Read Online One Fifth Avenue by Candace Bushnell - Free Book Online

girl at the interview who e-mailed me his information. Then I e-mailed him myself, and he e-mailed me right back. I have an interview next week.”
    Beetelle was nearly speechless. “Darling, that’s wonderful.” She pulled her daughter into a smothering embrace. “Philip Oakland is exactly the kind of person you came to New York to meet. He’s an A-list screenwriter. Think of the people he must know—and the people you’ll meet through him.” Gaining momentum, she added, “This is everything I always wanted for you. I just didn’t expect it to happen so soon.”
    Lola wriggled out of her mother’s grasp. “It hasn’t happened yet,” she said. “He still has to hire me.”
    “Oh, but he will,” Beetelle insisted. She sprang up. “We’ll have to get you a new outfit. Thank goodness Jeffrey is right around the corner.”
    Hearing the word “Jeffrey,” Cem shuddered. Jeffrey was one of the most expensive stores in Manhattan. “Weren’t we just there?” he asked cautiously.
    “Oh, Cem,” Beetelle scolded. “Don’t be silly. Please, get up. We need to shop. And then we’ve got to meet Brenda Lish. She has two more apartments to show us. I’m so excited, I don’t know what to do.”
    Fifteen minutes later, the threesome exited Soho House and came out on Ninth Avenue. Lola had decided to break in her new boots; in the gold platform heels she elicited gaping stares from passersby. After a few feet, they were forced to stop when Cem brought up a map on his iPhone.
    “We go straight. And then we veer to the left at the fork.” He looked 44
    Candace Bushnell
    down at the iPhone again. “At least I think we do,” he added. His few days in the West Village had been a continual exercise in navigational frustration.
    “Oh, Daddy, come on ,” Lola said, and strode off ahead of them. She had officially outgrown her parents, she thought, teetering along a cobblestoned street. They were just too slow. The evening before, it had taken her father ten minutes to work up the confidence to flag down a cab.
    The Fabrikants met the real estate agent, Brenda Lish, in front of a plain white brick building on West Tenth Street, one of many constructed all over the city in the sixties as middle-class housing. Brenda would not normally have dealt with such small potatoes as the Fabrikants, who were only seeking a rental, but Cem was an acquaintance of one of Brenda’s major clients, who had asked if she would help them out. Since the client was spending several million dollars on an apartment, Brenda was happy to be generous to these nice people with the beautiful daughter.
    “I think this will be perfect for you,” Brenda said in her happy, flighty voice. “It’s a twenty-four-hour doorman building, and it’s filled with young people. And you can’t beat the West Village location.”
    The apartment was a studio with a separate kitchen and dressing area.
    The exposure was southern, which meant good light. The cost was thirty-five hundred a month.
    “It’s so small,” Lola said.
    “We like to call it cozy,” Brenda said.
    “My bed will be in the same room as my living room. What if I want to have people over? They’ll see my bed,” Lola protested.
    “You could get a foldout couch,” Brenda said cheerfully.
    “That’s awful,” Lola said. “I don’t want to sleep on a foldout couch.”
    Brenda had recently returned from a spiritual journey to India. There were people in the world who slept on thin mats made of plant materials, there were people who slept on cement slabs, there were people who had no beds at all. She kept a smile on her face.
    Beetelle looked at Lola, gauging her mood. “Is there anything else?”
    Beetelle asked Brenda. “Anything bigger?”
    “Honestly, I’ve shown you everything available in your price range,”
    Brenda said. “If you want to look in another area, I’m sure you can find a one-bedroom for the same amount of money.”

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    “I want