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Authors: Elin Hilderbrand
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Delilah’s foot. It was… Greg’s spoon, one of Greg’s many spoons. (This dinner required the full Emily Post lineup of utensils.) He bent down to retrieve it, a very un-Emily-Post-like move. (How many times had Delilah’s mother told her that when you dropped a utensil, you were to leave it be and ask the server to bring you another one?) Delilah felt Greg’s fingers fondling her left heel. She was shocked, but she kept her expression steady. His fingers kept going; he dragged them up the back of Delilah’s calf to the crease in her knee. This was outrageous. It was unprecedented. There had been new allies forged on this trip, yes, and maybe Greg, like Jeffrey, was recalling their flirtatious afternoon at the Hoover Dam—but to fondle her foot under the table during dinner?
Greg surfaced like a kid trolling the bottom of a swimming pool for coins, holding his spoon aloft.
“Got it!”
It might seem like Addison and Phoebe were the couple who were the most mysterious, respectively unknowable and misunderstood, but Delilah was baffled by Greg and Tess. Because they, somehow, had won. They were everybody’s favorites. They were Boy Bright and Suzie Sunshine; they had what everybody wanted.
With Greg, it was easy to understand. Greg was, after all, their rock star. He played guitar and piano; he sang. He had shaggy brown hair and intense green eyes and a day of growth on his face. He was six feet tall—shorter than Jeffrey by five inches and Addison by three—but his body was that of a professional surfer. He had six-pack abs and the shoulders of Adonis. He had a vine tattoo encircling his left bicep. He wore two silver hoops in his left ear and a silver ring on the second toe of his left foot, which only someone like Greg could pull off. If there was a woman in the world who was resistant to the charms of Greg MacAvoy, Delilah had yet to meet her. In a way, Delilah was immune. (His looks and charm were a virus she had encountered many times before.) She prided herself on being Greg’s buddy, his partner in crime. She did not fantasize about Greg; she did not desire him.
(But this thing that had just transpired under the table—what was this? A joke, she decided. A harmless funny.) She looked at Tess. Had Tess noticed anything strange? She had not. She was listening with ridiculous, eager attention to Andrea talk about Eric’s crush on the elementary school art teacher.
Tess was the ingenue, the baby sister. She was Amy in
Little Women;
she was Franny Glass. Adored, coddled, spoiled, adored some more.
It helped that she was small—five feet tall, ninety-seven pounds—and it helped that she had thick dark hair cut into a bob and tucked behind her ears, showing off her pearl earrings or her microscopic diamond studs. It helped that she had freckles and a Minnie Mouse voice. It helped that she was the nicest, kindest, most generous person on the face of the earth. She loved babies and animals. She cried at movies and AT&T long-distance commercials. She sponsored an orphan in Brazil, an eight-year-old girl named Esmeralda, and in addition to sending regular checks, Tess sent boxes packed with brown rice, muesli, coloring books, Crayola markers and colored pencils, jigsaw puzzles, modeling clay, a hairbrush, barrettes, packages of new underwear, a toothbrush, floss, toothpaste, stickers, a flashlight, and a special-ordered copy of
A Little Princess
in Portuguese.
Only Tess.
She was a good egg, for real. She never had a mean word for anyone; she loved Greg and Andrea and the Chief and the rest of them with unbridled intensity. It felt good to have Tess like you, to have Tess love you; it felt like sunshine, it felt like warm chocolate sauce over your ice cream.
Greg was no dummy. He could have had any woman he wanted and so he snapped up the prize: Tess DiRosa. He had been playing with his band at the Muse and Tess had been in the front row, wearing—how many times had Delilah heard the story?—jeans and a
Greg surfaced like a kid trolling the bottom of a swimming pool for coins, holding his spoon aloft.
“Got it!”
It might seem like Addison and Phoebe were the couple who were the most mysterious, respectively unknowable and misunderstood, but Delilah was baffled by Greg and Tess. Because they, somehow, had won. They were everybody’s favorites. They were Boy Bright and Suzie Sunshine; they had what everybody wanted.
With Greg, it was easy to understand. Greg was, after all, their rock star. He played guitar and piano; he sang. He had shaggy brown hair and intense green eyes and a day of growth on his face. He was six feet tall—shorter than Jeffrey by five inches and Addison by three—but his body was that of a professional surfer. He had six-pack abs and the shoulders of Adonis. He had a vine tattoo encircling his left bicep. He wore two silver hoops in his left ear and a silver ring on the second toe of his left foot, which only someone like Greg could pull off. If there was a woman in the world who was resistant to the charms of Greg MacAvoy, Delilah had yet to meet her. In a way, Delilah was immune. (His looks and charm were a virus she had encountered many times before.) She prided herself on being Greg’s buddy, his partner in crime. She did not fantasize about Greg; she did not desire him.
(But this thing that had just transpired under the table—what was this? A joke, she decided. A harmless funny.) She looked at Tess. Had Tess noticed anything strange? She had not. She was listening with ridiculous, eager attention to Andrea talk about Eric’s crush on the elementary school art teacher.
Tess was the ingenue, the baby sister. She was Amy in
Little Women;
she was Franny Glass. Adored, coddled, spoiled, adored some more.
It helped that she was small—five feet tall, ninety-seven pounds—and it helped that she had thick dark hair cut into a bob and tucked behind her ears, showing off her pearl earrings or her microscopic diamond studs. It helped that she had freckles and a Minnie Mouse voice. It helped that she was the nicest, kindest, most generous person on the face of the earth. She loved babies and animals. She cried at movies and AT&T long-distance commercials. She sponsored an orphan in Brazil, an eight-year-old girl named Esmeralda, and in addition to sending regular checks, Tess sent boxes packed with brown rice, muesli, coloring books, Crayola markers and colored pencils, jigsaw puzzles, modeling clay, a hairbrush, barrettes, packages of new underwear, a toothbrush, floss, toothpaste, stickers, a flashlight, and a special-ordered copy of
A Little Princess
in Portuguese.
Only Tess.
She was a good egg, for real. She never had a mean word for anyone; she loved Greg and Andrea and the Chief and the rest of them with unbridled intensity. It felt good to have Tess like you, to have Tess love you; it felt like sunshine, it felt like warm chocolate sauce over your ice cream.
Greg was no dummy. He could have had any woman he wanted and so he snapped up the prize: Tess DiRosa. He had been playing with his band at the Muse and Tess had been in the front row, wearing—how many times had Delilah heard the story?—jeans and a
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