line for the restroom or seconds before falling asleep, I didn’t have time to think.
At the train station, when I said goodbye to Leanna, the tension was thick with everything we would not talk about. Everything I refused to consider.
“I’m excited,” I said, thinking about the art colony. “It’s going to be like having the type of resources I had at school but without having to share. Can you imagine?”
Leanna smiled, agreed, but the expression in her eyes was less than enthusiastic. Which I ignored with forced cheer.
Three hours later, Agatha Newman, the fellowship coordinator, was driving me and Don, another Barrows fellow, out to the farm. Don was a screenwriter who talked about his MFA and the film he’d written that had placed at the Sundance Film Festival. As he spoke, he flirted, and when he heard I was a sculptor he discussed how wonderfully sexual the pottery scene in Ghost had been. Agatha kept her eyes on the road but she seemed amused.
In some ways the moment felt like Real World: Artist Colony and I wondered if Gordon Fillmore’s joking about orgies and decadence would turn out to be the truth. Not that I had any desire to know first-hand.
The two-lane road wound through rolling green hills that made my heart rise into my throat at the beauty of it.
Then we arrived.
Barrows Farm was half working farm, half woodland and altogether gorgeous. I spent the first day stunned and excited about my new situation. My bedroom, a room in the main residence hall, was nothing to speak of. However my work studio was a huge cabin a quarter mile down a winding leaf-strewn path. My supplies had arrived already and someone had deposited the packages just inside the door.
I met the other residents, learned about the communal dinner and the biweekly open studios during which the public could visit. Every day I had a choice of coming back to the main residence hall for lunch or having a basket delivered. It was half camp and half spa, and while the days were