Звёздный принц и Ангельское яблочко. Михаил Чирков

an eternity he tensed and collapsed and I felt sticky hot wetness running out of me and down onto the faded Scooby-Doo sheets.

      I rode my bike home afterward with “Lovesong” running through my head and an uncomfortable dampness in my underwear. When I went to the bathroom it was all red and brown and weird in there and I didn’t want my mom to see it when she did the laundry. It hurt like fire to pee and I had to squeeze my eyes shut and hold on to the roll of toilet paper as I did it.

      My mom gave me a cookie as I got a can of Diet Pepsi from the fridge and told me I was getting too skinny. She said she was making fried chicken for dinner and she wanted me to eat a whole plate. I pictured great big bones of some dead chicken, covered in globs of greasy fried flour and oil, and a mountainous mass of mashed potatoes erupting and overflowing with salty gravy. Suddenly everything sounded horrible.

      I asked Charlie to the Sadie Hawkins Dance the next day. He said he was going with Aurelia.

      I was so wrapped up in the loss-of-virginity round table that I forgot to call Karen with the message that her lunch appointment had been changed to Thursday. Oops. When she got back from Barney Greengrass she yelled at me to get behind the eight ball and start thinking outside of the box. She said I had to step up to the plate and take ownership.

      And I thought I could get by on the ability to multitask with attention to detail in a fast-paced environment.

      “You’ll never be promoted if you can’t even remember the smallest details,” she told me with a frown.

      I nodded.

      “You’ll never convince me that you want a future here if you can’t even keep on top of the things you do now.”

      I nodded.

      “Now, try to get me the things I asked for by the end of the day, could you?”

      I nodded.

      “Your first priority is straightening out that catering mess at the Hyatt!” she yelled. “Tell them we are paying bulk for lunch or we’re taking our business elsewhere!” she screamed, just before slamming the door on her way out.

      The idea of calling the caterers and haggling over the chicken florentine for the Women in Business luncheon down in Irvine was really unappealing. So I surfed the Internet.

      I looked on www.weddingchannel.com and started freaking out because there are about a million and a half details that go into planning a wedding and so far I’ve only taken care of the location…kind of. My mother wants to have the wedding at our church and the reception at this old mansion in Santa Paula that rents out for such occasions. But when I told Lily I was getting married her mother got on the phone and said if we really want to do something special we should have the reception on her yacht. It’s parked in the Ventura Harbor and was Kitty’s wedding present from Lily’s first stepfather, Don. He died when we were in sixth grade. He drowned in the ocean during a day of bad undertow when he was surfing. They had to drag his body out of the water. Kitty was so upset that she got married again eight months later, to a stockbroker named Al who wears lots of gold chunk-chain jewelry and shaves his head bald on purpose. Al smokes cigars and calls women “honey” no matter how old they are. Everyone loves Al.

      Thoughts of all the things that make a bride crazy and annoying drove me to the Cosmo Web site, where I read a piece titled “A Girl’s Life in the Big City.” According to the girl in the article, life in L.A. is just like in the movies. L.A. men are successful and nice and vying to set up romantic dates, everyone goes to trendy bars or clubs to drink green apple martinis every single night, the rent on a stylish two-bed-room beachfront apartment is completely affordable, and one is always, but always, outfitted in really expensive sandals and sundresses. Because as I’m sure you already know, it is always summer here in Los Angeles. Endless Summer, just like the Beach Boys sang.

      You’ve got to love the stigma of the feminine existence in this town. I wondered if any of the other readers thought this chick’s perspective to be true to life, because I couldn’t really relate to such ridiculousness at all. I drank a fattening blended coffee drink and snacked on some Cheese Nips and stressed about my enormous “minimum” payment to Macy’s and heard Karen bitching on the phone to her attorney through my wall. I cranked up my music to tune her out and got back to my surfing.

      I pulled up the Lonely Planet Web site to read about Cameroon, even though Roman told me all about it before he left. It had a big warning message about what a dangerous place it is. Roman’s there with a group of big cheeses who have government connections. He always comes home safe. I thought if he got kidnapped like in Proof of Life and a man who looked and talked like Russell Crowe showed up to help me find him, Roman might be on his own.

      Our meeting was fortuitous. Roman was only at that gala because Landon commanded him to make an appearance. I was only at that gala because Karen has this habit of pretending she can totally handle it and then calling me at the last minute before an event and begging me please, please will I attend, because the woman can’t fucking do anything for herself. I’d planned to skip Roman’s speech for a smoke break but then thought I’d wait it out because Karen was giving me the eye. Turned out he had some really interesting things to say. I thought what a smart, handsome man and knew he would never talk to me, even though I swore I had caught him looking at me a lot. The next day there were a dozen peach roses waiting for me at work with a note asking me if I would have dinner with him. I never had any idea that men actually did things like that.

      He took me to an unknown restaurant and we ate creamy garlic pasta and drank delicious sweet wine and he talked to me as if I was every bit the intellectual that he was even though he was ten years older than me and he had graduate and doctorate degrees on a shelf at home from fancy universities like Georgetown and Oxford. I was fascinated. I was enchanted. He lived in Washington but he spent a lot of time out of the country (“in the field” was how he put it) doing really nice things for really unfortunate people. At my door he kissed my cheek and asked if he could call me when he was in town again. He was the first man who ever walked me to my door and kissed my cheek like that without expecting a screw in return. I said yes. He came back the very next weekend and took me up the coast to a bed-and-breakfast in Santa Barbara. We held hands as we took moonlit walks on the beach and cuddled in corners of dark romantic restaurants and bade each other good-night before going into our rooms to sleep in separate beds. He said he had to go back to D.C. but he wanted to fly me out to visit as soon as we could arrange it. And so became our relationship.

      And now we’re getting married. And I know I really lucked out. Because with Roman I’ll never have to worry about sitting in this office for the rest of my life, wishing I were somewhere else. With Roman I’ll never have to worry about anything.

      I picked up the phone to call the caterers. Might as well make myself useful till then.

      Chapter 4

      I picked up Electra on the way home. She works right in Beverly Hills so usually we carpool. The funny thing is that I’m almost always the one driving. She says it’s because her big red Range Rover is a gas-guzzler, but I think it’s just that she likes to be chauffeured.

      “Has Roman called from Cameroon?” she asked.

      “He will when he has time. He said he’s going to be very busy.”

      “Yeah, yeah, that’s what they all say. You know, I can just tell when Josh has his secretary lying for him. Like he’s really in that many meetings!”

      A quick rundown on this one. Electra Hanover Kibbler, former Miss Teen South Carolina. All-knowing know-it-all. Want her opinion—you’ve got it. Don’t hate her because she’s beautiful.

      At home we found Ava sprawled out on the living room floor. She was burning every candle in the house. She was playing Morrissey and drinking vino from a big jug. She was wearing Mickey Mouse socks and her hair was in beribboned pigtails.

      A quick rundown on this one. Ava Maria Damiano, household pet and resident oddball. So sheltered growing up that she only ever left the family home to go to Catholic school. Grew up fast in college. Decided