The Jodi Picoult Collection #2 Read online

“Pardon me if you and Romeo were having your little tête-à-tête through a thin wall.”

  “If you’ve got something to say,” I suggested, “say it.”

  “Me?” Izzy frowned. “Hey, it’s none of my business, is it?”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Right. So I’ll just keep my opinion to myself.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Out with it, Isobel.”

  “Thought you’d never ask.” She sat down beside me on the couch. “You know, Julia, the first time a bug sees that big purple zapper light, it looks like God. The second time, he runs in the other direction.”

  “First, don’t compare me to a mosquito. Second, he’d fly in the other direction, not run. Third, there is no second time. The bug’s dead.”

  Izzy smirked. “You are such a lawyer.”

  “I am not letting Campbell zap me.”

  “Then request a transfer.”

  “This isn’t the Navy.” I hugged one of the throw pillows from the couch. “And I can’t do that, not now. It’ll make him think that I’m such a wimp I can’t balance my professional life with some stupid, silly, adolescent . . . incident.”

  “You can’t.” Izzy shook her head. “He’s an egotistical dickhead who’s going to chew you up and spit you out; and you have a really awful history of falling for assholes that you ought to run screaming from; and I don’t feel like sitting around listening to you try to convince yourself you don’t still feel something for Campbell Alexander when, in fact, you’ve spent the past fifteen years trying to fill in the hole he made inside you.”

  I stared at her. “Wow.”

  She shrugged. “Guess I had a lot to get off my chest, after all.”

  “Do you hate all men, or just Campbell?”

  Izzy seemed to think about that for a while. “Just Campbell,” she said finally.

  What I wanted, at that moment, was to be alone in my living room so that I could throw things, like the TV remote or the glass vase or preferably my sister. But I couldn’t order Izzy out of a house she’d moved into just hours before. I stood up and plucked my house keys off the counter. “I’m going out,” I told her. “Don’t wait up.”

  • • •

  I’m not much of a party girl, which explains why I hadn’t frequented Shakespeare’s Cat before, although it was a mere four blocks from my condo. The bar was dark and crowded and smelled of patchouli and cloves. I pushed my way inside, hopped up on a stool, and smiled at the man sitting next to me.

  I was in the mood to make out in the back row of the movie theater with someone who did not know my first name. I wanted three guys to fight for the honor of buying me a drink.

  I wanted to show Campbell Alexander what he’d been missing.

  The man beside me had sky-eyes, a black ponytail, and a Cary Grant grin. He nodded politely at me, then turned away and began to kiss a white-haired gentleman flush on the mouth. I looked around and saw what I had missed on my entrance: the bar was filled with single men—but they were dancing, flirting, hooking up with each other.

  “What can I get you?” The bartender had fuchsia porcupine hair and an oxen ring pierced through his nose.

  “This is a gay bar?”

  “No, it’s the officers’ club at West Point. You want a drink or not?” I pointed over his shoulder to the bottle of tequila, and he reached for a shot glass.

  I rummaged in my purse and pulled out a fifty-dollar bill. “The whole thing.” Glancing down at the bottle, I frowned. “I bet Shakespeare didn’t even have a cat.”

  “Who peed in your coffee?” the bartender asked.

  Narrowing my eyes, I stared at him. “You’re not gay.”

  “Sure I am.”

  “Based on my track record, if you were gay, I’d probably find you attractive. As it is . . .” I looked at the busy couple beside me, and then shrugged at the bartender. He blanched, then handed me back my fifty. I tucked it back into my wallet. “Who says you can’t buy friends,” I murmured.

  Three hours later, I was the only person still there, unless you counted Seven, which was what the bartender had rechristened himself last August after deciding to jettison whatever sort of label the name Neil suggested. Seven stood for absolutely nothing, he had told me, which was exactly the way he liked it.

  “Maybe I should be Six,” I told him, when I’d made my way to the bottom of the tequila bottle, “and you could be Nine.”

  Seven finished stacking the clean glasses. “That’s it. You’re cut off.”

  “He used to call me Jewel,” I said, and that was enough to make me start crying.

  A jewel’s just a rock put under enormous heat and pressure. Extraordinary things are always hiding in places people never think to look.

  But Campbell had looked. And then he’d left me, reminding me that whatever he’d seen wasn’t worth the time or effort.

  “I used to have pink hair,” I told Seven.

  “I used to have a real job,” he answered.

  “What happened?”

  He shrugged. “I dyed my hair pink. What happened to you?”

  “I let mine grow out,” I answered.

  Seven wiped up a spill I’d made without noticing. “Nobody ever wants what they’ve got,” he said.

  • • •

  Anna sits at the kitchen table by herself, eating a bowl of Golden Grahams. Her eyes widen, as she is surprised to see me with her father, but that’s as much as she’ll reveal. “Fire last night, huh?” she says, sniffing.

  Brian crosses the kitchen and gives her a hug. “Big one.”

  “The arsonist?” she asks.

  “Doubt it. He goes for empty buildings and this one had a kid in it.”

  “Who you saved,” Anna guesses.

  “You bet.” He glances at me. “I thought I’d take Julia up to the hospital. Want to come?”

  She looks down at her bowl. “I don’t know.”

  “Hey.” Brian lifts her chin. “No one’s going to keep you from seeing Kate.”

  “No one’s going to be too thrilled to see me there, either,” she says.

  The telephone rings, and he picks it up. He listens for a moment, and then smiles. “That’s great. That’s so great. Yeah, of course I’m coming in.” He hands the phone to Anna. “Mom wants to talk to you,” he says, and he excuses himself to change clothes.

  Anna hesitates, then curls her hand around the receiver. Her shoulders hunch, a small cubicle of personal privacy. “Hello?” And then, softly: “Really? She did?”

  A few moments later, she hangs up. She sits down and takes another spoonful of cereal, then pushes away her bowl. “Was that your mom?” I ask, sitting down across from her.

  “Yeah. Kate’s awake,” Anna says.

  “That’s good news.”

  “I guess.”

  I put my elbows on the table. “Why wouldn’t it be good news?”

  But Anna doesn’t answer my question. “She asked where I was.”

  “Your mother?”

  “Kate.”

  “Have you talked to her about your lawsuit, Anna?”

  Ignoring me, she grabs the cereal box and begins to roll down the plastic insert. “It’s stale,” she says. “No one ever gets all the air out, or closes the top right.”

  “Has anyone told Kate what’s going on?”

  Anna pushes on the box top to get the cardboard tab into its slot, to no avail. “I don’t even like Golden Grahams.” When she tries again, the box falls out of her arms and spills its contents all over the floor. “Shoot!” She crawls under the table, trying to scoop up the cereal with her hands.

  I get on the floor with Anna and watch her shove fistfuls into the liner. She won’t look in my direction. “We can always buy Kate some more before she gets home,” I say gently.

  Anna stops and glances up. Without the veil of that secret, she looks much younger. “Julia? What if she hates me?”

  I tuck a strand of hair behind Anna’s ear. “What if she doesn’t?”