The Unfinished Life of Addison Stone (Page 21)

Now this was Addison’s first summer in town, but of course being that it was sweltering July, we were all in Southampton. And one night, we were at my friend Kiki Strawbridge’s dinner party. Addison was just that second starting to date my friend Zach, and he was thrilled to be introducing her to our clique. Usually when one of the boys dates outside our group, it’s just some ditzy fashion-model-slash-actress.

But Addison was becoming a star in her own right. There was a rumor she was being repped by Berger Gallery, and that Jürgen Teller was in discussions for her to do an ad, and that she was going to be one of the poster images for Beats headphones—which turned out to be a rumor—but still!

We were ready to despise her. And I was doing my part as Queen Bee. The very first thing I ever asked her was, “Oh, Addison, where in the world did you get your bag?” It was this chintzy Canal Street knockoff. And then I asked her where her family skied. Oh, and a hundred other snotty questions. I can really bring out the claws when I want. I was pummeling her. I wanted to chip away her façade until she gave me some reaction we could all make fun of—maybe some swearing, or generally losing her cool and going all white trash on us.

Instead, Addison said, in a perfect imitation of my voice, “Back when I was living at Glencoe, which was a divine mental health facility outside Boston, with such fabulous food, Marie-Claire, it almost makes you forget you’re trying to kill yourself every minute, one of our wellness exercises was to ‘savor a pleasurable experience.’ And so, darling, I am truly going to savor this.” And she picked up her vichyssoise and poured it like a baptism right over my head.

For the first three seconds, nobody moved. Dead silent. Me, too. Yet I felt committed to remaining in place. Letting her savor it! Just as she’d said! Then I started laughing. It really was so funny. Oh, and of course after that, we became furiously good friends. She was just too naughty and refreshing. Same kind of naughty as me.

Later, after we’d gotten close, I learned more about her illness. She let me in on that, I think, because I’m pretty frank about my own mother, who just spent her tenth anniversary at McLean. My poor mother, she’s schizoaffective, diagnosed when she was nineteen, and she’s been to hell and back with it. Mother’s breaks with reality are still terrifying for everyone. Once, when I was a girl, she set her own hands on fire. I didn’t see it happen; she was in Gstaad. But still, it happened. I see the welts and scars on her palms every time I visit, and I imagine her putting her fingers in the roaring fireplace and holding them there, watching the flames lick her skin, but too trapped in her disease to snatch them out.

Addison felt very easy speaking to me about her own schizophrenia once I told her about Mother. That same fall, after we became friends, Addison and I once drove up to McLean together, very hush-hush, to have my annual birthday lunch. It had been a lovely day, if rather strange and bittersweet. Mother was terribly foggy. I knew Addison didn’t like that, since Addison was always paranoid that the Z made her foggy, too.

But it was so sweet and good of her to go with me. I loved Addison because she took me for who I am, with all my family skeletons. My mother, the schizo. My Uncle Artie, the felon. The time I was kicked out of school for cheating. The time I was kicked out for good, when they found weed in my electronic cigarettes. Addison had plenty of heart, and plenty of room in it for other people’s shadows.

Addison and Marie-Claire, September, New York City, courtesy of Zachary Fratepietro.

BILL FIELDBENDER: Arlene and I started visiting New York a bit more that summer, just to peek in on her. We’d gotten her there, so we felt some personal responsibility for her general well-being. But we could tell she didn’t need us. Right from the get-go, Addison understood the city. It was like it’d been predestined, inked into her karma. You’d have thought she’d grown up in New York. She was as blasé as a Spence girl. She seemed utterly focused, too, attending art classes, and she’d learned the subway map cold. She even took us over to Williamsburg and Long Island City to catch some exhibits.

We were very concerned that she’d be preyed on by dealers and agents. We warned her to please talk that decision through with us, whenever she decided to seek representation. But we also knew that we couldn’t prevent what she did next. Week by week, Addison was shaping herself into her own person.

ZACH FRATEPIETRO: It’s outrageous that people would think I was capable of harming Addison Stone. I loved her more than anyone else. But our breakup was bad, and our revenge was some dirty tricks. I’m glad I can remember the good times before it all collapsed between us, when Addison was new in the city, fresh and wide-eyed and in love with me.

I was her first real taste of New York, don’t forget. The first person to show her the reservoir in Central Park, the MoMA, the top of the Empire State Building. We ate at all the best places: Bemelmans, The Spotted Pig, Cafe Luxembourg, Raoul’s, Il Mulino, The Lion. We walked the High Line, biked over the Brooklyn Bridge, told each other secrets in Strawberry Fields. And there was the public aspect, too, the people I introduced her to—Kiki Smith, Julian Schnabel, Terry Richardson, John Currin and Rachel Feinstein, Cindy Sherman. I was with Addison for some of her major moments. That’s what I hold onto. The good stuff.

Zach and Addison attend a dinner party in New York, courtesy of Alistair Chung.

MAXWELL BERGER: Everyone knows Berger Gallery. I’ve been dealing high-end art since before you were born. I’m based in New York City, and we got satellite offices in Asia and the UK and Paris and Brazil. So I don’t give my private line to anyone. In a business like mine, who wants some artist wunderkind calling me up at 3 A.M. to see if I can lend him a thousand bucks to score some grade-A blow, just so he can be awake for the next four nights and days to finish a canvas? Who needs that? Not me. Whoever’s got my number, well, I usually ignore them, too.

Zach Frat left me six messages before I called him back. He wanted me to meet this new girl.

I finally call back, I say, “Bring her by the Soho House.” I like the Soho House, I like the roof-deck pool and the lobster roll and the girls in their skimpy bikinis. Hey, I don’t apologize for that. If I can’t get to my place in Sagaponauk, I’m there. Art kids know me there, but they keep a respectful distance. They should. They know how many careers I’ve made—and broken. And I don’t do callbacks. But Zach Frat, he’s Carine’s kid, and Carine, she’s a powerhouse.