Lauren Weisberger: Chasing Harry Winston

Emmy had noticed him hours before he approached her, although she still couldn’t say why. It could have been his rumpled suit and loosened tie, both tastefully conservative and expertly matched, so different from the baggy polyester chef uniforms to which she’d grown so accustomed. Or maybe it was the way he seemed to know everyone and offered backslaps and cheek kisses and the occasional gallant bow to friends and friends-to-be. Who on earth was this confident? Who could move with such ease among that many people without appearing the least bit insecure? Emmy’s eyes tracked him around the room, subtly at first and then with an intensity she herself didn’t understand. It wasn’t until most of the young professional crowd had moved on to late dinners or early bedtimes and Adriana had flitted off with her man du jour that Duncan appeared next to her.

“Hi, I’m Duncan.” He slid himself sideways between her stool and the empty one next to it, leaning on his right arm against the bar.

“Oh, sorry. Here, I was just leaving.” Emmy scooted backward off the stool, placing it between them.

He grinned. “I don’t want your seat.”

“Oh, uh, sorry.”

“I want to buy you a drink.”

“Thanks, but I was just, uh-”

“Leaving. Yeah, you said that. But I’m hoping I can convince you to stay just a little longer.”

The bartender materialized with two martini glasses, petite compared to the fishbowl-sized ones most places served. Clear liquid in one, cloudy in the other, and both with a spear of mammoth green olives.

Duncan slid the one in his left hand toward her by the very bottom of its stem, his fingers pressing into the flattened glass base. “They’re both vodka. This one’s regular and this one”-as he pushed his right hand she noticed how clean and white his nails were, how soft and groomed his cuticles looked-“is extra dirty. Which do you prefer?”

Good lord! You’d think that would have been enough to activate anyone’s skeeve sensor, but noooo, not Emmy. She had found him positively captivating and, when invited moments later, had happily accompanied him home. Of course, Emmy didn’t sleep with Duncan that night, or the next weekend, or the one after that. She had, after all, been with only two men before him (the French chef didn’t count; she had planned to have sex with him until she’d tugged down his extra-tight white briefs and discovered what, exactly, Adriana meant when she insisted Emmy would “just know” when faced with an uncircumcised situation), and both were long-term boyfriends. She was nervous. Her prudishness-something Duncan had yet to encounter from a girl-increased his determination, and Emmy stumbled, quite unwittingly, onto the concept of hard to get. The longer she held out, the more he pursued her, and in this way their interactions came to resemble a relationship. There were romantic dinners out and candlelit dinners in and big, festive Sunday brunches at trendy downtown bistros. He called just to say hi, sent her Gummi Bears and peanut butter cups at school, asked her out days in advance to ensure she wouldn’t make other plans. Who could have possibly predicted that all that happiness would screech to a standstill five years later, that she would have gained such a cynical edge and Duncan would have lost half his hair and that they, the longest-lasting couple among all their friends, would collapse like a sand castle at the first sign of a tropical breeze?

Emmy posed this question to her sister the moment she picked up the phone. Izzie had been calling twice her normal amount in the week since Duncan had dumped Emmy; this was already the fourth time in twenty-four hours.

“Did you really just liken your relationship to a sand castle and the cheerleader to a tropical breeze ?” Izzie asked.

“Come on, Izzie, be serious for a second. Would you ever have foreseen this happening?”

There was a pause while Izzie considered her words. “Well, I’m not sure that it’s exactly like that.”

“Like what?”

“We’re talking in circles, Em.”

“Then be straight with me.”

“I’m just saying that this isn’t completely and totally out of left field,” Izzie said softly.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“It’s just when you say that everything collapses at the first sign of, uh, another girl, I’m not exactly sure that would be completely accurate. Not that accurate matters, of course. He’s an idiot and a fool regardless, and so not even remotely in your league.”

“Okay, fine, so it wasn’t exactly the first sign. Everyone deserves a second chance.”

“That’s true. But a sixth or a seventh?”

“Wow. Don’t hold back now, Izzie. Seriously, tell me what you really think.”

“I know it sounds harsh, Em, but it’s true.”

Together with Leigh and Adriana, Izzie had supported Emmy through more of Duncan’s “mistakes,” “poor judgment calls,” “oversights,” “accidents,” “slip-ups,” and (everyone’s favorite) “relapses” than anyone cared to remember. Emmy knew her sister and friends hated Duncan for putting her through the wringer; their disapproval was palpable and, after the first year, very vocal. But what they didn’t understand, couldn’t possibly understand, was the feeling she got when his eyes found hers at a crowded party. Or when he invited her into the shower and scrubbed her with cucumber-scented sea salt, or got into the cab first so she wouldn’t have to slide across the backseat, or knew to order her tuna rolls with spicy sauce but without crunch. Every relationship comprised such minutiae, of course, but Izzie and the girls simply couldn’t know what it felt like when Duncan turned his fleeting attention toward you and actually focused, even if only for a few moments. It made all the other drama seem like insignificant noise, which is exactly what Duncan always assured her it was: innocent flirtation, nothing more.

What bullshit!

She got angry just thinking about it now. How on earth had she accepted his rationale that passing out on some girl’s couch was understandable-hell, it was downright reasonable-when one drank as much whiskey as he did? What could she possibly have been thinking when she invited Duncan back to her bed without ascertaining an acceptable explanation for the rather disturbing message she’d overheard on his voice mail from “an old family friend”? And let’s not even mention that whole debacle that required an emergency trip to the gynecologist where, thankfully, everything was fine except for her doctor’s opinion that Duncan’s “nothing little bump” was most likely a recent acquisition and not, as Duncan insisted, a flare-up from the old college days.

The sound of Izzie’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

“And I’m not just saying this because I’m your sister, which I am, or because I’m obligated to-which I absolutely am-but because I sincerely believe it: Duncan is never going to change and you two would not, could not-not now or ever-be happy together.”

The simplicity of it almost took her breath away. Izzie, younger than Emmy by twenty months and a near physical clone, once again proved to be infinitely calmer, wiser, and more mature. How long had Izzie felt this way? And why, through all the girls’ endless conversations about Izzie’s once-boyfriend-now-husband Kevin or their parents or Duncan, had Izzie never stated so clearly this most basic truth?

“Just because you’ve never heard it before doesn’t mean I haven’t said it. Emmy, we’ve all said it. Been saying it. It’s like you went temporarily insane for five years.”

“You’re a real sweetheart. I bet everyone wishes they had a sister like you.”

“Please. You and I both know that you’re a serial monogamist and you have trouble defining yourself outside a relationship. Sound familiar? Because if you ask me, it sounds an awful lot like Mom.”