Read Online London Is the Best City in America by Laura Dave - Free Book Online Page A

wrist. “I’m really sorry.”
    I tried to wave it off. “That’s okay,” I said.
    “Oh, of course it is. Of course!” Stacey said, Sheila nodding her head, fiercely, in agreement. “Things sometimes happen. Things change! The important thing is the present. What are you up to now, Emmy?”
    “I’m working at a fishing supply store in Rhode Island,” I said.
    “Oh.” They looked at each other. “Huh.”
    The bartender placed down the tray of tequila shots, the bottle sitting in the middle of the tray. I picked up the tray and then turned back to the girls, holding it up in their direction. “Well, I guess I should be getting these over to the table,” I said. “But don’t worry. I’ll be back in a minute to get everyone else’s.”
    They looked at each other, again, and then both started laughing, a little too hard. But I guess that’s what you get for offering up a bad joke, or, maybe, for seeming a little too much like one yourself.
     
    When I got back to the table, my father was telling a story. I put the booze quietly in the center and sat down in the chair next to Berringer. He looked over at me and gave me a smile, and then turned his attention back to my father, whose arm was around Josh. I was only catching the tail end of the story, but I’d heard it before. It was the one when Josh was pitching his first junior varsity baseball game. Josh had been pitching a no-hitter until the last inning, when someone hit a home run out of the park. “Josh ran up to the home plate and broke the bat in half because he was so convinced the guy put cork inside,” my father was saying.
    Everyone laughed, except me. I was too busy wondering if all bachelor parties were this much fun.
    Berringer leaned in toward me. “Are those friends of yours?” he asked, motioning to Stacey and Sheila at the bar.
    I shrugged, reaching straight across him for a tequila shot. “Why do you ask?”
    “You look upset.”
    I downed the shot, instead of answering him. Then I reached for another. I started to ask if he remembered Sheila and Stacey, mostly because I thought he wouldn’t. Which I thought would make me feel better. But before I even could, he leaned forward and whispered in my ear.
    “When I tell certain people that I’m a chef, they look at me funny, and ask what I like to cook,” he said. “And I know if I say I like making some really fancy dish, like margret of duck with verjus, or whole roasted squab and truffles, or foie gras and anything, they’ll approve. I know these are the things they want to hear.”
    “So what do you tell them?”
    “Peanut butter,” he said. “And jelly.”
    I started laughing, feeling a chill run through me, his lips still close to my ear.
    I pulled back and looked at him. “So, you want to tell me something, Berringer?”
    He was still smiling at me. “Anything,” he said.
    “Have you met Elizabeth?” When he didn’t answer, I tried to clarify for him. “Josh’s Elizabeth.”
    “Emmy, you should probably be talking to Josh about this instead of me.”
    I motioned across the table to where Josh was taking another tequila shot of his own, quickly—his face starting to get red, a little too flushed. “Josh is busy right now,” I said.
    Berringer shook his head, keeping his eyes down. He certainly wasn’t smiling anymore.
    “What?” I said. “She’s that great?”
    He looked back up at me, reluctantly, offering a soft nod. “She’s pretty great,” he said.
    I stared down at my empty shot glass, thinking of Meryl. She had just come to New York a couple of weeks ago for her final dress fitting, and had driven up to the Hilton in southern Connecticut to meet me for lunch. We ended up talking about this great documentary she had seen in L.A. about a filmmaker who was so in love with this old novel he read that he embarked on a countrywide journey to find the author, who hadn’t been heard from in over two decades. She got so excited telling me the story that she